47
Views
0
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Research Article

The “Topaze stick fragment”—a newly discovered rongorongo-inscribed artifact collected during the Rapa Nui (Easter Island) visit of HMS Topaze in 1868

&

References

  • Aigner, K. 2014. A short history of the Oceanic collection in the Vatican Ethnological Museum. Oceanic Art Society Journal 19 (3):6–7.
  • Ángeles, R., and D. Pozzi-Escot. 2000. Textiles del Horizonte Medio: Las Evidencias de Huaca Malena, Valle de Asia. In Huari y Tiwanaku: Modelo VS. Evidencias. Primera Parte, eds. Peter Kaulicke (Roerman) and William H. Isbell, 401–24. Vol. 4. Lima: Pontificia Universidad Católica de Perú.
  • Ávila Fuentealba, F. 2007. Ensayo de estudio visual de las tablillas rongorongo [(An) Essay of visual study of the rongorongo tablets]. Temuco, Chile. Unpublished typescript.
  • Barthel, T. S. 1958. Grundlagen zur Entzifferung der Osterinselschrift. (Abhandlungen aus dem Gebiet der Auslandskunde 64, Reihe B). Hamburg: Cram, de Gruyter & Co.
  • Barthel, T. S. 1959. Neues zur Osterinselschrift [New reports on the script of Easter Island]. Zeitschrift Für Ethnologie 84:161–72.
  • Barthel, T. S. 1963. Rongorongo-Studien (Forschungen und Fortschritte bei der Weiteren Entzifferung der Osterinselschrift) [Rongorongo studies: Further research and progress in the decipherment of Easter Island’s script]. Anthropos (Published by Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH) 58 (3-4):372–436.
  • Bélyácz, K., K. Endreffy, and A. M. Nagy (eds.). 2010–2019. Magical gems: The Campbell Bonner Magical Gems Database. http://cbd.mfab.hu/ (accessed 10 April 2023).
  • Bettocchi, L. 2009. Rongorongo, les écritures de l’île de Pâques (Première Partie). KADATH: Chroniques Des Civilisations Disparues. Special Rongo Rongo (Bruxelles) 105:4–42.
  • Bryson, N. 1988 [1983]. Vision and painting: The logic of the gaze. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
  • Butinov, N. A., and Y. V. Knorozov. 1957 [1956]. Preliminary report on the study of the written language of Easter Island. The Journal of the Polynesian Society 66 (1):5–17.
  • Campbell, R. 1971. La herencia musical de Rapanui: Etnomusicología de la Isla de Pascua. Santiago: Editorial Andrés Bello.
  • Churchill, W. 1912. EASTER ISLAND: The Rapanui Speech and the Peopling of Southeast Polynesia. Washington DC: Carnegie Institution of Washington.
  • Dalton, O. M. 1904. On an inscribed wooden tablet from Easter Island (Rapa Nui) in the British Museum. Man 4 (1):1–7. doi: 10.2307/2840315.
  • de Laat, M. 2009. Words out of wood: Proposals for the decipherment of the Easter Island script. Delft, the Netherlands: Eburon Academic.
  • Dederen, F. 2013. Corpus Rapa Nui. Inventaire Mondial de la Statuaire en Bois de l’île de Pâques/Corpus Rapa Nui: Global Inventory of the Wooden Statuary of Easter Island. Braine-L’Alleud, Belgium: François Dederen/DCL Printers.
  • Du Feu, V. 1996. Rapanui (Descriptive Grammars series). London and New York: Routledge.
  • Elliot, R. S. 1979. Tapa legacy update – Of whales and Tapa. Journal of the New Brunswick Museum 1979:165–8.
  • Englert, S. 1948. La tierra de Hotu Matu‘a: Historia, etnología y lengua de la Isla de Pascua. Padre Las Casas (Chile): Editorial San Francisco.
  • Englert, S. 2003 [1936]. Legends of Easter Island (second edition; English translation from the Spanish by Ben LeFort and Pilar Pacheco). Rapa Nui: Museum Store, Father Sebastian Englert Anthropological Museum.
  • Ferrara, S., L. Tassoni, B. Kromer, L. Wacker, M. Friedrich, F. Tonini, L. Lastilla, R. Ravanelli, and S. Talamo. 2024. The invention of writing on Rapa Nui (Easter Island). New radiocarbon dates on the Rongorongo script. Scientific Reports 14 (1):2794. (accessed 31 March 2024). doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-53063-7.
  • Fischer, S. R. 1994. Rapanui’s “great Old Words”: E timo te akoako. Journal of the Polynesian Society 103 (4):413–43.
