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Rongorongo 067
Rongorongo (Rapa Nui: ) is a system of glyphs discovered in the 19th century on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) that appears to be writing or proto-writing. Numerous attempts at decipherment have been made, with none being successful. Although some calendrical and what might prove to be genealogical information has been identified, none of these glyphs can actually be read. If rongorongo does prove to be writing and proves to be an independent invention, it would be one of very few independent inventions of writing in human history. Two dozen wooden objects bearing rongorongo inscriptions, some heavily weathered, burned, or otherwise damaged, were collected in the late 19th century and are now scattered in museums and private collections. None remain on Easter Island. The objects are mostly tablets shaped from irregular pieces of wood, sometimes driftwood, but include a chieftain's staff, a bird-man statuette, and two ''reimiro'' ornaments. There are also a few petroglyphs which ...
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Rapa Nui Language
Rapa Nui or Rapanui (, Rapa Nui: , Spanish: ), also known as Pascuan () or ''Pascuense'', is an Eastern Polynesian language of the Austronesian language family. It is spoken on the island of Rapa Nui, also known as ''Easter Island''. The island is home to a population of just under 6,000 and is a special territory of Chile. According to census data, there are 9,399 people (on both the island and the Chilean mainland) who identify as ethnically Rapa Nui. Census data does not exist on the primary known and spoken languages among these people. In 2008, the number of fluent speakers was reported as low as 800. Rapa Nui is a minority language and many of its adult speakers also speak Spanish. Most Rapa Nui children now grow up speaking Spanish and those who do learn Rapa Nui begin learning it later in life. History The Rapa Nui language is isolated within Eastern Polynesian, which also includes the Marquesic and Tahitic languages. Within Eastern Polynesian, it is closest to Mar ...
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Comparison Microscope
A comparison microscope is a device used to analyze side-by-side specimens. It consists of two microscopes connected by an optical bridge, which results in a split view window enabling two separate objects to be viewed simultaneously. This avoids the observer having to rely on memory when comparing two objects under a conventional microscope. History One of the first prototypes of a comparison microscope was developed in 1913 in Germany. In 1929, using a comparison microscope adapted for forensic ballistics, Calvin Goddard and his partner Phillip Gravelle were able to absolve the Chicago Police Department of participation in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Col. Calvin H. Goddard Philip O. Gravelle, a chemist, developed a comparison microscope for use in the identification of fired bullets and cartridge cases with the support and guidance of forensic ballistics pioneer Calvin Goddard. It was a significant advance in the science of firearms identification in forensic science. Th ...
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Catherine Orliac
Katherine, also spelled Catherine, and other variations are feminine names. They are popular in Christian countries because of their derivation from the name of one of the first Christian saints, Catherine of Alexandria. In the early Christian era it came to be associated with the Greek adjective (), meaning "pure", leading to the alternative spellings ''Katharine'' and ''Katherine''. The former spelling, with a middle ''a'', was more common in the past and is currently more popular in the United States than in Britain. ''Katherine'', with a middle ''e'', was first recorded in England in 1196 after being brought back from the Crusades. Popularity and variations English In Britain and the U.S., ''Catherine'' and its variants have been among the 100 most popular names since 1880. The most common variants are ''Katherine,'' ''Kathryn,'' and ''Katharine''. The spelling ''Catherine'' is common in both English and French. Less-common variants in English include ''Katheryn'', ...
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Toromiro
''Sophora toromiro'', commonly known as toromiro, is a species of flowering tree in the legume family, Fabaceae, that is endemic to Easter Island. History Heavy deforestation had eliminated most of the island's forests by the first half of the 17th century, and the once common toromiro became rare and ultimately extinct in the wild in the 1960s. Local tradition has it that the rongorongo tablets of Easter Island are made of toromiro. However, all tablets of native wood tested by modern methods have turned out to be ''Thespesia populnea'', known as ''miro'' or ''milo'' in some Polynesian languages. David Attenborough describes the timber from which a small wooden male sculpture in his possession is made, having been identified by Kew Gardens as ''Sophora toromiro''. Conservation The tree is being reintroduced to the island in a scientific project partly led jointly by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the Gothenburg Botanical Garden, where the only remaining plants of this spec ...
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Barkcloth
Barkcloth or bark cloth is a versatile material that was once common in Asia, Africa, and the Pacific. Barkcloth comes primarily from trees of the family Moraceae, including ''Broussonetia papyrifera'', '' Artocarpus altilis'', ''Artocarpus tamaran'', and ''Ficus natalensis''. It is made by beating sodden strips of the fibrous inner bark of these trees into sheets, which are then finished into a variety of items. Many texts that mention "paper" clothing are actually referring to barkcloth. Some modern cotton-based fabrics are also named "barkcloth" for their resemblance to these traditional fabrics. Traditional Austronesia Before the development of woven textiles, barkcloth made from trees belonging to the mulberry family (Moraceae) were an important aspect of the pre-Austronesian and Austronesian material culture during the Neolithic period. Stone barkcloth beaters, in particular, are considered part of the "Austronesian toolkit." They have been found in abundance in the ...
