Name in the Kohau Rongorongo script (Easter Island)
by
Albert DAVLETSHIN*
ABSTRACT
RÉSUMÉ
Many interpretations of the undeciphered Kohau
Rongorongo script of Easter Island have been proposed, but nowadays only the suggestion about a genealogy on the Small Santiago Tablet offered by Yuri Knorosov and Nikolai Butinov in 1956 seems to be trusted.
The paper seeks answers on two controversial questions
related to this suggestion: What is the function of sign
076? And why the a possessive marker is absent there?
Three Kohau Rongorongo texts represent name lists,
supposedly, of either defeated and sacrificed enemies or
newborns. Structural analysis of the tablets shows that
some signs, which frequently appear in a certain position
in the names, may be titles. Many names are complemented with possible titles, others are not. The genealogy consists of six names marked by the same title,
which follow a passage free of names. Probably, this
passage is inserted into the name list and refers to the
most prominent person mentioned. The proposed suggestions indicate that Kohau Rongorongo texts served
as an important media of sociopolitical integration.
Si plusieurs interprétations de l’écriture encore indéchiffrée de l’île de Pâques (Kohau Rongorongo) ont été
proposées, aujourd’hui seule la suggestion faite par Yuri
Knorosov et Nikolai Butinov, que la petite tablette de
Santiago contient une généalogie, semble acceptée.
L’article tente de répondre à deux questions controversées liées à cette suggestion : quelle est la fonction du
signe 076 ? Et pourquoi le possessif a est-il absent ?
Trois textes en Kohau Rongorongo sont des listes de
noms, que l’on suppose être des noms soit d’ennemis
vaincus ou sacrifiés soit de nouveau-nés. L’analyse
structurale des tablettes révèle que certains signes, qui
apparaissent souvent à une place déterminée dans les
noms, pourraient être des titres. De nombreux noms sont
assortis de titres potentiels, d’autres ne le sont pas. La
généalogie est composée de six noms marqués par le
même titre et se réfère à la personne la plus éminente. Les suggestions proposées indiquent que les textes
en Kohau Rongorongo servaient à l’intégration
sociopolitique.
K: Kohau Rongorongo Script, Easter Island,
logo-syllabic writing systems, structural analysis, artificial bilinguals, title, rank, pre-Contact
Polynesia
M- : Écriture Kohau Rongorongo, île de
Pâques, systèmes d’écriture logo-syllabiques,
analyse structurale, textes bilingues, titre, rang,
Polynésie d’avant contact
Natives of Easter Island were inventors of a
unique writing system called Kohau Rongorongo.
As far as we know, no other Polynesian peoples
at the time of their discovery possessed an indigenous writing system. The Kohau Rongorongo
script remains undeciphered (see for example,
Barthel, 1993; Vignes, 1990). I shall avoid here a
lengthy repetition of the discovery of the Kohau
Rongorongo tablets and the history of the
various attempts at decipherment ¢ since such a
subject calls for independent investigation. I can
do no more than mention the most interesting
and important, in my opinion, works (Jaussen,
1893; Harrison, 1874; Piotrowski, 1925;
Métraux, 1940: 389-411; Kudrjavtsev, 1949;
Imbelloni, 1951; Butinov and Knorosov, 1956;
* Knorosov Centre for Mesoamerican Studies, Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow, aldavletshin@mail.ru
Journal de la Société des Océanistes, 134, année 2012-1
96
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
Barthel, 1958; Kondratov, 1969: 169-192; Fischer, 1993). I shall also avoid arguing my view of
the Kohau Rongorongo script as an exemplary
logo-syllabic writing system1, texts of which are
written without omitting any grammatical markers in a language that is a direct ancestor of
Modern Rapanui. The reasons are the following:
on one hand, it is serious and extensive topic,
and, on the other, it is quite obvious from the
script itself and ethnohistoric sources we have at
our disposal. Nonetheless, some essential points
should be presented:
¢ First, the rigorous and systematic structural analysis from the conservative viewpoint still is to be
applied to the Kohau Rongorongo tablets, for the
numerous interpretative efforts cannot be called
successful (Harrison, 1874; Métraux, 1940: 400411; Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Kondratov,
1969: 169-192; Fischer, 1995).
¢ Second, the identification of the language of the
tablets never has been made on the basis of the
inscriptions themselves (Butinov and Knorosov,
1956; Kondratov, 1969: 169-192).
¢ Third, in spite of some claims (Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Kondratov, 1969: 169-192; Fedorova, 1982; Macri, 1996), the Kohau Rongorongo
script has not received required attention as an
example of the logo-syllabic writing system.
¢ Fourth, there are no bilingual texts in the strict
sense of the word known.
A ‘‘consensus’’ exists among the scholars
regarding the only interpretation, namely, the
sequence of signs representing a genealogy as
identified by Nikolai Butinov and Yuri Knorosov in 1956 (Barthel, 1958: 308, 1993; Macri,
1996; Guy, 1998a-b). Butinov and Knorosov’s
genealogy is the only artificial bilingual text
securely identified until the date. By the term
‘‘artificial bilingual texts’’ I understand cases,
when either a particular structure of a text or
contexts of an inscription permit us to compare
it with extant texts in a given language and at
least partially recognise its content.
Name pattern in the Kohau Rongorongo script
according to Butinov and Knorosov 1956
As has been originally noted by Nikolai Butinov and Yuri Knorosov (1956), there is a
sequence consisting of six groups of signs on the
Small Santiago Tablet, Verso, Lines 5-6 (fig. 1).
The same sign ‘‘Man’’ appears at the beginning
F 1. ¢ Nikolai Butinov and Yuri Knorosov’s genealogy
and its surroundings on the Small Santiago Tablet, Verso.