  • Fischer, S. R. 1997. Rongorongo: The Easter Island script, history, traditions, texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Fischer, S. R. 2004. Possible series of first-fruit pæans in Easter Island’s Rongorongo inscriptions. Rongorongo Studies 14 (2):69–75.
  • Gorman, K., and R. Sproat. 21 March 2024. Was rongorongo an independent invention of writing? Filed by Mark Liberman under Language and archeology, writing systems. https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=63139 (accessed 22 March 2024).
  • Guy, J. B. M. 1982. Fused glyphs in the Easter Island script. The Journal of the Polynesian Society 91:445–7.
  • Guy, J. B. M. 1990. The lunar calendar of Tablet Mamari. Journal de la Société Des Océanistes 91 (2):135–49. doi: 10.3406/jso.1990.2882.
  • Guy, J. B. M. 2006. General properties of the Rongorongo writing. Rapa Nui Journal 20 (1):53–66.
  • Haag, S., A. de María y Campos, L. R. Weber, and C. Feest. 2012. Der Altmexikanische Federkopfschmuck [The Ancient Mexican Feather Head-dress]. Wien: Special Exhibition Weltmuseum Catalogue 2012.
  • Haberlandt, M. 1886. Über Schrifttafeln von der Osterinsel. Mitteilungen Der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien 16:97–102.
  • Harris, M., and T. S. Melka. 2011. The rongorongo script: On a listed sequence in the recto [verso, repaired] of tablet ‘Mamari’. Journal of Quantitative Linguistics 18 (2):122–73. doi: 10.1080/09296174.2011.556003.
  • Hayden, B. 2018. The power of ritual in prehistory: Secret societies and origins of social complexity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Heyerdahl, T. 1961. An introduction to Easter Island – History. In Archaeology of Easter Island, eds. Thor Heyerdahl and Edwin N. Ferdon, Jr., 33–90. Vol. 1 Reports of the Norwegian Archaeological Expedition to Easter Island and the East Pacific. Stockholm: Forum Publishing House.
  • Heyerdahl, T. 1979. The heterogeneity of small sculptures on Easter Island before 1886. Asian Perspectives 22 (1):9–31.
  • Hoorebeeck, A. v. 1979. La vérité sur l’île de Pâques. Le Havre: Pierrette d’Antoine.
  • Horley, P. 2005. Allographic variations and statistical analysis of the rongorongo script. Rapa Nui Journal 19 (2):107–16.
  • Horley, P. 2007. Structural analysis of Rongorongo inscriptions. Rapa Nui Journal 21 (1):25–32.
  • Horley, P. 2021. Rongorongo: Inscribed objects from Rapa Nui. Viña del Mar (Chile): Rapanui Press.
  • Horley, P., and G. Lee. 2012. Easter Island’s birdman stones in the collection of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. Rapa Nui Journal 26 (1):5–20.
  • Horley, P., and K. Pozdniakov. 2018. L’Écriture de l’Île de Pâques. In L’Île de Pâques, eds. A. Pierre, A. Blanquer-Maumont, C. Ramio, 80–93. Arles: Actes Sud/Musée Champollion – Les Écritures du Monde, Figeac/Musée Fenaille, Rodez/Musée d’Histoire Naturelle de Toulouse.
  • Imbelloni, J. 1951. Las “Tabletas Parlantes” de Pascua, monumentos de un sistema gráfico Indo-oceánico [The “Talking Tablets” of Easter Island, Monuments of an Indo-Oceanic Graphic System]. Runa, Archivo Para Las Ciencias Del Hombre 4 (1-2):89–177. doi: 10.34096/runa.v4i0.4857.
  • Jaussen, F. É. 1893. L’Ile de Pâques: Historique et Écriture. [Note: The generally accepted publication date for this work is 1893 – see, e.g., Fischer (1997, 692) – although it is sometimes listed as 1894.]. https://archive.org/details/tepanojaussen.1894.liledepaqueshistoriquseecritureetrepertoiredessignesdestablett (accessed 1 April 2024).
  • Julien, N. 1996. The Mammoth dictionary of symbols. Trans. by Elfreda Powell. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc.
  • Kaeppler, A. L. 2001. Rapa Nui art and aesthetics. In Splendid Isolation: Art of Easter Island, ed. Eric Kjellgren, 32–41. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art/New Haven-London: Yale University Press.
  • Kaeppler, A. L. 2003. Sculptures of barkcloth and wood from Rapa Nui: Symbolic continuities and Polynesian affinities. Res: Anthropology and Aesthetics 44:10–69. doi: 10.1086/RESv44n1ms20167604.
