3-056-758 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Human sacrifices at Otaheite (Tahiti), c1777-c1779. 'A Human Sacrifice in a Morai, in Otaheite; in the presence of Captain Cook'. Captain James Cook and his officers watching a group of Tahitians chanting as a man and some pigs are prepared for sacrifice. The man to be sacrificed is lying on the ground, tied to a pole, while in the background a macabre pile of human skulls is visible. This is one of the events witnessed by Cook, the famed navigator and hydrographer, during the second of his three exploratory voyages to the Pacific region in 1772-1775 when they crossed latitude 70 degrees - the furthest south then reached by Europeans. These voyages transformed our knowledge of the region. From a series of ninety drawings by J Webber, of the third voyage of Captain Cook.