1787 Bankes Antique Print View of Nomuka Island, Tonga - Cooks Voyages in 1777

Publisher : Captain James Cook

Description:
This fine original cooper-plate engraved antique print of a view of the Island of Nomuka, a small island in the southern part of the Ha apai islands, in the Kingdom of Tonga, during Captain Cooks 3rd Voyage of discovery to the South Seas in 1777 was published in Thomas Bankes 1787 edition of A New, Royal and Authentic System of Universal Geography, Antient and Modern..... printed by Charles Cook, London.

General Definitions:
Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stable
Paper color : - off white
Age of map color: -
Colors used: -
General color appearance: -
Paper size: - 14in x 9in (355mm x 230mm)
Plate size: - 12in x 7 1/2in (305mm x 190mm)
Margins: - Min 1/2in (12mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - None
Plate area: - None
Verso: - None

Background: 
Nomuka is a small island in the southern part of the Ha apai group of islands in the Kingdom of Tonga. It is part of the Nomuka Group of islands, also called the Otu Muomua.
Nomuka, is 7 square kilometres in area and contains a large, brackish lake (Ano Lahi) in the middle, and also three other smaller lakes—Ano Haamea, Ano Fungalei, and Molou. There are approximately 400-500 inhabitants who subsist on fishing, farming, and remittances from family members abroad. The island has a secondary school, two primary schools, and a kindergarten. It also has seven churches.
The island is accessible by boat only. Boats leave weekly from Nukualofa and Lifuka, Haapai. There is one guesthouse on the island, and three or four small fale koloa, or convenience stores.
Notable historic visitors include Abel Tasman, Captain Cook, Captain Bligh, and William Mariner. The Dutch Abel Tasman made the first European discovery of the island on 24 January 1643. A party went ashore to get water, and the description of the huge lake they brought back afterwards leaves little doubt about the identification. Tasman called it Rotterdam island, after the city of Rotterdam, a major port in the Netherlands, and noted in his maps the indigenous name of Amamocka, a misspelling of ʻa Nomuka, ʻa being a subject indicating article. We also find the name of Amorkakij for Nomuka iki. Captain Bligh in the Bounty spent 3 days wooding and watering at Nomuka in April 1789. The Mutiny on the Bounty occurred the day after they left.
Cooks Diary.........as it was, Cook did not encounter the Tongan islands until his Second Voyage, when he stopped at both \'Eua and Tongatapu (or, by Tasman\'s nomenclature, Middleburg and Amsterdam respectively) in October of 1773. Here he was \"welcomed a shore by acclamations from an immence [sic] crowd of Men and Women not one of which had so much as a stick in their hands\".
Indeed, Cook found the islanders to be so accommodating that he returned to the archipelago in 1774 on his way back from New Zealand. Stopping at the island of Nomuka, Cook was sought out by name, and with this \"proof that these people have a communication with Amsterdam \", the cultural unity of the islands was established.
It was at this time that he famously named the island group the Friendly Archipelago, \"as a lasting friendship seems to subsist among the Inhabitants and their Courtesy to Strangers intitles [sic] them to that Name.\"
Cook\'s Third Voyage also included a visit to Tonga, this time for a stay of several months. Cook first dropped anchor at Nomuka in May, and then, at the invitation of the great chief Finau, travelled to another island, Lifuka. Here, Cook and his men were treated to such entertainments as \"whould [sic] have met with universal applause on a European Theatre.

Cook\'s Third Voyage (1776-1779)
In the course of his first two voyages, Cook circumnavigated the globe twice, sailed extensively into the Antarctic, and charted coastlines from Newfoundland to New Zealand. Following these achievements, Cook\'s third voyage was organized to seek an efficient route from England to southern and eastern Asia that would not entail rounding the Cape of Good Hope. The search for such a Northwest (or Northeast) Passage had been on the agenda of northern European mariners and merchants since the beginning of European expansion in the late fifteenth century. England\'s growing economic and colonial interests in India in the later eighteenth century provided the stimulus for the latest exploration for this route.
Cook, again in command of the Resolution, was to approach the Northwest Passage from the Pacific accompanied by a second ship, the Discovery, captained by Charles Clerke. The ships left England separately, regrouped at Cape Town, and continued on to Tasmania, New Zealand, and Tahiti. The expedition then sailed north and made landfall at Christmas Island and the Hawaiian Islands. Cook continued northward and charted the west coast of North America from Northern California as far as the Bering Strait. He returned to Hawaii for the winter and was killed in a skirmish with natives on February 14, 1779. Upon Cook\'s death, Clerke took command of the expedition but died six months later. The ships returned to England in 1780 under John Gore, who had commanded the Discovery after Cook\'s death. From start to finish, the voyage had lasted more than four years. (Ref Tooley; M&B; Clancy)

$105.00