Tattooed and not only – residents of Easter Island, the origins of their tattoos
Let us begin our journey and search for the origins of tattooing with the Polynesian Triangle, the smallest and most distant island, with Easter Island.
It's amazing how 50,000 years ago, the first sailors from East Asia traveled a very long distance, with primitively built footbridges that would be comparable to today's canoe.
The main thing is that they did it crossing the Pacific Ocean, that was far from the calmest in terms of tempest and thunderstorms. Indeed, it was a remarkable journey.
Dutch admiral Jacob Rogevin, who gave the island its current name, was the first European to set foot on the island. As he arrived on Easter Sunday, April 5, 1722, he named the island Easter Island. He and his team encountered natives whom they described as mixed physical types who worshiped huge, standing statues. With fire in hand, they bowed to the rising sun. Some of them, who were considered 'white men', had their earlobes sliced and hung at the shoulders, clearly not a Polynesian custom.
To date, there are two independent hypotheses about the early culture that settled on this island.
- Excavations at Anakena have revealed that various statues were carved in the early period, differing mainly from the latter in their rounded heads and stubby bodies. The first statues were realistic sculptures of a full male figure kneeling with the buttocks on heels and hands on knees, all features' characteristics of the pre-Inca monuments of Tiwanaku in South America.
- In the middle period, around 1050-1680, the statues were deliberately destroyed, and all the ahus were rebuilt without regard to the orientation of the sun or the masonry fittings. It seems that the only desire was to have strong platforms that could support ever taller and heavier busts, the classical medieval moai that we still see today.
Myth has it that after the arrival of the Polynesians, another controversial immigration arrived on the island, with racial characteristics different from those of the native population. The newcomers were tougher and more resilient and were known as the Hanau E'epe or 'broad race' as opposed to Hanau Momoko or 'thin race'.
Rapa Nui stories tell of Hanau Momoko and Hanau 'E'epe, two groups who disputed the island many centuries ago, culminating in an epic battle at the foot of the Poike Peninsula. This legend became especially popular with the emphasis given in the books of the Norwegian researcher Tor Heyerdahl. He believed that the story of two different races dividing the island justified his hypothesis of an ancient colonization of Easter Island from the South American continent.
Of course, they are all myths :) We are looking for tangible evidence of the origins of tattooing. Easter Island (Rapa Nui - Spanish name) is no exception. Polynesian tattoo art shares common features across the region, with each island or group of islands developing new designs and meanings from their culture over time.
The originality of this new iconography particularly stood out in the Rapa Nui due to its remote location, which made contact with other people's difficult. Moai are carved from volcanic tuff (solidified ash). Human figures were first outlined in the rock wall, then chipped away until only the image remained. The head-to-trunk ratio is three to five, a sculptural feature corresponds to Polynesian belief, or the sanctity of the head. Archaeologists believe that the statues were a representation of ancient Polynesian ancestors.
Moai statues face away from the ocean and towards the villages, as if watching over the people. The exception is the seven Ahu Akivi, which face the sea to help travelers find the island. Ancient tattoo motifs can be seen on the moai's back. Rapa Nui art combines anthropomorphic and zoomorphic imagery in exquisitely crafted and almost surrealistic forms.
It is not known exactly how and when the practice of tattooing was incorporated into Easter Island customs. It may have been introduced by the first settlers who arrived on Rapa Nui. There is a possibility that they already came to the island tattooed, according to their culture or later adopted this culture through contacts with other Polynesian islands. The first historical references to the practice of tattooing in Rapa Nui can be found in drawings and descriptions made by Europeans who arrived on Easter Island in the 18th century.
In their chronicles, they tell how the ancient natives were practically naked, but they wore an amazing combination of tattoos and paintings that covered their bodies like clothing.
Anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss said that "paintings give the individual his dignity as a human being, turning the animal into a civilized man and nature into culture."
The position of the tattoo on the body was also important and affected its meaning. The body was seen as the link between heaven and earth, the upper part of the body was associated with the spiritual world and the lower part of the body to the earth. Tattoos on the back were associated with the past, and on the front - with the future. The left side of the body was associated with women and the right side with men. Rapa Nui tattoo implements were similar to those found elsewhere in Polynesia; a bird bone comb attached at right angles to a wooden handle. The comb was dipped in a prepared pigment of charred leaves mixed with black nightshade juice. The further process derives from the Polynesian term 'Ta', which means to strike or mark. Hence the word "Ta Tau" or "Ta Kona" is common in several Polynesian islands.
P.S.
What can I say, interesting, but it is not the origin of the oceanic island tattoo, the island of Rapa Nui has become a home for travelers who successfully integrated their culture creating a completely new one. One thing must be acknowledged though, for the islanders, tattooing is not a symbol of heroism, a sign of the tribe, or a sacrifice to the gods. Here we have to talk about body art as clothing. The fact is that you will start getting tattooed at the age of 6-7 and finished by the age of 17-18, it will be a painful and infection-filled process that will continue until the skin has healed, so that as a result, your body will be 85% covered with tattoos. This type of drawing requires good geometrical knowledge and symmetry, if you drew on the left hand, the same should be repeated on the right and then joined as a whole.
An old proverb from the island of Borneo: "A man who is not covered with tattoos is invisible to the gods". A thought that shows the meaning of tattoos as a link between man and all that is divine.
Otherwise, it is better to choose a symbolic tattoo that reflects the culture of the inhabitants of a certain island :)
Tattooing spread throughout the Polynesian Triangle, including New Zealand, Hawaii, and Easter Island.
The meaning of Polynesian tattoos
The earliest traces found date back to the Neolithic, and tattooing is believed to have originated in the South Pacific in the Lapita culture, which spread in successive migrations from Tonga and Samoa more than 3,000 years ago. These Austronesian peoples
mixed with the indigenous population and the Lapita culture with its characteristic pottery. Lapita pottery had surface decorations; these motifs probably already existed in tattoos.
Captain Cook was the first to use the verb 'tattoo' in English in 1769 when he described the Tahitian art of tatau in his diary. Now people all over the world wear Polynesian-inspired tattoos, but the first to wear these famous designs were likely the Lapita, who lived around 1500-500 BC and are the ancestors of many modern Pacific peoples. There is no direct evidence of Lapita tattooing, but University of California, Berkeley archaeologist Patrick Kirch says the intricate designs they incised on their pottery resemble tattoo motifs still in use today, made with the same tooth-like tools that can still be used today, to create tattoos. "These vessels were decorated in the same way as the body and could represent ancestors," says Kirch, who thinks these "tattooed pots".
The name of this unique technique of permanent body decoration comes from the Polynesian term "Ta" which means to hit or mark. Hence the word "Ta Tau" or "Ta Kona" is common in several Polynesian islands.
They share ancestry with other Polynesians such as Hawaiians, Tahitians, and New Zealand Maori.
The Austronesian Polynesians who first settled on the island most likely came from the Marquesas Islands from the west. These settlers brought bananas, taro, sugarcane, and paper mulberry, as well as chickens and Polynesian rats. The island once supported a relatively advanced and complicated civilization.