About this item
- Title
- Fangufangu (nose flute)
- Content partner
- Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa
- Collection
- Te Papa Collections Online
- Description
Tongan fangufangu (nose flutes) are beautifully crafted musical instruments. Historically, they were used to awaken the Tongan royalty from their sleep. Made from bamboo, they have intact nodes at each end, forming a sealed cylinder. However, they also document important moments in Tonga’s history. Te Papa has three fangufangu dating from the 1800s. Etched on each fangufangu are images, words and names that tell us a story
- Format
- Image
- Date created
- 1800s
- URL
- https://collections.tepapa.govt.nz/object/897277
- Related subjects
- Musical instruments / Flutes / bamboo / nose flutes / wind instruments / pyrography / Tonga / Polynesian / Oceanic / Tongan / Songs & music / incising / Derek Wilson
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Creative Commons
This item appears to be licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (BY-NC-ND) 4.0 CC International license.

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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
You can learn more about the rights status of this item at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
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What can I do with this item?
Check copyright status and what you can do with this item
Check informationReport this item
If you believe this item breaches our terms of use please report this item
Report this itemDigitalNZ brings together more than 30 million items from institutions so that they are easy to find and use. This information is the best information we could find on this item. This item was added on 21 April 2012, and updated 15 July 2025.
Learn more about how we work.
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