|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
This page contains the results of our research of internet, books and leaflets, from our visits to the sites and from information provided by Cristian Pakarati, a Rapanui artist and archaeologist. The information has been organised to give a brief outline of all aspects of Easter Islands history, geography, culture and artefacts as far as we have been able to ascertain. Not being experts we have tried to give the best descriptions we can without going in to too much depth.
|
|
As with anything historical, much is conjecture; with Easter Island which was isolated from the rest of the world for 1400 years and later saw its population dwindle to 110 people this is more than ever true.
|
|
It would also be wrong to think that because Easter Island is so small and it's statues so famous that there would be nothing else of importance, but wherever you move there is archaeology, history and legends.
|
|
Anyone who has information that they think will be useful to us is welcome to send it to us at max_di_rtw@hotmail.com - no attachments.
|
|
Easter Island, as it is known in the English speaking world, has a number of other names by which it is also known.
|
|
To it's Chilean governors it's called Isla de Pascua which is just Easter Island in Spanish.
|
|
It's Polynesian name is Rapa Nui, given to it by a Tahitian visitor who in the 19th century said that it was like another Polynesian island call Rapa only bigger (Nui).
|
|
But to its original inhabitants it was known as "Te Pito O Te Henua" (Navel of The World).
|
|
The general convention, when wanting to be politically correct, seems to be to call the island Rapa Nui and the people and language Rapanui. According to the context I'll call the island either Rapa Nui or Easter Island.
|
|
Located in the South Pacific Ocean at 27.12 S 109.37 W, roughly midway between Chile 3600 km to the east and Tahiti 4000 km to the north west, Easter Island is the world's most isolated inhabited island.
|
|
The 165 square km triangular shaped island, 24km long and 12km wide, rises to 511m and is mostly composed of volcanic rock. Small coral formations exist along the shoreline, but the lack of a coral reef has allowed the sea to cut cliffs around much of the island. The coastline has many lava tubes and volcanic caves. The only sandy beaches are on the north-east coast.
|
|
With Hawii 6900km to the north west and New Zealand 6000km west south west it forms the eastern point of Polynesia.
|
|
The closest other inhabited island is tiny Pitcairn Island 2000km away, where the mutineers of the H.M.S. Bounty settled in 1790.
|
|
Easter Island sits at the juncture of three tectonic plates, the Nazca plate to the east, the Pacific plate to the west and the Antarctic plate to the south. The Nazca Ridge runs along the middle of the Nazca plate with Easter Island at its western end. Running down the eastern side of the Pacific Plate is the Eastern Pacific Rise.
|
|
The Nazca Plate is moving eastward and submerging under the South American Plate (creating the Andes) causing the western side and Easter Island to rise.
|
|
The separation of the plates at the Eastern Pacific Rise at over 15cm per year is the fastest in the world. Easter Island is a tectonic hot spot.
|
|
The island was mainly formed from three volcanoes; Poike is the oldest at 3m years, the surface has now been completely eroded, the second volcano was Rano Kau which formed 2.5m years ago creating a second island, and lastly Maunga Terevaka which arose between the previous two 1.5m years ago joining up with the other two to form a triangle shaped island. In total there are around 80 cones of various sizes.
|
|
The last eruptions were 12,000 years ago on the west flank of Maunga Terevaka.
|
|
This volcanic activity provided mineral resources that were essential to life on the island, these included basalt, a very hard stone made from lava, that was fashioned into tools to carve the moai statues; obsidian, a volcanic glass used to make extremely sharp cutting tools, and; volcanic tuff, a soft, porous rock out of which most of the island's sculpture were carved.
|
|
Both temperatures and humidity are high and, although the soil is adequate, drainage was very bad. Because the island's lava caves drain water underground, there were no permanent streams on the island. The only natural fresh water available is from lakes inside the extinct volcanoes and a few springs.
|
|
Due to the island's remoteness, there are no native vertebrates and very few native plant species. By studying ancient deposits of pollen and other preserved plant remains, archaeologists now know that in antiquity the island was thickly forested and was teeming with land birds, but with the destruction of the trees they became less. There were thirty indigenous species of flora, no mammals, a few insects and two types of small lizard. The waters around the island now contained very few fish. Though it was the richest seabird breeding site in Polynesia and probably in the whole Pacific.
|
|
Although deforested over a period of 1500 years, during the last 100 years efforts have been made to re-establish woodland mainly with fast growing eucalyptus.
|
|
Throughout Polynesia there was a belief in a mythical homeland called Hawaiki. This name crops up in various forms, Hawaii, Savai'i, Tahiti. Some suggest that it could have been Taiwan where one of the local languages is part of the Austronesian family to which the Polynesian languages also belong. Undoubtedly the migration started from somewhere in South East Asia.
|
|
Rapa Nui is at the eastern end of the great Polynesian migration which started about 8000BC and travelling from island to island to reach Fiji around 1000BC. From there migration was through Samoa to Marquesas in 500BC which was the central point for the Polynesian colonisation with migrants reaching Hawaii in 300AD, Rapa Nui in 400AD and New Zealand in 1000AD.
|
|
Their long voyages were made in double canoes, joined together by a broad central platform to transport and shelter people, plants, animals and food. These were deliberate colonisation missions and they represented considerable feats of navigation and seamanship since the prevailing currents and winds in the Pacific are against west to east travel.
|
|
They used the fact that normally the wind blew east to west by waiting for a reversal to the normal pattern and then sailing out to the east, confident that the wind would turn again and blow them back home. They were accustomed to travelling up to 5,000 miles navigating by the stars.
