Which country is Easter Island in. Where is Easter Island? Easter Island: photos

Easter Island(Spanish Isla de Pascua) is a volcanic island belonging to the South Pacific, between Chile and the island of Tahiti (fr. Tahiti). Together with a small uninhabited Fr. Sala y Gomez (Spanish: Isla Sala y Gómez) forms the commune and province of Isla de Pascua (Spanish Provincia de Isla de Pascua) within the region (Spanish: Region de Valparaíso). Local name given to the island by Polynesian whalers: Rapa Nui(Rapa Nui).

The only city of Anga Roa is the capital of the island.

The island is home to about 6 thousand people, about 40% of them are Polynesians or Rapanui, indigenous people, the rest are mainly Chileans. Rapanui speak the Rapanui language, believers profess Catholicism. There are 70 extinct volcanoes on the island with an area of ​​about 165 km². They have not erupted even once in the 1,300 years since the day of its colonization. The island has the shape of a right-angled triangle with sides of 24, 18 and 16 km., At the corners of which the cones of extinct volcanoes rise: Rano-Kao (rap. Rano Kao; 324 m), Pua-Katiki (rap. Puakatike; 377 m) and Terevaka ( rap.Terevaka; 539 m - the highest point of the island). Between them lies a hilly plain formed by volcanic tuffs and basalts. Lava tubes and influxes have formed many underwater caves and a bizarre, steep coastline.

There are no rivers on Rapa Nui, the main sources of fresh water here are lakes formed in the craters of volcanoes.

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The climate is subtropical, with an average monthly temperature of + 18 ° C to + 23 ° C. Mostly herbs grow here, as well as a few eucalyptus and banana plants.

Along with the Tristan da Cunha archipelago, Rapa Nui is considered the most remote inhabited island in the world: the distance to the continental Chilean coast is almost 3514 km, and to the nearest inhabited place, the Pitcairn Islands, belonging to the UK - 2075 km ...

Basically, Rapa Nui became famous for its - stone giants, in which, according to the beliefs of the local population, the mystical power of the ancestors of Hotu Mato-a, the first king of the island, lies.

Easter Island is undoubtedly the most mysterious island in the world. With its curiosities and inexplicable riddles, it magnetically attracts the attention of historians, geologists and culturologists.

History

In 1722 a squadron of 3 ships under the command of a Dutch traveler, Admiral Jacob Roggeveen (Dutch Jacob Roggeveen; 1659-1729), heading from South America in search of the riches of the Unknown Southern Land (Latin Terra Australis Incognita), on Sunday 7 April, the day of Christian Easter, I discovered a small island in the South Pacific. At a council convened by the admiral, the ship captains signed a resolution announcing the opening of a new island. Surprised travelers discovered that on Easter Island (as the sailors immediately dubbed it) three different races coexist peacefully: reds, blacks and white people. The locals greeted the travelers differently: some waved their arms in a friendly manner, while others threw stones at uninvited guests.

The Polynesians, the inhabitants of Oceania, call the island "Rapa Nui" (rap. Rapa Nui - Big Rapa), however, the islanders themselves call their homeland "Te-Pito-o-te-Henua" (rap. Te-Pito-o -te-henua, which means " the center of the world»).

Formed by a series of large volcanic eruptions, the secluded island has been home to seabird colonies for millions of years. And its steep, steep banks marked the route of navigation for the ships of Polynesian seafarers.

Legends say that about 1200 years ago, King Hotu Mato-a descended on the sandy beach of Anakena and began to colonize the island. Then, for many centuries, a mysterious society existed on this island lost in the ocean. For reasons unknown, the islanders have been carving giant statues known as moai. These idols are considered one of the most inexplicable ancient artifacts on Earth today. The islanders built villages from houses of an unusual, elliptical shape. Presumably, the newly arrived settlers adapted their boats for temporary housing by turning them upside down. Then houses began to be built in a similar way, most of the hundreds of such buildings were destroyed by the missionaries.

By the time the island was discovered, its population was 3-4 thousand people. The first settlers found lush vegetation on the island. Giant palm trees (up to 25 m in height) grew in abundance here, which were cut down for the construction of houses and boats. People brought here a variety of plants, which perfectly took root in the soil enriched with volcanic ash. By 1500, the population of the island was already 7-9 thousand people.

As the population grew, separate clans were formed, concentrated in different parts of Easter Island, linked by the general construction of statues and the cult that arose around them.

In 1862, Peruvian slave traders took out most of the inhabitants of the island and destroyed their original culture. In 1888, Rapa Nui was annexed to Chile. Today, the islanders are engaged in fishing, agriculture - growing sugar cane, taro, sweet potatoes, bananas, and also work on cattle farms and make souvenirs for tourists.

Sights and mysteries of Rapa Nui

Despite its small size, Easter Island has many attractions, both natural and man-made. In 1995, the Rapa Nui National Park (Spanish: el Parque Nacional de Rapa Nui National) was included in the UNESCO World Heritage Register.

The entire territory of the island is an archaeological reserve, a single amazing open-air museum.

Easter Island has 2 sandy beaches: located in the northern part of the island, Anakena Beach (Spanish Playa Anakena), one of the few beaches officially allowed to swim, a great place for surfers. The second beautiful deserted beach, located along the southern coast of the island, is a real gem called Ovahe (Spanish Playa Ovahe). Ovahe is surrounded by picturesque cliffs, it is much larger than Anaken.

The main attraction of the island and an unresolved mystery that has haunted scientists for centuries, of course, are the sculptures "Moai". Huge ancient statues rise almost everywhere along the southern part of the island.

It is not known why the islanders began to massively create gigantic statues. Their incomprehensible obsession subsequently led to a catastrophic depletion of forest resources. The forest needed to transport the giant moai was cut down mercilessly. The first monolithic sculptures as tall as a man were made from basalt. Then the islanders began to make huge statues (more than 10 m high, weighing up to 20 tons) from soft volcanic tuff (compressed volcanic ash), an ideal material for sculpting. Located a little in the depths of the island, the Rano Raraku crater (Spanish: Rano Raraku; a small extinct volcano up to 150 m high) is a place where famous giants were carved. Hundreds of islanders worked on their creation from morning to evening. Today, here you can see all the stages of painstaking work, unfinished figures are scattered right there. Probably, the manufacture of statues by skilled sculptors took place in compliance with numerous ceremonies and rituals. If a defect occurred during the making of the statue, which was considered a sign of the devil, the carvers abandoned the work and took on another.

When the statue was hewn and the bridge connecting it to the crater rock was cut off, the figure rolled down the slope. At the base of the crater, the statues were placed upright and finalized here. How were the massive moai then transported to various places on the island? Statues weighed up to 82 tons at a height of up to 10 m. Sometimes they were moved and installed at distances over 20 km!

As the Easter legends say, the moai ... went to their places on their own. Some researchers believed they were being dragged. They later came to the conclusion that the figures moved in an upright position. How it all looked in reality remains another unsolved mystery of Easter Island's civilization.

In 1868 the British tried to take one of the statues home. However, they abandoned this venture, limiting themselves to a small bust (2.5 m high). It was installed in the British Museum in London. Hundreds of natives and the entire crew of the ship took part in the process of transporting and loading the "baby".

At the site, the statues were installed on ahu (rap. Ahu) - polished stone platforms of various sizes, slightly inclined towards the sea. Then the final stage of the creation of cult figures took place - the installation of eyes made of volcanic glass or coral. The heads of many stone idols were decorated with “hats” (rap. Pukao) of reddish rock.

The moai pedestals are more than 3 m high, the length is up to 150 m, and the weight of the stone slabs that make them up is up to 10 tons. Near the crater of the volcano, about 200 unfinished figures were found, among which there are giants over 20 m in length.

Over time, the number of moai reached 1000, which made it possible to build an almost continuous line of monuments along the coast of Rapa Nui. The reason why the inhabitants of the tiny island spent time and energy creating numerous giants remains a mystery today.

It is believed that the sculptures of Easter Island were images of noble representatives of the clans. The statue's typical design - legless, with an angular grim face, protruding chin, tightly compressed lips, and a low forehead - remains one of Easter Island's greatest mysteries. All statues (except for seven moai located in the middle of the island) stand on the coast and "look" into the sky towards the island. Some experts consider them to be the guardians of the dead, who with powerful backs protected the deceased from natural elements. Mysterious giants, silently lined up on the coast, with their backs to the Pacific Ocean, are like a powerful army guarding the peace of their possessions.

Despite some primitiveness of the moai, the statues are mesmerizing. The giants look especially impressive in the evening, in the rays of the setting sun, when only huge, blood-curdling silhouettes appear against the sky ...

So, the Rapa Nui civilization reached its heyday, then something terrible happened.

An ominous story about the merciless use of natural resources and the devastation of the island was revealed. The Europeans who set foot on Easter Island for the first time were amazed how people could survive in such a desolate place. It ceased to be a mystery when recent studies showed that in ancient times the island was covered with dense forest, there was an abundant tropical paradise here.

Apparently, the resources of the island seemed inexhaustible, trees were cut down for the construction of dwellings and canoes, and giant palms - for transporting moai.

