MARSHALL ISLANDS STICK CHART. DATE: ca. late 19th to early 20th centuries. MATERIAL: Wood and cowrie shell. DIMENSIONS: 2 feet by 1.8 feet. FOUND: Marshall Islands, Micronesia. The education of a ...

Easy: with sticks and shells. The stick charts of the Marshall Islands, in use since they were first inhabited in the 2 nd century B.C., are simple-seeming navigational tools that look like little ...

But today, Western scientists and the last of the Marshall Islands’ expert navigators are attempting to explain the physics that underlie this ancient art for the first time. As they translate ...

It would be hard to guess, but this arrangement of bamboo sticks and cowrie shells makes up a map of the ocean and the greater Marshall Islands region. (Credit: A.926.1/DMNS) This post originally ...