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Rongorongo Text Ragitoki
The Raŋitoki fragment (Ragitoki, Rangitoki) is a possibly authentic member of the rongorongo corpus. Location This fragment is kept in an undisclosed institution. Description Red ink on undyed (or at least faded) barkcloth, 4.5 × 15.5 cm. The nine glyphs were apparently painted on the cloth with some kind of brush. The piece is reportedly a strip torn from a skirt/loincloth. Bark-cloth cloaks and headpieces were indications of high status in the pre-missionary period. Inks used on bark cloth – made from roots, berries and minerals – were apparently rather sophisticated. The cloth was made from the paper mulberry The paper mulberry (''Broussonetia papyrifera'', syn. ''Morus papyrifera'' L.) is a species of flowering plant in the family Moraceae. It is native to Asia,
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Petroglyphs
A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions of the technique to refer to such images. Petroglyphs are found worldwide, and are often associated with prehistoric peoples. The word comes from the Greek prefix , from meaning "stone", and meaning "carve", and was originally coined in French as . Another form of petroglyph, normally found in literate cultures, a rock relief or rock-cut relief is a relief sculpture carved on "living rock" such as a cliff, rather than a detached piece of stone. While these relief carvings are a category of rock art, sometimes found in conjunction with rock-cut architecture, they tend to be omitted in most works on rock art, which concentrate on engravings and paintings by prehistoric or nonliterate cultures. Some of these reliefs exploit the rock's na ...
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Rongorongo K-v London (edge)
Rongorongo (Rapa Nui: ) is a system of glyphs discovered in the 19th century on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) that appears to be writing or proto-writing. Numerous attempts at decipherment have been made, with none being successful. Although some calendrical and what might prove to be genealogical information has been identified, none of these glyphs can actually be read. If rongorongo does prove to be writing and proves to be an independent invention, it would be one of very few independent inventions of writing in human history. Two dozen wooden objects bearing rongorongo inscriptions, some heavily weathered, burned, or otherwise damaged, were collected in the late 19th century and are now scattered in museums and private collections. None remain on Easter Island. The objects are mostly tablets shaped from irregular pieces of wood, sometimes driftwood, but include a chieftain's staff, a bird-man statuette, and two ''reimiro'' ornaments. There are also a few petroglyphs which may ...
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Rongorongo G-r Small Santiago (raw)
Rongorongo (Rapa Nui language, Rapa Nui: ) is a system of glyphs discovered in the 19th century on Easter Island, Rapa Nui (Easter Island) that appears to be writing system, writing or proto-writing. Numerous attempts at Decipherment of rongorongo, decipherment have been made, with none being successful. Although some calendrical and what might prove to be genealogical information has been identified, none of these glyphs can actually be read. If rongorongo does prove to be writing and proves to be an independent invention, it would be one of very few independent Invention of writing, inventions of writing in human history. Two dozen wooden objects bearing rongorongo inscriptions, some heavily weathered, burned, or otherwise damaged, were collected in the late 19th century and are now scattered in museums and private collections. None remain on Easter Island. The objects are mostly tablets shaped from irregular pieces of wood, sometimes driftwood, but include a chieftain's staf ...
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Steven Roger Fischer
Steven Roger Fischer (born 1947) is a New Zealand linguist. He is the former Director of the Institute of Polynesian Languages and Literatures in Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ..., New Zealand. Fischer is the author of more than 150 books and articles on linguistics, many of which are commonly cited. For his contributions to the decipherment of ancient scripts, Fischer was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2010. Sources

* * 1947 births Fellows of the Royal Society of New Zealand Linguists from New Zealand Linguists of Polynesian languages New Zealand non-fiction writers Living people {{Linguist-stub ...
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Thomas Barthel
Thomas Sylvester Barthel (4 January 1923 in Berlin – 3 April 1997 in Tübingen) was a German ethnologist and epigrapher who is best known for cataloguing the undeciphered rongorongo script of Easter Island. Barthel grew up in Berlin and graduated from secondary school in 1940. During the Second World War, he worked as a cryptographer for the Wehrmacht. After the war he studied folklore, geography, and prehistory in Berlin, Hamburg, and Leipzig. He received his doctorate in Hamburg in 1952 with a thesis on Mayan writing. From 1953 to 1956 he was a Fellow of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, in 1957 a lecturer in Hamburg, and from 4 July 1957 to 1 February 1958 he was a guest researcher with the Institute for Easter Island Studies at the University of Chile. In order to document rongorongo, Barthel visited most of the museums which housed the tablets, of which he made pencil rubbings. With this data he compiled the first corpus of the script, which he published as ''Grundlage ...
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