  • Kjellgren, E., (ed.). 2001. Splendid isolation: Art of Easter Island. With contributions by Jo Anne Van Tilburg and Adrienne L. Kaeppler. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art/New Haven-London: Yale University Press.
  • Krupa, V. 1974. The symbol for lizard in the writing of the Easter Island. Asian and African Studies 10:61–8.
  • Kudrjavtsev, B. G. 1949. Письменность острова Пасхи [Scripts of Easter Island]. Сборник музея антропологии и этнографии [Collection/Miscellanea of the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Leningrad)] 11:175–221.
  • Lee, G. 1992. The rock art of Easter Island: Symbols of power, prayers to the gods. Monumenta Archaeologica. Los Angeles, CA: Coetsen Institute of Archaeology/University of California Press.
  • Lee, G., and P. Horley. 2013. The paintings of Ana Kai Tangata cave, Easter Island (Rapa Nui). Rapa Nui Journal 27 (2):11–32.
  • Lehmann, W. 1907. Essai d’une monographie sur l’île de Pâques. Translated by R. P. Théophane Calmes (des Sacrés Cœurs de Picpus). Anthropos (Salzburg) 2: 141–51, 257–68. https://www.digi-hub.de/viewer/image/DE-11-001852164/223/LOG_0061/.
  • Marin, M. 2023. When ornithology meets ethnology and archeology: The birds of the bird-cult at Rapa Nui (Easter Island) and their demise. Marine Ornithology 51:33–40.
  • Marino, K. R. 2010. Setting the womb in its place: Toward a contextual archaeology of Graeco-Egyptian Uterine Amulets. PhD diss., Brown University. https://repository.library.brown.edu/studio/item/bdr:11094/PDF/ (accessed 29 March 2023).
  • Martínez, E. 1913. Vocabulario de Lengua Rapa-Nui, Isla de Pascua. Santiago de Chile: Sección Impresiones del Instituto Meteorológico.
  • Martinsson-Wallin, H. 2022. Warfare in Rapa Nui (Easter Island). In Archaeological perspectives on conflict and warfare in Australia and the Pacific, eds. Geoffrey Clark and Mirani Litster, 69–87. Canberra, Australia: ANU Press.
  • McCall, G. 2004. Appendix (known ship arrivals to Easter Island from 1722–1879). In Early visitors to Easter Island, 1864–1877: The reports of Eugène Eyraud, Hippolyte Roussel, Pierre Loti, and Alphonse Pinart, 137–43. Ann M. Altman (translator). Los Osos, California: Easter Island Foundation.
  • Melka, T. S. 2008. Structural observations regarding RongoRongo tablet ‘Keiti’. Cryptologia 32 (2):155–79. doi: 10.1080/01611190801911361.
  • Melka, T. S. 2009a. Some considerations about the Kohau Rongorongo script in the light of a statistical analysis of the ‘Santiago Staff’. Cryptologia 33 (1):24–73. doi: 10.1080/01611190802548998.
  • Melka, T. S. 2009b. The corpus problem in the rongorongo studies. Glottotheory 2 (1):111–36. doi: 10.1515/glot-2009-0010.
  • Melka, T. S. 2009c. Linearity, calligraphy and syntax in the rongorongo script. Glottotheory 2 (2):70–96. doi: 10.1515/glot-2009-0022.
  • Melka, T. S. 2013. “Harmonic”-like structures in the rongorongo script. Glottotheory 4 (2):115–39. doi: 10.1524/glot.2013.0018.
  • Melka, T. S. 2016. Distinctive sequences in rongorongo texts C, G, and B. In Rapa NuiEaster Island: Cultural and historical perspectives, eds. Ian Conrich and Hermann Mückler (asst. ed. Jennifer Wagner) 217–35. Berlin: Frank & Timme GmbH.
  • Melka, T. S. 2017. A developmental continuum for the rongorongo script. Part I/Part II. Unpublished typescript in the collection of the author.
  • Melka, T. S., and M. Místecký. 2020. On stylometric features of H. Beam Piper’s Omnilingual. Journal of Quantitative Linguistics 27 (3):204–43. doi: 10.1080/09296174.2018.1560698.
  • Melka, T. S., and R. M. Schoch. 2020a. Exploring a mysterious tablet from Easter Island: The issues of authenticity and falsifiability in rongorongo studies. Cryptologia 44 (6):481–544. doi: 10.1080/01611194.2019.1706065.
  • Melka, T. S., and R. M. Schoch. 2020b. Two recently identified artifacts with rongorongo-like signs – collected during the expeditions of “U.S.S. Mohican” (1886) and “Mana” (1914–15) to Easter Island. Unpublished typescript in the collection of the authors.
