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The Enigmatic Moai Statues of Easter Island
An overview of the moai of Rapa Nui: who carved them, roughly how many exist, what they are thought to represent, and what is still debated about them.
The Americas
Easter Island and Rapa Nui
The moai, the island people and the debate over what happened to them.
The Enigmatic Moai Statues of Easter Island: A Mystery
The ahu platforms of Rapa Nui were more than pedestals for moai: they were ceremonial and burial sites tied to ancestors, with debated astronomical alignments.
The Mysterious Case of the Easter Island Moai: Giant Statues of the Ancient World
Rano Raraku, the volcanic quarry where most moai were carved, holds hundreds of statues in every stage of work, including the giant unfinished El Gigante.
The Mysterious Case of the Easter Island Statues
Red scoria pukao topknots, the Puna Pau quarry, and the buried bodies and petroglyphs that excavation revealed beneath the best-known moai heads.
The Mysterious Case of the Rapa Nui Statues
The Rapa Nui are a living Polynesian people. This article covers their settlement of the island, their ownership of the moai, and their role in heritage today.
The Mysterious Collapse of the Easter Island Civilization
Did Rapa Nui society destroy itself by cutting down its forest? A fair look at the ecocide debate set against evidence for rats, disease and slave raids.
The Mysterious Disappearance of the Easter Island Statues
The Easter Island statues did not vanish. Most were toppled between the 18th and 19th centuries, and many were later re-erected in modern restoration work.
The Mystery of the Easter Island Moai: A Story of Ancient Engineering
How did the Rapa Nui move multi-tonne moai across the island? The walking experiment, sledge and roller theories, and the road evidence compared.
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