Records of the Canterbury Museum Volume 35 2021 

Rosanna McCully McEvedy and Marion Seymour

ABSTRACT: Hugh Simms McCully (1878–1967) was the grandfather of the authors. He was a Canterbury farmer and amateur archaeologist who invented 11 agricultural machines. This is a personal account of his association with two Māori silcrete quarries located at Grays Hills in the lower Mackenzie Basin and an anvil described as missing in 2017 (Moore et al. 2020: 12). A recent paper that suggested James Robert Irvine was the first to write about the Grays Hills quarries (Moore et al. 2020: 5) caused us to search Hugh McCully’s photographs and documents and review our grandfather’s association with the Grays Hills quarries. Here we publish hitherto unpublished historical photographs of “Quarry No 1” in 1936 and 1953 and of the missing anvil stone. We also discuss references to the sites and anvil by Buick (1937) and Irvine (1943).

Roswyn Wiltshire

ABSTRACT: Among the lesser known artefacts in Canterbury Museum is a substantial assemblage of ancient glass. Some 30 objects are acquisitions made by the founding director, Sir Julius von Haast, or are later bequests. The bulk, however, comprises the Damon Collection. Purchased in 1901, this (mostly Roman) glass collection was put together by English geologist Robert Damon. The vessels, almost all in superb condition, were found in Cyprus, and at Tyre and Sidon in Lebanon around 1875–1882. Until now the origins and content of the collection have been obscure. This article reports some of the findings of recent research into the objects and their history as a collection. It will present the collector, the collection, and compare the assemblage to other material from the Levant during the Roman period. From archaeological finds and ancient literary sources we can learn the original context of the vessels now in Canterbury Museum. The collection, in turn, offers further insight into glass production and use in Tyre and Sidon, cities that played a significant role in the Roman East especially in relation to glass.

Jill Haley

ABSTRACT: Women’s contributions to photography in New Zealand have largely been overlooked by historians. When women are considered, it is often to find the first female photographer. However, what a photographer is can be open to definitions ranging from camera operator to studio owner. This article investigates three women who have been put forward by photo historians for the distinction of being the first: Elizabeth Pulman, Eliza Leaf and Jane Smith. A previously unknown photographer, Emma Meluish in Dunedin, offers a fourth candidate. When thinking beyond conventional definitions of what a photographer is, Eliza Grey offers yet another possibility. However, focusing on the search for the first female photographer overlooks the myriad of other roles women had within photography studios and the impact they had on the development of photography in New Zealand.

R Paul Scofield

ABSTRACT: David Lyall (1849–1911) is credited with the discovery of the world’s only flightless songbird, the extinct Lyall’s Wren (Traversia lyalli). The hitherto undocumented lives of David Lyall and his family are investigated and the roles of David Lyall’s sons, Andrew Lyall (b. 1879) and William Mail Lyall (b. 1882) are discussed. Andrew Lyall, who died in 1972, is here credited with being the last person to have seen Lyall’s Wren alive.

Julia Bradshaw

ABSTRACT: The first large-scale export of unworked jade (pounamu or greenstone) from New Zealand occurred during the early 1840s when pounamu was taken from the southern end of Te Tai o Poutini, the West Coast of the South Island, to China. This venture is likely to be the first sizeable export of New Zealand minerals by Europeans. The venture combined the skills and knowledge of local Māori and newly resident Pākehā mariners with capital from Sydney. In the mid-1840s pounamu was taken directly to the North Island, further disrupting the pounamu trade network that had been controlled by Ngāi Tahu until the destruction of Kaiapoi Pā in 1831. The supply of several tons of pounamu to the North Island prior to the commercialisation of the central Westland source in the late-1860s is likely to have influenced the number of taonga made during the contact period.

Phillip R Moore

ABSTRACT: Māori artefacts (taonga) made from red argillite are rare and only about 20 have been recorded from Canterbury, mainly from early period coastal occupation sites dating to the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries. They include small adzes or chisels, minnow lure shanks, discs and a decorated hook point. Most of these  probably had a non-utilitarian purpose and at least some were likely possessed by people of higher social status. New information is provided on these artefacts and on possible sources for the raw material.

Geraldine Lummis, Lyndon Fraser and Joanna Cobley

ABSTRACT: This article offers new insights into New Zealand’s early alpine recreation and tourism heritage. It focuses on Joseph James Kinsey (1852–1936), an extraordinary yet typical Victorian gentleman of the day, and his collection of alpine photographs and related ephemera held at Canterbury Museum, which captures the evolutionary moment of the South Island’s mountains’ transformation into a tourist site. In 1880, Kinsey, his wife Sarah and their daughter May migrated from England to New Zealand. The Kinsey family, like many others at the time, were seeking new opportunities. Kinsey, the entrepreneur, philanthropist, collector, amateur mountaineer, photographer and businessman had boundless enthusiasm for the mountains in the province of Canterbury, a "wonderland of ice and snow." Taken when the nineteenth century gave way to the twentieth, these photos offer a valuable record of Victorian-era drama, discovery and exploration in the South Island’s mountains. Today, as the South Island’s glaciers recede at a dramatic rate, this collection has even more significance.

Terry R Hitchings and Tim R Hitchings

The mayfly, Deleatidium (Deleatidium) kakahu sp. nov. from the central South Island and lower North Island is described. A description of the three principal life stages (nymph, subimago and imago) is included. Notes on ecology and distribution are given. Diagnostic characters of the species are illustrated and compared with similar species.

The full volume of Records of the Canterbury Museum 35.