  • Melka, T. S., and R. M. Schoch. 2021a. The quest for information retrieval: An inscribed relic from ancient Rapa Nui (Easter Island) – Part I. Asian and African Studies 30 (1) :137–72 and 249–53 (Figs. 1–6). doi: 10.31577/aassav.2021.30.1.07.
  • Melka, T. S., and R. M. Schoch. 2021b. The quest for information retrieval: An inscribed relic from ancient Rapa Nui (Easter Island) – Part II. Asian and African Studies 30 (2):405–50 and 489–509 (Figs. 1–14b). doi: 10.31577/aassav.2021.30.2.06.
  • Melka, T. S., and R. M. Schoch. 2023a. Review of Rongorongo: Inscribed objects from Rapa Nui by Paul Horley. Cryptologia 1–29. doi: 10.1080/01611194.2023.2175186.
  • Melka, T. S., and R. M. Schoch. 2023b. On two different personalities from Old Rapa Nui: Personal effects of ‘ariki mau Nga‘ara (? – ca. 1859) and ‘Prophetess’ María Angata Veri Tahi (ca. 1853–1914) – Part I: The Pistol of Nga‘ara. Supplement I. Figures 1–8. The Journal of Pacific History 58 (3):280–306. doi: 10.1080/00223344.2023.2215712.
  • Mellén Blanco, F. 1993. Tres Trabajos sobre Pascua – 1 – Interpretación Rapa Nui de los Numerales Escritos por los Españoles en 1770. (Interpretation of Rapanui Numbers Written for the Spanish in 1770). Revista Española del Pacífico – Asociación Española de Estudios del Pacífico (A.E.E.P.) 3:60–6.
  • Métraux, A 1940. Ethnology of Easter Island. Bernice P Bishop Museum Bulletin 160. Honolulu: Bernice P. Bishop Museum Press.
  • Métraux, A. 1957. Easter Island: A stone-age civilization of the Pacific. Trans. from the French by Michael Bullock. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Ojeda, C. C. 1947. Geo-etimología de la ISLA de PASCUA [Geological etymology of EASTER ISLAND]. Santiago de Chile: Instituto Geográfico Militar.
  • Orliac, C. 2007. Botanical identification of the wood of the large Kohau Rongorongo tablet of St Petersburg. Rapa Nui Journal 21 (1):7–10.
  • Orliac, C. 2010 [2007]. Botanical identification of 200 Easter Island wood carvings. In The Gotland Papers: Selected Papers from the VII International Conference on Easter Island and the Pacific Migration, Identity, and Cultural Heritage, Gotland University, Sweden, August 20–25, 2007, eds. Paul Wallin and Helene Martinsson-Wallin, 125–41. Visby: Gotland University Press.
  • Orliac, M., and C. Orliac. 2008. Trésors de l’île de Pâques/Treasures of Easter Island. Collection de la Congrégation des Sacrés-Cœurs de Jésus et de Marie SS.CC. Paris: éditions Louise Leiris.
  • Orliac, C., M. Orliac, and P. Horley. 2016. Computer modeling of a turtle pendant and a moai kavakava from Easter Island. Rapa Nui Journal 30 (1):33–42. doi: 10.1353/rnj.2016.0004.
  • Orliac, C., M. Orliac, and P. Horley. 2019. Wooden figurines collected by HMS Topaze on Easter Island. In Easter Island and the Pacific: Cultural and environmental dynamics, eds. B. Vogt, A. Kühlem, A. Mieth, and H.-R. Bork, 211–20. Easter Island: Rapa Nui Press.
  • Owsley, D. W., V. E. Simon, K. G. Barca, J. A. Van Tilburg, and D. Whitmore. 2016. Demographic analysis of modified crania from Rapa Nui. In Skeletal Biology of the Ancient Rapanui (Easter Islanders), eds. Vincent H. Stefan and George W. Gill, 253–68. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press
  • Palmer, J. L. 1870a. A visit to Easter Island, or Rapa Nui. Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society of London 14 (2):108–19. doi: 10.2307/1799553.
  • Palmer, J. L. 1870b. A visit to Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, in 1868. Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London 40:167–81. doi: 10.2307/1798641.
  • Park Harrison, James. 1874. The Hieroglyphics of Easter Island. The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 3:370–83. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2840910.
  • Poignant, R. 1967. Oceanic mythology: The myths of Polynesia Micronesia Melanesia Australia. London: Paul Hamlyn.