The sign ‘‘Man’’ (=TB200) is marked off by the frame and
‘‘Phallus’’ (=TB076) by arrows (after Paul Horley’s
drawings by his courtesy)
of each group. It is likely that this is a name list,
and that the sign ‘‘Man’’ corresponds to the
particle ko, which precedes personal names. The
signs ‘‘Seating Man with Lifted Hand’’ and
‘‘Turtle’’ follow the sign ‘‘Man’’ in the third
group as do the signs ‘‘Turtle’’ and ‘‘Shark’’ in
the fourth group, the signs ‘‘Shark’’ and ‘‘Octopus’’ in the fifth group, and the only sign ‘‘Octopus’’ in the sixth one. Thus, the second sign of
each group ¢ that follows the sign ‘‘Man’’ ¢
stands for the first in the following group. This
sort of alignment suggests that it is not just a list
of names, but a genealogy ascending from a
descendant to an ancestor. The second sign
in the third, fourth and fifth groups would be
the father’s name. Names of Hotu Matu’a’s descendants from the genealogy in the Gabriel
Hereveri Manuscript (after Barthel, 1959: 79),
for example, are composed in the same fashion:
Hotu Iti a Miru
Hotu Iti [son] of Miru
Tuu a Hotu Iti
Tuu [son] of Hotu Iti
Honga a Tuu
Honga [son] of Tuu
Te Kena a Honga
Te Kena [son] of Honga
Tuukoihu a Te Kena Tuukoihu [son] of Te Kena
The pattern of the name in the Kohau Rongorongo texts was examined by Yuri Knorosov’s
1. A logo-syllabic writing system is a writing comprised of word-signs or logograms and phonetic signs or syllabograms. The
logogram is a sign, which spells a word and denotes its meaning. The phonetic sign is a sign, which spells a syllable, but has no
meaning (see for example, Gelb, 1963: 250, 253).
NAME IN THE KOHAU RONGORONGO SCRIPT (EASTER ISLAND)
followers. The last sign in each group depicts
‘‘phallus’’. According to Metoro Tauara, the
sign should be read as URE ure ‘‘penis, semen,
clan’’. As Alexander Kondratov has stated
(1969: 169-192), in all likelihood the sign in question is a patronymic marker, something similar
to the Russian ¢ vih ‘‘patronymic suffix’’. The
facts that ‘‘Phallus’’ is of very frequent use in the
texts and that it shows a peculiar distribution is
in favour of this hypothesis (see below). Irina
Fedorova (1982: 56-60) has noted that the sign
‘‘Phallus’’ is not identical in its position with the
article of personal name a in Modern Rapanui,
which marks the boundary between the personal
name in strict sense and the father’s name in the
name of son. Irina Fedorova suggests that the a
article replaced ure, which was originally used as
the father name’s marker2. Having pointed out
that the sign appears in final position in a large
series of groups (more than 100) on the Santiago
Staff, Knorosov also suggests that the text on the
Santiago Staff is a list of names, a peculiar record
of births (personal communication in Fedorova
1997). Attempts to find names in the Kohau
Rongorongo texts, marked with a sign different
from TB076 (Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Butinov, 1959), cannot be considered successful.
In this manner the pattern of the name in the
Kohau Rongorongo texts may be described by
means of the formula: [A]-B-C-D, where A ¢ sign
‘‘Man’’ (=TB200) ¢ functions like the focus marker ko (Fedorova’s article of the personal name)
and is usually missing, B is a name that can be
spelled with one or several signs, C is the father’s
name that can also be spelled with one or several
signs and D ¢ the sign ‘‘Phallus’’ (=TB076) ¢ is
the father name’s marker ure. According to the
formula, the boundary between the son’s and the
father’s names is not marked.
The interpretation offered for the fragment on
the Small Santiago tablet as well as that of the
sign ‘‘Phallus’’ as a name marker looks convincing or at least interesting in the light of combinatory data and ethno-historic evidence. Nevertheless, some issues cast doubts on the validity of
the hypothesis. Why is the a possessive (marker
of alienable possession) attested in all Polynesian languages in the name before the father’s
name (Englert, 1948: 333; Elbert and Pukui,
1985: 136-145) absent in the Kohau Rongorongo
texts? What does the suffix ¢ure mean, if such a
construction is unknown in the Polynesian languages? Why the suffix ¢ure is so infrequent in
97
the other Kohau Rongorongo texts? Is it possible
that personal names are almost absent there?
Why does the sign ‘‘Man’’ appear exclusively in
the genealogy on the Small Santiago Tablet and
is absent before other names marked with the
sign ‘‘Phallus’’, if it spells the focus marker ko, as
has been suggested by Butinov and Knorosov?
Distinctive Kohau Rongorongo texts
In this paper, a text which shows distinctive
distribution of a particular sign is termed distinctive text. In view of the fact that the objective
of the paper is to examine names and their structure in the Kohau Rongorongo script, the attention will be concentrated on the Kohau Rongorongo tablets showing distinctive distribution of
the sign TB076. There are three texts of this
kind:
(1) Small Santiago Tablet, Verso,
(2) Santiago Staff, and
(3) Honolulu Tablet B.3629.
It should be noted that Recto and Verso of the
Small Santiago Tablet present different texts,
since the inscription on the side Recto is parallel
to that of the Small London Tablet (Butinov
and Knorosov, 1956). Moreover, TB076 is of
frequent use on the Small Santiago Tablet,
Verso F(TB076)=11.98 %, while the side Recto
shows no distinctive distribution of the sign
F(TB076)=0.56 % (see Table 1). The graphics of
the Kohau Rongorongo script is poorly understood due to, among other things, a peculiar organization of the Barthel’s catalogue (see for example, Vignes, 1990; Macri, 1996). Sometimes it is
unclear in the catalogue if a sign is one or a
combination of two or three signs. However, this
fact doesn’t have negative implications for statistical estimations of such kind.
The high frequency of use for the sign TB076
makes it possible to set apart the mentioned texts
from the others. F(TB076) is 23.40 % on the
Santiago Staff, 22.76 % on the Honolulu Tablet
and 11.98 % on the Small Santiago Tablet,
Verso, whereas on the other texts it is equal to or
less than 1 % (see Table 1). To put it another way,
the sign TB076 is very infrequent on the other
tablets. At the same time, the structure of the two
former texts is different from the last one as
suggested by the distribution of TB076 (see
2. Following Sebastian Englert (1948: 333), Nikolai Butinov, Yuri Knorosov, Alexander Kondratov and Irina Fedorova term
both the ko focus marker and the a possessive marker as ‘‘articles of the personal name’’. As I don’t have a good descriptive
grammar of Rapanui at my disposal, I will refer to Samuel Elbert and Mary Pukui’s grammar of Hawai’ian (1985), a language
closely related to Rapanui.
