Rapa Nui - Easter Island | Polynesian Cultural Center Home > Polynesian Culture > Rapa Nui (Easter Island) Easter Island (Rapa Nui) — The Navel of the World Also called Rapa Nui ("Great Rapa") or Te Pito o te Henua ("Navel of the World") by the islanders. About 1,500 years ago the adventurous chief, Hotu Matu'a, led his people to the isolated island of Rapa Nui where they lived in isolation from the rest of Polynesia for many generations. They called their home Te pito o te henua — "the navel [or center] of the world," as the phrase is often translated; however, it can also mean "the end of the land" — which aptly describes the distant map-dot. About a century ago a visiting Tahitian thought the shape of the island reminded him of one of his home islands, Rapa Iti [Small Rapa], and he gave the island its widely known Polynesian name, Rapa Nui [Big Rapa].

Today, while the people there are citizens of Chile, they still share a common Polynesian heritage with their "cousins" throughout the rest of Polynesia. Location Rapa Nui is located about 4,300 miles southeast of Hawai'i (it's actually closer to Antarctica). It is approximately 2,000 miles to the East of Tahiti and approximately 2,200 miles off the coast of Chile, making it one of the most isolated islands in the world. Its nearest neighbor, tiny Pitcairn Island where the mutineers from HMS Bounty and their Polynesian family and friends settled in 1790, is over 1,200 miles away. -return to top- Geography Rapa Nui, or Easter Island, is a small volcanic island that encompasses about 67 square miles of land mass, and at its highest point rises to about 1,700 feet. According to research and oral traditions, it was once covered with trees, which have since all been cut down, possibly to aid in the construction and transportation of the almost 900 moai or stone monuments. The main community is located at Hanga Roa ('Great Bay').

Thanks to the U.S. space program, NASA extended an existing runway into a full-length airstrip capable of handling an emergency landing of the space shuttle. Today, Lan Chile, the official carrier of Chile, provides regularly scheduled commercial air service to Rapa Nui. Population Just under 3,000 people live on Rapa Nui today, most of them Polynesians. Like many of the other Pacific islands during the 18th through early 20th centuries, European diseases and indentured labor practices decimated the population. For example, as many as 5,000 islanders were carried away to work in Peru, and only a few ever returned. About 1875, 500 more were taken to work the sugar plantations in Tahiti, where a small number of Easter Islanders remain to this day. At one point in the early 1900s there were only 111 Rapa Nui people left on the island; and while the slowly growing population has managed to hang on to much of their Polynesian culture, a great deal was also lost forever.

For example, the people of Rapa Nui may have been the only Polynesians to have something akin to a writing system in the form of their rongorongo tablets, a few samples of which have survived to present times in widespread museums. The ability to translate them, however, seems to have been lost forever. History and Discovery As with all other Polynesian people, the islanders of Rapa Nui left no written history, but anthropologists believe they came from the area now called French Polynesia about 1,600 years ago. There is no indication of other subsequent contact with Polynesia; but some anthropologists believe there was also contact with or from South America because of the stone moai — which they believe could reflect Incan or Meso-American influence, as well as sweet potatoes — which botanists have proved came from the Americas. Oral tradition says the years between Hotu Matu'a and first contact with the western world were filled with growth to a population as large as 10,000, as well as the creation of the moai, but also with civil warfare, cannibalism and the complete deforestation of the land.

Dutch admiral Jacob Roggeveen came upon Rapa Nui on Easter Sunday, 1722, hence the English name Easter Island. Rapa Nui is also known by its Spanish name, Isla de Pascua, which is the transliteration of the English name. Rampant inter-clan warfare began within a few decades of this contact, and resulted in all of the moai being toppled by 1864. British explorer Capt. James Cook came in 1774. Other explorers followed — all of whom marveled at the stone moai. In 1888 Chile annexed the island, which remains a territory of that nation to this day. In the 1950s the famous anthropologist Thor Heyerdahl, whose successful rafting voyage from Peru to Tahiti a few years earlier suggested a connection between South America and Polynesia, came to Rapa Nui to study and excavate the moai. His visit probably spurred subsequent efforts to restore some of the ahu platforms and the moai to their upright positions. The work continues to this day, with a number of Rapa people involved.

For example, Sergio Rapu, a former governor of the island who previously worked at the Polynesian Cultural Center, has done extensive archeological and anthropological research on his homeland. Languages Rapa Nui and Spanish (and limited English). The Rapa Nui language is very similar to other Polynesian languages, particularly Tahitian. The Rapa greeting word, Iorana, for example, is nearly identical to Tahiti's greeting. You'll also notice that the Rapa word for house, hare, is similar to the Tahitian fare [pronounce both syllables]. -return to top- Rapa Nui Moai Since they came to the attention of the outside world, the moai have captured the fascination of everyone who sees them. These stone statues range from just a few feet high to almost 80 feet high, and are made from scoria — or hardened volcanic ash. Unfortunately, scoria is not very durable, and ongoing conservation of the existing moai is a major concern. In all, the islanders created almost 900 statues, although the majority of those were never transported or erected on ahu platforms, or even finished.

Many theories have been put forth about why they were carved and how people without sophisticated machinery could move the heavy megaliths. One island tradition says those moai that were eventually set up on ahu platforms facing the ocean "walked" there. Those with more of an engineering orientation say this is feasible, suggesting the people may have used a series of long ropes and log rollers to tip a moai a little toward one side and then pivot it forward on the resting point, much as one person can move a heavy object by rocking it forward without having to pick it up. This and similar theories also suggest that all of the trees on the island were eventually cut down to provide the log rollers. Another widely publicized author at one time suggested extraterrestrial beings were somehow involved in the process. But most of the islanders, including the four carvers who came to the Polynesian Cultural Center to create the ones here, today believe the moai represent their ancestors. They point to the fact that no two moai were or are carved the same. The carvers also believe the capstones, usually made from reddish scoria rock, represent their ancestors' hair or top-knots.

