About the Author

Dr. Nicholas Thomas, director of the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropogy at Cambridge since 2006, is an anthropologist and historian. He visited the Pacific Islands first in 1984 to research his PhD thesis on the Marquesas Islands and later worked in Fiji and New Zealand, as well as in many archives and museum collections in Europe, North America, and the Pacific itself. His books include Discoveries: The Voyages of Captain Cook(2003) and Islanders: The Pacific in the Age of Empire(2010), which was awarded the Wolfson History Prize. James Cook (1728-1779) was a British explorer, mapmaker, and navy captain. His three voyages to the South Pacific resulted in the mapping of previously uncharted lands. His voyages were also renowned for their scientific discoveries and for Cook's own extraordinary leadership skills. John Hawkesworth (c. 1715-1773) was an English publisher and writer commissioned to edit the papers from Cook's first voyage. His accounts of the manners and customs of the cultures Cook encountered caused a sensation in England, and the backlash is rumored to have hastened his death.