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SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
T 1. ¢ Distribution of the sign TB076 in the Kohau Rongorongo texts
Tables 2-4). The glyphic sequences marked with
TB076 are separated by text fragments unmarked with TB076 on the Small Santiago Tablet,
Verso, while the text on the Santiago Staff and
Honolulu Tablet has no insertions of the unmarked with TB076 text. Average distance between
neighbouring signs TB076 on the Santiago Staff
and Honolulu Tablet and out of the unmarked
text on the Small Santiago Tablet, Verso is more
or less constant: it is equal to 3.04, 3, and 4.07
respectively. This fact suggests that the text marked with TB076 presents lists of names and
RAV(TB076-076) reflects average length of the
name in the Kohau Rongorongo texts expressed
in number of signs. Basing on this observation,
it is possible to conclude that the text on the
Santiago Staff represents a single list consisting
of 560 names or thereabouts.
As the distinctive distribution of the sign
TB000 suggests, the text on the Santiago Staff is
different in its structure from that on the Honolulu Tablet (see Table 4). The sign TB000 appears
exclusively on the Santiago Staff, where it is
attested 98 times and of frequent use
F(TB000)=0.04. TB000 is almost always found
in the same position, coming in one-two signs
before TB076 [RAV(TB000-076)=1.05]. Sometimes the sign TB000 is called a special division
mark or a punctuation symbol (Barthel, 1958,
1971, 1993; Fisher, 1995). It looks unlikely
because the sign divides the text at irregular
intervals, always appears in the same position associated with TB076 and is absent in
the other texts. In all probability, the sign TB000
and signs following it are additional insertions
of the text ¢ some characteristics of mentioned
persons or something like this ¢ following
or preceding the name [RAV(TB076-076)=4.69
for supposed names including TB000, and
RAV(TB076-076)=3.12 for names without
TB000].
It is necessary to consider the beginnings and
ends of the texts showing a distinctive distribution of TB076 in order to answer the following
question: Is the sign TB076 initial or final one in
its position in the name pattern? The Honolulu
Tablet is too damaged to discern its beginning
and end. The text on the Small Santiago Tablet,
Verso begins with a sequence of names and ends
with an unmarked fragment of text (Fig. 2). The
initial sequence of names begins with an introductory sign and TB076, showing that TB076
rather functions as an initial sign there. The
question of the opening and closing lines on the
Santiago Staff is problematic, because lines cover
all the surface of the staff. The lines on the
Santiago Staff have been numerated by R.A.
Philippi in an arbitrary way (Barthel, 1958: 24).
Thomas Barthel maintained Philippi’s arbitrary
line order. The text consists of 13 equal lines of
signs (Lines 1-11 and 13-14) and one additional
brief line (Line 12) suggesting that the text
begins with Line 13 and ends with Line 12
(Fig. 3A). Some compactness of the text in the
end of Line 12 counts in favour of such interpretation, although it is unclear from Barthel’s
NAME IN THE KOHAU RONGORONGO SCRIPT (EASTER ISLAND)
F 2. ¢ Beginning (Line 1) and end (Line 8) of the
inscription on the Small Santiago Tablet, Verso. The sign
TB076 is marked off by arrows (after Paul Horley’s
drawings by his courtesy)
99
for example, in the Mayan and Egyptian scripts.
The explanation is supported by the form of
TB076 itself as well as by the fact that some
combinations of TB076 with certain signs on the
Santiago Staff, for example, TB755¢076¢075
(not violating the distinctive distribution of
TB076) almost always are conflations as well
(Fig. 5).
F 3. ¢ Presumable beginning and end of the inscription
on the Santiago Staff. The signs TB076 and TB000 are
marked off by arrows. (A) Thomas Barthel’s scheme of the
inscription I. After drawings by Bodo Spranz (Barthel,
1958). (B) Probable beginning (Line 13) (after Paul Horley’s drawings by his courtesy) (C) Probable end (Line 12)
(after Paul Horley’s drawings by his courtesy)
scheme why the line is shorter in the beginning,
but not in the end. A good photo or examination
in situ could probably make the case clearer. If
the interpretation proposed here is correct,
TB076 is rather an initial sign (Fig. 3B-C).
Final proof for the definition of TB076 as the
initial sign in the name pattern comes from a
close examination of the proposed genealogy
from Small Santiago Tablet, Verso (Fig. 4).
Names in the genealogical fragment evidently
begin with the signs TB076¢200. The widely
accepted definition of TB076 as a final sign
(Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Barthel, 1958:
109-112; Fischer 1995) is probably based on the
fact that it is found attached to the preceding
signs. At the same time, it is well recognized that
the conflation of signs is not used for dividing
the text in words, sentences and the like in the
Kohau Rongorongo script (Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Barthel, 1958, 1971, 1993). Such a
position of TB076 could be explained as a peculiar feature of the Kohau Rongorongo graphics to
attach certain signs including TB076 to preceding ones. There are a lot of similar ‘‘abnormalities’’ in the graphics of many writing systems,
Notes on the figure. The sign TB076 in the first sequence is
obliterated. In all probability, the same name ¢ father’s name
in the first sequence and son’s name in the second one ¢
represent two different ways of writing the same word: (1)
syllabic spelling TB430¢432 and (2) logographic spelling
TB769, thus TB769 = TB430+TB432 [TB430 is (c1)v1, TB432
is (c2)v2 and TB769 is (C1)V1(C2)V2]. Here C stands for a
consonant, V for a vowel. From comparing the second and
third sequences, it is possible to suggest that the sign group
TB432-TB002 and the sign TB350? are used to write the same
word as well, thus TB350? = TB432+TB002 = (C2)V2(C3)V3
[TB432 = (c2)v2 (see above), TB002 = (c3)v3; cf. transliteration
in Barthel 1958: 59]. The sign following TB076 in the seventh
sequence represents a unique combination of signs
TB062¢TB073?, which is probably used to write the same title
with two phonetic signs, thus TB200 = TB062+TB073? =
(C4)V4(C5)V5 [TB062 = (c4)v4, TB073 = (c5)v5]. Less likely, it
may be a rare allograph of TB200 with the identical phonetic
value [TB200 = (C4)V4(C5)V5, TB062+073 = (C4)V4(C5)V5].
Even more unlikely, TB062¢TB073 is used to spell another
title. The signs in question are marked off by asterisks.