The destruction of the forest has led to soil erosion and depletion. Poor harvests, lack of food led to armed conflicts between the island clans, moai - symbols of power and success - were overthrown. The struggle intensified over time, according to legend, the winners ate their enemies to gain strength. In the southwestern part of Rapa Nui there is a cave "Ana Kai Tangata", the name of which is ambiguous: it can mean "a cave where people eat", or maybe - "a cave where people were eaten." The Rapa Nui culture, which had formed over the past 300 years, collapsed.

Due to the lack of forest, the islanders were cut off from the outside world even more than before. Even fishing proved to be difficult for them. Easter Island has become a devastated, deserted piece of land with depleted soils, with about 750 survivors. In these conditions, the cult of the bird-man was born here. Over time, it acquired the status of the dominant religion on the island, which was practiced until 1866-1867.

Due to the lack of material for building a canoe and the ability to sail away from the island, the Rapanui people watched with envy the birds soaring in the sky.

On the edge of the Rano-Kao crater, the ritual village of Orongo (rap. Orongo) was founded, where the god of fertility Makemake (rap. MakeMake) was worshiped and a kind of competition was held between men of different clans.

In the spring, each clan selected the most physically prepared warriors who needed to descend from steep slopes to the sea teeming with sharks, swim to one of the islands and bring from there an unharmed egg of a sea bird, a dark mallard (Latin Onychoprion fuscatus). The warrior who was the first to deliver the egg was proclaimed the Bird-Man (the earthly incarnation of the deity Makemake). He received awards and special privileges, and his tribe received the right to rule the island for a year, until the next competition.

Unique sights of Orongo are also hundreds of petroglyphs that have survived for centuries, carved by the Bird-Men in solid basalt rock. It is believed that the petroglyphs represent the winners of the annual competition. About 480 such petroglyphs have been found around Orongo.

The Rapanui culture began to revive, perhaps, the inhabitants of the island would again be able to flourish, but in December 1862 ships of Peruvian slave traders moored to the island and took away all the able-bodied inhabitants of the island. At the time, the economy was booming and needed labor. Due to poor nutrition, unbearable working conditions and disease, no more than a hundred islanders survived. And only thanks to the intervention of France, the surviving residents of Rapa Nui were returned to the island. At the time of the annexation of the island to Chile in 1888, about 200 indigenous people lived here.

Missionaries who arrived on the island found a decaying society here, it did not take long for its inhabitants to convert to Christianity. Changes were immediately made to the clothing of the indigenous population, or rather, its complete absence. The inhabitants of the island were deprived of their ancestral lands, they lived in a small part of the island, while the arrived farmers used the rest of the land for agriculture.

Tattoos were banned, houses and ritual shrines were destroyed, and Rapanui works of art were destroyed. All wooden sculptures of the island, religious artifacts, and, most importantly, "" (rap. Rongo Rongo) - wooden planks of the "talking tree", speckled with a unique script, were destroyed. Easter Island is the only island in Polynesia whose inhabitants have developed their own writing system. Ancient legends, traditions, religious chants were carved with a shark's tooth on planks of dark toromiro wood, only a few of which have survived to this day. Cohau plaques with inscribed on them images of a winged bird-man, frogs, turtles, lizards, stars, crosses and spirals are another mystery of the outlandish island, which scientists have not been able to decipher for more than 130 years. Now there are only 25 left rongo rongo scattered in museums around the world.

In 1988, Rapa Nui presented scientists with another surprise. During excavations in a small swamp in the interior of the island, Australian scientists found the remains of a medieval knight in full gear, sitting on a war horse. In the peat, which has conservative properties, the knight and the horse are well preserved. Judging by his armor, the knight was a member of the German Catholic Livonian Order (1237-1562). Gold Hungarian ducats minted in 1326 were found in a belt wallet; these coins were circulating in Poland and Lithuania. Scientists have not been able to explain how the rider ended up thousands of kilometers away on a remote Pacific island. Before the discovery of America (1492) from 1326 there were more than 150 years! Thoughts about the existence of the phenomenon of teleportation involuntarily come to mind. No more convincing arguments explaining the appearance of the medieval knight-crusader on Easter Island have been found to this day.

A little sad digression

The phenomenal Easter Island, which is a small piece of land (only 165 m²), at the time of the construction of the mysterious giants was 3-4 times larger than before. Some part of it, like Atlantis, disappeared under water. In calm, sunny weather, areas of flooded land are visible through the water column. There is even such an incredible version: the mysterious Easter Island is a tiny surviving part of the ancestor of mankind, the mythical continent Lemuria, which sank about 4 million years ago.

And the island-pearl, located in Oceania far from civilization, prompts certain thoughts and conclusions. The history of Easter Island is a miniature copy of the history of our time. She is able to teach an object lesson to us, the inhabitants of the planet Earth. All of us, in essence, are inhabitants of an island floating in the endless ocean.

On a tiny piece of land, which is Easter Island, the consequences of a barbaric attitude towards nature and ruthless deforestation are well traced. The inhabitants, continuing their monstrous actions, probably prayed to their gods to make up for the damage done to their land. To continue to abuse her further.

What could the gods do? There is only one thing - to reason with the man who cut down the last tree. The man understood that this tree was the last one, nevertheless, he cut it down. This is the most terrible tragedy of our time ...

Uniqueness Easter islands manifests itself in an ambiguous opinion about him. That is, on the one hand, people know everything about this place, on the other, nothing at the same time. Its mysterious stone statues are still silent witnesses of an ancient and unknown culture. But who and how could have created these monumental sculptures from the rocks?

A bit of geography. Easter Island is located in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, between Chile and Tahiti (Figure 1). Local natives christened it - Rapanui or Rapa Nui (Rapa Nui). Easter is the most remote island in the world. The distance to the nearby piece of land in the west is two thousand ninety-two kilometers, and in the east - two thousand nine hundred and seventy-one kilometers. It is formed in the shape of a triangle, with extinct volcanoes on each edge.

The area of ​​the island is about one hundred and sixty square kilometers. Easter Island is recognized as the highest point above sea level. It is located on a huge hill, which was named the East Pacific Upland. In view of this, Thor Heyerdahl wrote that the nearest land that the locals see is the Moon.

The capital of the island, as well as its only city, is Anga Roa. The island has its own flag (Fig. 3) and its own coat of arms (Fig. 4).

Interestingly, Easter Island has / had several names: Vaihu, Mata-ki-te-Ragi, San Carlos Island, Rapanui, Teapi, Tekaouhangoaru, Te-Pito-o-te-Henua, Hititeairagi, Easter Island.

Some legends claim that Easter Island was once part of one large country (many consider it the surviving part of Atlantis). This looks quite plausible, since today at Easter, a lot of evidence has been found that confirms these legends: there are roads on the island that lead directly to the ocean, a large number of underground tunnels have been dug, originating in local caves and paving the way in an unknown direction, as well as others not less significant information and surprising finds.

Interesting data on underwater exploration of the ocean floor near Easter Island is given by the Australian Howard Tirloren, who arrived here with Cousteau. He said that having arrived here in 1978, they studied the bottom around the island in sufficient detail. Anyone who has gone down in the bathyscaphe will confirm that the mountains under water, even at shallow depths, have a rather unusual appearance: some of them even had holes that resembled connectors for windows. And once Jacques-Yves Cousteau found one unfamiliar deep-sea depression in the vicinity, where after he dived for another three days. When he returned, he wanted to explore this depression even more scrupulously. Cousteau did not manage to see anything in full, but according to him, at the bottom you can see the silhouettes of the walls, forming something like a section of a large city. However, because of the people serving in the DINA political police, which was supervised by Pinochet himself, nothing came of it. According to Tirloren, they were forced to endorse documents on non-disclosure of information, and also demanded to stop the research, so all work was stopped. But what is unusual about this depression? Why the Chilean state security is so afraid of scientists remains a mystery. After the Pinochet regime, this issue was raised again, but to no avail. Thus, this fact does not exclude the assumption that a significant part of Easter Island sank during some kind of catastrophe.

In 1973-1977, several American oceanographers studied oceanic trenches near Easter Island, namely, near the Sala-i-Gomez ridge. As a result, they discovered sixty-five underwater peaks and agreed with the hypothesis of the existence of an unknown archipelago, which was in this area tens of thousands of years ago, and then sank into the water. But all subsequent studies were frozen for no good reason at the request of the Chilean government. "Island of mysteries" still does not give an opportunity to unravel its mystery.

The obtained geophysical information asserts that the coast of Southeast Asia is slowly sinking into the ocean. Maybe this subsidence once happened faster and at one moment, like Atlantis, it went deep into the depths of the ocean, including Pacifida with its huge population and distinctive culture, traces of which are still found on Easter Island? And the various tablets with inscriptions and monuments of art are nothing more than surviving evidence of an ancient extinct civilization? After all, according to the testimony of the first inhabitant of Easter Island, Eiro, in all the buildings there are wooden planks or sticks containing some hieroglyphs and symbols. Basically, these are images of unknown animals, which the natives continue to paint with stones to this day. Each image has its own designation; but in view of the fact that they make such products on very rare occasions, this suggests that these hieroglyphs are only the remnants of ancient writing. That is, the natives are only trying to follow old customs, without trying to find any meaning in this.

