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Rongorongo facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts
Rongo-rongo script
rongo rongo tablets source
Rongorongo B-v Aruku-Kurenga (color)
An authentic rongorongo

Rongorongo is a system of writing native to Easter Island. It cannot be read. There are two dozen examples of rongorongo script, mostly carved on tablets made from wood of the portia tree Thespesia populnea, known as makoi in Rapanui (Easter Island) language. The longest inscription in existence is the Santiago Staff, a wooden sceptre 126 centimetres long and 6.5 centimetres wide, bearing 2300 glyphs (Gr. γλυφη "carving"). The staff, which once belonged to an Easter Island king, was acquired by the Chilean Navy in 1870 and is now in Santiago's Museum of Natural History.

Images for kids

  • Rongorongo G-r Small Santiago (raw)

    The Small Santiago Tablet (tablet G) clearly shows the fluting along which the glyphs were carved.

  • Rongorongo K-v London (edge)

    To maximize space, the text wraps around the edge of tablet K.

  • Red Banana leaf veins

    Rongorongo tablets may have been influenced by writing on banana leaves like this one.

  • Rongorongo Gv4 (section)

    Bulb on line]]) are connected by a faint bent hair-line that may have been inscribed with obsidian. (The chevrons are also linked by such a line, too faint to be seen here, which connects them to the hand of the human figure.)

  • Rongorongo B-v Aruku-Kurenga (end)

    A photographic negative of one end of tablet B. The numbers are line numbers; Fin de 13 means "end of [line] 13".

  • Rongorongo-sample-en

    Some of the more iconic rongorongo glyphs. The seated man [bottom left] is thought to be a compound. Readings from Barthel (1958). The captions in the right-most column are merely descriptive.

  • Roro-1770-signatures

    glyph 300]].

  • Anaokeke

    Petroglyphs in the cave Ana o Keke resemble the feather-like rongorongo glyph 3 (left) and a compound glyph 211:42 RR 211.42.png (center), a hapax legomenon found in Br1, followed by a V shape that may be glyph 27 . A line of divots passes through them.

  • Barthel code

    Coding: The first digit distinguishes head and basic body shape, and the six in the units place indicates a specific raised hand.

  • Rongorongo rubbing of line 1 of Santiago staff

    Rubbing of the first line of the Santiago Staff, used by Barthel (CEIPP archives)

See also

Kids robot.svg In Spanish: Rongo rongo para niños

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