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‘Amicable signs’
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2012
It is to be observed that friendship, from whatever mercenary cause it was entered into is inviolate and is a kind of real relation in Tahiti.
– William Pascoe CrookI believe no European in future will ever know what their ancient Customs of receiving Strangers were.
– William BlighThe naturalist George Forster got his first glimpse of the Tahitian coastline on the morning of 16 August 1773. Looking out from the deck of the Resolution, he watched the dawn break over the island and the inhabitants awake, perceive the ship and launch their canoes. His initial encounter with Tahitian people was subsequently described in A Voyage Round the World, written in English and published in 1777:
One of the[ canoes] approached within hale. In it were two men almost naked, with a kind o[f] turban on the head, and a sash round their waist. They waved a large green leaf, and accosted us with the repeated exclamation of tayo! which even without the help of vocabularies, we could easily translate into the expression of proffered friendship. The canoe now came under our stern, and we let down a present of beads, nails, and medals to the men. In return, they handed up to us a green stem of a plantane [sic], which was their symbol of peace, with a desire that it might be fixed in a conspicuous part of the vessel. It was accordingly stuck up in the main shrouds, upon which our new friends immediately returned towards the land. In a short time we saw great crouds of people on the seashore gazing at us, while numbers in consequence of this treaty of peace, which was now firmly established, launched their canoes, and loaded them with various productions of their country. In less than an hour we were surrounded by an hundred canoes, each of which carried one, two, three, and sometimes four persons, who placed a perfect confidence in us, and had no arms whatsoever. The welcome sound of tayo resounded on all sides, and we returned it with a degree of heart-felt pleasure, on this favourable change of our situation.
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