Asked why one of the moai at the Cultural Center's Ahu Tu'u Koihu doesn't have "hair," the lead carver responded (through a translator), "He was bald." The carvers told how they each dived and brought pieces of white coral and dark scoria with them to Hawai'i to make the "eyes" for the moai; and after they placed these eyes into the sockets they had carved, then the moai were no longer "blind," but now "could see. The eyes give life to the moai and, therefore, to the people who were [traditionally] buried under the ahu." The carvers also explained that moai were erected on an ahu platform, which is where their ancient ancestors buried their ariki or high chiefs. "Today, we interpret these moai as sculptures of particular ariki who were buried in this ahu.

In the Rapa Nui culture when a high chief passed away, the family or perhaps the wife, would make a moai representing the person buried in the ahu." Finally, the four carvers said, "Although this ahu is a partial replica of Ahu Nau Nau in Rapa Nui, we have chosen to give it the name Ahu Tu'u Koihu. Tu'u Koihu was an ancient ariki [high chief] from Rapa Nui who initiated the art of carving moai." -return to top- Interesting Facts: Since it was not practical to import scoria from Rapa Nui, or prudent because that volcanic slag is not very durable, the Rapa Nui carvers who came to the Polynesian Cultural Center worked with local engineers and a cement factory to create a cement-like compound they felt was similar to the stones they were used to carving. The carvers then used traditional toki or adzes as well as modern steel chisels, hammers, and even jackhammers to shape the ma'ea or stone into moai.

Easter Island Easter Island The Moai statues of Easter Island (Rapa Nui) One of the world's most famous yet least visited archaeological sites, Easter Island is a small, hilly, now treeless island of volcanic origin. Located in the Pacific Ocean at 27 degrees south of the equator and some 2200 miles (3600 kilometers) off the coast of Chile, it is considered to be the world’s most remote inhabited island. Sixty-three square miles in size and with three extinct volcanoes (the tallest rising to 1674 feet), the island is, technically speaking, a single massive volcano rising over ten thousand feet from the Pacific Ocean floor. The oldest known traditional name of the island is Te Pito o Te Henua, meaning ‘The Center (or Navel) of the World.’ In the 1860’s Tahitian sailors gave the island the name Rapa Nui, meaning ‘Great Rapa,’ due to its resemblance to another island in Polynesia called Rapa Iti, meaning ‘Little Rapa’.

The island received its most well known current name, Easter Island, from the Dutch sea captain Jacob Roggeveen who became the first European to visit Easter Sunday, April 5, 1722. In the early 1950s, the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl (famous for his Kon-Tiki and Ra raft voyages across the oceans) popularized the idea that the island had been originally settled by advanced societies of Indians from the coast of South America. Extensive archaeological, ethnographic and linguistic research has conclusively shown this hypothesis to be inaccurate. It is now considered likely that the original inhabitants of Easter Island are of Polynesian stock (DNA extracts from skeletons have confirmed this), that they most probably came from the Marquesas or Society islands, and that they arrived as early as 318 AD (carbon dating of reeds from a grave confirms this). It is estimated that the original colonists, who may have been lost at sea, arrived in only a few canoes and numbered fewer than 100.

At the time of their arrival, much of the island was forested, was teeming with land birds, and was perhaps the most productive breeding site for seabirds in the Polynesia region. Because of the plentiful bird, fish and plant food sources, the human population grew and gave rise to a rich religious and artistic culture. That culture's most famous features are its enormous stone statues called moai, at least 288 of which once stood upon massive stone platforms called ahu. There are some 250 of these ahu platforms spaced approximately one half mile apart and creating an almost unbroken line around the perimeter of the island. Another 600 moai statues, in various stages of completion, are scattered around the island, either in quarries or along ancient roads between the quarries and the coastal areas where the statues were most often erected. Nearly all the moai are carved from the tough stone of the Rano Raraku volcano. The average statue is 14 feet, 6 inches tall and weighs 14 tons.

Some moai were as large as 33 feet and weighed more than 80 tons (one statue only partially quarried from the bedrock was 65 feet long and would have weighed an estimated 270 tons). Depending upon the size of the statues, it has been estimated that between 50 and 150 people were needed to drag them across the countryside on sleds and rollers made from the island's trees. Moai statues, Easter Island The Paschalococos disperta and the Saphora toromiro were once the island’s most bountiful trees and sediment samples dating from 200 AD indicate an abundance of pollen from both trees in the island biota at that time. The Paschalococos disperta bear a striking resemblance to the still-surviving Jubaea chilensis, the Chilean wine palm, which grows up eighty feet tall and six feet in diameter. Thus the Paschalococos disperta palm tree trunks are the most probable candidates for the solution to the transportation of the enormous moai from their carving location at the Rano Raraku volcano to the many locations where they were erected around the island.

These trees were also important to the islanders for fuel and for the construction of houses and ocean-fishing canoes. The moai and ahu were in use as early as AD 500, the majority were carved and erected between AD 1000 and 1650, and they were still standing when Jacob Roggeveen visited the island in 1722. Recent research has shown that certain statue sites, particularly the most important ones with great ahu platforms, were periodically ritually dismantled and reassembled with ever-larger statues. A small number of the moai were once capped with ‘crowns’ or ‘hats’ of red volcanic stone. The meaning and purpose of these capstones is not known, but archaeologists have suggested that the moai thus marked were of pan-island ritual significance or perhaps sacred to a particular clan. Scholars are unable to definitively explain the function and use of the moai statues. It is assumed that their carving and erection derived from an idea rooted in similar practices found elsewhere in Polynesia but which evolved in a unique way on Easter Island.

