Most people visit Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi to see sights related to the park’s volcanoes, including Halemaʻumaʻu Crater at the top of Kilauea and the various lava flows produced by Kilauea in recent decades. Given the destructive capacity of the recent volcanic activity, the park may seem like an unlikely location for an archaeological site, yet one of the most notable collections of petroglyphs within Polynesia can be found downslope from Kilauea’s summit.

The site, named Puʻuloa (long hill), lies in a lava field that formed between the years 1200 1450. Today, a seemingly barren lava field near an active volcano may not seem like a good place to leave petroglyphs, but the lava at Puʻuloa is actually ideal for it. This lava is a form of rock called pahoehoe, with smooth layers on top and rougher, darker layers underneath, so images pecked into the rock appear very prominently. Additionally, Puʻuloa is located where two ancient Hawaiʻian land divisions (or ahupuaʻa) once met, and such sites on the Big Island were quite common places for people to create petroglyphs.

The site contains over 23,000 petroglyphs. Most of these are small circular holes called puka, that were created after a baby was born. The child’s mother would peck the small hole into the rock, deposit a small segment of the child’s umbilical cord into it, and then cover it with a rock.

However, Puʻuloa features many other geometric designs, particularly circles, as well as depictions of people. Some are drawn as stick figures, others are drawn with triangular torsos, while more are drawn with thicker, heavier lines and filled-in torsos. Uniquely, the site also features a very rare petroglyph of a sea turtle.