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California Indigenous Dress & Fishing Rafts, Early Ethnographic Engraving 1754
$270
€240 · £205
Original print, not a reproduction.
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- Date
- 1754
- Sheet size
- 14.5 × 9.7 in (36.8 × 24.6 cm)
- Condition
- Fair. Fair to good antique condition. The paper shows general age-related toning and scattered spotting. There is visible staining and discoloration in the upper margin and along parts of the sheet, as well as light surface wear.
- Wardrobe
- Far & away
- Era
- 1700s, Rococo
- Stock no.
- f_47986612
California dress and fishing methods in a single copper engraving, engraved for Millar's New Complete and Universal System of Geography, signed "Thornton sculp." and published in London by Alexander Hogg, No. 16 Paternoster Row. The plate title reads "Dress of the Inhabitants of California with their manner of Rafts for Fishing, &c."
The view sits inside an ornamental frame of floral swags and urns, with an empty scroll cartouche at the top and the title on a ribbon below. On a rocky shore two figures in long hide cloaks stand together, one holding a bow, while a man at the right wears a feathered headdress and carries a bundle of spears or reeds. Behind them, two men on a raft of lashed logs fish with long poles, and birds cross a sky with a volcanic hill on the horizon.
Millar's geography was a London part-work that mixed maps, views and costume plates for general readers. California was still known mainly through the narratives of early voyagers, and the scene should be read as a European composition of the period.