Macmillan Brown, in his research, even tried to find out the approximate date of the death of the Pacifida. In his opinion, this phenomenon could have occurred in the interval between 1687, when the English sailor Davis examined a large ledge in the area of ​​Easter Island, and 1722, when Admiral Roggeven did not find anything in this place except for a small island. The cataclysm that happened was evidenced not only by the unexpectedly stopped work in the quarries on Rano Raraku. In many areas of Easter Island, spacious roads are paved that end in the ocean. Does this mean that these paths end deep under water? Is it possible to find new evidence of a lost culture on the seabed?

There is one but that completely destroys this hypothesis, and this is a question of chronology. At what point did the land in the Pacific Ocean begin to sink? Three hundred years ago, or three thousand, or perhaps even three hundred thousand? Or is this figure in the millions? Geological and geophysical data indicate that the deepening of the land and the collapse of the Pacifida happened just in the ancient period. The fauna and flora of islands such as the Galapagos, New Zealand, Fiji were formed from the mainland, but many centuries ago they were part of one huge continent. This led to the finding here of fossils that have long disappeared and are not found anywhere else on the globe. Likewise, at one point the Australian continent broke away from Asia. Land immersion at the location of Easter Island has not occurred since that ancient period.

Geological and oceanographic surveys near Easter by Chubb confirmed the fact that it did not drop by a millimeter, and at the time the monuments were erected, the coastline was as stable as it is today. This argument was repeated by the Swedish expedition, which established the geological stability of the island, which lasts for at least a million years.

Studying the question of the emergence of the island itself, the author got the impression that many scientists set the goal not to understand or reveal the truth, but pursue the goal of defending their own point of view, to prove what is beneficial to them. Or, moving in an absolutely impartial search, they come across postulates that are currently imposed on society as official ones, but burst at the seams at the slightest check. This forces them to deploy their research from a straight path to the thorny direct official wilds. It is not difficult to draw attention to the fact that most researchers evaluate the available artifacts only from the point of view of the dominance of matter over spirituality, and nothing else.

In the process of studying the topic, a number of questions arose. Why do scientists, faced with inexplicable archaeological artifacts and at the same time with the same incomprehensible behavior of the authorities, which openly prohibit research, do not sound the alarm in every possible way and do not try to convey the obvious to the public? Why don't they build hypotheses in which there would be a place for all findings and facts, and not just convenient or understandable ones? How can one sometimes come up with theories so that they do not seem crude to the public? Are they not interested in learning about the past of their planet, or simply do not have free time due to everyday problems? Who really needed to build multi-ton statues on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean, arrange them around the perimeter of the island facing the ocean, paint with ornaments and patterns? What was it about their writing that when the first Europeans who visited the island saw it, they began to hastily eradicate it from the local population, so much so that after forty years almost none of the Rapanui could not only write, but also read their household signs? One can argue that it was accidental and in general this 18th century was a very long time ago, well, but why are not excavations and research being carried out at the state level now? Why, if you now go to the statue behind the fence, the person will face prison? And why has UNESCO banned excavation and exploration of the underground part of the statues? Another curious fact is that almost all modern researchers of the original culture of Easter Island claim that it is impossible to find out its true meaning or decipher the writing, and everything that is read is ordinary everyday texts.

A people exterminated in half a century.

Fifty years later, in 1722, the Englishman James Cook and the Frenchman La Perouse visited Easter Island. Since then, the situation has changed a lot. Many plains were abandoned. Once the chubby inhabitants lived in poverty, and the statues filled with grandeur were almost all toppled and lay on the ground. The ancient cult was erased from memory. From the famous race of "long-eared" only a few representatives remained, most likely, their death is associated with rivals - "short-eared", who not only destroyed the tribe, but also their inherent culture. As a result of the events that took place on Easter Island, a whole era ended, which lasted more than one century, and possibly even a millennium. What it was during the period remained an unsolved mystery for many. Roggeven and his assistants were unable to find out practically anything about her. Captain Cook, La Perouse and the Spaniards, who discovered this island in the second half of the 18th century, did not show curiosity about ancient artifacts, they were looking only for new territories that could be developed and used as colonies. By the time European researchers finally woke up interest in the cultural heritage of other peoples, only silent witnesses of its majestic past remained on Easter Island - these are huge and breathtaking statues. Now they have been thrown off their foundations, on the edge of the crater there was only an abandoned temple and several strange wooden tablets with unknown hieroglyphs. The number of local residents decreased not only because of the incessant civil wars. In 1862, slave traders from Peru burst here, they captured and took out about nine hundred people, including the last king. The prisoners were sent to extract fertilizers in the Atacama Desert. Later, another three hundred inhabitants of the island were captured and sent to Tahiti for hard labor on the plantations. When, on Easter, a showy war began, organized by Dutroux-Bornier at the request of a French company, the remaining inhabitants and inhabited missionaries fled from it. Subsequently, they moved to the Gambier Archipelago, located in a more westerly direction. Thus, the population of the island in fifteen years has decreased from two and a half thousand to one hundred and eleven people! Therefore, those few people who decided to stay, no longer remembered anything about the age-old customs of their forefathers.

Interesting facts about the inhabitants of the island (Fig. 6). According to H.P. Blavatsky, the multi-colored skin of the local aborigines indicates that different peoples have mixed on Easter Island, which include the Lemurians (the third hereditary race) and the Antlants (the fourth hereditary race). This information is contained in the Secret Doctrine of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, where Easter Island is mentioned as the habitat of some of the earliest generations of the third race. An unexpected volcanic eruption and the rise of the ocean floor sank it, along with all the monuments and culture. At the same time, the island remained untouched, as proof of the existence of Lemuria. There is another interpretation - the territory of Easter was occupied by several Atlanteans, who, fleeing from the cataclysm that occurred in their area, settled on the rest of Lemuria, but not for long, since it was subsequently destroyed by a volcanic eruption and collapsed lava. Thus, it becomes clear that the ancestors of black Lemurians, as well as red-skinned and fair-skinned Atlanteans, were mixed in this territory.

A blow that destroyed the culture of the ancient people.

A large number of scientists have made a lot of efforts to reconstruct the culture of the Easter population piece by piece. But the resulting picture was incomplete. The researchers were fortunate enough to find out that on this small piece of land, measuring only one hundred and eighteen square kilometers, there are two cultural centers:

Rano Raraku quarry;
the Orongo sanctuary on the edge of the Rano Kao volcanic mountain.

At the same time, Rano Raraku is also a volcano crater, on the southern side of which there are ancient quarries. In them, huge sacred statues were subsequently carved from the porous rock of the rocks. This mountain still bears the aftermath of a terrible civil war. A large number of statues remained unfinished, at various stages of completion. In some, only the first outlines are observed, for others, for readiness, it is enough to work with a chisel several times in order to freely dissociate them from the rock and move them. The rest are standing or lying around and are already prepared for shipment. One of the most massive ready-made monuments is Rano Raraku, whose summit is twenty-two meters from the ground. At the base of the volcano stretches a huge platform formed of basalt blocks, another similar platform is located below, directly on the coast. Its length is fifty meters. The lower platform once housed as many as fifteen stone idols. However, now they are all, with the exception of one, lying on the ground. The race of "short-eared", completely defeated the carriers of the mysterious culture of "long-eared", dumped their huge monuments, breaking stones from the foundation.

The mass of the largest idols reaches fifty tons. To dislodge them, stone hammers, axes and chisels were used, due to the fact that the locals did not know how to make tools from metal. Most incomprehensible is the way in which these statues were transported from the volcano to the sites located at its base, as well as at a considerable distance from it. After all, there were not many people on Easter Island to carry out the forced work. Therefore, it is believed that stone idols were transported with the help of small groups of their local residents, using for this rigid cables made of reed or plant threads, wooden rollers and levers. Then they were installed vertically with a neat supply under their base of a stone embankment. But this business did not end. Now on the island, on which there is practically no vegetation cover, such monuments are everywhere you see. They are standing, lying, unfinished, or just started. A bloody civil war at the end of the 18th century. led to the collapse of these iconic sculptures. It should be noted that these statues were used not only as tombstones, they had a peculiar spiritual purpose, evidence of which was found on the rocky plateau of Orongo, stretching at the base of Rano Kao in the southwestern side of Easter Island. In that place, not far from the crater of the volcano, there are mysterious buildings without a hole for windows, erected from bulky stone blocks. And on the rocks around them a lot of incomprehensible images are minted.

Bird-man.

According to ancient legends, once a year the priests turned to God with a request to choose a new bird-man. The man chosen for this role was to organize a group of several guys and go with them to the stone dwellings and caves of Rano Kao. Once there, they waited (sometimes for months) until the island's gulls lay their eggs on a rock several hundred feet from the coast. Then the group, floating on the water, headed to the rock called Motunui. The first person to arrive immediately had to start looking for the egg, then wash it and bring it intact to the island. Having done this, he, filled with pride, gave the egg to the leader of the tribe, who, from that moment on, acquired the status of bird-man. Clutching it in the palm of his hand, the head of the tribe danced along the entire southern coast of the island until he got to Rano Raraku. In this place, the leader had to live for twelve months next to the stone inhabitants on Rapanui. He lived there completely alone, spending time in prayer and meditation. For the rest of the Rapanui people, this place was forbidden, because the quarters of the respected master settled there. The main deity of this outlandish religion was Make-Make. At the same time, he has no resemblance either to the creator God known to us, or to the Creator of the entire Universe. He, his comrade-in-arms - the lord of the seagulls and three deities - the guardians of eggs and future descendants, demanded an offering of human sacrifices. It is possible that once upon a time cannibalism could well have existed on the island.