  • Pope, M. 1999 [1975]. The story of decipherment: From Egyptian hieroglyphs to Maya script. Revised Edition. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd.
  • Pozdniakov, K. 1996. Les bases du déchiffrement de l’écriture de l’Ile de Pâques. Journal de la Société Des Océanistes 103 (2):289–303. doi: 10.3406/jso.1996.1995.
  • Pozdniakov, K. 2011. Tablet Keiti and calendar-like structures in Rapanui script. Journal de la Société Des Océanistes 132 (1):39–74. doi: 10.4000/jso.6371.
  • Pozdniakov, I., and K. Pozdniakov. 2007. Rapanui writing and the Rapanui language: Preliminary results of a statistical analysis. Forum for Anthropology and Culture 3:3–36.
  • Robertson, M. (ed.). 1984. Journal of the Margaret Rait 1840–1844 by Captain James Doane Coffin, with an Introduction by Marion Robertson. Hantsport, Nova Scotia: Lancelot Press.
  • Robinson, A. 2002. Lost languages: The enigma of the World’s undeciphered scripts. A Peter Neuvramont Book. New York: McGraw-Hill.
  • Rogers, H. 2005. Writing systems: A linguistic approach. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, Ltd.
  • Routledge, K. (Mrs Scoresby Routledge). 1919. The mystery of Easter Island: The story of an expedition. London and Aylesbury: Hazell, Watson, and Viney, LD.
  • Schoch, R. M., and T. S. Melka. 2019. The Raŋitoki (Rangitoki) bark-cloth piece: A newly recognized rongorongo fragment from Easter Island. Asian and African Studies (Bratislava) 28 (2):113–48 and 413–7. Figures 1–7.
  • Schoch, R. M., and T. S. Melka. 2020. The Raŋitoki (Rangitoki) fragment: Further analysis of a short rongorongo sequence on bark-cloth from Easter Island. Asian and African Studies (Bratislava) 29 (1):26–41 and 113–8. Figures 1–9).
  • Schoch, R. M., and T. S. Melka. 2021. A “Sacred Amulet from Easter Island –1885/6–”: Analyzing enigmatic glyphic characters in the context of the rongorongo script. In Grapholinguistics in the 21st Century 2020 Proceedings. Grapholinguistics and its Applications, Part II vol 5, ed. Yannis Haralambous, 847–903. Brest, France: Fluxus Editions.
  • Schoch, R. M., and T. S. Melka. 2022. A wooden hand from Easter Island (Rapa Nui), part I. Res: Anthropology and Aesthetics 77-78 (1):303–17. doi: 10.1086/721156.
  • Schoch, R. M., and T. S. Melka. 2023. A wooden hand from Easter Island (Rapa Nui), part II: Rongorongo-like glyphs and tattoo patterns. Res: Anthropology and Aesthetics 79–80 (1):277–98. doi: 10.1086/729106.
  • Sproat, R. 2003. Approximate string matches in the RR corpus. http://www.cslu.ogi.edu/∼sproatr/ror/ (accessed 2 October 2013).
  • Tanaka-Ishii, K., and S. Aihara. 2015. Computational constancy measures of texts – Yule’s K and Rényi’s entropy. Computational Linguistics 41 (3):481–502. doi: 10.1162/COLI_a_00228.
  • Thomson, W. J. 1891. Te Pito te Henua, or Easter Island. Report of the United States National Museum for the Year ending June 30, 1889. Annual Reports of the Smithsonian Institution for 1889. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution.
  • Tressider, J. (General ed.). 2004. The complete dictionary of symbols. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, LLC.
  • Van Tilburg, J. A. 1992. HMS Topaze on Easter Island: Hoa Hakananai‘a and Five Other Museum Sculptures in Archaeological Context. British Museum Occasional Papers No. 73, Department of Ethnography, London.
  • Winkelman, M. J. 2022. An ethnological analogy and biogenetic model for interpretation of religion and ritual in the past. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 29 (2):335–89. doi: 10.1007/s10816-021-09523-9.

Reprints and Corporate Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

To request a reprint or corporate permissions for this article, please click on the relevant link below:

Academic Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

Obtain permissions instantly via Rightslink by clicking on the button below:

If you are unable to obtain permissions via Rightslink, please complete and submit this Permissions form. For more information, please visit our Permissions help page.