1 Southern African Humanities Vol. 17 Pages 1–31 Pietermaritzburg December, 2005 Encounters with the Colonial: Dr Ernest Warren, science, and new representations of nature at the Natal Museum (1903–1913) by Shirley Brooks School of Environmental Sciences – Geography, Memorial Tower Building, Howard College Campus, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 4041 South Africa; brookss2@ukzn.ac.za ABSTRACT Dr Ernest Warren, a British-trained zoologist, became Director of the Natal Government Museum in 1903. While Warren’s identity as a progressive scientist was shaped in the metropolitan context, it was in the Natal Colony—later, the South African province of Natal—that he made his career. In doing so, Warren forged new physical and administrative connections between the museum and the newly conquered territory of Zululand with its game reserves, connections that were not without difficulty and ambivalence. After tracing Warren’s intellectual pedigree, the cultural politics of museum display in the Natal Museum mammal halls are examined, together with the aesthetics of wildness, in terms of which Warren attempted to introduce to the colony new representations of nature. A further theme is the relationship between hunting and museum collecting, as well as the everyday social practices involved in building up a museum in a colonial context such as this one. Warren’s long ‘encounter with the Colonial’ was in many respects a bruising one. The fact that he made less impact in the cause of nature preservation in Natal than he had hoped, is explained in terms of his increasing bureaucratic isolation and the political ecology—in particular with regard to the cattle disease, nagana—of Zululand, the region with which Warren was most concerned. KEY WORDS: colonial science, progressive materialism, colonial museums, representations of nature, aesthetics of nature, wildness, fauna, taxidermy, cultural politics of conquest, Zululand, game reserves, game preservation. INTRODUCTION A British-trained zoologist, Ernest Warren, was appointed Director of the Natal Museum in Pietermaritzburg, the seat of the Natal colonial government, in 1903. He arrived in the colony with a view of scientific endeavour, and an associated view of the natural world and how it should be portrayed in museums, that was radical in the context of colonial Natal. By the end of his career, his vision had been largely overwhelmed by the exigencies of the colonial situation, in particular the pressures of agricultural and industrial development that had led to encroachment on animal habitats and calls for the extermination of wildlife. Also, Warren’s influence as a senior bureaucrat in the colony waned significantly after 1910, as Natal became just one of four provinces (and not the most important one) in the new Union of South Africa. Yet Warren began as an ambitious man whose dream was to create a leading colonial museum that would be an object of pride for citizens of both the Natal Colony and the British Empire. My focus here is largely on Ernest Warren’s early career and thinking, only referring more briefly to the later part of his life. I begin by considering the development of Warren’s identity as a scientist. Of particular interest is his insistence on the social significance of science and the way in which this translated into his ambitions for the Natal Museum, both as a leading museum in the empire and as a vehicle for educating the colonial public about the natural world. I trace a previously undocumented link between Warren and progressive science in http://www.sahumanities.org.za