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The rei miro are rich symbols, we have not yet by far exhausted the associations. Fischer informs that it has been suggested the rei miro wooden pendants may have originated when Captain Cook visited the island in 1774:

... Throughout Polynesia, the word rei signifies a neck ornament of some kind, perhaps internationally best known as Hawaii's lei ('flower necklace'). Easter Island's rei miro ('wooden rei') are without parallel in Polynesia.

However, they display a form that is strikingly similar to the silver crescent gorget worn by Cook's Marine Officer Gibson who accompanied Cook on all three voyages, including the one to Rapa Nui in 1774. Such silver crescent gorgets was prescribed dress for a Marine Officer of the British Royal Navy in the second half of the eighteenth century. Rapa Nui's rei miro were attested only after 1774 ...

Clearly the Easter Islanders quickly must have grasped the meaning of the silvery crescent symbol worn by the officer on duty: viz. to identify the man in charge of responsibilities. The form of the moon is the crescent and it is silvery.

However, the possibility must not be ruled out that Rei glyphs appeared before the rei miro pendants. Fischer has stated that Mamari was a tablet certainly created before missionary times, and in Mamari we find Rei glyphs.