F 4. ¢ Revision of the genealogy on the Small Santiago
Tablet, Verso. The signs TB200 are marked off by the
frame; the text unmarked with the sign TB076 is underlined (after Paul Horley’s drawings by his courtesy)
100
Santiago Staff, Line 6. TB755¢076¢075.
Santiago Staff, Line 10. TB073¢006¢076¢075.
Santiago Staff, Line 11. TB002¢076¢078.
F 5. ¢ Some examples of the conflation in the Kohau
Rongorongo script (after Paul Horley’s drawings by his
courtesy)
(a) TITLE1a ¢ TB530. Santiago Staff, Line 4.
(b) TITLE1b ¢ TB021¢530. Santiago Staff, Line 13.
(c) TITLE2 ¢ TB020¢010. Santiago Staff, Line 2.
(d) TITLE3 ¢ TB010¢079. Santiago Staff, Line 14.
Proposed titles are marked off by the frame; the signs TB076
and TB000 are marked off by arrows.
F 6. ¢ Titles in the Kohau Rongorongo texts (after Paul
Horley’s drawings by his courtesy)
Distinctive signs of the Kohau Rongorongo texts
In this paper, a sign which shows a distinctive
distribution in texts is termed distinctive. A sign
is distinctive if it appears in a certain position in
respect to a certain sign. Taking into consideration the objective of this paper, the attention will
concentrate on signs appearing in a certain position in respect to sign TB076. Another distinctive feature of signs is their capacity to form
sequences of the kind ABAB, BABA, AAAA
and AAA in combination with other signs. It has
long been noted that such glyphic sequences are
of frequent use in the Kohau Rongorongo texts
(Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Kondratov, 1969:
169-192). Moreover, it has also been suggested
(Butinov and Knorosov, 1956; Kondratov, 1969:
169-192) that they correspond to the completely
and partially reduplicated forms. Reduplication
is a very productive grammatical process in Poly-
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
nesian languages (see for example, Elbert and
Pukui, 1985: 64-67). However, it should be
highlighted that such a distinctive feature as
the capacity to form sequences ABAB, BABA,
AAAA and AAA strongly suggests that the sign
has a phonetic (syllabic) value, just because
word combinations such as, for example, ‘‘fish
fish fish fish’’ mean nothing in any language
(cf. TB700¢700¢700¢700, Small Santiago
Tablet, Verso, Line 5; Atua-Mata-Riri Tablet,
Side b, Line 4). And vice versa the absence of this
feature is indicative of a logographic value if the
sign in question is presented with a sufficient
number of examples in different contexts. I
believe that this remarkable sign feature in rongorongo texts may be used to suggest and check
reading values of signs.
Distinctive distribution of the signs TB076
and TB000 is described above. TB076 is a
syllabic sign as suggested by sequences
TB430¢076¢430¢076,
TB090¢076¢090¢076,
TB076¢076¢076, and perhaps TB076¢276¢
076¢276 (Table 5). Besides, there are a number of
examples of reduplication for the sign on the
Santiago Staff, where its distribution predicts
only one TB076 for a name. Contrariwise,
TB000 doesn’t form sequences ABAB, BABA,
AAAA, AAA and it always occurs in the same
position. Thus, the combinatorial data suggest a
logographic value for TB000.
There are signs and combinations of signs
which appear frequently in a certain position
associated with TB076 on the Santiago Staff
and the Honolulu Tablet. These are TB5303,
TB021¢530, TB020¢010, and TB010¢079
(Fig. 6, Table 6). They appear after TB076, that
is to say, in the initial position in the name. They
seldom if ever occur in the medial and final
positions in the name or in the text unmarked
with TB076. Besides, there are no signs or sign
sequences that show distinctive distribution in
the medial and final positions. The fact that
some combinations of signs appear in a certain
position in the name strongly suggests that they
represent titles. As this takes place, some names
are complemented with titles, and some names
are not. It is highly probable to find titles on the
Kohau Rongorongo tablets in the light of what we
know about Polynesian social organization (see
for example, Kirch, 1984: 34-37). Various titles
are attested in Rapanui folklore texts (Easter
Island Manuscript E2: 1-6, in Barthel, 1974; text
and translation are given after Fedorova, 1988:
15, 46):
3. Various variants of the sign and its conflations with other signs were numbered by Thomas Barthel as TB530-539. TB530
and TB532a represent different variants of the sign, the other numbers in the catalogue designate its conflations.
NAME IN THE KOHAU RONGORONGO SCRIPT (EASTER ISLAND)
ko moe hiva ariki maahu 1
ko tuku maura ariki
maahu 2
ko ngerani ariki maahu 3
ko po ariki maahu 4
ko henga ariki maahu 5
Erima maori o te ariki o
oto uta.
Moe Hiva, ariki maahu 1,
Tuku Maura, ariki maahu 2,
Ngerani, ariki maahu 3,
Po, ariki maahu 4,
Henga, ariki maahu 5.
(These) are five sages of the
chief Oto Uta.
There is good evidence for interpretating the
signs in the initial position after TB076 as titles.
It is possible to carry out a statistical comparison
between names mentioning supposed titles and
names without them on the basis of the large list
of names attested on the Santiago Staff.
RAV(TB076-076) for names without titles and
including them is equal to 3.00 and 3.46 respectively, and RAV(TB076-000) for names without
titles and including them is 2.55 and 3.17. When
RAV for names including titles is compared with
RAV for names without titles, it is apparent that
supposed titles represent additional insertions in
names. It is reasonable to find such a pattern for
titles. TB020¢010 and TB010¢079 designated
here as TITLE2 and TITLE3 are rarely attested,
thus their identification as titles is presumable.
The sign TB530 is logographic (Table 5).
TB530 depicts a ‘‘man in a headdress’’ (Fig. 6A)
and Metoro’s reading vie poko pono ‘‘femme
coiffée/woman in a hat’’ seems to support such
interpretation (Jaussen, 1893: 21; Heyerdahl and
Ferdon, 1965: Fig. 83). Eugène Eyraud noted
that, at the first look, all islanders were alike,
because they had the same clothes (Englert,
1948: 228). Sebastian Englert adds that there
were nevertheless a great variety of headdresses,
although all were made from the same material
found on the island (ibid.). Different kinds of
headdresses are characterized by the length, the
colour or the arrangement of feathers. Each,
known by a special name, was worn on specific
occasions and often had a symbolic meaning.
