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Comprehensive Lexicon

Complete Glyph Reference Database

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Updated Comprehensive Rongorongo Lexicon

Having merged insights from prior scholarship (Barthel's sign list, Fischer's interpretations, Metoro's readings) with our recent cross-tablet analyses, we now present the most comprehensive Rongorongo glyph lexicon to date. Below are the key glyphs (with their Barthel catalog numbers) and their proposed meanings, organized by category. Each entry notes the glyph's English meaning, the Rapanui term (in italics), and context or confidence level, with sources supporting the interpretation.

Anthropomorphic and Kinship Glyphs

These glyphs depict human figures and often signify people or relationships:

Glyph 1 (Person)
A standing human figure meaning "person/human" (tangata)
High Confidence
This basic anthropomorphic sign appears widely in names and narratives.
Glyph 200 (Chief)
A seated human figure interpreted as "chief" (ariki)
High Confidence
A high-ranking man. It often marks leaders in genealogies (e.g. the ariki Hotu MatuΚ»a in Tablet B's third voyage) and is considered confirmed in context.
Glyph 300 (Woman/Mother)
An anthropomorphic figure denoting a female (vie, māmā)
Moderate Confidence
This sign likely indicates important female persons (for example, a queen or ancestress) in the texts.
Glyph 400 (Child/Offspring)
A small human figure indicating a child or offspring (poki, hua)
Moderate Confidence
It represents descendants in genealogical lists. Our lexicon includes glyph 400 as hua ("offspring") based on such usage.
Glyph 500 (Elder/Ancestor)
A distinguished or aged human figure thought to signify an elder or ancestor
Tentative
This variant (larger or with specific attributes) would mark forefathers or venerable figures.
Glyph 7 (Descendant Group)
An anthropomorphic sign interpreted as "child/descendant" (poki)
High Confidence in Context
Metoro (Bishop Jaussen's 19th-c. informant) explicitly read this glyph as "poki" (child). In Tablet B, it begins the second sequence, representing the party of "young descendants" (the scouts), likely with an implied plural marker for the group.

Celestial and Temporal Glyphs

These glyphs relate to heavenly bodies or time-reckoning, many confirmed by the Mamari lunar calendar (Tablet C):

Glyph 8 (Sun/Star)
A radiating circular symbol identified as "sun" (ra'a) and by extension a star
Confirmed
It signifies the sun in creation chants (e.g. "the sun was born" in the Staff text) and can also denote a star when context requires (Polynesian hetu'u "star").
Glyph 10 (Moon/Month)
A crescent-shaped glyph meaning "moon" or "month" (māhina)
Very High Confidence
In the Mamari tablet's calendar, a series of 29–30 glyph 10 variants correspond to the nights of the lunar month, firmly establishing this interpretation.
Glyph 152 (Full Moon)
An oval glyph with internal markings, identified as the full moon symbol
High Confidence
It appears at the midpoint of Mamari's night sequence (night 15), exactly where the full moon occurs, confirming its meaning. Rapanui metaphor calls the full moon "nuahine kā umu a rangi" ("the old woman lighting the oven in the sky").
Glyph 69 (New Moon/Lizard)
Likely depicts a lizard (moko), associated with the new moon
Moderate Confidence
Barthel noted that the lizard was an incarnation of the god Hiro (who personifies the first night of the moon). Thus glyph 69 is understood as the new moon or its deity, marking the start of the lunar cycle.

Fauna and Natural World Glyphs

Many glyphs depict animals or natural features, often with dual literal and symbolic meanings in myths:

