Wooden freestanding figures from the Marquesas Islands (apart from post figures) are rarely found in collections, and retain no related collection data (e.g. von den Steinen, 1969, Vol.II, p.100, fig.74). An almost identical figure, which is certainly from the same hand, is in the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum, Cologne, (Frölich, 1967, pl.48 and 1971, pl.63: it is also illustrated in Dodd, 1967, p.219). We are kindly informed by the Museum that their figure was amongst the twenty-two Polynesian sculptures given to them by the heirs of Tin Joest in 1909, and was the subject of correspondence between Frölich and Von Den Steinen. In the opinion of the latter it was an old ancestor figure carved from breadfruit, used by fishermen, perhaps lashed to a canoe, to help them on their expeditions. He suggested an exotic headdress might have been fixed to the head