Some of them, for example, hau tara, hau hiehie,
hau veri, were associated with the chief
(Métraux, 1940: 222-223). In the light of what
has been mentioned above, it is possible to suggest that the sign for the title in question depicts
a ‘‘Man in a headdress’’.
It is likely that TB530 and TB021¢530 refer to
the same title designated here as TITLE1 (the
variant TB530 is designated as TITLE1a and
TB021¢530 - as TITLE1b). Thus, the title in
question is of the most frequent use on the
Kohau Rongorongo tablets showing distinctive
distribution of TB076 (Table 6), and yet it
appears only 15 times on the other tablets.
Although evidence supporting a syllabic value
of the sign TB021 is rather weak, I suggest that
101
TB021 is a phonetic complement to TB530, since
qualifiers always follow the nouns they modify in
Rapanui (Englert, 1948: 337; Elbert and Pukui,
1985: 127): compare, for example, ariki and ariki
henua, ariki maahu, ariki mau, ariki motongi,
ariki nui, ariki paka, ariki tamahahine, ariki vaivai. Phonetic complements, which are not read
but confirm the reading of a word sign nearby,
are a distinctive feature of all known logosyllabic writing systems (see for example, Gelb,
1963: 250). In fact, a small number of ABAB,
BABA, AAAA and AAA sequences for TB021
may be ascribed to our lack of understanding of
Kohau Rongorongo graphics, or to the fact that
TB021 is an allograph (a variant of the sign),
used mainly on the Santiago Staff. Taking into
consideration a very high frequency of TITLE1,
the tentative reading (‘ARIKI) for TB530 could
be proposed. If this reading is correct, TB021
should spell (‘a): TB021¢530 (‘a)-(‘ARIKI) ‘ariki
‘‘chief’’ (for the initial glottal stop see Blixen
1972).
The signs TB010, TB020 and TB079 which
are used to spell possible titles and designated
here as TITLE2 [TB020¢010] and TITLE3
[TB010¢079] are syllabic ones as their combinations with others signs suggest (Table 5). The
sign TB200 is of frequent use, but it doesn’t show
a distinctive distribution in the texts marked with
TB076. It is attested in ABAB, BABA, AAA and
AA combinations with other signs (Table 5),
suggesting its phonetic nature.
Name pattern in the Kohau Rongorongo script
reconsidered
On the basis of the foregoing discussion and
new added data, the name pattern in the Kohau
Rongorongo tablets may be reexamined. We
should first answer the question why the possessive a is absent before the father’s name in the
genealogy on the Small Santiago Tablet. Such
grammatical markers in similar contexts may be
omitted; it is a well-known phenomenon in texts
belonging to different cultures. Although there
are no similar examples in surviving Rapanui
folklore texts, we may find them, for instance, in
the long genealogy of the Hawai’ian chant
Kumulipo (Chant 11:717-721; after Beckwith,
1981: 205-206, 108):
Hanau o Loa’a ke kane
Loa’a ke kane [o]
Nakelea ka wahine
Le [o] Kanu
Kalawe [o] Kamau
Born was Loa’a, a male
Loa’a the husband [of]
Nakelea the wife
Le [the husband of] Kanu
[the wife]
Kalawe [the husband of]
Kamau [the wife]
102
Kulou [o] Haliau
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
Kulou [the husband of]
Haliau [the wife]
Some eight hundred pairs of names, of men
and women, follow this fragment in the chant
(ibid.: 109, 206-225). The o possessive is omitted
(as indicated with brackets above) in the entire
list. It should be noted that the possessives o and
a are nearly synonymous, in this case the difference is that a (alienable possession) relates
names of a son and a father, and o (inalienable
possession) relates names of a husband and a
wife (Elbert and Pukui, 1985: 137). I suggest that
the a possessive in the names in the genealogy on
the Small Santiago Tablet is absent for the very
same reason. My attempts to find a possible
candidate for (a) between names on the Santiago
Staff have been unsuccessful. Nevertheless, I
believe that it is due to our poor understanding
of the Kohau Rongorongo graphics and that the a
possessive is to be found there.
Taking into account the possibility of omission of the a possessive in the genealogy due to
the clarity of the contexts and stylistic reasons,
the meaning ure ‘‘patronymic marker’’ suggested
for TB076 should be revised. As discussed above,
TB076 is a syllabic sign attested in initial position, that is before names, in genealogies and
name-lists. Compared with the available Rapanui genealogies and folklore texts (see some
examples below), it becomes clear that TB076
functions like the ko focus marker:
The Estevan Atan Manuscript, Ko Hotu
Matua (after Heyerdahl and Ferdon, 1965:
Fig. 123):
ko hotu matua a taana harai Hotu Matu’a [son] of
Taana Harai
ko tuu ma heke a hotu matua Tuu Ma Heke [son] of
Hotu Matu’a
ko miru a tuu ma heke
Miru [son] of Tuu Ma
Heke
ko ataranga a miru
Ataranga [son] of Miru
ko ihu a ataranga
Ihu [son] of Ataranga
The Juan Haoa Manuscript (after Heyerdahl
and Ferdon, 1965: Fig. 150):
ko ira
Ira
ko pukupuku Pukupuku
nga tavake
Nga Tavake
ko kuukuu
Kuukuu
ko uha tava
Uha Tava
ko rapa renga Rapa Renga
Comments: Ira, Kuukuu, Uha Tava, Rapa Renga are
names of scouts sent in advance by Hotu Matu’a to
Easter Island, and Nga Tavake together with Te Ohiro
were the first settlers on Easter Island. Nga Tavake
joined Ira and other scouts (Kondratov, 1965: 407).
E te tangata ko Atamu, ko Riro, ko Atamu a Te Kena,
ko Riro a Ngure, ko Atamu, ko Riro, te ariki, i oho o te
mukomuko / The men Atamu, Riro, Atamu [son of] Te
Kena, Riro [son of] Ngure, Atamu, Riro, the chiefs,
were left without heirs
(The Estevan Atan Manuscript, Ko Hotu Matua, in
Heyerdahl and Ferdon, 1965: Fig. 125, translation is
given after Fedorova, 1978: 326, 328).
