From Ethnographical Subjects to Archaeological Objects: Pierre Loti on Easter Island (Rapa Nui)

Daniel Schávelzon

doi:10.5334/bha.2419

Abstract

In 1872 French sailor Pierre Loti visited the desolate Pacific island of Rapa Nui . Descriptions in his diary and drawings were published and received great public interest. Here were all the ingredients to satisfy nineteenth century ideas of the exotic: remote, tropical, cannibal inhabited, strange rituals and frenzied dancing, and in addition – the ruins of an ancient and unknown civilisation. But Loti had visited the island almost at the end of its occupation by its indigenous people. The large stone statues had not been erect for some time, even though he recorded them as being so, and its population had been decimated. So Loti’s graphic and written descriptions were embellished for his audience, a fact that is almost as interesting as the real fate of Rapa Nui.

Highlights

Rapa Nui, previously known as Easter Island, remains famous for its massive stone carvings which attracted great interest from as far back as the eighteenth century
Pierre Loti’s travel diary record of his visit to Rapa Nui in 1872 bore witness to the end of the island’s culture, which he described as the logical conclusion of an inferior culture in the face of the advance of the West
In 1886 William Thomson from the United States of America visited Rapa Nui and in the name of science looted and destroyed everything that remained. He disassembled houses to carry away painted stones, and took hundreds of other artefacts (Thomson 1892) to the point where little remained. His written work and his surveys were well done for their time, and they were the result of the scientific archaeology or ethnography that fattened European collections, and spelled destruction for local artefacts and material culture

Summary

Daniel Schávelzon*

In 1872 French sailor Pierre Loti visited the desolate Pacific island of Rapa Nui. Descriptions in his diary and drawings were published and received great public interest. Loti’s graphic and written descriptions were embellished for his audience, a fact that is almost as interesting as the real fate of Rapa Nui

Introduction

Conclusion