I wonder how many reading this thought, as I did when I arrived on Easter Island, that westerners found the island uninhabited, with the indigenous population (the Rapa Nui) assumed to have succumbed to a combination of inter tribal warfare and collapse of their society due to depletion of natural resources such as trees, and maybe water, after an earthquake etc?
I was amazed to learn, from our tour guide, a proud Rapa Nui man, that this was not so!
The island formed about 1 million years ago. like Hawaii, it is a volcanic island formed on an oceanic continental plate as it moved over a mantle 'hot spot'. As the oceanic plate 'conveyor belt' moves, it takes the island with it, away from the hot spot, and the volcanos on the island go quiet, and a new island forms behind. The leading island(s) erode and sink back into the sea.
People came to the island about 700AD, very likely from Polynesian islands to the west. They formed into a number of clans, each with their own territory across the island. There were the aristocracy within each clan, and the 'rest' - mainly slave workers.
The Easter Island statues, or
moai were carved to deify the leader of a clan when they died; multiple statues were placed on the same platform (ahu) over time. The source was a single quarry, which we visited last on the tour.
The first western visitor was a Dutchman, in 1722 - Easter Sunday, hence the name. the Spanish also visited, as did Cook briefly in 1774. Almost co-incidental with the westerner's arrival was the start of collapse of the Rapa Nui society, with the slave class gradually rising up against the aristocracy. By 1838 various civil wars and battles resulted in
all the statues being toppled, mostly by man, although we saw evidence that some had probably been toppled by earthquake and some by tsunami.
Almost all the statues face inland - to face and protect the people and were carved from about 1,000 - 1680. Any statue upright today has been restored by archaeologists.
Driving back from the sunrise site, we passed some small volcanic cones, and in the RH pic, one of the very many platforms with unrestored statues sprawled about.
We went to the Vinapu site, just off the end of the runway. Unrestored, but of note because of the construction of the platform - anyone who has visited Inca sites will recognise the stonework! I think this is the only such example on the island ... tantalising as to the Sth American influence on the peoples ...
A few heads lying in the ground. Not the sedimentary rock texture - I thought the states were carved out of basalt, but no - volcanic tuff rock, quite soft to carve (and erode):
Also lying about were some 'topknots' - hairpieces of the chiefs, which had become separated.
The original statues would have looked something like this (with white coral for eyes).
Thankfully our accommodation transfer waited for us.
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