Thus, the comparison suggests TB076 to be
the ko syllable. The proposed reading agrees
with the following premises: the sign is syllabic, it
precedes names in genealogies and lists of
names. Besides, such a reading may explain the
absence of TB076 in the unmarked text on the
Small Santiago Tablet and in the Kohau Rongorongo texts different from those on the Small
Santiago Tablet Verso, the Santiago Staff and the
Honolulu Tablet. The ko focus marker is necessarily placed before names in lists and other
quite limited contexts; one function of this
grammatical particle is to mark appositions and
consequently to introduce items of enumerations and lists (Englert, 1948: 333). The fact that
TB076 is of low frequency in most tablets
doesn’t mean that names are absent there; that
would be difficult to imagine in an early complex
society. It only means that those names are
unmarked with TB076 spelling the ko focus marker. Butinov and Knorosov’s interpretation of
TB076 as URE was based on the Metoro’s readings ure, tupu, hua ‘‘phallus, offspring, fruit,
fetus’’ (Fedorova, 1982: 56) as well as on the
imagery of the sign depicting ‘‘phallus’’. It is well
recognized that what a sign depicts shouldn’t
have any obvious bearing on its phonetic value,
particularly if that sign is a syllable (see
for example, Stuart, 1987). Nevertheless, it is
possible to offer an explanation of why does
the sign depicting ‘‘phallus’’ spells ko: the syllabic value (ko) may be derived via acrophony
from the Rapanui kohio ‘‘miembro viril/penis″;
see also kohio-hanga ‘‘cópula carnal/copulation’’
(Englert, 1948: 462)4.
The meaning of TB200 remains unclear. On
one hand, TB200 appears in the position of a
title in the genealogy on the Small Santiago
Tablet (Fig. 4). On the other hand, it is of very
frequent use and forms ABAB, BABA, AAAA
and AAA sequences in combination with other
signs that evidences for its phonetic nature. Furthermore, TB200 rarely occurs in the position of
titles in the Kohau Rongorongo texts marked with
TB076. There are two possibilities for resolving
this contradiction. The first is that TB200 has
4. Acrophony is a process when a phonetic sign originates from the initial sounds of a logogram. Acrophony is of great
concern in the origins of phonetic signs (see for example, Gelb, 1963: 251).
NAME IN THE KOHAU RONGORONGO SCRIPT (EASTER ISLAND)
two values: one syllabic value and one logographic, which refers to a rare title5. The second is to
suggest that the signs TB076¢200 in the genealogy correspond to ko te, and TB200 corresponds to the syllabic sign (te). Sometimes lists of
names with ko te are attested in folklore texts
(The War Between Tuu and Hotu-Iti II, in
Métraux, 1940: 83):
He matau toroto to te ana The valiant warriors in the
cave were
ko te Toki Heu,
Toki Heu,
ko te Toki Punipuni,
Toki Punipuni,
ko te Toki Rengorengo.
Toki Rengorengo.
My attempts to find ko te in genealogies and to
propose an explanation for this grammatical
construction (see for example, Englert, 1948:
332) were unsuccessful. That is the reason why I
prefer not at present draw the ultimate conclusion about TB200.
The interpretation of the name pattern in the
Kohau Rongorongo texts proposed in this paper
may be summarized by means of the following
formula: [A]-[B]-C-[D]-E, where A (=TB076) is
(ko) spelling the ko focus marker, which appears
before personal names in lists of names (and in
genealogies in particular) and is absent in other
contexts; B is a title that can be omitted; C is a
name that can be spelled with one or several
signs; D is the a possessive and meaning ‘‘[son] of
[father]’’, which is unattested in the genealogy on
the Small Santiago Tablet, but possibly present
in other names on the Kohau Rongorongo tablets;
and E is father’s name that can also be spelled
with one or several signs.
To my knowledge, the only fact that argues
against this interpretation is the name pattern.
The interpretation suggests the title position to
be strictly between the ko focus marker and the
personal name. Conversely, Sebastian Englert
(1948: 333) writes that ko is mainly used before
personal names, especially after titles, for example: Te Ariki Ko Hotu Matu’a ‘‘the Chief Hotu
Matu’a’’, Te Hakaora Ko Yêtú ‘‘the Savior
Jesus’’. Indeed, the last construction is common
in folklore texts along with the construction
where a title with or without the te article follows
the personal name with the ko subject marker,
for example: Ko Ava Rei, tamahahine ‘‘Ava Rei,
girl’’, Ko Tiki Hati A Tangaroa, ariki motongi
‘‘Tiki Hati A Tangaroa, paramount chief’’, Ko
Rukunga, te ariki hopea ‘‘Rukunga, the last
chief’’, Ko Atamu, te ariki tumu ‘‘Atamu, the
legitimate chief’’. Nevertheless, I believe it is
reasonable to assume that the title might be
103
included in the personal name ¢ such a phenomenon is attested in many early complex societies. In addition, the construction where a title
precedes the name, either marked or unmarked
with the a article of personal names, is attested in
folklore texts.
He hoki te tangata ko Hotu-iti, he noho te ariki
Tu-ki-haka-he-vari i tōna kona. / The men of Hotu-iti
came back. The king, Tu-ki-haka-he-vari remained in
his country (A Tanga Roa, e te uha, after Métraux,
1937: 47).
He mate Oroi, he ariki Oroi o Hiva o Marae-Renga. /
Thus died Oroi, a chief Oroi from Hiva from MaraeRenga (The Fight with Oroi, after Métraux, 1940: 67).
He noho he hakarata i te tangata te matua a Rute. /
The father Roussel lived [on Easter Island and] taught
islanders new faith
(The Estevan Atan Manuscript, Ko Hotu Matua,
in Heyerdahl and Ferdon, 1965: Fig. 124; text and
translation are given after Fedorova, 1978: 324, 326).
Ku tomo ro ai koe te ariki a Hotu Matua ku noho ro
ai. / The chief Hotu Matua landed on the shore [and]
settled [there]
(after Fedorova, 1965: 397).
Content of the Kohau Rongorongo texts (sign
TB076)
Data obtained via structural analysis of undeciphered scripts have much potential for yielding
information about the contents and purposes of
texts (see for example, Urcid 2001). Thus, we
may use the data at our disposal for understanding the contents and purposes of the Kohau
Rongorongo texts. Furthermore, we should
try to use the data for this objective, because
otherwise we risk of offering readings and interpretations that make no sense in the contexts of
Pre-European Easter Island’s culture.
