M0018560: Soul catcher, Haida and New Zealand

Previous title, replaced October 2020: Soul catcher, Haida, Queen Charlotte Islands

Photograph of an albatross bone used as a soul catcher. It was purchased at auction by the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum in 1930 and accessioned in 1937 (accession number R920/1937). It was included in the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum exhibition "Medicine of the Aboriginal Peoples in the British Commonwealth" held in 1952 and published in Catalogue of an exhibition illustrating the medicine of the aboriginal peoples in the British Commomwealth. According to the accession register it is from Kaiapoi, New Zealand but according to the exhibition catalogue it is from Haida Gwaii (also known as Queen Charlotte Islands), Canada.

1961

1 photograph sheet film negative; 10.2 x 12.7 cm

Wellcome Collection holds the accession register which provides an entry for the item: R920/1937. Wellcome also holds the exhibition publication.

Copyright is held by Wellcome Collection

Catalogue data comes from a combination of entries in the original glass plate registers, metadata created when the glass plates were digitised in the early 2000s and enhancements made by the cataloguer in 2022.

This item is fragile. Email library@wellcomecollection.org to request access to the physical item.