Archaeological and iconographic analysis indicates that the statue cult was based on an ideology of male, lineage-based authority incorporating anthropomorphic symbolism. The statues were thus symbols of authority and power, both religious and political. But they were not only symbols. To the people who erected and used them, they were actual repositories of sacred spirit. Carved stone and wooden objects in ancient Polynesian religions, when properly fashioned and ritually prepared, were believed to be charged by a magical spiritual essence called mana. The ahu platforms of Easter Island were the sanctuaries of the people of Rapa Nui, and the moai statues were the ritually charged sacred objects of those sanctuaries. While the statues have been toppled and re-erected over the centuries, the mana or spiritual presence of Rapa Nui is still strongly present at the ahu sites and atop the sacred volcanoes. Mystery surrounds the purpose of the ahu platforms and moai statues but even more perplexing mysteries have begun to surface from the research of scholars outside the boundaries of conventional archaeology. As previously mentioned, orthodox archaeologists hypothesize that Easter Island was initially settled sometime around 320 AD by a small group of Polynesians lost on the open sea.

Other scholars, however, have suggested that the tiny island may once have been part of a larger island whose original discovery and use may be several thousands of years earlier in time (it is known, for example, that Melanesians were journeying around the Pacific in boats as early as 5500 BC). Three researchers in particular, Graham Hancock, Colin Wilson and Rand Flem-Ath, believe that Easter Island was an important node in a global grid of sacred geography that predates the great floods of archaic times. Easter Island, writes Graham Hancock, is “part of a massive subterranean escarpment called the East Pacific Rise, which reaches almost to the surface at several points. Twelve thousand years ago, when the great ice cap of the last glaciation was still largely unmelted, and sea-level was 100 meters lower than it is today, the Rise would have formed a chain of steep and narrow antediluvian islands, as long as the Andes mountain range.” At that time, the land we now call Easter Island would simply have been the highest peak of a much larger island.

Humans were traveling in these areas at that time and so might have settled at various places, including what is now the island of Easter Island. Besides its more well known name of Rapa Nui, Easter Island is also known as Te-Pito-O-Te-Henua, meaning ‘The Navel of the World’, and as Mata-Ki-Te-Rani, meaning ‘Eyes Looking at Heaven’. These ancient names, and a host of mythological details ignored by mainstream archaeologists, point to the possibility that the remote island may once have been a geodetic marker and the site of an astronomical observatory of a long forgotten civilization. Speculations about this shadowy antediluvian culture include the notion that its mariners had charted the world’s oceans, that its astronomers had sophisticated knowledge of long-term astronomical cycles such as precession and cometary orbits, and that its historians had records of previous global cataclysms and the destruction they caused of even more ancient civilizations. In his book, Heaven’s Mirror, Hancock suggests that Easter Island may once have been a significant scientific outpost of this antediluvian civilization and that its location had extreme importance in a planet-spanning, mathematically precise grid of sacred sites.

He writes, “The very existence of such an ancient world grid has been staunchly resisted by mainstream archaeologists and historians – as, of course, have all attempts to relate known sites to it. Nevertheless, the definite traces of lost astronomical knowledge that are to be seen on Easter Island, and the recurrent echoes of ancient Egyptian spiritual and cosmological themes, cast doubt on the scholarly explanation that the odd name ‘Navel of the World’ was adopted for purely ‘poetic and descriptive’ reasons. We suspect that Te-Pito-O-Te-Henua may originally have been selected for settlement, and given its name, entirely because of its geodetic location.” “What we are suggesting therefore is that Easter Island might have originally have been settled in order to serve as a sort of geodetic beacon, or marker – fulfilling some as yet unguessed at function in an ancient global system of sky-ground co-ordinates that linked many so-called ‘world navels’”. Two other alternative scholars, Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas, have extensively studied the location and possible function of these geodetic markers.

In their fascinating book, Uriel’s Machine, they suggest that one purpose of the geodetic markers was as part of a global network of sophisticated astronomical observatories dedicated to predicting and preparing for future cometary impacts and crustal displacement cataclysms. The great floods of archaic myths did not result from the melting of the ice caps between 13,000 and 8000 BC but rather from two great cataclysms that were caused by cosmic and cometary objects affecting the entire planet. These cataclysms were 1) the pass-by of an enormous, perhaps moon-sized cosmic object and an ensuing planet-wide crustal displacement in 9600 BC, and 2) the seven cometary impacts of 7640 BC which resulted in the massive waves (3-5 miles high, traveling at over 400 miles per hour for distances of more than 2000 miles), volcanic activity and other terrestrial and climatological events recorded in myths all across the planet. Prior to these cataclysmic events however, in what is commonly called the late Paleolithic era, a maritime civilization may have existed with cities situated along coastlines that are now submerged beneath the seas.

Moai statues, Easter Island The decline of culture on Easter Island In the past few decades various theories have been suggested for the rapid decline of Easter Island’s remarkable culture. Jared Diamond in his excellent book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive explains that a few centuries after Easter Island’s initial colonization the resource needs of the growing population had begun to outpace the island's capacity to renew itself ecologically. By the 1400s, the forests had been entirely cut, the rich ground cover had eroded away, the springs had dried up, and the vast flocks of birds coming to roost on the island had disappeared. With no logs to build the canoes necessary for offshore fishing, with depleted bird and wildlife food sources, and with declining crop yields because of the erosion of good soil, the nutritional intake of the people plummeted. First famine, then cannibalism, set in. Because the island could no longer feed the chiefs, bureaucrats and priests who kept the complex society running, the resulting chaos triggered a social and cultural collapse.

By 1700 the population dropped to between one-quarter and one-tenth of its former number, and many of the statues were toppled during supposed “clan wars” of the 1600 and 1700’s. This all happened before the Europeans came. After they came, things got even worse. To fully understand the tremendous social devastation that occurred on Easter Island it is vital to recognize that it was a consequence of two separate matters: the pre-European environmental degradation and ensuing cultural collapse and the inhumane behavior of many of the first European visitors, particularly the slavers who raped and murdered the islanders, introduced small pox and other diseases, and brutally removed the natives to mainland South America. Readers interested in more detailed information concerning the causes of Easter Island’s ecological devastation, its so-called civil war, and the genocide caused by European slavers will appreciate the article, From Genocide to Ecocide: The Rape of Rapa Nui , written by Benny Peiser. Recent research: New findings indicate that Native Americans had visited Easter Island before Columbus sailed to the Americas.

