Easter Island is one of few places around the World where writing was independently invented. Some publications say that there were three different writing systems on the island: Kohau Rongorongo, Ta‘u and Mama. Kohau Rongorongo was first reported in 1864, Ta‘u in 1919 and Mama in 1959. This work presents a comparative study of the inscriptions in Rongorongo, Ta‘u, Mama and the texts in Rapanui, the language spoken on the island. Certain structural patterns of rongorongo resemble those of a Polynesian language written in a syllabic notation. In contrast, Ta‘u and Mama lack these combinatorial properties. Our analysis suggests that Kohau Rongorongo has high chances to be a script, which is not the case of Ta‘u and Mama that seem to be imitations of Rongorongo developed at the late stage.

In a writing system with a large number of signs, in particular in the case of a pictorial script, some similarity of two graphic designs is an insufficient basis for considering them to have the same reading value. This paper seeks to apply concepts developed in the graphic analysis of other pictorial writing systems to the still undeciphered script of Rapa Nui (Easter Island). The following technical terms are adapted and defined from both theoretical and practical points of view: sign, reading value, graphic design, allograph, graphic variant, iconic formula, complete, incomplete and false substitution. A modified version of the substitution method (method of inverse sign substitution) is proposed for verifying equivalences and differences between readings values corresponding to the graphic designs analysed in this paper. This method is based on the assumption that two graphic designs that possess the same reading value are in free distribution, so the probability of sign substitution between them should be close to the probability obtained by multiplying the probabilities of their occurrences in texts. Application of these technical concepts to the parallel texts discovered by Boris Kudrjavtzev shows that many graphically similar signs with different reading values have not been previously recognised. This conservative graphic analysis also has permitted the identification of allographs in the strict sense of the word, i.e., signs that look different but possess the same reading value, though such allographs, in the strict sense of the word, seem to be relatively rare in the Kohau Rongorongo texts. It is suggested that the method of iconic formulae provides a useful foundation for future iconographic analysis of the highly pictorial signs of the Kohau Rongorongo script.

This article discusses a possible identification of a duplication marker in the rongorongo script. Several structural observations as well as statistical analysis point to “split circles” glyph as a likely bearer of reduplication functions. This notion springs from internal analysis of the genealogy portion in the Small Santiago Tablet as well as syntax patterns exhibited by “split circles” in other inscriptions. As a result of the analysis performed in this work, several semantically constrained meanings for “split circles” glyphs are proposed. All of them relate to the doubling character of “split circles.” If the identification is correct, it might be an advancement in our understanding of the rongorongo script and could allow for further progress in the decipherment.

The Rongorongo is a system of writing, still undeciphered, from Easter Island in the Pacific. It consists of a corpus of twenty-six inscriptions, scattered around the world. This article presents the state-of-the art in the study of one of these inscriptions, Text D or the ‘Échancrée’ tablet housed in a museum in Rome, Italy. Through an integrated methodology based on photogrammetry and high-precision structured light scanning, a 3D model of the inscriptions is made available through a public 3D Viewer for the first time. The technique made use of the benefits of both methods of image acquisition: a very accurate, precise, high resolution, and metric reconstruction of the tablet geometry gained through the scanning process, and a high-quality texture achieved through photogrammetry. In addition, we present a new analysis of the text, through a close palaeographic examination of its signs, and corrections of previous hand drawings and transcriptions. The ultimate aim is to reach unbi...

Apparently, every rongorongo text is an open string of inscriptions. The tablets are completely covered in glyphs, with only the direction of writing being certain. Sometimes – due to poor preservation – even the beginning and end of several texts have not survived. However, of those tablets with known starting point we can discern some textual fragments that are preferentially appearing as formal introduction of inscriptions. We are now also able to carry out a segmentation of rongorongo texts based on the parallel occurrence of shorter and longer glyph passages. Thus, we recognize textual fragments, which in form and content have specific characteristics in common. Foremost among those are the so called d-lists – interpreted on seven different tablets as delimiters. Analogously to all cases of opening sequences we can also discern some textual fragments that appear preferentially at the beginning of d-lists. With this method we are able to identify three different opening sequences and one closing sequence. This is a very important accomplishment that goes much beyond simple segmentation practiced till now in rongorongo studies. Being able to assign some rongorongo passages to a specific semantic category is a necessary step for further decipherment.

The rongorongo writing system of Easter Island is the only example of writing in Polynesia. The structural properties of the script and the few remaining inscriptions has complicated decipherment work for many years. With the development of sophisticated language and word-frequency distribution models (Zipf, 1949; Baayen, 2001; Evert and Baroni, 2006), and text-classification, (Mosteller and Wallace, 1964; Landauer and Dumais, 1997; Landauer et al., 2002; 2004; 2007; Manning et al., 2008), the issues relating to the study of large multilingual corpora may be addressed. This study adopts a mixed-methods approach, and evaluates the potential for classification of the rongorongo texts according to literary-genre. Although there is still work to be done in determining the types of literary-genre produced by rongorongo scribes, it is believed a classification of the texts, will restore some contextual information to enable future studies to identify some of the structural-principles behind the productivity of particular glyphs. The paper highlights the empirical issues relating to the use of multilingual-corpora, word-frequency distributions, and samples of varying size. The Barthel (1958) corpus is tested to find the optimum representation for statistical exploration. Furthermore, the results validate previous conclusions regarding the presence of shared passages (Barthel, 1958; Fischer, 1997; Sproat, 2003; Guy, 2006; Horley, 2007a; 2009; 2010; Melka, 2008; 2009b; 2010), and literary-genre, (Butinov and Knorozov, 1957; Barthel, 1958; Guy, 1985; 1990; Fischer, 1997; Davletshin, 2002; Berthin and Berthin, 2006; Melka, 2008; 2009a; 2009b; 2010; Wieczorek, 2010). The final results may provide a possible foundation for further exploration of literary-genre and in the rongorongo corpus.

The Rongo Rongo Script of the Rapa Nui Tablets is deciphered using the best of the scholars approach to date and verifiable syllables with glossary, a first of its kind, of the symbolic writing system of Easter Island, Polynesia.