You may have heard of Easter Island and its huge, legendary statues, but don’t worry if you haven’t. First of all, let’s talk about directions. You’ll definitely need a sat nav to go here! Well, it is just off the coast of South America - 4300 miles to be precise.
Rapa Nui as it was called when the natives lived there, was first settled around 1200 AD. They set up civilization there but it declined becase of deforestation. By the time the Europeans first visited in 1720, there were only a few thousand inhabitants. Slavery, european diseses and emmigration further reduced the population, until there were only 111 islanders by 1870.
The Europeans started to be curious about who built the stone statues and why, but there were so few natives that no-one could give the answer, and so the mystery of the stone heads was born...
By the time there were no people left on Easter Island, it became a World Heritage Site. But that caused another mystery to arise: why did civilization leave? Scientist think that the humans greedily used up all of the resources, and so there was nothing to keep the islanders going, and they either starved to death or sailed away on boats, knowing they couldn’t stay there. But later on the quest to find answers to this, archaeologists found out that with no trees left there, there were no boats to escape, so option one must be correct.
The statues are called Moai and were carved from volcanic stone. Even though the only part of them visable is the head, moost of them are complete figures with arms and bent legs. These were carved 887 times between the years 1100 and 1680, and stopped when the Spanish arrived. The Moai were actually made in a quarry and had to be dragged out on sledges to their intended location, but only a quarter were moved as the job came to a standstill and was never completed. It must have been hard work!
Easter island was formed from three volcanoes. The typical landscape is rounded hills with low vegetation, but once it was completely covered with tropical rainforests, which is why the South Americans decided to travel there.
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