Rongorongo (;

Rapa Nui Easter Island ( rap, Rapa Nui; es, Isla de Pascua) is an island and special territory of Chile in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian Triangle in Oceania. The island is most famous for its nearly ...

: ) is a system of glyphs discovered in the 19th century on

Easter Island Easter Island ( rap, Rapa Nui; es, Isla de Pascua) is an island and special territory of Chile in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian Triangle in Oceania. The island is most famous for its ne ...

that appears to be

writing Writing is a medium of human communication which involves the representation of a language through a system of physically inscribed, mechanically transferred, or digitally represented symbols. Writing systems do not themselves constitute h ...

proto-writing Proto-writing consists of visible marks communicating limited information. Such systems emerged from earlier traditions of symbol systems in the early Neolithic, as early as the 7th millennium BC in Eastern Europe and China. They used ideograp ...

. Text D of the

rongorongo 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 c ...

corpus, also known as ''Échancrée'' ("notched"), is one of two dozen surviving texts. This is the tablet that started Jaussen's collection.

Other names

D is the standard designation, from Barthel (1958). Fischer (1997) refers to it as RR3.

Location

On long-term loan to the ''

Musée de Tahiti et des Îles The Musée de Tahiti et des Îles ("Museum of Tahiti and the Islands"), Tahitian Te Fare Manaha ("the Museum"), is the national museum of French Polynesia, located in Puna'auia, Tahiti. History The museum was founded in 1974 to conserve and res ...

,''

Punaauia Punaauia is a commune in the suburbs of Papeete in French Polynesia, an overseas territory of France in the Pacific Ocean. Punaauia is located on the island of Tahiti, in the administrative subdivision of the Windward Islands, themselves part o ...

, Tahiti. There are reproductions at the '' Padri dei Sacri Cuori'' in Rome (2 copies); the ''

Musée de l'Homme The Musée de l'Homme (French, "Museum of Mankind" or "Museum of Humanity") is an anthropology museum in Paris, France. It was established in 1937 by Paul Rivet for the 1937 ''Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne ...

,'' Paris; the ''

Cinquantenaire The Parc du Cinquantenaire ( French for "Park of the Fiftieth Anniversary", pronounced ) or Jubelpark (Dutch for "Jubilee Park", pronounced ) is a large public, urban park of in the easternmost part of the European Quarter in Brussels, Belgi ...

,'' Brussels; and in Steven Fischer's collection in Auckland. In 1990, hundreds of less precise replicas were sold at an exhibition in Brussels.

Description

A broken-off wedge-shaped piece of wood, approx. 30 × 15 cm, it is in good condition though notched on the top and bottom and with a long, deep, horizontal gouge on side a, line 6. It is said to be made of ''

Podocarpus latifolius ''Podocarpus latifolius'' (broad-leaved yellowwood or real yellowwood, af, Opregte-geelhout, nso, Mogôbagôba, xh, Umcheya, zu, Umkhoba) is a large evergreen tree up to 35 m high and 3 m trunk diameter, in the conifer family Podoc ...

,'' a species which does not occur on Easter Island, but other tablets so identified turned out to be Pacific rosewood.

Provenance

This tablet bore a gift of a sixteen-meter cord of human hair, perhaps a fishing line, from the recent converts of Easter Island that Father Gaspard Zumbohm and Urupano (Urban) Hina Potegiven delivered to the Bishop Jaussen of Tahiti in 1869. The tablet was merely the spool for this gift, and its notched form suggests that it had been used as a fishing reel before that, showing how far rongorongo had fallen from its once taboo status. It was sent to the headquarters of the ''Congrégation des Sacrés-Coeurs et de l'Adoration'' (SSCC) in Paris, where it was deposited in the Missionary Museum, either by Jaussen in 1888 or by the French navy in 1892 after his death. In 1905 it was moved to the SSCC museum in

Braine-le-Comte Braine-le-Comte (; nl, ’s-Gravenbrakel, ; wa, Brinne-e-Hinnot) is a city and municipality of Wallonia located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. On January 1, 2018, Braine-le-Comte had a total population of 21,649. The total area is whic ...

, Belgium. In 1953 it followed the SSCC to

Grottaferrata Grottaferrata () is a small town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Rome, situated on the lower slopes of the Alban Hills, south east of Rome. It has grown up around the Abbey of Santa Maria di Grottaferrata, founded in 1004. Nearby comm ...

, near Rome, and in 1964 to Rome itself. In 1974 the SSCC moved to its permanent headquarters in Rome, and in 1975 ''Échancrée'' was lent to Tahiti on a long-term loan; it was still there as of 1997. The shape and wood suggest to Fischer (1997) that ''Échancrée'' may have been made from a piece of planking of a boat from a European or American ship.

Line a3 contains a series of figures (glyph 200), holding various objects and irregularly separated by frigatebirds (glyph 600). Fischer (1997) speculates that these may represent a numerical series. Fischer (1997:422) remarks that the quality of inscription differs markedly between the two sides. Side a is expertly carved, with small, fine glyphs; side b less so, with larger and cruder glyphs, indicating that were written by different authors.

Text

Seven lines of glyphs on side a, with traces of an eighth on its beveled edge; six lines on side b, for ~ 270 glyphs in all, both legible and damaged. Although Barthel (1958) starts his transcription at the wide end of side a, the start of the text could just as well be at the narrow end (Barthel's line Da8); the same is true of side b. However, as the two sides are written with different hands, it is likely that these are distinct texts, and therefore that the question of recto vs. verso is irrelevant. ;Barthel :: ::Side a, as traced by Barthel. The lines have been rearranged to reflect English reading order: Da1 at top, Da8 at bottom. :: ::Side b, as traced by Barthel: Db1 at top, Db6 at bottom. ;Fischer

Image gallery

Image:Rongorongo D-a Échancrée (natural).jpg, Side a Image:Rongorongo D-b Échancrée (natural).jpg, Side b Image:Rongorongo D-a Échancrée.jpg, Side a, with glyph tracings Image:Rongorongo D-b Échancrée.jpg, Side b, with glyph tracings

References

* BARTHEL, Thomas S. 1958. ''Grundlagen zur Entzifferung der Osterinselschrift'' (Bases for the Decipherment of the Easter Island Script). Hamburg : Cram, de Gruyter. * FISCHER, Steven Roger. 1997. ''RongoRongo, the Easter Island Script: History, Traditions, Texts.'' Oxford and N.Y.: Oxford University Press.

External links

Barthel's coding of text D
{{Rongorongo Rongorongo inscriptions