{"collection":"Sacred Texts -- Pacific Islander Religions","full_text_available":false,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/sacred_texts_v1_pac_ei_ei59_htm/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/sacred_texts_v1_pac_ei_ei59_htm","id":"sacred_texts_v1_pac_ei_ei59_htm","license":"unknown_pending_legal_review","rights_basis":"sacred_texts_v1_preview_gate_primary_text_only; acquisition-method/ToS and compilation-copyright questions still open, not resolved by this gate","source":"sacred_texts_v1","source_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/pac/ei/ei59.htm","summary":"This is an 1891 artifact catalog from William J. Thompson's survey of Easter Island (Te Pito Te Henua), documenting objects collected or observed during his visit \u2014 a genre sitting between ethnographic inventory and museum accession record. The text systematically describes wooden and stone figures (Moai), ceremonial clubs, feather headdresses, obsidian spear-points, calabashes, fishing equipment, ritual fetish objects, and the famous rongorongo incised tablets, giving each its Rapa Nui name alongside physical description and use. A recurring and distinctive claim is the sharp distinction between objects that were venerated (actual stone \"gods\" for fish, fowl, and crops \u2014 rough, uncarved pebbles) and decorative or ceremonial objects like wooden figures that were honored but explicitly not worshipped. Thompson also notes specific functional and social details often absent from contemporaneous accounts \u2014 for instance, that bone fish hooks were made from the thigh-bones of deceased fishermen and that islanders still preferred them to European hooks, or that nine distinct named classes of obsidian spear-point existed. The catalog ends with brief dynastic notes hinting at civil war in Easter Island's history. This text would interest anyone researching Rapa Nui material culture, 19th-century ethnographic collection practices, or the specific objects held in museums from Thompson's expedition.","tags":[],"text":null,"title":"Te Pito Te Henua, or Easter Island: List of Ethnographic Specimens Obtained at Easter Island","tradition":"Sacred Texts -- Pacific Islander Religions","translated_text":null,"word_count":1807}