If you carefully study the legend of the bird-man and compare it with primordial knowledge, then a completely clear logical picture emerges. Suppose that, unlike our civilization, the ancient inhabitants of Easter Island did not have a materialistic perception, but lived with a predominance of spiritual values. Maybe because of this, some of the Europeans needed to destroy their culture in such a hurry?

Then it turns out that the election of the next bird-man (the bird is a symbol of the front essence) is nothing more than the choice of the most spiritually developed personality to perform important tasks (climate control, weather, seismic activity, perhaps even the solution of planetary tasks). For this, he recruited a group of young men to form a circle of power. In this case, it is logical to assume what they were doing while being together in the cave - they studied, were intensively engaged in spiritual practices, spiritual self-development, and self-disclosure. When the group was ready, something like an exam or a test for the possession of certain properties related to understanding the structure of the world (the symbol is the world egg) was appointed. After that, this bird-man began to work with the largest ahu Rano Raraku. This is confirmed by the symbols inscribed on many statues, perhaps it is worth taking a closer look at them to study the signs with which the bird-man worked.

The connection between the worship of the bird-man and the massive stone idols is proved by the images inscribed on the backs of most of the statues. These drawings depict skeletons, ghosts, deities, but most often - a bird-man. In 1722, the cult of worship of demigod and huge statues was promoted to the fullest, but after the landing of the "short-eared" tribe on Rapanui, everything changed dramatically. Legends tell of several large boats, on which there were about three hundred men and, most likely, the same number of women. Scientists believe they fled the Rapaiti Islands after the outbreak of a terrible civil war or an incinerating drought.

From the AllatRa book:

Anastasia: A few more words about Easter Island. The local population retained beliefs that the ceremonial platforms ("ahu"), on which some stone statues are located, are a link between the visible and invisible (otherworldly) worlds, that the stone statues themselves ("moai") contain the supernatural power of their ancestors. The latter is believed to be capable of regulating natural phenomena and, accordingly, lead to a favorable outcome - the prosperity of the people ...

Rigden: Yes, there is nothing supernatural there. It's just that once upon a time there lived people who knew how and for what it was necessary to activate some signs. If their descendants had not lost the knowledge that they were given, then those living on that island would have better understood themselves and their elementary connection with other worlds. Usually for the chronicle, as a transfer of knowledge and legends to descendants, knowledgeable people put signs on stone statues, and themselves were often decorated with appropriate tattoos that had a special symbolic meaning. For uninformed people, these were drawings that did not mean anything at all, but inspired respect and fear of those who, in their opinion, "probably knew something special." Later, of course, there was an ordinary imitation.

Anastasia: Yes, but there are no signs on the stone heads and platforms on Easter Island.

Rigden: Who said that these heads have no continuation? Yes, let them dig deeper in those places, then maybe they will find what is hidden from their eyes. But that is not the question. Even if people find something interesting in signs and symbols, what will they do about it? With the domination of material thinking and the absence of Knowledge, at best, they will make a sensation in the media in order to attract more tourists to the island and make money. That's all. Knowledge is valuable for a spiritual seeker only when one can use it and improve oneself, provide spiritual help to other people. (page 443)

Letter and symbols.

It must be said that the culture of the islanders did not die with them. Along with the worship of the bird-man and massive idols, the tribe of "long-eared" also possessed writing skills. Therefore, it is natural that the "short-eared" managed to take advantage of them. In the first half of the 19th century, the last of the literate Ariki remained to rule on the island, he was called Ngaara, he was white-skinned and small in stature. The ruler accumulated a whole repository of symbolic tablets with hieroglyphs, and also taught the features of the sacred writing of rongo-rongo at school. Only a select few were provided for training him, for the rest of the inhabitants of the island it was the strictest prohibition. They had no right to even touch these tablets. And those who nevertheless were allowed to learn the rongo-rongo alphabet, which included several hundred characters, had yet another test. First of all, they had to get used to twisting rope knots and silhouettes that fit these hieroglyphs. Similar tests are also known in many other parts of the world.

From the AllatRa book:

“Anastasia: The importance of some signs, in my opinion, proves another fact of a kind of“ hunt ”for them. Take, for example, the story of the ancient writing of Easter Island. In that area, knowledge about signs and symbols, however, as well as their use in writing, disappeared quite recently, in the middle of the 19th century, when the "Western Civilization" broke into the island in the form of people who sailed on Dutch and Spanish ships. A Catholic missionary who visited the island told the world about the unusual writing of the island. The inhabitants of Easter Island kept their notes with special signs on wooden tablets, which were in almost every house. But, having opened the signs of Easter Island to the Europeans, this missionary and his followers at the same time did everything to destroy this writing, burn it like a pagan heresy. And what is left of this very recently existing culture now? Several hundred huge sculptures-heads as high as a multi-storey building and weighing more than twenty tons, scattered throughout Easter Island, and a couple of dozen plaques - written monuments, which miraculously survived, as well as a staff and a breast ornament with letters. Moreover, the latter are scattered across various museums around the world. It seems that the world priests, having learned about these signs and symbols, did everything to destroy them, even though this was already actually a pitiful remnant of the once-past knowledge. "

Rigden: Well, the Archons do not sleep, they act. Well, someone who, but they understand what signs are, and even more so what an activated sign is in work. (page 439)

Among the primitive settlers of Oceania, where established habits and traditions have not lost their true meaning, knot magic has become especially widespread. You can read about this in the one hundred and thirteenth chapter of the Koran. His modern interpreters explain this fact as witchcraft. In the old explanations, on the contrary, it is believed that the mention of knots in the Qur'an means sorceresses who knit magic figures, then blow on them and pronounce spells, which contributes to the attraction of evil. Moreover, in Arabia, such things were considered quite common in the pre-Islamic period. But today it is no longer possible to find either a Christian or an Arab who would understand anything in "lace witchcraft". But in those regions where traditional beliefs have not supplanted the worship of deities, as well as ancient and mystical customs, people still knit magic knots, which often form rather complex configurations. This is customary among peoples such as:

• Eskimos;
• Indians of North, Central and South America;
• all African peoples;
• island tribes of Oceania;
• native inhabitants of Australia and East Asia, including Japan.

In most cases, various rope shapes are made for fun. But at the same time, you can often hear how the aborigines, pulling a knitted silhouette from a cord on their fingers, pronounce ancient words with a magical meaning. Such witchcraft is especially developed in the isolated territories of the Melanesian Archipelago, Micronesia, Polynesia, as well as among the American Indians.

At the moment, scientists are familiar with about three and a half thousand such figures. The material for their manufacture is an ordinary rope, the ends of which are tied, or a woven synthetic lace. In ancient times, tribes used animal veins, intestinal fibers, connected or twisted plant threads, and sometimes even long locks of human hair to obtain magical patterns.

Sometimes it happens that the ritual is based on the worship of spirits and mystical creatures. So, for example, the Eskimos are convinced of the existence of a soul in bound figures and are overly afraid of it, since, in their opinion, it can pose a danger to their lives. If someone plays with ropes for too long or does it at an unauthorized time, then the characteristic rustling is heard in front of the dwelling, and at this moment inside the tent the light of the lamp begins to slowly fade away. And only the knowledgeable understand that the spirit of the connected figures is approaching in this way. At one time he removed the insides from his dried up body and now he himself is engaged in knitting from dehydrated intestines. This process is accompanied by a sound similar to the rustling of paper.

An interesting fact is that the Navajo Indians, who settled in the northwestern United States of America, are convinced that knotting arose in ancient times with the help of the Spider-Man tribe, and they later taught this craft to other people. A large number of peoples tie figures from laces in order to later donate them to their deities. But the inhabitants of the Gilbert Islands in Micronesia are sure that such silhouettes appeared at the time of the creation of the world.

A gift that gives passage to another world.

As one belief says: "When the heavens were cut off from the earth at the origin of life, the demigod rose and, while the sky was gradually" rising, "he tied eleven knots one after another." On the Gilbert Islands, they are still familiar today, and the cheat Maude even managed to capture ten of them.

Leading signs.

It becomes clear why scientists still fail to interpret ancient records that are more symbolic than alphabetical, especially if we consider that they have survived only partially. These symbols, which have succumbed to oblivion, explain the real details and mysteries of a much older culture. So far, only twenty surviving epistles have been studied. They are in museums in Germany, Belgium, Chile, USA, Russia, England and Austria.

If you do not take into account the interpretation of Hausen, in which there is a decoding of approximately five hundred characters, the meaning of the rongo-rongo hieroglyphs has not yet been revealed. In doing so, they provoke interesting conclusions. Similar scripts were common among the natives of northwestern India in the 4th millennium BC. Subsequently, their culture also disappeared. Some historians believe that certain components of this culture, including writing, came to Polynesia sometime in the 2nd millennium BC. Then the tribe of "long-eared" spread them to the island of Rapanui, where they rested for many centuries, and possibly millennia. This continued until the death of knowledgeable people and priests led to the emergence of unsolved mystery for today's researchers.

