Inlaid Headrest, Tonga

David Shaw King, San Francisco
Lance and Roberta Entwistle, London, acquired from the above
American Private Collection, acquired from the above in 1991

In Tonga, the head was the most tapu, or sacred part of the body, and in sleep it was appropriate to rest one’s head on a carefully made headrest, or kali. There are several forms of kali, all of which demonstrate the elegance and economy of form characteristic of Tongan sculpture. This graceful headrest is of the kali hahapo form, but the marine ivory inlays, or lei, distinguish it as a rare kali lei, a type “often most most prized on account of its whale-tooth ivory inlay”. (Keith St Cartmail, The Art of Tonga: Ko e ngaahi ‘aati ‘o Tonga, Honolulu, 1997, p. 55).