It has been noted before that it is natural and
reasonable to expect the Kohau Rongorongo
tablets to contain either genealogies of chiefs or
lists of defeated enemies (Routledge 1919: 249;
Knoche 1939; Butinov and Knorosov, 1956;
Guy, 1998a). Both interpretations make sense in
the light of what we know about pre-European
Polynesia in general and Easter Island in particular. Social organization in Polynesia is frequently described as a conical clan, where the
status and rank of a person depend on the genealogical distance from the lineage founder (see for
example, Kirch, 1984: 31-34). Therefore genealogies should have been of paramount importance for the Rapanui at that time. Various titles,
determining the status of the person and establishing relationships between individuals in the
5. The principle of polyphony ¢ when individual signs have more than one canonical value ¢ is well attested in world’s writing
systems (see for example, Gelb, 1963: 251).
104
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
Numbers denote the distance between two neighboring signs TB076 or TB200 expressed in number of signs between; the
genealogy is marked by the double line; the text unmarked with TB076 is underlined.
T 2. ¢ Distribution of the signs TB076(A) and TB200(B) on the Small Santiago Tablet, Verso
Numbers denote the distance between two neighboring signs TB076 expressed in number of signs between; [...] indicates
damaged signs; * is TITLE1, and *** is TITLE3.
T 3. ¢ Distribution of the signs TB076(A) on the Honolulu Tablet B. 3629
society, play a large role in every early complex
society. On the other hand, lists of defeated and
sacrificed enemies narrating about exploits of
chiefs and proving the presence of the sacred
power mana of an ‘ariki and his glorious ancestors, could legitimize his authority. As this takes
place, Kohau Rongorongo texts were an important media of sociopolitical integration on Easter Island. The results presented above show that
the genealogy on the Small Santiago Tablet,
Verso, is not a genealogy in the strict sense,
although true genealogies were probably written
on the tablets as well. It is a genealogical fragment written in reverse order and inserted into a
name list which evidently refers to the most prominent person mentioned there. It is used to
supply reference to the person with genealogical
information mentioning his ancestors in at least
6 generations. Besides this, three discussed
Kohau Rongorongo texts differ in their genres: (1)
the Honolulu Tablet presents a list of names
marked in part with titles, (2) by contrast, the
text on the Santiago Staff contains insertions
marked with TB000, and (3) in the text on the
Small Santiago Tablet six sequences of names ¢
from 3 to 13 names (Table 2) ¢ are separated by
fragments of the text unmarked with TB076.
Although the data are too deficient to make
ultimate conclusions, it is possible to compare
these three texts in their genres with the following kinds of Kohau Rongorongo boards, from
which only the descriptive names were known
from the natives: kohau o te tangata mate ‘‘tablets
of the dead’’ used to record the names of
deceased men; kohau o te ranga ‘‘tablets of fugitives’’ used to record the names of fugitives and
prisoners; kohau ika ‘‘tablets of victims’’ used to
record the names of slaughtered or sacrificed;
and, less probably, kohau ta’u ‘‘tablets of years’’
which were registers of births made by tangata
tapu ta’u (Métraux, 1940: 394-395; Englert,
1948: 321, 462; Barthel, 1971: 1168). The interpretation of kohau ta’u as ‘‘registers of births’’
obtained from some islanders differs from the
more common one ‘‘annals recounted events of
the past’’. According to Sebastian Englert (1948:
462), this information should be considered
doubtful. It is interesting that the tablets with
the names of sacrificed men, called kohau ika,
were suspended on every funerary cairn ahu (see
Knoche 1939: 32).
Conclusion
Structural analysis from a conservative viewpoint makes it possible to suggest a more refined
and consistent description of the names in the
Kohau Rongorongo texts in comparison with the
original proposal offered by Nikolai Butinov
and Yuri Knorosov and eventually substantiates
their interpretation of the fragment on the Small
Santiago Tablet as a genealogy. It shows promise
for looking at the Kohau Rongorongo script as a
logo-syllabic writing system that employs syllabic spellings and phonetic complements and
does not omit grammatical markers excluding
those cases when the language itself permits to
omit them. The proposed here content interpretation of the text on Santiago Staff is in agreement with ethno-historic data at our disposal
and with what we know about the social organization of pre-European Easter Island. Representing one more example of artificial bilinguals
found, the tentatively identified titles may be
used for detection and verification of phonetic
values for the signs attested as their constituents.
NAME IN THE KOHAU RONGORONGO SCRIPT (EASTER ISLAND)
105
Numbers denote the distance between two neighboring signs TB076 or TB000 expressed in number of signs between; [...]
indicates damaged signs; * is TITLE1, ** is TITLE2, and *** is TITLE3.
T 4. ¢ Distribution of the signs TB076(A) and TB000(B) on the Santiago Staff
106
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
www.rongorongo.org. I also would like to thank
Evgenia Korovina, Martyn Harris, Paul Horley,
Rafal M. Wieczorek and Tomi Melka who
encouraged me to publish this paper and helped
me discussing issues concerned here. I am very
much obliged to Paul Horley for his kind suggestion to use his unpublished drawings for the
redone figures.
Addenda
Abbreviated references on the inscriptions follow the system
elaborated by Thomas Barthel (1958): A ¢ Tahua Tablet, B
¢ Aruku-Kurenga Tablet, E ¢ Keiti Tablet, H ¢ Great Santiago Tablet, I ¢ Santiago Staff, N ¢ Small Vienna Tablet, P ¢
Great St.-Petersburg Tablet, Q ¢ Small St.-Petersburg
Tablet, R ¢ Atua-Mata-Riri Tablet, S ¢ Great Washington
Tablet; r and v ¢ sides Recto and Verso, a and a ¢ Sides a and
b; digit indicates the number of line.