Any figure, woven from ropes, suited a certain melody that needed to be memorized, as well as a certain sign-drawing. These hieroglyphs were not letters or phrases, but at the same time they reflected some concepts and important thoughts. They were obtained with a volcanic glass chisel or grinded with a shark tooth. Each line was done from bottom to top. In this case, the lowest one was drawn from left to right, and the next one, on the contrary. In addition, characters were drawn upside-down in every even line. Scientists gave the name bustrofedon to this kind of writing system. However, in world literature, this method is extremely rare. The mysterious writing remained unknown for a long time. Therefore, the Europeans were not immediately able to find out about it. The first information about it surfaced only in 1817, when Tepano Hausen began to study them in detail. He was quite amazed when he realized that only a small number of literate islanders can read the texts written on the tablets, but at the same time they retell their essence in their own words, using signs solely as a hint. The information that pops up from the tips was learned by heart, but everyone learned it in their own way.

Here is an interesting point from Wikipedia that clearly shows how the archons, through their people, in this case the priests, uprooted the Rongo-rongo culture. Thomson was told about an old man named Ure Va'e Iko. He assured that he understood most of the signs, since he took reading lessons. He was in charge of the last king from the dynasty of monarchs - Nga'ara, who had the ability to read at least one learned text and reproduce many songs, but did not know how to write in rongo-rongo. Having learned this, Thomson began to load the old man with various gifts and coins in the hope that he would tell what is written in the tablets. But Ure Va'e Iko didn’t agree, as Christian priests didn’t allow him to do it, intimidated him with death. After that, he fled. However, Thomson later took photographs of the mysterious tablets and, with great efforts, persuaded the old man to reproduce the text written on them. While Ure was talking, Alexander Salmon wrote down all the information under dictation, and a little later he translated it into English.

Mysterious notebook.

One day Thor Heyerdahl decided to visit a shack on Easter Island. The owner of the hut claimed that he had a certain notebook written by his grandfather, who was aware of the secret of kohau rongo-rongo. It displays the main hieroglyphs of ancient writing, as well as the decoding of their meaning, indicated in Latin letters. But when the scientist tried to study the notebook, Esteban immediately hid it. Shortly after this event, witnesses claim that they saw him sailing in a small boat to the island of Tahiti. Most likely, the notebook was also with him. Since then, no one has heard of Esteban. Therefore, what happened to the notebook is also not clear.

Once the missionaries noticed an amazing similarity between the writing that existed on Easter Island and the hieroglyphs of ancient Egypt. At the same time, it turned out that one hundred and seventy-five characters of the kohau rongo-rongo are absolutely identical with the outlines of Hindustan. And their similarity with the ancient Chinese writing was established by the Austrian archaeologist Robert Teldern in 1951. American and German scientists are convinced that the writing system that once existed in Polynesia was miraculously not lost and remained on Easter Island.

The unusual tradition of the natives to achieve drooping earlobes testifies to the reverence for the possibilities of acute hearing, which at one time was the main advantage of the Lemurians. It was they who could pick up sounds that are absolutely incomprehensible to a modern person.

Such an amazing rumor was also mentioned in the book "Fragments of a Forgotten History". There it was argued that such physical data arose due to the improvement of the spirit. They had access to sounds that we are not able to hear, and this was their happiness. It was in honor of such a gift that previous generations of Lemurians rewarded themselves with drooping earlobes. Thus, they wanted to be like their distant ancestors.

Creation of sculptures for the glory of the gods.

Behrens loved to talk about the rich vegetation of Easter Island, as well as the huge harvests of vegetables and fruits that were harvested each year. When he described the local inhabitants, he wrote the following: "Always vigorous, of good physique, excellent runners, friendly, but extremely fearful. Almost each of them, having brought gifts, hurriedly threw them to the ground and immediately ran away, which is strength." As for the color of the skin, it has different shades - among them there are both blacks and completely white inhabitants, in addition, there are even redskins, which gives the feeling that they are sunburned. Their ears are long and often reach down to the shoulders. Some have small white bars inserted into their lobes as decoration.

According to some statements, the amazing abilities of the Rapanui are the will of the gods. They made them so that they could be responsible for the part of the world to which they are fully deployed. The inhabitants of the island confirmed that their ancestors once long ago were engaged in the construction of the now-known monuments, as they had tremendous power. However, this is not currently permitted. Having heard this version, James Cook did not want to believe it and even formulated the key mysteries of the island - how the idols could have arisen and why they do not appear now.

However, the islanders do not support this proposal and talk about the bird-people, that is, the deities who descended to earth, installed and flew back. The images of people with wings found on the island serve as evidence of this version.

Thus, the Rapanui culture has long excited the minds of researchers with its uniqueness and mystery. Its envoys created unique stone monuments, which testifies to the high level of development of this civilization. All statues appeared between 1250 and 1500. Their known number today is eight hundred and eighty-seven idols. At the same time, practically nothing is known about the inhabitants of Easter Island themselves. Indeed, at the time of its discovery by Europeans in the 18th century, a backward race was discovered that could not make such monuments in any way. When the island was captured by slave traders in the 19th century, the last remnants of civilization were buried.

In an article that was featured in the journal Antiquity, archaeologists provided a detailed overview of arrowheads found in large numbers in virtually all parts of the island. According to the analysis carried out, they are absolutely unsuitable for military operations. This conclusion is due to the fact that the main purpose of a good weapon is to kill the enemy, and spears from the island can only injure a person, but not fatally. Therefore, most likely, these tips were used by local residents as tools for cultivating land, food and various tattoos on the body. Also, there is no evidence of large-scale and bloody wars on the island. So it can be argued that the death of the ancient culture is most likely due to the lack of resources and the transformation of the economic structure. In theory, the revival of civilization was very possible, but this was prevented by the arriving Europeans.

Research results.

After reviewing the materials of various researchers, scientists, simply looking for people, the impression was that there is interest in the island, but the catastrophic lack of true information leads the student either into the jungle of harmonious standard theories, or to the conclusion that we will never know the truth.

So, what we managed to find out:

1. There are several types of moai (statues) on the island, some recently put on pedestals, others are scattered around the island, others are partially buried in the ground, some very deep.

2. Also, these statues differ in size and appearance, apparently made at different times.

3. At the moment, official science says that the Moai were created around 1200-1400 AD. And those that are in the ground up to the shoulders, just over time, skidded by the soil. How long does it take for nature to raise the soil level by 2-3 meters or more? Somehow it doesn't add up.

4. There are several traditions on the island that vaguely resemble the actions of people who had spiritual knowledge about man and the world (whitening of the skin, cult of the bird-man).

5. Despite the many mysteries and open opportunities to explore the island, local authorities do not conduct formal scientific research. Moreover, such research is taboo, excavations are prohibited, and the same is true with underwater research near the island. Researchers are awaiting a warning from the police or special services and a prison. There are many examples of this. Even that unearthed by Thor Heyerdahl has been buried. It turns out that someone is afraid that people will find out the truth kept by the island's artifacts and handwriting, familiar in many similar places around the world. The work of the archons deserves a detailed study so that, understanding the methods of their influence, which have not changed for centuries, it would be possible to identify them in the everyday life of society and bring them up for a nationwide review.

6. A very interesting question about the writing that was on the island and was destroyed so quickly with the arrival of the Europeans, in less than a century, almost no one remembered how to read and write their traditional signs and symbols. And those who still remembered the letter fled from the researchers like fire. Apparently taught by bitter experience.

7. From what has been said, it becomes obvious that before the appearance of Europeans, there was an ancient culture on the island, which kept true knowledge and not only kept, but also actively used it. For example, "plasticine" stone processing technology (when the stone for processing became plastic like plasticine), cutting and transportation of multi-ton stone statues, three-layer ahu (platforms), the lower layer is lined with polygonal masonry, like many other megalithic structures on different continents. The very fact of creating statues and installing them around the perimeter of the island suggests that there was a need (at least of the local population), and as we have already found out, these were knowledgeable spiritual people, this need could be associated with the creation of certain conditions for the whole world, or some part of it. Since "moai have the power of the northern winds and are responsible for the side of the world that they look into." It could be both climatic conditions and spiritual, perhaps Rigden Djappo will find it necessary and reveal to us the true purpose of the statues and their sacred meaning.

Thus, even now, many secrets of Easter Island remain unsolved and it is possible that the answers to the questions of interest to scientists have already been lost forever. However, while research is underway, people do not lose hope of solving the puzzle created many centuries ago.

Prepared by: Alex Ermak (Kiev, Ukraine)

Hititeaiiragi, Rapa Nui, Te Pito-o-te-Henua, Tekaouhangoaru are all other names for the area we know as Easter Island. For most people, Easter Island is associated with something mysterious - and not surprisingly: it is famous for huge stone statues lined up along the coast. They gaze with painted eyes into the ocean, and this look is at the same time eerie and mesmerizing. One of the main questions is how did these 10-meter idols get there? - still remains unresolved. Tourists flock here hoping to unravel the mystery, but return home hung with souvenirs and ... without an answer.

