TAKIA inland craft

[aukepalmhof]

The Fiji Islands issued on 26th October1998 a set of four stamps and one MS which show crafts used in and around the islands.

Fiji has a long and proud maritime heritage. Over three thousand years ago, it was in these islands that the earliest settlers of the Pacific honed the skills that enabled them to sail over thousands of miles of open ocean in their expansion throughout the islands of Polynesia to distant Hawaii, Rapanui (Eastern Island) and Aotearoa (New Zealand).
Two hundred years ago, Captain Cook remarked on how the Tongans and Samoans to the east of Fiji were eager to acquire Fijian drua (twin hulled canoes), which were larger, faster and more manoeuvrable than any other vessel in the Pacific.

The arrival of western technology has seen a decline in traditional canoe manufacture and navigation over the past two hundred years, with sail given way to steam and then to diesel in rapid succession.
But with over hundred inhabited islands, the largest of which boast a river navigable for over 40 miles and as broad as the River Thames at its mouth, Fiji still depends very much on its seas and waterways.

The TAKIA is a simple outrigger canoe, she is essentially a hollowed-out log with an outrigger attached. Typically it has no sail and is poled or paddled along rivers or in quiet coastal waters and bays. Some have a small deck with occasionally a thatched shelter built on it. This type of carft was still commonly used during the first half of the century, but is now no longer built.

Fiji 1977 25c sg547, scott382. 1998 13c sg1031, scott?

Source: From Fiji Post leaflet.

[Anatol]

Single-outrigger canoe used mainly on rivers of Viti Levu and Vanua Levu islands, although occasionally they worked along the shore, and may still work out from the more southern islands. Roughly hewn dugout, the design of which was dictat¬ed largely by the shape of the original tree; ends elon¬gated with small, horizontal shelves; circular in cross section. Low, lashed-on washstrakes raised the sides to support the outrigger booms. Platform extended beyond both gunwales; sometimes a peaked house cov¬ered the platform. Three horizontal booms ran to the float; supplemental booms went only to the longitudi¬nal stringers that were laid atop the boom. Float short and bluntly pointed. Booms and float attached by 2 pairs of tall, divergent stanchions. Mainly paddled, a large takia requiring 6-8 paddles; might be poled, especially upstream. One variety raises a boomed, tri¬angular mat sail, set with the apex tacked to the bow. Reported lengths 6-10m.

Fiji 1977г; 25ц; SG547. Source : A Dictionary of the world’s Watercraft from Aak to Zumbra,