The study, Genome-wide Ancestry Patterns in Rapanui Suggest Pre-European Admixture with Native Americans, was conducted by a team of geneticists from the Natural History Museum of Denmark and published in the journal Current Biology on November 3, 2014. The scientists analyzed genetic markers for 27 native Rapanui (Easter Islanders) and determined that 10 percent of their genetic admixture came from American Indians, while 75 percent was Polynesian and 15 percent was European. The study’s co-authors, Eske Willerslev and Anna-Sapfo Malaspina, argue that this evidence supports the possibility of Native American contact prior to the European ‘discovery’ of the island in AD 1722, in particular that interbreeding between the Rapa Nui and native people in South America occurred roughly between 1300 and 1500, or 19 to 23 generations ago. Another interesting matter is that recent studies of the DNA of sweet potatoes appear to confirm that the Polynesians had cultivated it before contact with Europeans, strong evidence of American Indian-Polynesian contact.

A 2013 study by a French team, led by Caroline Roullier and Vincent Lebot, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, analyzed the DNA of sweet potatoes collected during the voyages of James Cook (who sailed the Pacific in the years 1768-1779). Using these early and thus uncontaminated specimens, the researchers argued that their “results provide strong support for prehistoric transfer(s) of sweet potato from South America (Peru-Ecuador region) into Polynesia.” Easter Island | travelArt Easter Island Home / Packages & Daytrips / Easter Island Easter Island Easter Island, known to its native Polynesian inhabitants as Rapa Nui, lies in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. At about 3.800 km from the mainland and 4.200 km from Tahiti, Easter Island is the most remote place on earth. The island has a triangular shape, with the cone of an extinct volcano at each of its three points. Despite its small size – not measuring even 25 km in length or breadth – and its centuries-long isolation from the rest of the world, Easter Island nevertheless has a rich heritage of history, art and culture.

In fact, the entire island seems to be an open-air museum, with nearly 1000 “moai” (statues), cult sites, and ancient cave dwellings open to the public. A large part of Easter Island is protected as Rapa Nui National Park, which was established in 1935, and which, like Valparaíso, is listed as a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site. Our Tours 10 Most Remote and Remarkable Inhabited Islands - WebEcoist 10 Most Remote and Remarkable Inhabited Islands by Ecoist From islands populated by the descendants of mutineers to islands so tiny their inhabitants reside in boats nearby, the world is studded with thousands of beautiful islands that are remote, rare, and unique. Here are ten remarkable examples of breathtaking atolls, islands within lakes within islands, and other captivating and unusual islands that humans have managed to call home without using a house boat . Tristan da Cunha: Most Remote Island on Earth (Images via Google Maps ) The most remote inhabited island group in the world, Tristan de Cunha in the southern Atlantic Ocean, is so tiny its main island has no airstrip.

Home to 272 people sharing just 8 surnames, inhabitants suffer from hereditary complaints like asthma and glaucoma. Annexed by the United Kingdom in the 1800s, the island’s inhabitants have a British postal code and, while they can order things online, it takes a very long time for their orders to arrive. But then, that’s the trade off for having your own island settlement some 2,000 miles from the nearest continent. Vulcan Point: Island in a Lake in an Island in a Lake in an Island in a… (Images via elbruz and Google Maps ) Winning the M.C. Escher award for geography, the Vulcan Point of the Philippines is a popular tourist destination. Located on the island of Luzon, it’s actually an active volcano ( Taal Volcano ). This gives Vulcan Point the distinction of not only being an island in a lake on an island, but a volcano in a lake on a volcano. Spread the word…if you can keep it straight. Isola Tiberina (Images via diario di bordo and Google Maps ) Isola Tiberina is the only island in the Tiber River, which runs through Rome.

This tiny island (or ait ) is rich in legend. One myth holds that the island rose out of the river after the locals threw the tyrant Tarquinius Superbus into the Tiber in revolt. Since 293 B.C.E. at least, the island has been alternatively considered a place of healing and divine power (the Greeks built a temple) and darkness (for a time in the Middle Ages it was the holding place of criminals and other undesirables. Remnants of basilicas, monuments and a modern obelisk all can be seen on this tiny boat-shaped island accessible by two small bridges. Nauru (Images via Republic of Nauru and Google Maps ) From WebUrbanist : “ Nauru is the smallest independent island country in the world. This Pacific island is only 8 square miles, and is the third smallest country in the world next to Monaco and Vatican City. Once its natural reserves of phosphate were depleted, this once-rich island nation first became a haven for money laundering and then had to seek aid from Australia.

The island has since become a way station for asylum seekers looking to enter the land Down Under.” Foula (Images via birdguides , wikipedia and Google Maps ) Foula is the most remote British island to be inhabited year round. Part of the Shetlands, the 30 residents cling to the coast and make a living from wool production and a little fishing. Originally settled by Norsemen in the 800s C.E., the Scots colonized the island in the 1500s, but the culture is still strongly Nordic. Easter Island (Images via sacredsites , bugbog , intute and Google Maps ) This famous and remote Polynesian island in the Southern Pacific (just “off” the coast of Chile by 2,200-odd miles) is home to some of the most mysterious carvings on earth. Through famines, wars, disasters, epidemics, the inhabitants of one of the world’s most remote islands are famous to many, and Rapa Nui (the true name of Easter Island) is a popular tourist destination.

There is disagreement about when it was settled (estimates range from 200-1200 C.E.) but the numerous dramatic events threatening the population – such as mass abductions that wiped out half the population in the 1800s – have made a permanent mark on history. Pitcairn Island (Images via travelimages , lizasreef , oceandots and Google Maps ) The Pitcairn Islands are famous for being the home of the descendants of the mutineers of the notorious ship Bounty. Though not its own country, it is a sovereign jurisdiction. It’s also the tiniest one on earth, with only 48 residents from 9 original families. The culture was once famously strict and religious, but now the social rules have loosened a bit (alcohol is consumed) and only 8 residents attend church. Surin (Images via alternativeculture , Twip and Google Maps ) The Surin Islands off of Thailand are so undeveloped and relatively remote, sea gypsies (the only full time inhabitants) reside in boats in the waters surrounding the two biggest islands.