Easter Island

How to get there

Easter Island is part of Valparaiso, one of the regions of Chile. There are two ways to get to the island, and both are costly. The first one is on a tourist yacht or cruise ship, which sometimes come here. You can go on an independent trip and go to the port in a couple of weeks.

The second way is air, the island has an airport that accepts flights from the Chilean capital Santiago, Tahiti and Lima. The flight schedule depends on the time of year: for example, from December to March, flights are operated only once a week. In the rest of the months - twice a week. The flight from Santiago takes approximately 5 hours.

Search for flights to Santiago (closest airport to Easter Island)

Transport

All the sights of the island are close to each other, and the territory itself is small. On Easter Island you can take a taxi, bike or rent a car. It is almost impossible to get lost on the island, as there are only two roads.

The average cost of renting a car is from 80 USD per day with a full tank of gasoline. By the way, it is better to refuel completely - it will be difficult to do this on the island. Prices on the page are for September 2018.

Easter Island beaches

There are several beaches on Easter Island, but Anakena is the best choice. Locals even warn that they can only swim here. There are several cafes on the sandy beach, and in general the local landscape is somewhat reminiscent of the Black Sea coast: there are stalls with cold water on the beach, the natives sell sweets and other snacks, the smell of barbecue is in the air. Only instead of the sea - the ocean.

Cuisine and restaurants

There are quite a few small cafes on the island where you can have an inexpensive snack. On the menu, you should choose seafood dishes, such as soup or tuna steak. In general, the steaks are very good here - from meat and fish, with potatoes and herbs. The local beer is soft and very pleasant.

Some restaurants are built very close to the water. They stand on stilts, and the owners of the establishment can demolish one of the walls so that visitors can admire the view of the ocean.

Easter Island Hotels

The island has the only city where you can stay in a hotel - Hanga Roa. Most tourists prefer mini-hotels rather than chain operators, and nevertheless, the cost of living is rather big. The fact is that many goods are imported to the island from the mainland, which increases their price. The most expensive hotel on the island is Еxplora EN RAPA NUI. There are 30 rooms, a restaurant with an outdoor terrace, a bar, a souvenir boutique, an outdoor pool, a massage parlor, an outdoor jacuzzi.

One of the ways for the inhabitants of the island to make money is renting out apartments. At the airport, each new plane is greeted by a crowd of locals, vying with each other to offer accommodation in hotels or in their homes.

There is also a camping on the island - here you can pitch a tent or rent a very simple room for little money, and with the Internet. To get to the campsite, you need to find a guide at the airport with a Mihinoa sign - this is the name of the place where you will stay.

The shops

Selling souvenirs is one of the main sources of income for the islanders. In shops and shops, you can buy idols of different sizes, from pocket to 2-3 meters. The main thing is that you can take this piece of wood out of the country to your homeland. Especially popular are the "kawakawa" statues - either a person or a ghost - and, of course, magnets, necklaces, beads, hats, headbands, and embroidered shoes.

Easter Island entertainment and attractions

Moai

Stone moai are carved from petrified volcanic ash. These are stylized human figures with short torsos and elongated heads. The weight of each of the idols reaches almost 20 tons. According to local beliefs, they contain the supernatural power of the ancestors of the first king of Easter Island - Hotu Matua.

Moai stand along the coast and look out over the island. Hundreds of books have been written about the history of their origin, films have been made, but there are still no clues. Someone believes that aliens brought them to the island, others are sure that such statues could only be made by giant people 3-4 meters in height. Another version is that these idols themselves came to the island, but later they forgot how to walk and stayed here forever. There are about 900 statues on the island, most of them are located near the Rano Raraku volcano.

Volcanoes

The craters of the Rano Kau and Rano Raraku volcanoes are another attraction of Easter Island. It was from the remains of Rano Raraku that the moai were made. In the pit of this volcano are scattered unfinished statues. The view inside Rano Kau is breathtaking - the crater is filled with rainwater covered with clumps of grass, and the sky is reflected in this giant lake.

Orongo village

The ceremonial village of Orongo is located on the edge of the Rano Kau crater. There were once ceremonies dedicated to the bird-man. In the village you can find many cobblestones on which are carved images of the god Make-Make and the bird-man.

Hanga Roa Church

It is a Catholic church famous for its wood carvings. Looking at it, it seems that the building itself is carved out of wood. Craftsmen are engaged here, and music services are held on Sundays.

5 things to do on Easter Island:

1. In late January - early February, visit the unique Tapati festival, which certainly has no analogues in the world. It takes place in late January or early February. Tapati is a slice of Easter Island culture, and not an export version, but a real one. The natives sing, dance and measure their strength.
2. Ascend to the Te-Pito-te-henua ceremonial site, the name of which means "the navel of the earth" in Rapanui.
3. Arrange a romantic picnic in the palm groves of Anakena Bay.
4. Come up with your own moai legend - and then tell it to the locals. They love to hear versions of how the statues appeared on Easter. They will listen to you attentively, maybe they will write your story, if it is unique, and put it in the collected works of tourists.
5. Visit the village of Orongo and see numerous petroglyphs depicting bird-men and the god Make-Make. By the way, on this island its own written language was invented - rongo-rongo, which has not yet been deciphered.

Since the above are already trying to understand why this Moai decided to drown, I answer. Employees of both dive centers in the area said that they tried to take a specific specimen on a ship. But something went wrong and the ship capsized.
This version is quite true, because:
- it is really made of stone and is very similar to those that remained on land
- lies at a depth of 28 meters. For the fun of divers, ships and so on are sunk around 15-18, so that they could dive and not AOWD
- they took out a lot of idols. It is quite possible that once again a ton of stone was poorly secured. There are no legends like "The spirit of the stone did not allow leaving the island". Just unlucky again. Dozens of other Moai were taken out and are in museums around the world. The most skillfully made with the presence of an ass (almost the only one with this part of the body) is exhibited in the London Museum (in which I do not remember)

Moai underwater is unusual. But the most sur and egg-piercing view is the volcano mountain, where these Moai were gouged out of stone. To see multi-tone stone muzzles scattered at different angles is cool.

The island is pretty damn nothing. Above in the photos are typical vegetation. Only trees are missing, they are still represented on this piece of land in some low-lying places. There are no minerals. The sea does not shine either.
Why did people decide to settle there about thirteen centuries ago? In fact, the question is different, why did the people who settled there, set sail and flooded into the open ocean? There were no global cataclysms in this area, so that one could speak of an isthmus to the mainland or the presence of other islands a thousand years ago. Just for some unknown reason, one authoritative person said “Let's go there” and pointed at ninety degrees to the shore of his homeland. Others said, "Come on!" What made the authority to raise some people from their homes and float into nowhere, scientists still do not know. But it is perfectly understandable why these people decided to settle on the island "damn nothing". It is very simple - when you get through the boats in the Pacific Ocean for a couple of thousand kilometers (then there were no steam engines even in Europe), you will be happy about anything.

So a second wave of immigrants came, who seemed to have sailed without women. What they hoped for is not clear. But they were lucky - women were at the first wave. And the first migrants shared them in a friendly way. Everyone healed happily and called themselves Rapa Nui.
But the resources are few, so few that even the handful of people grazing on this island lacked. In addition, those who arrived last were slightly developmental. And there was a paradox: those who came in large numbers became nasalniks, and those who remained in large numbers turned into almost disenfranchised guest workers.

I don’t know how guest workers won honor and respect. But the cool ones decided everything in an adult way. Google suggests that at the best of times, about ten thousand people lived on the island. I don’t know how many clans there were, but they were definitely there. And the more advanced settlers did not think of anything better as proof of steepness than riveting idols out of stone. The Rano Raraku volcano was adapted for the raw materials. If you want honor and respect for your clan, hollow out a stone muzzle weighing several tons and bang it into your territory. Whoever has more stone muzzles is cooler. Each idol symbolizes connection with ancestors and endows the clan with mana. When wars happened, the enemies tried to destroy as much of the enemy's Moai as possible, thereby demoralizing them.
The second unanswered question is how the Moai were dragged from the volcano. Although the island is not large, very good reasons and some technology are needed to carry such cargo. The first was more than enough, but with the second there were problems. I'm not sure if the Rapanui used even horses. With a very high probability they were dragged by hand. Here, by the way, there were less developed guest workers. Someone thinks that stone muzzles weighing several tons were rolled on logs, someone believes that they were rolled from side to side. But somehow they were carried even to the opposite coast. Although, as the photographs show, a lot, and even more likely most, remained on the hill.
The largest Moai, which was nevertheless dragged to its destination, is five meters high and weighs 75 tons. The largest, which they did not manage to finish, is about twenty meters high and 270 tons.

