Visit Necker Island (Mokumanamana), Northwestern Hawaiian Islands

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Necker Island (Mokumanamana) is a small island in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. It is located in the Pacific Ocean, 155 miles (135 nmi; 249 km) northwest of Nihoa and 8 miles (7.0 nmi; 13 km) north of the Tropic of Cancer. It contains important prehistoric archaeological sites of the Hawaiian culture and is part of the Hawaiian Islands National Wildlife Refuge within the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Monument. One of the most sacred islands in the Hawaiian archipelago is Mokumanamana which contains over 52 archaeological sites and the highest concentration of heiau (religious temples/shrines) in Hawaiʻi. The stone structures include paehumu (platforms), paepae (terraces) and manamana (upright markers). Current research by Kānaka scholars is uncovering ancestral knowledge related to celestial alignments, voyaging practices, time calibration and religious ideology. Unique kiʻi pōhaku (stone images), not seen elsewhere in Hawaiʻi, were fabricated on island and once resided within the heiau until their removal in 1893. Mokumanamana is often translated as “branched” or “pinnacled,” which is a suitable description of the island. But many people who have studied its religious and cultural sites suggest that the repetition of the word mana (spiritual power) after the word moku (island) relates to the spiritual significance of the island, given the 33 shrines along its kua (spine) and the Hawaiian axis of life and death that cross directly over it. The name Hā‘ena, defined as “red-hot burning heat,” possibly refers to the intensity of a specific kapu (restriction) or sacredness of the island. Hanakeaumoe, meaning “late night bay,” refers to Shark’s Bay. Hana means “bay” while au refers to a type of movement from one period of time and space to another, and moe implies “to put to rest” or pass on to the afterlife. Together they reference Ke Ala Polohiwa a Kāne or “the Dark Shining Path of Kāne,” often used as a metaphor for the path to the afterlife. Because of the island's usage by Native Hawaiians as a ceremonial and religious site in Ancient Hawaii, the island was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.

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