easter island statues name

Moai, or mo'ai are the name of the Easter Island statues. At its peak, the population of Easter Island is believed to have reached 11,000. For years, archaeologists have wondered how the mysterious statues came to dot the island in the Pacific.

Easter Island is home to 887 monolithic carvings, called moai statues. Work on the statues stopped and the statutes were knocked over. The statues were carved by the Polynesian colonizers of the island, mostly between circa 1250 AD and 1500 Ad. But, the similarity ends there. The moai were built by the Rapa Nui, who were native to the island, somewhere between the years 1400-1650. The Moyai statue, a gift in the 1980s to the district from Japan’s volcanic Nii-jima Island, has very full lips (moai are thin) and the carving implies a mane of hair, which is not a feature of the maoi carvings. Researchers have long puzzled over why the huge Easter Island statues were placed where they are. When the first Europeans finally arrived on the island, most of these people had died out. The largest of the moai weigh up to 86 tons and can be as much as 30 feet tall, although the average size is about half that big, according to Easter Island Travel.

Easter Island is to demand the UK return one of the remote Polynesian territory’s famous giant head statues taken 150 years ago, which is currently held by the British Museum. Easter Island's famous moai statues slowly fading away. Sunset in Easter Island Much of what we do know of the gods and other mythological figures of Easter Island is derived from oral tradition passed down through the centuries. But, the similarity ends there.

Finally, the resources of the island became exhausted and the people resorted to cannibalism and began eating each other.

What you may not have known is that those Easter Island heads actually have hidden buried bodies. Practically everyone has seen the iconic images of the Easter Island heads. Moyai looks a bit like the Easter Island moai statuary, with the long broad nose and pronounced brow.

And, like Easter Island and the Rapa Nui people, much remains shrouded in mystery — and a great deal has undoubtedly been lost.