Bone fishhook blank from the Waiʻahukini Rockshelter site (H8) on Hawaiʻi Island, excavated by Bishop Museum archaeologists Kenneth P. Emory and Yosihiko Sinoto together with UH archaeologist William Bonk in 1954-1959.

Unfinished bone fishhook from the Puʻu Ali‘i site (H1) on Hawaiʻi Island, excavated by Bishop Museum archaeologists Kenneth P. Emory and Yosihiko Sinoto together with UH archaeologist William Bonk in 1953-1955.

Complete bone fishhook from the Puʻu Aliʻi site (H1) on Hawaiʻi Island, excavated by Bishop Museum archaeologists Kenneth P. Emory and Yosihiko Sinoto together with UH archaeologist William Bonk in 1953-1955.

Ho'omaka Hou Research Initiative Online Fishhook Database

Background Information

The Archaeology Collections housed at Bishop Museum include the largest collection of Hawaiian fishhooks in the world. To learn more about all of the archaeological collections housed at Bishop Museum, click here.

The publicly-accessible online fishhook databases hosted on this page feature over 4,000 fishhooks from three cultural sites in the Ka‘ū District of Hawai‘i Island. These sites were investigated by archaeologists from Bishop Museum and the University of Hawaiʻi, Hilo during the 1950s, and they are the current focus of collections-based research projects at Bishop Museum. These collections continue to hold great potential for teaching us about Hawaiʻi's cultural past.

Please remember that these and other cultural sites are wahi pana, or culturally significant places. If you visit these places, please show respect for them. Do not touch or remove anything that belongs near or around these areas.

Content

Links to Fishhook Databases:

Puʻu Aliʻi

Waiʻahukini Rockshelter

Makalei Rockshelter

Contact Us

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Play the Hoʻomaka Hou Research Initiative Fishhook Memory Game!

Publications

Recent Publications

One Fish, Two Fish, Small Fish, Big Fish: Exploring Changes in the Hawaiian Diet at Wai'ahukini Rockshelter by Kelley Esh, Ka Elele, Summer 2015.

Celebrating Dr. Sinoto's 60 Years with Bishop Museum by Eric Komori, Ka Elele, Fall 2014.

The Ho'omaka Hou Research Initiative by Mara Mulrooney, Ka Elele, Fall 2014.

New Dates from Old Samples: A Revised Radiocarbon Chronology for the Wai‘ahukini Rockshelter Site (H8), Ka‘u District, Hawai‘i Island by Mara Mulrooney, Kelley S. Esh, Mark D. McCoy, Simon H. Bickler, and Yosihiko H. Sinoto, Hawaiian Archaeology Special Publication 4, 2014.

Commentary: Recent Approaches to Digitizing Hawaiian Archaeological Collections at Bishop Museum by Charmaine Wong, Mara Mulrooney, and Summer Moore, Hawaiian Archaeology Special Publication 4, 2014.

Archaeological Reports

Age of the Sites in the South Point Area, Ka'u, Hawaii by Kenneth P. Emory and Yosihiko H. Sinoto, Pacific Anthropological Records No. 8, 1969.

Waiahukini Shelter Site (H8), Ka'u, Hawaii by Kenneth P. Emory, William Bonk, and Yosihiko H. Sinoto, Pacific Anthropological Records No. 8, 1969.

A Revised System for the Classification and Coding of Hawaiian Fishhooks by Yosihiko H. Sinoto, Bishop Museum Occasional Papers, Vol. 31, 1991.

Historical Publications

Historical Background of the South Point Area, Ka'u, Hawaii by Marion Kelly, Pacific Anthropological Records No. 8, 1969.

Majestic Ka'u: Mo'olelo of Nine Ahupua'a by Marion Kelly, Department Report Series 80-2, 1980.

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