However, the North and South islands, which are divided by a small channel, are popular during parts of the year as camping and diving destinations for tourists. Suwarrow (Images via cookislands , wikipedia , ntlworld and Axel ) The Suwarrow Atoll, part of the Cook Islands, was only temporarily inhabited. It’s been sporadically visited (and named) by different European and Russian explorers, but it was the New Zealand hermit Tom Neale who finally took up residence, for 15 years, in the 1950s. He wrote a book about the experience, but the Suwarrow is actually more famous as an actual Treasure Island. Many chests of gold coins and other treasure have been found throughout the centuries at Suwarrow. An Island of Your Own? Perhaps after seeing all these islands people call home, you’re thinking of taking up residence on your own patch of sand or rocky outcrop. Keep it convenient and rent out Singer Castle on Dark Island . No, it’s not remote (perfect for those commutes to the city for work), but it’s certainly unusual. From WebUrbanist : “The island sits in the St. Lawrence river between Ontario, Canada and New York, USA.

Dark Island isn’t known for its tropical jungle or white sand beaches. The real gem is the 100 year old castle on the island. It was originally built in 1905 as a hunting lodge family retreat by Fredrick Bourne (Then president of the Singer Sewing Machine Company). With towers and secret passages abounding you could literally be your own King of the Castle. The island would be a great getaway from the hustle and bustle, and is still only a short helicopter ride away from New York or Toronto, but it is currently only available for rent. Price: Available upon request – for rent.” Easter Island - Facts & Summary - HISTORY.com Google Early Settlement The first human inhabitants of Rapa Nui (the Polynesian name for Easter Island; its Spanish name is Isla de Pascua) are believed to have arrived in an organized party of emigrants around 300-400 A.D. Tradition holds that the first king of Rapa Nui was Hoto-Matua, a ruler from a Polynesian subgroup (possibly from the Marquesa Islands) whose ship traveled thousands of miles before landing at Anakena, one of the few sandy beaches on the island’s rocky coast.

Did You Know? After the decline of the moai culture, a new cult of bird worship developed on Easter Island. It was centered on a ceremonial village called Orongo, built on the rim of the crater of the Rano Kao volcano. The greatest evidence for the rich culture developed by the original settlers of Rapa Nui and their descendants is the existence of nearly 900 giant stone statues that have been found in diverse locations around the island. Averaging 13 feet (4 meters) high, with a weight of 13 tons, these enormous stone busts–known as moai–were carved out of tuff (the light, porous rock formed by consolidated volcanic ash) and placed atop ceremonial stone platforms called ahus. It is still unknown precisely why these statues were constructed in such numbers and on such a scale, or how they were moved around the island. Phases of Island Culture Archaeological excavations of Easter Island reveal three distinct cultural phases: the early period (700-850 A.D.), the middle period (1050-1680) and the late period (post-1680).

Between the early and middle periods, evidence has shown that many early statues were deliberately destroyed and rebuilt as the larger and heavier moai for which the island is most famous. During the middle period, ahus also contained burial chambers, and the images portrayed by moai are thought to have represented important figures that were deified after death. The biggest statue found dating to the middle period measures about 32 feet tall, and consists of a single block weighing about 82 tons (74,500 kilograms). The late period of the island’s civilization was characterized by civil wars and general destruction; more statues were toppled, and many mataa, or obsidian spearpoints, have been found dating to that period. Island tradition claims that around 1680, after peacefully coexisting for many years, one of the island’s two main ethnic groups, known as the Short-Ears, rebelled against the Long-Ears, burning many of them to death on a pyre constructed along an ancient ditch at Poike, on the island’s far northeastern coast. Outsiders on Easter Island The first known European visitor to Easter Island was the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, who arrived in 1722.

The Dutch named the island Paaseiland (Easter Island) to commemorate the day they arrived. In 1770, the Spanish viceroy of Peru sent an expedition to the island; the explorers spent four days ashore and estimated a native population of some 3,000 people. Just four years later, the British navigator Sir James Cook arrived to find Easter Island’s population decimated by what seemed to have been a civil war, with only 600 to 700 men and fewer than 30 women remaining. A French navigator, Jean-Francois de Galaup, comte de La Perouse, found 2,000 people on the island when he arrived in 1786. A major slave raid from Peru in 1862, followed by epidemics of smallpox, reduced the population to only 111 people by 1877. By that time, Catholic missionaries had settled on Easter Island and begun to convert the population to Christianity, a process that was completed by the late 19th century. In 1888, Chile annexed Easter Island, leasing much of the land for sheep raising.

The Chilean government appointed a civilian governor for Easter Island in 1965, and the island’s residents became full Chilean citizens. Easter Island Today An isolated triangle measuring 14 miles long by seven miles wide, Easter Island was formed by a series of volcanic eruptions. In addition to its hilly terrain, the island contains many subterranean caves with corridors that extend deep into mountains of volcanic rock. The island’s largest volcano is known as Rano Kao, and its highest point is Mount Terevaka, which reaches 1,969 feet (600 meters) above sea level. It has a subtropical climate (sunny and dry) and temperate weather. Easter Island boasts no natural harbor, but ships can anchor off Hanga Roa on the west coast; it is the island’s largest village, with a population of roughly 3,300. In 1995, UNESCO named Easter Island a World Heritage site. It is now home to a mixed population, mostly of Polynesian ancestry and made up of the descendants of the Long-Ears and Short-Ears. Spanish is generally spoken, and the island has developed an economy largely based on tourism.

