Rapa Nui Journal Volume 18 Issue 1

EIF News

The Prez Sez

What's New at the EIF Office

Moai Sightings

What's New in the Pacific

Publications

Dear Editor,

The paper on the Jubaea palms by H-R Bork and A Mieth (RNJ 1712: 119) presents a plausible scenario, but prompt some observations. One might imagine that people dependent upon the palms would notice before 'the feller of the last tree' did his work, especially since Hunter-Anderson tells you that at least some island people are sensitive to the ecological fragility of their environment. On the other hand, recall the difficulty of establishing parks to prevent Pacific Northwest loggers from cutting the last of the old-growth redwood.

Micronesia is a highly diverse region with thousands of islands scattered across some 4.5 million square miles of open water in the western Pacific. From the air, the region looks as if handfuls of pearls had been loosed from a string and haphazardly strewn across a velvety fabric of the deepest blue. As you begin your approach, however, these pearls start to take shape, revealing coral, volcanic and continental islands of varying shapes and sizes, some highly dissected with steep jungle terrain, others a thin ribbon of green hugging close to the water's surface. As both a cultural and geological paradise, Micronesia presents the inveterate trekker or novice traveler with a farrago of peoples, cultures, language , landscapes, and environments. Just trying to get around can be confusing, with a new set of challenge arising at every tum. Enter Neil Levy's latest edition of Moon Handbooks Micronesia.

It has always been easier to destroy than to create - and in literary terms this means it's usually easier to criticize than praise. Most decent works deserve a healthy smattering of both. The book that is the subject of this review, however, draws so much attention to its shortcomings (albeit sometimes minor ones) that praise is hard to come by.

I bought this expensive 2003 book to augment both my growing collection of Easter Island publications and my knowledge of Easter Island itself. So I began reading with enthusiasm. And when I came upon the first of a series of many typos, boo-boos, and flat-out errors, I first dismissed them as a reflection on how people rely far too heavily on spell-checkers in their word processing software. However, as the number of mistakes grew, I became distracted. That's when I started compiling a list.

FIRST THE FACTS...THEN THE FANTASY

The world ha paid little attention to the fact that, during the last few centuries, a number of early maps have turned up. These give an accurate picture of the coasts of Africa and North and South America, and they date from years BEFORE European explorers had arrived in these areas. A most intriguing question poses itself: who could have created them?

Fifty Years in the Field. Essays in Honour and Celebration of Richard Shutler Jr's Archaeological Career

Edited by Stuart Bedford, Christophe Sand, and David Burley New Zealand Archaeological Association Monograph 25, 2002, Auckland. Paperbound, A4 (21 x 29.5 cm), 260 pages, numerous illustrations (maps, drawings, and photographs); NZ$45.00, available through the NZAA

Website: www. nzarchaeology.org/mono.

Review by Mike Carson and Dave Tuggle International Archaeological Research Institute, Inc., Honolulu

Alphonse L. Pinart (1852-1911), anthropologist and linguist,

had established himself as a tireless documenter

of native North America, before turning his sights on the Pacific.

Rapa Nui, in particular, held him in thrall, and his diary

of the 1877 expedition aboard the Seignelay documents the

island during its most depopulated and depressed period. As a

linguist, he was also interested in rongorongo, and attempted

a collection of reproductions of the available texts.