Rongorongo text Ragitoki

The Raŋitoki fragment (Ragitoki, Rangitoki) is a possible rongorongo text, though its authenticity has been called into question.

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.[1] Inks used on bark cloth – made from roots, berries and minerals – were apparently rather sophisticated. The cloth was made from the paper mulberry tree, which was formerly prevalent on Eastern Island. It is possible that such items were recycled into more mundane clothing after the arrival of missionaries in 1864, and that the glyphs therefore date to a period when the elite were literate in rongorongo.

Provenance

Given by a Rapa Nui woman, Raŋitoki, to her lover Albrecht van Houten in March 1869. Van Houten had observed that Rapa Nui women wore loincloths adorned with "symbols". Van Houten rolled the fragment into a "scroll", tied it with a piece of twine, and placed it in a pocket-watch case along with a pair of skull-bone beads and a note that has been read,[2]

Ein Stück von dem Rock meiner geliebten wunderschöner Rangitoki. An mich als Geschenk überreicht – März, 1869 –

(A piece from the skirt of my beloved precious Rangitoki. Given to me as a present – March, 1869 –)

(The word here deciphered as überreicht 'offered/given' is unclear.)

The watchcase was handed down in Van Houten's family in Switzerland until it was put up for auction in 2018. Only when it was evaluated were the symbols on the cloth identified as rongorongo.

Text

The identification of the nine glyphs is not entirely secure. An argument for the authenticity of the text is that the glyphs do not appear to be copies from known texts.

The glyphs, from left to right, have been tentatively identified as,[3]

50 95h [hoch 'raised'] 600 46.76 700 V76 26V 200 95x

Authenticity

According to amateur historian Moreno Pakarati, the fragment is a forgery:[4]

An anonymous owner of the piece allowed the authors to photograph and study it and gave them a fanciful tale about an ancestor named Albrecht van Houten, who supposedly traveled to Rapa Nui in March of 1869. A local woman named "Raƞitoki" allegedly provided him with the object. However, Catholic missionaries who were present on Rapa Nui at that time and wrote several dozens of letters kept a record of every ship that called on the island. There is no vessel that called in Hanga Roa, and no mention of any Albrecht van Houten in March of 1869. Raƞitoki is not a female Rapanui name recorded anywhere in the abundant genealogical, baptismal or burial records from before 1871. The piece looks exactly like typical painted barkcloth souvenirs sold to tourists between 2010 and 2020.

References

1. Adrienne Kaeppler (2001) "Rapa Nui Art and Aesthetics". In Eric Kjellgren (ed.) Splendid Isolation: Art of Easter Island. Yale University Press, p. 35; Kaeppler (2003) "Sculptures of Barkcloth and Wood from Rapa Nui: Symbolic Continuities and Polynesian Affinities". RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics vol 44, p.17.
2. Schoch & Melka (2020: 33)
3. Schoch & Melka (2020: 28 ff)
4. Pakarati, C. M. (2023). Rongorongo in 2023 (pt. I). Cristián’s Substack. Retrieved from https://rapanuihistorian.substack.com/p/rongorongo-in-2023-pt-i

• Robert Schoch & Tomi Melka (2019) The Raŋitoki (Rangitoki) bark-cloth piece: A newly recognized Rongorongo fragment from Easter Island. Asian and African Studies 28:2.
• ———— (2020) The Raŋitoki (Rangitoki) Fragment: Further analysis of a short Rongorongo sequence on bark-cloth from Easter Island. Asian and African Studies 29:1.