Tags Easter Island has its iconic stone heads, but no forests and little farmland. What happened? - latimes June 20, 2012 |By Thomas H. Maugh II Volunteers "walk" an imitation stone head on Easter Island… (Sheela Sharma ) Most everyone is familiar with the enigmatic stone heads of Easter Island, the massive carved rocks that sit on stone platforms on the coast and lie scattered across the landscape. The heads, called moai, and a small native population are virtually all that is left of the Polynesian civilization that once flourished on the island. The once-lush forests that covered the 63-square-mile island, known to its inhabitants as Rapa Nui, have all been lost and the fertile soil that once supported a vital farming community has been blown away by tradewinds. Something else has been left behind: two great mysteries. How did the islanders manage to transfer the massive heads, some weighing as much as 80 tons, from the quarries to the shore, and what happened to the forests? This month's National Geographic magazine examines the two competing theories for each of those questions.

UCLA anthropologist Jared Diamond famously detailed what the called the "ecocide" of Rapa Nui in his 2005 book "Collapse." When Polynesians first settled the island about AD 800, they had the misfortune to select one that was dry, cool and remote -- and thus poorly fertilized by windblown dust or volcanic ash. They chopped down forests to provide wood for construction and for moving the moai, and the trees didn't return. The denuded landscape allowed winds to blow off the topsoil, and fertility fell sharply. When the natives no longer had wood for building fishing canoes, they killed and ate all the birds. Before the Dutch arrived at the island on Easter Sunday in 1722, the population had descended into cannibalism and barbarity. Diamond called it "the clearest example of a society that destroyed itself by over-exploiting its own resources." But archaeologists Carl Lipo of Cal State Long Beach and Terry Hunt of the University of Hawaii have a different take on the events based on more recent research. They agree that the island was an ecological disaster, but argue that the inhabitants share a smaller portion of the blame.

Their research indicates that the Polynesian settlers did not arrive at Rapa Nui until about AD 1200, which would not leave nearly enough time to devastate the forests solely by slashing and burning. Unfortunately, the settlers brought Polynesian rats with them. The first inhabitants dined on the rats, but the animals had no other natural predators and overran the island. Buried nuts from the extinct Easter Island palms show distinctive teethmarks from the rats. They probably also ate birds' eggs. With the rats eating the palm nuts, the trees could not be reseeded naturally, Lipo and Hunt argue in their recent book, "The Statues That Walked," and the forests disappeared. The stone for the moai came from a quarry at Rano Raraku, the island's southeastern (extinct) volcano, several miles from the coast. Diamond and others have argued that the inhabitants put the moai on wooden sledges and dragged them to the shore on wooden rails -- an effort that would have required both large amounts of labor and massive quantities of wood.

Last year, however, Hunt and Lipo showed that the stones could be "walked" by as few as 18 people with ropes by tilting them back and forth on their bases. That version jibes well with the islanders' own mythology, which claims that the moai walked across the island. The island is now a part of Chile and its 5,000 inhabitants are vastly outnumbered by the 50,000 tourists who visit each year. All food, fuel and other necessities have to be flown or shipped in, and water supplies are growing scarce. Residents worry about the future and how long the economy can survive in its present condition. The past is grim. The future might be grimmer. A documentary about the island will appear on "Nova" in November. LATimesScience@gmail.com Easter Island, Chile – Rapa Nui | don Quijote Read the Spanish version Just 25 square miles in area and 1242 miles from the nearest population center, which happens to be in western Chile, the tiny, triangular-shaped Easter Island is one of the most remote places in the world.

Despite its isolated location in the South Pacific Ocean, incredibly, this island is home to 5000 inhabitants. What makes this island unique is the mystery that surrounds this island and makes historians and tourists alike who wonder how the first settlers could have ever stumbled across such a distant and extremely small land mass. Equally mysterious are the other “inhabitants” of the island— the monumental, monolithic head-and-torso moai statues—who capture, in all their enigmatic glory, the attention of the island’s visitors. Rapa Nui Known also as Rapa Nui, or Isla de la Pascua in Spanish, Easter Island got its name when early 18th Century Dutch explorer, Jacob Roggeveen, landed on this Polynesian island on Easter Sunday and therefore chose to commemorate his day of discovery by giving it the name of this holiday. Despite the ever-growing influences of globalization, the Rapa Nui people continue to speak their own language, also called Rapa Nui, in addition to Spanish given that, although distant, the island is considered a “special territory” of Chile.

Although there remains uncertainty regarding the exact time when the first settlers arrived and the origin of their extensive journey, most historians agree that it was around 700 AD that an organized group of emigrants travelling in wooden canoes arrived from East Polynesia unbelievably battling past the Pacific Ocean’s immense waves to safely arrive to the shores of their new home. Clearly gifted when it came to creating innovative architectural structures, the Rapa Nui made their mark with the raising of the giant moai around the island. For six hundred years from the 10th to 16th centuries, almost 900 moai statues were erected. These figures deified important deceased family members from the close-knit island community. While the centuries that followed were certainly less peaceful for Easter Island’s Polynesian descendants with the arrival of famines, civil war, slave raids, epidemics, colonialists and near deforestation; the Rapa Nui have resisted these multiple threats to their culture and still celebrate many of their long-held traditions today.

By keeping alive their rare language, their polytheistic religion and their annual Tapati Rapa Nui festival, the island’s native inhabitants demonstrate their pride of their unique past and strive to preserve their customs long into the future. As for Easter Island’s striking geographical landscape, visitors are treated to the sights of three colossal, extinct volcanoes that have been fused together and which give the island its distinctive triangular shape. The dramatic coastline of black lava rock and steep cliff faces contrasts with the beautiful, palm-lined white sand beach of Anakena. In fact, it is the island’s coast which is particularly appealing to the adventurous tourist. Thanks to its beautifully clear waters and exceptionally powerful waves, the island has gained worldwide fame among scuba diving and surfing enthusiasts. For those energetic tourists who prefer land based activities, the island boasts a multitude of hiking, mountain bike and horse riding opportunities. With its enthralling statues, spectacular landscapes and wide-ranging sporting activities, Easter Island is a hidden trove of archeological treasures and recreational options which makes the long journey there worth every minute.