Glyph 12 (Fish)
A fish pictograph meaning "fish" (ika)
High Confidence
It appears literally in contexts like lists of creatures, but also metaphorically as divine names. For example, on the Great Santiago text, glyph 12 "ika" (fish) forms titles like Ika roa ("great fish") referring to the sea-deity Tangaroa.
Glyph 700 (Fish / Victim)
Another fish symbol (elaborate form) also read as ika
Moderate Confidence (Polysemic)
In creation verses it denotes actual fish, while in a war or sacrifice context it can mean "victim" (metaphorically treating a slain person as a "fish"). This polysemy is attested by differing uses across tablets.
Glyph 68 (Turtle)
Depicts a turtle (honu)
High Confidence
In Rapanui tradition, the turtle is associated with the god Rongo, and indeed glyph 68 "honu" (turtle) is used as the name/epithet of a chief deity (Rongo) in a genealogy. This identification is well supported by both Metoro's readings and cross-tablet mythic parallels.
Glyph 606 (Birds, Plural)
A composite sign indicating "birds" in plural (manu)
High Confidence
It is literally the bird glyph combined with the plural hand sign (6), meaning "many birds" or a flock. Fischer famously cited the sequence 606-76-700-8 as "all the birds copulated with the fish; the sun (was born)" in a creation chant.
Glyph 9 (Sand/Beach)
Represents "sand" (one)
High Confidence
It appears, for instance, at the end of the Hau-Maka and Hotu MatuΚ»a voyage sequences to denote Anakena beach (the sandy bay). This context leaves little doubt about its meaning as the term one specifically means the sand or beach.
Glyph 13 (Cave/Tomb)
A symbol interpreted as "cave" or "tomb" (ana, avanga)
High Confidence in Context
In Tablet B's scout expedition sequence, glyph 13 occurs exactly where the legend says a scout was buried in a cave; Metoro identified this glyph with the word "avanga" (cave/tomb) during his chant.

Functional Markers and Abstract Symbols

These glyphs serve grammatical, structural, or abstract purposes rather than naming concrete entities:

Glyph 76 (Procreation Link / "son of")
A distinctive glyph signifying "to copulate/procreate" or genealogical descent
β‰ˆ95% Confidence
It functions as a relational connector between two entities. In creation myths, it literally means "mated with" (as Fischer read it), while in king lists it conveys "begot" or "child of". Glyph 76's extremely high frequency (564 occurrences on the Staff alone) and consistent placement between name glyphs give us high confidence in this interpretation.
Glyph 6 (Plural/Multiple)
A hand-shaped glyph meaning "many" or acting as a plural marker
High Confidence
In Polynesian languages the word for "five" or an outstretched hand (rima) can imply plurality; fittingly, glyph 6 attached to another symbol pluralizes it. For example, bird (glyph 44) + hand (glyph 6) yields birds (glyph 606).
Glyph 32 (Section Delimiter)
A symbol used to mark divisions in the text, equivalent to a chapter or section break
High Confidence Due to Context
On Tablet B (Aruku Kurenga), glyph 32 appears at the start of each of the three repeated voyage sequences, clearly signaling the beginning of a new section or verse. Scribes used this glyph to chunk the narrative, reflecting how oral chants were separated into verses or episodes.
Glyph 610 (Origin/Seed)
A complex glyph often interpreted as an "egg" or seed symbol – essentially origin or genesis
Moderate Confidence
It is thought to represent the concept of birth or the starting point of lineage. For instance, an "egg" glyph could preface a creation sequence. Our lexicon lists 610 as "origin (mata)" meaning source, aligning with the idea of a primordial egg or first cause.

Summary: The lexicon above reflects the current state of our decipherment efforts, where about 30–40 glyphs have reasonably secure meanings and many others remain tentative or unknown. We achieved these interpretations by cross-referencing multiple tablets and aligning glyph sequences with Rapa Nui oral traditions (e.g. lunar calendar names, mythic genealogies, place names). Notably, the once-"impossible" script is now partially readable: we can identify when a text is listing ancestral names linked by "son of" (glyph 76), referencing a lunar phase (glyphs 10 and 152), or narrating a voyage around the island (place glyphs ending in "sand" at Anakena). This comprehensive lexicon – continually refined through internal evidence and external comparison – arms us to tackle the remaining untranslated texts.

Next Steps

Using this lexicon, we will proceed to decipher other tablets with similar methods. Each new tablet (e.g. Mamari Tablet C, the Great Santiago Tablet, etc.) can now be approached with a strong hypothesis bank for glyph meanings. We will scan for familiar patterns (such as genealogical chains, known divine names like Rongo or Tangaroa indicated by animal glyphs, or calendar sequences), and apply the lexicon entries to propose readings. As we validate these glyph meanings across multiple contexts, the interpretations will solidify further. The ultimate goal is coming into view – to fully crack Rongorongo's code – and with each tablet we translate, we are indeed "making history" by illuminating the voice of Rapa Nui's past in its own script. Each confirmation feeds into the lexicon, and each lexicon update, as presented above, brings us closer to reading this unique script in its entirety.

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