T 5. ¢ Distinctive signs and their combinations ABAB,
BABA, AAAA, AAA, AA in the Kohau Rongorongo texts
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Vladimir Belikov
(Department of South Pacific Studies, Institute
of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of
Science, Moscow), whose knowledge of Polynesian languages and cultures is second to none,
for a very fruitful discussion and his regular
help. I would also like to thank Dmitri Beliaev
(Knorosov Center for Mesoamerican Studies,
Russian State University for the Humanities,
Moscow) for his comments on the epigraphic
part of the work. A special acknowledgment
must go to the author of the website http://
The paper was originally written for and presented at the 2nd International Conference ‘‘Hierarchy and Power in the History of Civilizations’’ held in St.-Petersburg, Russia, in 2002
(Davletshin, 2002). Unfortunately, I had no
opportunity to publish it at that time, but it was
distributed between scholars and cited in the
literature (see for example: Horley, 2011). So, I
have decided to publish it as it was written with
minor stylistic corrections; figures were redone
on the basis of new drawings. It reflects the
original reasoning and shows the ways I have
arrived at my conclusions. My knowledge of
Rapanui language and of Kohau Rongorongo
have considerably improved in these years, but
my opinion on the main ideas suggested in the
paper, cautious as they are, remains unchanged.
But I would now like to add a few comments
which will probably be the most interesting part
of the article. Remarkably, many changes are
related to the documentation of the Kohau Rongorongo texts which has been greatly improved.
Several works published in recent times concern
the topic of this paper (Guy, 2004; Bettocchi,
2009; Horley, 2011; Melka, 2009; Nikolay,
2001).
1. As regards the beginning of the text on
the Santiago Staff, I believe that Paul Horley
(2011) has offered the best solution for the
identification of the reading order, opening and
closing lines. It would be impossible to make it
without many photographs, rubbings and casts
Horley worked with. Although my conclusions
were grounded, the data at my disposal were not
sufficient.
2. Today I believe that sign TB076 represents
not the ‘‘phallus’’, but ‘‘a kind of plant’’,
i.e., kohe ‘‘cierta planta que crece en la costa/a
kind of plant growing on the shore’’ (Englert,
1948), proto-Polynesian *kofe ‘‘1. bamboo spp.
2. bamboo knife’’ (Biggs and Clark, n.d.).
3. Examining photos (see Ramírez and
Huber, 2000), I can tell that the sign TB200 in the
genealogy on the Small Santiago Tablet is different from its common version because it always
NAME IN THE KOHAU RONGORONGO SCRIPT (EASTER ISLAND)
107
T 6. ¢ Supposed titles and frequencies of their use in various positions in respect of TB076 in the Kohau Rongorongo texts.
The totals (Σ) are given for both texts (Santiago Staff and Honolulu Tablet B. 3629)
has four additional lines at the head (hair?, a
kind of headdress?). I suggest that it is a different
sign, not slotted in Thomas Barthel’s notation. It
behaves as a logogram and is attested in the
position of titles on the Small Santiago Tablet.
Thus, it probably spells a word denoting a title.
4. In 2002 neither Steven Fischer’s drawings
of the text I (Fischer, 1997), nor photos of the
inscription were available to me. Nowadays, I
think that the sign TB021 of the Santiago Staff is
iconically different from the TB021 found in
other texts. It is probably a logograph used to
spell one more title in the text on the Santiago
Staff.
5. Thanks to the new drawings available
(Fischer 1997; see also Melka 2009: 38, footnote
37), it is clear that the Honolulu Tablet B.3629
does possess at least two examples of the
sign TB000: in line Ta4 and in line Ta7. Thus, the
text on the Santiago Staff and the text on the
Honolulu Tablet most likely share the same
genre.
6. The text on the Santiago Staff is more structured than is presented here and permits a more
refined analysis with important implications for
its interpretation.
7. It is possible to arrive at the reading of
TB076 as ko spelling ‘‘focus marker’’ and at the
interpretation of the text on the Santiago Staff as
a name-list independently from the Small Santiago’s genealogy. The Santiago Staff represents a
list of some 560 items of more or less equal
length, 3 signs on average, each of them marked
with sign TB076. The ko focus marker in Rapanui language is used for introducing items in lists
and enumerations of any kind. Lists unmarked
with the ko focus marker are agrammatical, so ko
should be there and TB076 is the only possible
solution. Thus, 560 individual items of a list that
are almost never repeated in the text should
represent personal names, even if they would be
personal names of Easter Island stone statues.
The last suggestion seems to be unlikely from an
anthropological point of view. This observation
unnoticed in the literature is important, because
it makes the interpretation stronger (cf. Nikolay,
2001: 9).
8. Currently, I am a little bit sceptical about
the analysis concerning Figure 4’s notes. Strangely, TB076 seems to be missing after the first
name and two possible substitutions are attested
in the first part of the supposed genealogy. These
two facts make the substitution problematic. No
other examples of substitutions with these signs
are found in the text. The focus marker ko can
introduce not only names in a genealogy, but
also items of any list. Thus, we can assume that
the whole passage represents a list of three
names marked by a title (names 1-3) and the last
one of them, possibly, referring to a very important person (name 3), is followed by a short
genealogy indicating four generations of his
ancestors (names 4-7). However, in this case it is
difficult to explain why at least six members of
the list are specified by the same title. Significantly, this title is not attested in other contexts
in the present text and in the Kohau Rongorongo
texts in general. I believe that until an alternative
logical explanation for this distortion in the
structure of the genealogy will be found, the
hypothesis of the suggested substitutions should
be maintained. From my point of view, this kind
of analysis is promising and important for the
Kohau Rongorongo studies.
Abbreviations and conventions
N(A): Number of the signs A in a text.
NΣ: Total number of all the signs in a text.
F(A): Frequency of use for the sign A expressed
as the percentage of the number of the signs A
to the total number of all the signs in a text
[F(A) = N(A):NΣx100 %].
RAV(A-B): Average distance between the neighbouring signs A and B expressed in the
number of signs between them.
108
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
This paper employs the system of graphic
transcription elaborated by Thomas Barthel
(1958), to whose catalogue three-digit numbers
associated with the capital letters TB refer.
TB000 stands for the ‘‘Vertical Line’’ sign, which
is absent in the catalogue and appears exclusively
on the Santiago Staff. Working with the graphics
I try to be independent from Thomas Barthel’s
catalogue, so I also refer to the signs discussed
with their descriptive nicknames, for example,
‘‘Turtle’’. This nickname doesn’t mean that the
sign is read ‘‘turtle’’ or depicts it, but only that it
looks like one.
The system of glyphic transliteration is traditional (see for example: Fox and Justeson, 1984).
Logographic signs are printed in capitals
(‘ARIKI), while phonetic signs are printed in
small letters (ko); both are given in bold case.
Parentheses highlight the presumable nature of
the offered phonetic readings.
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