Contact us Easter Island Civilization Not Destroyed by War, New Evidence Shows Easter Island Civilization Not Destroyed by War, New Evidence Shows Knvul Sheikh Pin it Share Thousands of small, sharp, spearlike objects scattered throughout Easter Island have long been presumed to be evidence of massive warfare that led to the demise of its ancient civilization. But new evidence from archaeological investigations suggests that these objects, called mata'a, were not used as weapons at all. Easter Island is a tiny landmass located about 2,300 miles (3,700 kilometers) off the coast of Chile. The remote volcanic island, also known as Rapa Nui , has been at the center of fierce debates in both academia and popular culture. Polynesians first arrived on the island in the 13th century, and Rapa Nui’s early inhabitants were famous for the enormous stone statues (called moai) that they built and placed on the coastline. More than 900 of these majestic statues were found on the island — so many that scholars have argued that there must have been tens of thousands of residents on Easter Island at one point — but so far, scientists and historians have not been able to agree on what caused the collapse of its society.

[ Image Gallery: The Walking Statues of Easter Island ] Popular belief held that massive internal warfare led to the population’s catastrophic collapse . This grim outcome became a cautionary tale of the overuse of limited resources and eventual self-destruction. But, in the past decade or so, this understanding has been challenged by archaeologists whose research points to a different story — in which disease and slavery introduced by Europeans were the more likely cause of the Polynesian society’s decline. By carefully examining more than 400 mata'a, collecting photographs and analyzing their shape using a technique known as morphometric analysis, researchers have added new evidence to this line of thinking. “The mata'a have lots of different shapes,” said lead study author Carl Lipo, an anthropologist at Binghamton University in New York. “Some of them are roundish, some of them are square and some are kind of triangular.” The mata'a would not have made good weapons, Lipo said. For one, they are not sharp, and not all of the mata'a are pointed. They are also too thick and asymmetrical for piercing lethal wounds, and the wear patterns on these objects suggest that they were used to scrape and cut things, rather than puncture vital organs, he said.

Moreover, other evidence of systemic warfare on the island is mysteriously absent, according to the researchers. For instance, archaeological digs on Easter Island have not uncovered traces of lethal skull trauma, severed limbs or mass graves, Lipo said. Nor did scientists find defensive fortlike structures common on other islands in the Pacific with a history of warfare , such as Fiji and New Zealand. “There’s no question that there’s going to be competition on the island,” Lipo told Live Science. “It is an island with finite resources. But the interesting thing is that it doesn’t appear to have led to lethal violence.” All of this evidence suggests that the small population of 3,000 that was living on the island when Europeans first arrived in 1722 wasn’t a relic of a much greater civilization. In fact, the Rapa Nui society probably flourished until well after initial European contact , according to Mara Mulrooney, an anthropologist at the Bishop Museum in Honolulu, who also studies the Rapa Nui civilization but was not involved with the new research.

The researchers’ “morphometric analysis of mata'a lends further empirical support to the notion that Rapa Nui is an example of success rather than ‘collapse,’” Mulrooney told Live Science in an email. The Rapa Nui mata'a were probably general-purpose tools used for agricultural practices such as lithic mulching, ritual sacrifice and tattooing, Lipo said. These peaceful activities actually make more sense in an archaeological context because on such a small, isolated island, people would have had to learn to deal with their problems and mitigate group-level competition, he added. “You can’t afford to escalate to killing because there’s no way to escape the cost of killing,” Lipo said. “Warfare would have killed everybody.” If the Rapa Nui civilization was successful on the remote island, the next question archaeologists need to answer is how these people created a sustainable community, Lipo said. “The mystery is actually more interesting now,” he said, “because now, we have something to learn.” The new study was published online Feb. 17 in the journal Antiquity .

Easter Island Moai | Polynesia (article) | Khan Academy Easter Island Moai Email View of the northeast of the exterior slopes of the quarry, with several moai (human figure carving) on the slopes; a young South American man with a horse is standing in the foreground next to one of the moai carvings, as a scale, Easter Island, photograph, 8.2 x 8.2 cm © The Trustees of the British Museum View of the northeast of the exterior slopes of the quarry, with several moai (human figure carving) on the slopes; a young South American man with a horse is standing in the foreground for scale, Easter Island, photograph, 8.2 x 8.2 cm © Trustees of the British Museum The moai of Rapa Nui Easter Island is famous for its stone statues of human figures, known as moai (meaning “statue”). The island is known to its inhabitants as Rapa Nui. The moai were probably carved to commemorate important ancestors and were made from around 1000 C.E. until the second half of the seventeenth century.

Over a few hundred years the inhabitants of this remote island quarried, carved and erected around 887 moai. The size and complexity of the moai increased over time, and it is believed that Hoa Hakananai'a (below) dates to around 1200 C.E. It is one of only fourteen moai made from basalt, the rest are carved from the island’s softer volcanic tuff. With the adoption of Christianity in the 1860s, the remaining standing moai were toppled. Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c. 1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes) © The Trustees of the British Museum Three views of Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c.

1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © Trustees of the British Museum. This monumental carving of the head and torso of a man is almost twice life-size. The proportions are typical of these statues, with the head one-third of the total height. Their backs to the sea This example was probably first displayed outside on a stone platform (ahu) on the sacred site of Orongo, before being moved into a stone house at the ritual center of Orongo. It would have stood with giant stone companions, their backs to the sea, keeping watch over the island. Its eyes sockets were originally inlaid with red stone and coral and the sculpture was painted with red and white designs, which were washed off when it was rafted to the ship, to be taken to Europe in 1869. It was collected by the crew of the English ship HMS Topaze, under the command of Richard Ashmore Powell, on their visit to Easter Island in 1868 to carry out surveying work.

