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A good example of military scrimshaw work. This type of work was executed by several miltary personnel during the New Zealand Wars, including von Tempsky.
This extract originally appeared in Te Ata o Tū The Shadow of Tūmatauenga: The New Zealand Wars Collections of Te Papa (Te Papa Press, 2024) on page 313.
This extract was authored by Katie Cooper.
A number of New Zealand museums have objects associated with von Tempsky, and although these taonga sometimes have less-than-certain associations with the man himself, their presence and preservation in museum collections has served to reinforce his folk-hero status. . .
Von Tempsky’s artistic output included paintings and scrimshaw works. The bullock horn shown below is signed ‘G.F. Von Tempsky’ and features images of two Māori figures, a waka prow, plants and a bird. The engravings may be based on people and scenes von Tempsky knew or observed, although on other scrimshaw pieces he is known to have traced images from magazines.1
The art of scrimshaw is often associated with whaling, but nineteenth-century military personnel also created scrimshaw as a way to pass the time. Bullock horns were commonly used, perhaps because the imperial army relied on bullocks to transport artillery.2 This horn has been modified into a powder flask: the wide end is sealed by a wooden stopper nailed in place, and the tip is removable, thus forming a cap. The horn could be suspended from a belt by the two metal rings.
1 Heather Curnow, ‘G. F. Von Tempsky: The Artist’, in Young, G. F. von Tempsky, p. 337.
2 Tim Ryan, ‘The Māori Warrior and British Soldier’, in Kelvin Day (ed.), Contested Ground Te Whenua i Tohea: The Taranaki Wars 1860–1881 (Puke Ariki, New Plymouth District Council, TSB Community Trust, Huia, Wellington, 2010), p. 122.