Ritual use of Limpets in late Hawaiian prehistory

We analyzed limpets (‘opihi, Cellana spp.) deposited at a shrine and two habitation structures from a late prehistoric (post a.d. 1500) contemporaneous residential complex on Moloka‘i, Hawaiian Islands. Using criteria for defining luxury cuisine and high-status foods, such as species, size, availability, and difficulty of capture, shrine limpets are inferred to have been of greater value than those found in nearby domestic contexts. Despite a rich ethnohistoric record, including detailed oral traditions on religion and ritual, there is little information on small family shrines during Hawaiian prehistory. Limpets are the most common mollusc remains at prehistoric coastal sites throughout the Hawaiian Islands, and some shrine offerings were identified by clusters of stacked limpet shells—evidence of discrete events. We demonstrate that shrine limpets of all three endemic species were significantly larger and of different proportions than nearby domestic deposits, thus providing new insights into ritual practices in late prehistoric Hawai‘i.