Archeologists Dig Around Easter Island Heads, What They Discovered Will Drop Your Jaw
Easter Island has undoubtedly become a top tourist spot and for obvious reasons – it’s full of mystery and marvel, the perfect recipe for memorable vacations. But there’s something most people don’t know – there are bodies buried underneath the giant heads in Easter Island. Known as moai, there are over 900 heads in the 63-square mile Easter Island with the heaviest weighing in at 95 tons, the tallest standing over 30 feet high and the oldest carved in the year 1250.
Legend states that in the 12th century Polynesians migrated to Easter Island by sea and soon became isolated from the rest of the world. Back in those days, the only source of hydration for people, animals, and crops were three crater lakes, so no one knows why the people, also known as Rapa Nui, chose Easter Island’s hostile environment as their permanent home. In order to honor their ancestors, the Rapa Nui carved the moai and to make space for the giant heads, they cut down a huge number of trees, which geographer Jared Diamond believes, led to the island’s demise.
Due to deforestation, there was hardly any wood left to construct shelters and canoes, leaving people to survive without basic necessities. Deforestation also led the way to land erosion, making it difficult for people to grow food. As if that’s not enough, Polynesian rats further led to the fall of the island’s ecosystem. Some researchers say that due to the lack of food, the Rapa Nui resorted to cannibalism, but no concrete proof supports this claim. By 1722, the Rapa Nui population decreased from a solid 15,000 to a mere 2,000 and by 1877, there were only 100 who had survived slavery, tuberculosis, and smallpox.
In 2010, the world was left speechless with what researchers from the Easter Island Statue Project (EISP) found underneath the giant moai – bodies. Founded in 1982 by American archaeologist Jo Anne Van Tilburg, EISP’s mission was to study the moai and nearly two decades later, in 2000, an extensive ongoing project was launched with the help of a Rapa Nui co-worker Cristián Arévalo Pakarati to uncover the island’s mysterious history. In 2010, while excavating two statues from the island they saw that beneath the giant heads were giant bodies. This meant that the moai weren’t just heads, they had a torso and a waist that stretched several feet underground.
Due to the changing landscape and erosion, the torso and waist became buried while the head remained above the ground, creating an illusion that the moai were just giant heads. Researchers also discovered detailed carvings and ancient symbols that looked like half-moons on some statues. They hope that these symbols also knowns as petroglyphs, will help them uncover more secrets about the Rapa Nui. Since the moai are made from porous stone, they are vulnerable to erosion, and hence the EISP’s main objective is to restore and preserve them.
Pakarati, on the other hand, stated that the only way to keep the moai alive was to encourage people to learn the art of carving them. He believes that while the moai will disappear at one point in time, the art of making them will revive them once again.
