Rapa Nui Journal: Journal of the Easter Island Foundation Volume 2 Article 1 Issue 1 Rapa Nui Notes Spring 1988 1988 Rapa Nui Notes 2#1 Spring 1988 Follow this and additional works at: https://kahualike.manoa.hawaii.edu/rnj Part of the History of the Pacific slI ands Commons, and the Pacific slI ands Languages and Societies Commons Recommended Citation (1988) "Rapa Nui Notes 2#1 Spring 1988," Rapa Nui Journal: Journal of the Easter Island Foundation: Vol. 2 : Iss. 1 , Article 1. Available at: https://kahualike.manoa.hawaii.edu/rnj/vol2/iss1/1 This Research Report is brought to you for free and open access by the University of Hawai`i Press at Kahualike. It has been accepted for inclusion in Rapa Nui Journal: Journal of the Easter Island Foundation by an authorized editor of Kahualike. For more information, please contact [email protected]. et al.: Rapa Nui Notes 2#1 Spring 1988 the premier source for cu"enf Easter Island events and scientific studies . .... Rap" Nai Notes Bill Mulloy Se VA, Se Va La Lancha A Rememberonce Recuerdos de Ropo Nui Patrick C. McCoy Emily Ross Mulloy Se va, se va la lancha 1\111 THE REMEMBRANCE OF BILL MULLOY, who died ten years ago at the age of 61, stirs a lot of Se va la 'Christian Bjelland' memories. A short obituary article that I En esta lancha que cruz el mar wrote for the Journal of the Polynesian Society Se va tambien mi amor. (1979, Vo1.88 (4); pp.373-374) helped to clear -From a song popular on Rapa Nui in 1%0 my mind of the weight of bereaving a man ~ IN EARLIER DAYS, whentravel to and from Rapa so admired. This special issue of Rapa NUl Nuiwasonlybyshipand generallyonly once Notes indicates that William Thomas or twice a year, the day of departure was Mulloy is fondly remembered by many, and somethinglike a wake. Everyone leaving the that for those who were close to him, he has island was mourned for as though they were not "silently gone out of mind," to borrow a dying. The long drawn-out process of load­ phrase from the Irish poet Seamus Heaney. ingpeopleandfreight into lanchas and trans­ Th ough the man may neverbe forgotten, portingthemto the ship could take all day, so I must admit to a growing fear that the it gave plenty of time for multiple weepy importance of Mulloy's long-term research farewells. The islanders really did notexpect on Easter Island prehistory may never be to see anyone who left, ever again. Fortu­ fully appreciated. There are a couple of nately, with the adventofair travel andmore reasons for thinking so. First, at the time of frequent arrivals anddepartures, thi~ custom his death much of his work was still unpUb­ has fallen into disuse. So when BIll made lished, and what had appeared in print was what did turn out to be his final visit to the largely either descriptive and/or preli~­ island, ten years ago this February, it turned nary. There is the related problem that his out to bea happy, rather thana sad,occasion. site reports are characteristically so packed During the final trip he was able to meet with detail that they are liable to withmanyof the people hehad worked with be glossed over or even ignored in the past 23 years, as well as to "pass the by those who are only interested torch to the next generation" of young an­ in the "Big Picture." Secondly, thropologists, Chilean and Rapanui, ~hom Mulloy was on the whole ex­ he had worked with and taught. QUlte by tremely cautious in his interpre­ chance the man who had been his foreman tations, refusing to generalize on during most of the ahu restoration projects, the basis of sketchy or incom­ and who was then living in Tahiti, returned plete evidence. Itis of interest to home on a visit at the same time Bill was continued on page 12.... there. And one of his old friends from the Norwegian expedition, Carlyle Smith, w~s Special Edition also on the island with a tour group and BIll This issue ofRIlpa Nui Notes is was able to act as guest lecturer when the entirely dedicated to the mem­ group visited one of the ahu he had restored. ory of Dr. William T. Mulloy. Amongotherhighlightsofthetripwere the Many of our readers have chance to accompany the National Geo­ never met him, but perhaps graphic photographer, James Blair, on a reading the words of those who flight justatsunrise to photo~rap~ the wh.ole did will help bring to life his islandfrom theair(the resultls andlustrahon vision ofscience and his lovefor for the NGS book, "Mysteries of the Ancient the island. continued on page 2.. Rapa Nui Notes 7 / Page 1 / Spring 1988 Published by Kahualike, 1988 1 Rapa Nui Journal: Journal of the Easter Island Foundation, Vol. 2 [1988], Iss. 1, Art. 1 ...E.. R. Mulloy. continued from page ,. A Preliminary Culture-Historical World" for which Bill acted as a consultant). Best of all was the surpriseata ceremonyintheschool groundswhenhewaspresented Research Model for Easter Island witha beautifulhand-lettered anddecorateddocumentproclaiming him as an '111ustrious Citizen of Easter Island." William Mulloy Of all the honors Bill received