Islanders helped the crew to move the statue, which has been estimated to weigh around four tons. It was moved to the beach and then taken to the Topaze by raft. Moai Hava (“Dirty statue” or “to be lost”), Moai (ancestor figure), c. 11-1600 C.E., 156 cm high, basalt, Easter Island (Rapa Nui) © The Trustees of the British Museum Moai Hava (“Dirty statue” or “to be lost”), Moai (ancestor figure), c. 11-1600 C.E., 156 cm high, basalt, Easter Island (Rapa Nui) © Trustees of the British Museum The crew recorded the islanders' name for the statue, which is thought to mean "stolen or hidden friend." They also acquired another, smaller basalt statue, known as Moai Hava (left), which is also in the collections of the British Museum. Hoa Hakananai'a is similar in appearance to a number of Easter Island moai. It has a heavy eyebrow ridge, elongated ears and oval nostrils. The clavicle is emphasized, and the nipples protrude.

The arms are thin and lie tightly against the body; the hands are hardly indicated. In the British Museum, the figure is set on a stone platform just over a meter high so that it towers above the visitor. It is carved out of dark grey basalt—a hard, dense, fine-grained volcanic rock. The surface of the rock is rough and pitted, and pinpricks of light sparkle as tiny crystals in the rock glint. Basalt is difficult to carve and unforgiving of errors. The sculpture was probably commissioned by a high status individual. Bust (detail), Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c. 1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © The Trustees of the British Museum Bust (detail), Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c.

1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © The Trustees of the British Museum Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c. 1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © The Trustees of the British Museum Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c.

1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © The Trustees of the British Museum Hoa Hakananai'a's head is slightly tilted back, as if scanning a distant horizon. He has a prominent eyebrow ridge shadowing the empty sockets of his eyes. The nose is long and straight, ending in large oval nostrils. The thin lips are set into a downward curve, giving the face a stern, uncompromising expression. A faint vertical line in low relief runs from the centre of the mouth to the chin. The jawline is well defined and massive, and the ears are long, beginning at the top of the head and ending with pendulous lobes. The figure's collarbone is emphasized by a curved indentation, and his chest is defined by carved lines that run downwards from the top of his arms and curve upwards onto the breast to end in the small protruding bumps of his nipples. The arms are held close against the side of the body, the hands rudimentary, carved in low relief.

Later carving on the back The figure's back is covered with ceremonial designs believed to have been added at a later date, some carved in low relief, others incised. These show images relating to the island's birdman cult, which developed after about 1400 C.E. The key birdman cult ritual was an annual trial of strength and endurance, in which the chiefs and their followers competed. The victorious chief then represented the creator god, Makemake, for the following year. Back (detail), Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c. 1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © The Trustees of the British Museum Back (detail), Hoa Hakananai'a ('lost or stolen friend’), Moai (ancestor figure), c.

1200 C.E., 242 x 96 x 47 cm, basalt (missing paint, coral eye sockets, and stone eyes), likely made in Rano Kao, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), found in the ceremonial center Orongo © The Trustees of the British Museum Carved on the upper back and shoulders are two birdmen, facing each other. These have human hands and feet, and the head of a frigate bird. In the centre of the head is the carving of a small fledgling bird with an open beak. This is flanked by carvings of ceremonial dance paddles known as 'ao, with faces carved into them. On the left ear is another 'ao, and running from top to bottom of the right ear are four shapes like inverted 'V's representing the female vulva. These carvings are believed to have been added at a later date. Collapse Around 1500 C.E. the practice of constructing moai peaked, and from around 1600 C.E. statues began to be toppled, sporadically. The island’s fragile ecosystem had been pushed beyond what was sustainable.

Over time only sea birds remained, nesting on safer offshore rocks and islands. As these changes occurred, so too did the Rapanui religion alter—to the birdman religion. This sculpture bears witness to the loss of confidence in the efficacy of the ancestors after the deforestation and ecological collapse, and most recently a theory concerning the introduction of rats, which may have ultimately led to famine and conflict. After 1838 at a time of social collapse following European intervention, the remaining standing moai were toppled. Suggested readings: S.R. Fischer, "Rapani’s Tu’u ko Iho versus Mangareva’a ‘Atu Motua: Evidence for Multiple Reanalysis and Replacement in Rapanui Settlement Traditions, Easter Island," Journal of Pacific History, 29 (1994), pp. 3–48. S. Hooper, Pacific Encounters: Art and Divinity in Polynesia 1760-1860 (London, 2006). A.L.

Kaeppler, "Sculptures of Barkcloth and Wood from Rapa Nui: Continuities and Polynesian Affinities," Anthropology and Aesthetics, 44 (2003), pp. 10–69. R. Langdon, "New light on Easter Island Prehistory in a 'Censored' Spanish Report of 1770," Journal of Pacific History, 30 (1995), pp. 112–120. J.L. Palmer, "Observations on the Inhabitants and the Antiquaries of Easter Island," Journal of the Ethnological Society of London, 1 (1869), pp. 371–377. P. Rainbird, "A Message for our Future? The Papa Nui (Easter Island) Eco-disaster and Pacific Island Environments," World Archaeology, 33 (2002), pp. 436–451. J.A. Van Tilburg, and G. Lee, "Symbolic Stratigraphy, Rock Art and the Monolithic Statues of Easter Island," World Archaeology, 19 (1987), pp.

133–149. J.A. Van Tilburg, Remote Possibilities: Hoa Hakananai’a and HMS Topaze on Rapa Nui (London, 2006). The British Museum logo Easter Island (Rapa Nui) - Lonely Planet Easter Island (Rapa Nui) Adventures Welcome to Easter Island (Rapa Nui) Few areas in the world possess a more mystical pull than this tiny speck of land, one of the most isolated places on Earth. It's hard to feel connected to Chile, over 3700km to the east, let alone the wider world. Endowed with the most logic-defying statues in the world – the strikingly familiar moai – Easter Island (Rapa Nui to its native Polynesian inhabitants) emanates a magnetic, mysterious vibe... Read More Top experiences in Easter Island (Rapa Nui) Sights in Easter Island (Rapa Nui)

Question: Which small, remote island is known to its inhabitants as Rapa Nui?
Answer: Easter Island