1790 Footprints

The 1790 Footprints are a set of footprints found near the Kīlauea volcano in present-day Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the island of Hawaiʻi. Resulting from an unusually explosive eruption, they may be associated with a series of battles in the area in 1790.

The 1782 Battle of Mokuʻōhai gave Kamehameha I control of the west and north sides of the island of Hawaiʻi, but Keōua Kuahuʻula and his uncle Keawemauhili were able to escape. For a few years, while Kamehameha was occupied with Maui and the arrival of Europeans to Kona, Keōua ruled Kaʻū and Keawemauhili ruled Hilo. By 1790, Keawemauhili and Kamehameha had made peace. Keawemauhili aided Kamehameha's invasion of Maui that same year. This cooperation broke an agreement between Keawemauhili and Keōua. Keōua, angered, raided some of the lands of Kamehameha while he was in Maui at the Battle of Kepaniwai. Keōua then attacked and killed his uncle at Hilo. Kamehameha returned from Maui to the Big Island, and Keōua ambushed them in a thick forest of Paʻauhau, but the battle was inconclusive. Kamehameha counterattacked and drove Keōua back, in what is known as the Battle of Koapapaʻa. Kamehameha had brought a cannon salvaged from the ship Fair American captured at Kaʻūpūlehu. Keōua captured the piece, but did not have gunpowder nor expertise to use it effectively. After heavy losses on both sides, the commanders each decided to retreat to their secure territory. The footprints were thought to have been left by Keōua's forces in their retreat. While passing Kīlauea, they made offerings to the goddess Pele and made camp. As the volcano started to erupt, they thought they might have made some offense, so he split his group into three and stayed to make more offerings. Two parties of warriors were overwhelmed by a pyroclastic eruption while crossing the desert. Only one party of three survived the eruption. The footprints were attributed by early geologist Thomas Jaggar to those warriors who were killed in this event. Keōua would be killed later in 1791 at Kawaihae. The Ancient Hawaiians kept elaborate oral histories, but did not accurately count years from the Christian era. One important event in the oral history

Archaeological site data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).