Research for Conservation and Restoration of Prehistoric Structures in the Cook Islands.

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Today, in many parts of world, the oral traditions, as well as the physical artifacts of many traditional societies are vanishing. In both cases, once they have been lost, due to "modernization" or "industrialization", there is no possibility for recovery. Once archaeological sites are destroyed, they can not be replaced. Careful consideration should be given to the proper choice of protective measures for these cultural heritages from many thousands years old.In present condition in the Pacific countries, the cultural heritages are getting more important as identity maker. People of the Cook Islands have just started their efforts to find the own history which was for the most part destroyed by the Western impacts, Christianization and industrialization. Our project was made up the plans along with this line by great supporting of the gorernment of the Cook Islands.Most archaeological environments, e. g. Marae house sites and old village sites, have been or are in the process of being … More completely destroyed by agricultural and urban land usage, and their significance from a historical and cultural point of view lost to the Cook Islands people and to the intellectual and scientific world. there is, therefore, a great need to survey some of these historical sites for some future reconstruction works.Our work was carried out at Rarotonga, Pukapuka, Manihiki, Rakahanga, Tongareva, Mangaia, and Aitutaki island. . 4, nd we already published the results of analytical studies on the material from Pukapuka and Mangaia. We also had brief reports on Tongareva, Manihiki and Rakahanga.Rarotonga : After general survey and mapping of archaeological sites in the island, our field research strategy focused on Avana valley area, and excavation works have done on marae, dwelling sites and rock-shelter sites. We also had investigation for the sequence of environmental changes based on the pollen analysis and the diatoms analysis at some swamps in the area. Standard chronological orders of the Rarotongan prehistory are expected to come out from these results.Pukapuka : Archaeological sites on Pukapuka were tentatively classified into three groups :1. Stone monuments, Shrines and other ceremonial sites. 2. Habitation or settlement sites. 3. Burial sites. Artifacts excavated from each location revealed that this area contained the remains of occupations and burial grounds which dated back to 2310 years ago.Tongareva (Penrhyn) : The archaeological sites of Tongareva comprise the marae, turtle oven mounds and the slab-walled structures. One of tridacna shell from Unit. 2 at Tautua has given a carbon-14 date of A. D. 700<plus-minus>75 YearManihiki and Rakahanga : Archaeological survey and excavation was extensively conducted on Manihiki for two years, 1990 and 1991, and also was mainly at Te Kainga on Rakahanga in 1990. The archaeological sites on Manihiki and Rakahanga comprise the Marae, house pavement, graves, oven mounds, and so on. Less