Garry's Blog

Not archaeology but: 1769 The detailed publication in the 1950s and 60s of the diaries of the British voyagers to New Zealand reduced the heroic version of James Cook to one having a stain of violence to M ā ori. Since then evaluations here have been more nuanced, but a great navigator and mapmaker certainly. The earliest European voyages to New Zealand were met by Māori warriors. There were frequent challenges: Come ashore and we will eat you, was one. With all male crews what were the Māori to make of the ships? –   they were not obviously peaceful. While many contacts resulted in a peaceful exchange many did not. Of the contacts up to and including Cook’s third voyage, of one Dutch, three British and two French expeditions, crew members were killed by Māori on three of them. Retaliation was undertaken in all cases though Māori loss of life is only certain for one. Cook arriving later to one incident had the opportunity for further retaliation. To the dismay of his cr...

Notre Dame A beautiful cathedral - sadly gravely damaged. Its glory was always its superb location and exterior. These survive and from photographs the vaulting is somewhat damaged but let's hope not too severely. The spire should be an easy rebuild. There must have been a lot of small timbers in the roof for it to have burned like that - large timbers char and burn very slowly. The reconstruction can use timber, but it must be wisely and have protections that modern buildings have. For visitors to France do not be deterred. Sainte Chapelle and Saint Denis are still in Paris, even  Sacré-Cœur if you like the style  or at least the view if you don't. The  rest of France is well endowed with cathedrals. Avoiding the tourist crush at Notre Dame is perhaps a small plus.

U3A Papers : "U3A Papers I am a member of the Howick University of the Third Age and contribute to the Art and Science Groups. Below are some of the powerpoint presentations I have used. Art Four British war artists part 1 Four British war artists part 2 Italian Maiolica Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres Margaret Preston and Margaret Olley - two Australian artists Science Earth history from the bottom of the ocean Genetics into history Lidar and archaeology Radiometric Dating Spillways for dams" 'via Blog this'

Some years ago I bought a copy of Peter Buck's printed Cawthron Lecture - The Coming of the Maori.Tucked inside it was a printed postcard of two Maori men. It was not the usual subject for a Maori postcard - usually they were tourist scenes. The two intrigued me - the sitting one clearly of higher status and unusually well dressed for the period. It seemed an unlikely subject. The card was tucked onto a bookcase shelf and has sat their occasionally attracting my attention ever since, until I recently watched a Shipwreck TV programme about the 1863 wreck of the Delaware near Nelson. It was the well known story of the rescue of most of the crew by the "New Zealand Grace Darling" Huria Matenga. You can read her story and more on the wreck here:    http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nzbound/delaware.htm    http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/1966/matenga-huria-te-amoho-wikitoria      http://www.theprow.org.nz/maori/maori-rescues/ ...

Maruiwi Press, Historical, heritage and archaeological publications : I have recently converted two of my e-publications from pay-for to free. See the links to the web page version here.

Canterbury Earthquake Royal Commission A short guide to some documents of heritage interest. Volume 4 which deals with unreinforced masonry buildings their strengthening and performance is of the greatest heritage interest. Volume 4: Earthquake-prone buildings  Section 4: Individual unreinforced masonry buildings that caused fatalities  (.docx) Section 5: Unreinforced masonry buildings and their performance in earthquakes  (.docx)  Section 7: Earthquake-prone buildings policy and legislation   (.docx) Appendix 1: Seismic retrofit case studies The focus on the CTV building has meant CCC has got of with relatively little attention to its performance with dealing with sub-standard buildings prior to the earthquakes. It is described as passive. Undoubtedly this passivity contributed to the death toll.  Much of the rest oft the commission's report is highly technical - and  only specialist structural en...

"Die Erinnerung ist das einzige Paradies , aus welchem wir nicht getrieben werden können."  - The  memory is the only paradise from which we cannot be driven. Johann Paul Richter otherwise known as Jean Paul, 1812 Do archaeologists create paradises of the past? The authors of Genesis did. While we might not write stories that so explicitly include a descent from a state of grace, we surely do place emphasis the extraordinary and the great from the past, to the exclusion of the mundane.The impression can be left that the past is a land of heroes, greater than the present day. Yet archaeology should be the stuff of the ordinary - for that is a large part of what we find. We should be able to tell an unvarnished version of the past. What are the enemies of that objective? - why ourselves in large part - we want to see what we do as important and illustrative and tend to present it in that light. Who else? - why ourselves again - if we are the...