Easter Island (Chile)

How hundreds of giant stone statues that dominate the island's coast were moved and erected?

A team of archaeologists with their crew sought to unravel a central mystery of Easter Island by struggling to raise a 10-ton statue of Moai, using only the tools and materials available to the ancient Easter Islanders.

The Rano Kau crater

During my visit to the island with a colleague on September 21, 1981 I had the opportunity to see the 276 of the 300 famous stone heads, 193 of which are almost completed. Our visit to Orongo site on the slopes of Rano Kau, the extinct volcano located on the outskirts of the island's capital Hanga Roa, lasted more than three quarters of the day as we walked up there due to lack of transportation. Actually, the transport on the island is only available by private cars and cars are very few on the island. Mostly, every transport is by horse riding and motorbikes. From Rano Kau, we had a magnificent view of the crater, which looks like a hand-drawn picture and from its eastern side slope we had a view of the capital town of Hanga Roa. The Orongo village located near the crater on the eastern side. The village is un-inhabitant for long time. From the rocks near the village we observed the three smaller islands in the open sea. One of them is called the Devil's island. We also saw the petroglyph designs on the rocks. Some other designs including the birdman, we had the chance to observe inside a cave about 250 meters away from the outskirts of Hanga Roa. This cave was introduced to us by a Chilean archaeologist who was seeking clues of the island's mystery. The archaeologist arrived on the island using the same flight with us from Santiago to study its mysterious environment. 

      Rano Raraku crater

The Rano Raraku crater was on the other side of the island and is the place that those famous Moais have been built on its inside and outside slopes. No one knows who engrave them on the volcano stones and move them across the island. These Moais were scattered on both sides of the Rano Raraku, some of them lying down, others stand up, some others are half-built and everything shows that while these Moais were being built, there was a sudden eruption of the volcano and the people there left everything and run away to save their lives. Another important thing about the Moais that has to be mentioned is that almost all of the statues had a flat hoop around their neck tight one with the other to avoid escape like they had been slaves of a superior power. At least, that's what their builders wanted to show to the rest of the people.

The Moai, the stone-faced giants lie in different forms of production around the outside area of Rano Raraku's extinct crater. Some of them are half carved, others are broken, and many seem to have been abandoned in mid-construction and transport. The inside of the crater is just an empty space with muddy dead water. However, at the base of the quarry, some Moais stand half-buried in the slope (up to their chins and noses) from years of erosion.

This quarry is the staging area on which all speculators base their theories on how the Moai were transported.

Archaeologist Jo Anne Van Tilburg addresses why this looks like a graveyard of stone giants. It's as if the production of Moai were abruptly abandoned stopped, possibly as a result of the lack of any more wood to transport the Moai across the island, or perhaps it was the result of a factional war. It leaves us a frozen snapshot in time so we can look closely at exactly how the Moai were carved out of the available rock.

Ahu Tongariki

In 1960, an earthquake in Chile triggered a tidal wave, which hit the coast of Easter Island at Tongariki. The tidal wave sent the 15 Tongariki Moai -- some of which weigh 30 tons -- several hundred feet inland. The Ahu, the largest on Easter Island, was effectively destroyed. It wasn't until 1992 that the site was restored, under the direction of Chilean archaeologist, Claudio Cristino. The task took five years.

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