Cool, by the way, were called long-eared, and guest workers were short-eared.
And the latter did not like this state of affairs. Drag Maui they are, and honor and respect to those who forced them to carry. The revolution has come to pass. And although the long-eared were development, the short-eared clearly knew life. Whatever one may do to develop it was necessary not to carry some garbage across the whole island, but at least to upgrade the stone axes. In general, all or almost all of the long-eared were decided.
This ended the production of Maui. Those that had already been installed in holy places continued to be worshiped, but they stopped carrying new ones. The official version seems to say that short-eared minds have not grown to such a crown of human genius as hollowing out a multi-toned muzzle and ramming it five kilometers away. Personally, I believe that they just turned on their brains to the fullest and came to the conclusion that in this world, even in their little world, there are much more interesting, and most importantly, much more useful activities.

The short-eared people stopped hammering the rock for the sake of raising their self-esteem. The old idols, of course, have not gone anywhere, but the tsunami will roll over, then the volcano will slightly blow. Stone by stone, but gradually the Moai collapsed, taking mana with them. And besides, not all clans remain at the same level of steepness. If you don't make new Moai, then where can you get additional honor?

And at some point, the veneration of the Moai begins to intertwine with the veneration of the bird-man, something like a demigod or something like that. Old beliefs and gods are not canceled, but they gradually go to rituals and the acquisition of power without material evidence, like a lump of ten tons. Now the bird-man has become the main one on the island. He is the viceroy of God and is worshiped as a god. To become one, you must complete the task first on the designated day and hour. To do this, next to the damn nothing Easter Island is fucking nothing in the form of the island of Motu Nui. On it, besides stones, there are only nests of sea gulls. So, to become a god, one has to go down a very steep rocky slope of the volcano, swim a kilometer to Motu Nui, climb its steep slope, find a sea gull egg and return along the already trodden path with it to offer it to the chief priest. It is impossible to break, of course. Where they put it in order to save it during the return trip, history is silent. Or maybe it was not necessary to drag, maybe the gentlemen took their word for it.

Now, another confirmation of my theory that the short-eared were not so dumb. At least some of them. So, some pretzel did it. But it is not he who becomes the main thing, but the one he represents. Not every shit is the main thing, right? Now the one who was represented by the hero-egg-seeker, well done, he is now a god. He is shaved in all places. including eyebrows. Give a new name. Refurbish the cave dwelling after the previous god. In this cave, the hero's representative will spend the next year making laws and resolving conflicts. He cannot cook his own food - the priest does it for him. He cannot cut his hair or nails, this is also the responsibility of the priest. He cannot help but talk to someone, no one has the right to look at him. That is, God lives as a hermit. His only means of communication with the people under his control is the high priest, who transmits the decrees of the bird-man. Not stupid, right? At the same time, the priest does not strain every year for the sake of his title, well, except to jump, wave the local censer and bring the “master” to devour (something I doubt that at least one priest himself strained for the sake of cooking). What this pretzel from the cave actually said, even the pretzel itself will not remember in a year. If he remembers, then at the time of his communication with other people he will no longer be a god. So, running into the high priest is fraught with the loss of your eggs, and not bird eggs. And cooking is also a good space for action. If the bird-man bends the shore, then add the necessary drug and business with the end. The gods called to him, he was so cool, what else can I say. In the meantime, there are no eggs, I will be in charge here. Well, or piss on Motu-Nui right now, if you like, but don't come back without eggs. No birds with eggs? Your problems.
Although in fact the main power was with the military leaders, I suppose.

Easter Island is one of the most isolated islands in the world. Approximately 1200 years ago, sea travelers first came ashore here. Over the centuries, a mysterious society emerged on this isolated and remote island. For reasons still unknown, they began carving giant statues out of volcanic rock. These monuments, known as "moai", are some of the most incredible ancient relics on earth. Where did they come from and why did they disappear? Science has allowed a lot to learn about the mystery of the island and to discard some of the more bizarre theories, but questions and disagreements still remain.

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Easter Island history

Easter Island is a tiny piece of land in the South Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people call it Rapa Nui. Formed by a series of large volcanic eruptions, it has been home to seabirds and dragonflies for millions of years. Its steep slopes marked the route of navigation for the ships of the brave Polynesian seafarers. How long their voyage lasted and the reasons that served as the basis for migration from their historical homeland remains a mystery to which we will never have an answer, but we can imagine their joy at the sight of this island after, perhaps, many months of wandering in the open the ocean.

Located in the South Pacific between Chile and Tahiti, Easter Island is one of the most isolated inhabited islands in the world. Triangular in shape, with a total area of ​​102 km2, it was formed when flows of molten lava rose deep from the bowels of the Earth, broke through the shell of the earth's crust and escaped to the surface of the ocean.

Today, volcanic cones are found at every point on the island. The largest of them, Rano Kanu, is clearly visible even from space. The highest, Terevaka, rises to a height of 507 meters above sea level. In total, there are over 70 eruptive centers on the island. Lava tubes and oncoming waves have created hundreds of underwater caves and an erratic coastline.

Legends tell that it was on the sandy island of Anaken that King Hoto Manua descended and began to colonize the island. Excavations in this area indicate that this particular area boasts one of the finest collections of moai monuments. Travelers began to build villages and houses of an unusual elliptical shape. It is believed that this construction method began when newly arrived settlers turned their boats upside down, thus adapting them for their temporary housing. There were hundreds of remains of these structures on the island in the 1800s, but most of them were destroyed by missionaries who used them to build fences.

The first settlers of the island found lush vegetation here, teeming with large palm trees, from which they adapted to make boats and dwellings. The plants they brought with them adapted well to the soil enriched with volcanic ash, and by 1500 the island's population ranged from 7,000 to 9,000 thousand inhabitants.

As the population grew, separate clans began to form, concentrated in different areas of Easter Island. All of them had one thing in common - the construction of statues and the cult that formed around them.

It is unclear why the inhabitants of Easter Island have resorted to the massive construction of monuments on such a large scale. Their obsession ultimately led to disastrous results for them, as they cut down the forest that was required to transport the huge moai. The depletion of forest resources has had truly catastrophic consequences.

The first sculptures were made of basalt, and their height did not exceed the height of a person. Then the technology of their manufacture changed completely. The statues began to be carved in the quarry of the extinct volcano Rano Raraku from volcanic tuff (tuff - compressed volcanic ash, compacted after a volcanic eruption). Their height began to reach 10 meters or more, and their mass - about 20 tons.

The soft volcanic tuff was the ideal material for carving statues. Using tools made of hard volcanic rocks, the creators of the monuments first marked the contours of the moai, carved the face and body in the front, then the back of the figure, and then gradually carved the statue out of the rock until it was connected only by a thin bridge. Craftsmen making moai statues, were skilled sculptors who went through all the stages of mastering the skill of their profession in a kind of "carvers' guild". The making of the statue most likely took place during the performance of numerous ceremonies and rituals. If by chance a defect occurred during manufacture, it was thrown and the carvers took up its creation in another place. Such a mistake during work was considered a sign of the devil and was a bad omen. In short, they were skilled craftsmen.

The famous Norwegian traveler Thor Heyerdahl in 1955-1956 organized an archaeological expedition to the island, which focused on experiments in the manufacture and transportation of moai sculptures. Two teams of sculptors worked in shifts to make the future sculpture. It took them no less than a whole year. So making them was a very painstaking business.
Finally, when the statue was hewn, the bridge connecting it with the rock of a volcanic crater was torn off, and it slowly rolled down the slope. At the base of the crater, the statues were placed in an upright position, and here the final polishing and refinement of the back and torso took place. After that, preparatory work was carried out for the transportation and installation of the moai in various places on the island. As proof that the statues were not easy to move, many of them can be seen along the ancient roads, where they fell into disrepair and were abandoned.

It is believed that Easter Island statues embodied memorable images of representatives of noble families. However, the moai were not portraits of specific individuals, although it is possible that some of them had some kind of inscriptions or other signs that associated them with certain overlords. Why they chose a stylized design with an angular face, a protruding chin and no legs at all remains one of Rapa Nui's greatest secrets.

There are other stone statues made by Polynesians outside Easter Island. Sculptures have been found in parts of South America that resemble the kneeling statue in Rano Raraku, but nothing in the world beats the typical design of moai statues.

When work on the carving of the statues came to an end, they had to be transported across the island. In some cases, they were transported over a distance of over 20 km. How were these massive sculptures transported to their locations? Easter legends say that the moai themselves went to their places. Some researchers claim that they were dragged around. Later, this theory was refuted and came to the conclusion that they were moved in an upright position. Until now, no one can say in the affirmative how it all looked like in reality. This is another, completely unsolved mystery of the civilization of the Rapa Nui island.

In 1868, the British made an attempt to take one such statue to their homeland, but this task was clearly beyond their strength. In the end, they gave up this venture and limited themselves to a small bust two and a half meters high, which was installed in the British Museum in London. The entire crew of the ship and several hundred natives took part in the process of its transportation.

At the end of the transportation, the statues were installed on ahu (ahu) - stone platforms slightly inclined towards the sea. They were made from large stones of various sizes and shapes. The stones were polished and fitted to each other in such a way that they fit perfectly on top of each other. Installed on the coast, the ahu required the same engineering expertise and workforce required to create the statues themselves. It is here, on Easter Island, that one can truly appreciate the high craftsmanship of the stonework of the inhabitants of the island.

After installing the statue on ahu, the final stage of making the figure took place - the installation of eyes from coral or volcanic glass. According to legend, only after gaining eyes, the moai could see the place where it was installed.