in his lifetime, this was the one he The paper from which the following excerpts have been taken has never been prized most highly. From his first visit in 1955 he had always had a strong affinity for the island and its people. published in the U.S., but it did appear in 1979 in Vol.1 of Las Islas Bill had made more than 20 trips to the island over the years Oceanicas de Chile, Instituto de Estudios Internacionales de la Univer­ sidad de Chile (pp. 105-151). between1955 and 1978, spendinga totalofnearlyfive years there; he had been planning, before his illness was diagnosed, .to take early SINCE ITS DISCOVERY on Easter Sunday of 1722 by the Dutch retirement and move to the island permanently that same year navigator Jacob Roggeveen, the peculiar cultural characteristics of (1978). During his last season offield work on the island, a year and Easter Island have fired theimaginations ofalmostall who have had a half earlier, Bill had flown back to Santiago briefly to attend a the opportunity to visit this tiny mote of land lost in the endless seminarattheUniversityofChile's InstituteoflntemationalStudies. empty seas of the southeast Pacific. Much has been written about it The paper which he gave on this occasion, and which proved to be both by visitors and those who knew it only from the accounts of the last thing he ever wrote for publication, is entitled "A Prelimi­ others. From Roggeveen's dayto this the compulsion to explain the nary Culture-Historical Research Model for Easter Island." unlikely presence of a spectacular and complex culture under such This paper, which is exerpted below, outlines a numberofareas in extreme conditions of isolation has been obsessive. Thousands of which, hebelieved, more workwasneeded. Someofthese havebeen titles exist in the literature ranging from accounts by casual visitors studied in the past decade but as Bill frequently said, much more of a few days or by those who had not seen the island at all to the research is needed. Thetitles ofmany ofhis publications contain the worksofseriousscholars who systematicallycollected as manysolid words "preliminary" or "speculative", reflecting his caution about facts as they could and brought to bear on the problem the most too hasty conclusions. reasonable theoretical interpretations that could be derived from In a letter to Bill written 30 years ago by Father Sebastian Englert, these. who had just received reports of the carbon 14 dates from the This disproportionate intensityofinterest in sucha tiny part ofthe excavations done by the 1955-56 Norwegian expedition, I found the world is readily understandable. It is oneofthe most basic canons of follOWing remarks which could equally well express Bill's own history that complex cultures and civilizations, when certain other philosophy of science: 'The Carbon 14 dates upsets all my chrono­ conditions are met, are the product of relatively large populations logical guesses in my book. But I should not worry about, because living in localities where cultural contacts with many other peoples human science is a permanent correcting of errors." are easy. Cultural complexity almost everywhere appears to be closely related to the intensity of opportunities to exchange ideas Wltl'i nelghoorsan 0 fOrmulate newones withtheaidofthese. Con­ versely, when such opportunitiesare lacking, one normally expects the simplest of cultural adaptations. The apparent violation of this basic principle on Easter Island has quite reasonably attracted the interest of many scholars and casual visitors as well. It is probably not reasonable to characterize the culture of Easter Island as a civilization, though it has often been so described. Nevertheless, a culture with a written language (an undeciphered hieroglyphic script that cannot be demonstrated to be related to any otherintheworldandthus, inthepresentstateofknowledgeat least, must be presumed to be a local development) possessed one of the most characteristic hallmarks ofcivilization. A class organized soci­ ety with enough coercive power to bring large work crews together and maintain them in systematic operation long enough to produce theremarkableamountofreligious architectureand sculpture pres­ ent on the island certainly possessed a considerable degree of political organization.The presenceofsolar rangingdevices and the practiceoforientingthe facades ofsomestructureto theazimuthsof the rising and setting sun at the solstices and equinox indicate awareness ofsolarmovements.Theseand othertraits suggesta level of cultural advancement amply sufficient, under such unusual con­ ditionsofisolation,to haveattractedtheunusualattentionwhich has been directed toward the island. An understanding of these developments and other peculiarities is of considerable theoretical importance and clearly requires much knowledge ofthe originofthe culture, ofits pattern ofdevelopment on theisland, oftherelationship ofits peopleto its tinyenvironment of 413 square kilometers and other kinds of information as well.