NAVIGATION

In the 1840’s non-Haida subject matter almost completely dominated the argillite carvers’ repertoire. Thin slabs of argillite were intricately carved and pierced into silhouette friezes of imaginative ship board scenes the figures usually active, busy at real or imagined sailors tasks. They carved portraits of sea Captains as well as their sailing ships, often of the most frequently non-native visitors to the Queen Charlotte Islands known as ‘Boston Men’ or ‘King George’s men’.
However the carved image on the fragment of this panel pipe could depict an Inuit in his parker rather than a Euro-American sailor in his sou’wester.