Soon, moai statues began to appear in all parts of the island, and over time their number reached 1000. Over the decades, there was a growing desire to create the largest and largest moai, each of which belonged to a particular clan, which allowed the formation of an almost continuous line of sculptures along the coast of Easter Island. An unfinished statue over 20 meters high and weighing 270 tons remains in the Rano Raraku quarry! Culture has reached its dawn. And then something terrible happened.

A chilling story of the predatory use of resources and the devastation of Easter Island has come to light. The Europeans who first arrived on the island wondered how people could survive in such a desolate place. In fact, it was a mystery for a long time until recent research showed that the island was covered with dense forests dominated by the now extinct giant palm.

Having set foot on the island for the first time, future residents saw a rich tropical paradise here. The rainforest resources seemed inexhaustible. The trees were used to build dwellings, canoes, firewood for fires, and, apparently, for transportation and erection of moai statues.
The erection of statues has become an obsession over time, accompanied by massive deforestation. They began to reach such enormous sizes, which made it practically impossible to transport them over long distances. The trees were cut down. With the deforestation, soil erosion began, which led to its depletion. Low harvests led to armed conflicts between different clans for control over the scarce resources. Symbols of power and success for the inhabitants of the island, the moai, were overthrown.

The armed struggle only intensified over time. The victors are said to have devoured their defeated enemies to gain strength. The bones found in various parts of the island are proof of cannibalism. In the context of insufficient resources, this may have been the result of hunger, or ritual activities. In the southwestern part of Easter Island is the Ana Kai Tangata cave, which translates as “the cave where people were devoured”. The society and culture of Rapa Nui, which has developed over the past 300 years, collapsed. All that remains after them are moai ...

The inhabitants of Easter Island were even more cut off from the outside world than before. Any hope of escaping from the devastated island was dashed due to the lack of forest. The only things they could build were small rafts and canoes made of reed, so even fishing proved to be difficult in this corner of the world. The island became an abandoned piece of land, the eroded soil barely producing enough food for the tiny population to survive. It was in these conditions that the cult of the bird-man arose among the survivors of the conflict (perhaps there were 750 inhabitants).

It is possible that the cult of the bird-man began at the time of the erection of the moai statues. Over time, it became the dominant religion on the island and was practiced until 1866-1867. With no trees to build boats and the ability to sail off the devastated island, all the inhabitants of Easter Island could do was watch the birds soaring high in the sky with envy.
High on the edge of the Rano Kau crater, the ceremonial village of Orongo arose. Founded to worship the god of fertility Makemake, it has become the birthplace of intense competition between members of the island's different clans.

Every year, in the spring, each clan chose the most physically prepared warriors who took part in the competition. Participants had to go down the steep slopes to the sea, swim to one of three small islands in the water teeming with sharks, and the first one to bring back an intact egg of a bird of a dark mallard. The warrior who was the first to deliver the egg to Easter Island was considered the Bird of the Year and received a special award and privileges, and his tribe began to rule the island for a year until the next competition. The ritual, unique for all residents of Polynesia, was dedicated to the supreme deity Makemake. The conqueror became the earthly embodiment of this deity.

Some of the most interesting sights in Orongo are hundreds of petroglyphs carved by bird-men. Engraved in solid basalt rock, they have survived time and harsh weather. It has been argued that the petroglyphs depict the winners of the bird-man competition. About 480 of these petroglyphs have been found on the island, mainly around Orongo.

It seemed that the culture of the inhabitants of the island began to revive along with the new cult of the bird-man. We will never know if the inhabitants of the island of Rapa Nui would have been able to reach the flourishing of their culture again, because in December 1862 ships of Peruvian slave traders moored to the island and took the entire working population of the island into slavery. Peru's economy was booming at the time and needed additional labor. Due to difficult working conditions, illness and poor nutrition, about a hundred inhabitants of Easter Island survived. Thanks to the urgent intervention of France, an agreement was reached with the government of Peru, thanks to which the surviving residents were returned to the island. They brought with them diseases that further reduced the population of Easter Island. At the time of the annexation of the island of Chile in 1888, fewer than 200 indigenous people lived here.

Missionaries arrived on the island when the population was in a particularly dire state. They found a declining society here, and it did not take long for them to convert its inhabitants to Christianity. First of all, the manner of clothing of the indigenous population was changed, or rather, the complete absence of such. Tattooing and any use of body paint were prohibited. The destruction of Rapanui art, buildings and other shrines, including the rongo-rongo tables - the key to understanding their history - was swift and complete. The inhabitants of the island were forced to give up their ancestral lands, and they were forced to live in a small part of the island, while the rest of the land was used for farming by the arrived farmers.
In fact, the missionaries did more damage to the island than the activities of the Peruvian slave traders, who took away most of the island's population. Those who managed to escape and hid in the caves of the island were rescued by those missionaries who continued to destroy all the wooden sculptures of the island, religious artifacts, and, most importantly, Rongo-Rongo wooden tablets with Rapani script (inhabitants of Easter Island). Easter Island is the only island in the Pacific Ocean whose inhabitants have developed rongo rongo, their own writing system. Only a few of these tablets have survived to this day, so no one is able to decipher them.

The annexation of the island of Chile brought new trends, and today there are only a small handful of people who are blood related to the native population of the island.

What conclusions can be drawn from all this. A pearl island located in the endless sea far from the centers of civilization. Seeming endless material resources. Technological progress. Population growth. Depletion of resources. Wars. Decline. Sounds familiar? The history of Easter Island is the history of our time. We are also like an island floating in the endless sea. Of course, there are differences. We can say that Easter Island is too small, so it was only a matter of time before the resources of such a closed territory would be fully used. But parallels arise between the attitude of the islanders to their surrounding nature and our own, and this is the most terrible part of the story.

On such a tiny piece of land as Easter Island, one can easily trace the consequences of deforestation, exactly how it happened. Despite the reduction of forest areas, residents continued their destructive actions. They probably prayed to their gods to make up for the damage done to their lands so that they could continue their abuse of her further, but the gods did not answer their prayers. And all the trees were cut down. Whoever did what to change this ecosystem, the result was quite predictable. The man who cut down the last tree understood that it was the last tree. However, he or she did it. This is the saddest moment. Almost everyone today has access to television, thanks to which we learn about the massive deforestation in the world, which poses a serious threat today. And all our governments and most ordinary citizens watch this with indifference. It seems that they are ready to destroy the last tree in order to build the moai of our time - enterprises that represent high technology and progress. Will the meaning of our life be to harmonize the way of life of a person with the well-being of the environment, or are all people the same as that islander who cut down the last tree on Easter Island?

Attractions in Easter Island

Despite its diminutive size, Easter Island has many attractions, both natural and man-made. So much so that the United Nations has listed it as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The island's historical sites are easily accessible. There are still no fences or signs warning where you can and where not. Perhaps their absence is explained by the fact that the entire territory of Rapa Nui is a continuous archaeological reserve. One large open-air museum.

The main tourist attraction of the island is, of course, the moai. Please note that Easter Island moai are rather fragile historical monuments than they actually look like. Therefore, they must be handled very carefully.
All places available for visiting are located mainly along the coast of the island. First time visitors to Easter Island are amazed at the large number of archaeological sites scattered throughout its territory. Each settlement had its own ahu and moai statues, so when traveling along the southern part of the island, you can see historical monuments almost everywhere.

The most popular attractions are the craters of the Rano Kau and Rano Raraku volcanoes. Located a little inland, the Rano Raraku quarry is home to the famous statues. Hundreds of island residents worked on their production from morning to evening. The remains of the volcano served as material for their creation. Here tourists can see with their own eyes all the stages of painstaking work; here are scattered remains of unfinished moai statues. Climbing to the top of the left side of the crater and descending into the excavation of an extinct volcano is worth it. The opposite side of the crater, where most of the moai statues are located, is the most impressive site on the island.

The Rano Kau crater, like Rano Raraku, is filled with rainwater and has a variegated, unearthly appearance that will take your breath away.
Easter Island has two sandy beaches. Anakena on the north side of the island is a great surfing spot. The second beach is a real gem named Ovahe. Located along the southern coast of the island, this beautiful deserted beach is much larger than Anakena and is surrounded by beautiful cliffs.

Diving and snorkelling are popular around Motu Nui and Motu Iti

Often overlooked, but a particularly fascinating and supernatural aspect of Easter Island is its expansive cave system. While there are several "official" caves of interest in their own right, there are many other interesting caves to explore, most of which are nearby Ana Kakenga. Although most of the inlets are small (some are barely large enough to crawl through) and hidden, many are available for independent exploration.

Due to the extreme geographic distance of Easter, many believe that only the most desperate travelers can make it to the island. In fact, airlines have regular flights and tourism is the main branch of the island's economy. Chilean airline LAN Airlines is the only operator with scheduled flights to Easter Island, with the local airport serving as a stopover between Santiago and Tahiti. As a monopoly passenger carrier, this airline's airfare is not cheap.

If you are a brave traveler, the sailing ship Soren Larsen makes a trip to the island from the shores of New Zealand once a year. Time travel takes 35 days. The island is located on the route between South America and Polynesia. Cruise ocean liners on this route also stop at Easter Island.

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