|
|
It is said that the ancestors of the Rapanui came from two places known as Marae Renga and Marae Tohio in a land called Maori ("Land of the Native People"), or Hiva ("Black"; perhaps a reference to the basalt of volcanic islands, perhaps Mangareva. Hiva was a Polynesian name for the Marquesas Islands). Their fishhooks and stone adzes resembled early Marquesan models.
|
|
In the early 1950s, the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl (famous for his Kon-Tiki raft voyages across the oceans) popularised the idea that the island had been originally settled by advanced societies of Indians from the coast of South America. Extensive archaeological, ethnographic, and linguistic research has conclusively shown this hypothesis to be inaccurate though Thor Heyerdahl still clings to his theory.
|
|
Original Settlers (400-1000AD)
|
|
It is now generally accepted that the original inhabitants of Easter Island were of Polynesian stock (DNA extracts from skeletons have recently confirmed this), and that they arrived around AD 380 to 400.
|
|
It is estimated that the original colonists, arrived in just a few canoes and numbered fewer than 100 by legend led by the intrepid culture hero, Hotu Matu`a, who either fled warfare or a flooded island to land at the white sand beach of Anakena, and from there to divide up the land amongst his sons. Because of the plentiful bird, plant and fish sources, including tuna, sea bass, and two types of lobster, the population grew rapidly and gave rise to a rich religious and artistic culture.
|
|
Recent scientific work, involving the analysis of pollen types, has shown that at the time of the initial settlement Easter Island had a dense vegetation cover including extensive woods.
|
|
A subtropical forest of trees and woody bushes towered over a ground layer of shrubs, herbs, ferns, and grasses. In the forest grew tree daisies, the rope-yielding hauhau tree, and the toromiro tree, which furnishes a dense, mesquite-like firewood. The most common tree in the forest was a species of palm now absent on Easter Island but formerly so abundant that the bottom strata of the sediment column were packed with its pollen. The Easter Island palm was closely related to the still-surviving Chilean wine palm, which grows up to 82 feet tall and 6 feet in diameter. The tall, branchless trunks of the Easter Island palm would have been ideal for transporting and erecting statues and constructing large canoes. The palm would also have been a valuable food source, since its Chilean relative yields edible nuts as well as sap from which Chileans make sugar, syrup, honey, and wine.
|
|
Polynesians in their home islands depended on a very limited range of plants and animals for subsistence: their only domesticated animals were chickens, pigs, dogs and the Polynesian rat and the main crops were yam, taro, breadfruit, banana, coconut and sweet potato. The settlers on Rapa Nui brought only chickens and rats with them and they soon found that the climate was too severe for semitropical plants such as breadfruit and coconut and extremely marginal for the usual mainstays of their diet, taro and yam. The inhabitants were, therefore, restricted to a diet based mainly on sweet potatoes and chickens. The only advantage of this monotonous, though nutritionally adequate, diet was that cultivation of the sweet potato was not very demanding and left plenty of time for other activities.
|
|
However, the islanders did have the sea to provide food, but whereas fish provided a substantial part of the diet for the Polynesians, on Easter Island this was replaced by porpoise.
|
|
No where else in Polynesia do porpoises account for even 1 percent of discarded food bones. Most other Polynesian islands obtained meat in the form of birds and mammals, including domestic pigs and dogs. On Easter Island, porpoises would have been the largest animal available. The porpoise species identified at Easter Island, the common dolphin, weighs up to 165 pounds. It generally lives out at sea, so it could not have been hunted by line fishing or spear fishing from shore. Instead, it must have been harpooned far offshore, in big seaworthy canoes built from the palm tree.
|
|
Initial settlement was along the coast near the original ahus. As the population grew, inland agricultural plantations were developed with their attendant living sites. Other settlements on the hill tops increased the available cultivation area. Extensive agriculture was needed to pay for the building and expansion of ahu and the carving and transport of moai. At the peak of production, a large part of the island was cultivated. But even then the population was only about 7,000 organised into 15 main clans - "mata" with land allocated radiating out from Rano Aroi giving each an inland territory and a strip of coast where the clan's religious, political and social centre was located. Boundaries were marked by cairns Settlements were scattered across the island in small clusters of peasant huts with crops grown in open fields.
|
|
It is possible that in order to clear land for cultivation some of the forest was burnt.
|
|
Pollen records show that by the year 800 the destruction of the forests was well under way.
|
|
Ahu Moai phase (1000-1500AD)
|
|
Ahu had been built and Moai carved before 1000AD, usually using local stone, but for the next 500 years it became an obsession and would appear to have been a major occupation for many of the inhabitants.
|
|
Over the period the style and size of the moai changed from small human like statues to large more stylised ones. It would seem in the end that each clan was trying to out do the other in the size of it's moai until they reached a point at which production could just not be sustained.
|
|
By the 1400s the forests had been entirely cut, the rich ground cover had eroded away, the springs had dried up, and the vast flocks of birds coming to roost on the island had long since disappeared.
|
|
With no logs to build canoes for offshore fishing, with depleted bird and wildlife food sources, and with declining crop yields because of the erosion of good soil, the nutritional intake of the people plummeted
|
|
Although the reason is not known it would seem that the carving and erection of Moai ceased almost overnight. Some 394 statues are at Rano Raraku were in various stages of carving, many of them (including the largest carved) are still attached to the matrix of the rock where they lie unfinished, other have been left beside the tracks in the process of being hauled to their Ahu. One is to be found beside it's ramp, the process of erection having stopped.
|
|
What could have caused this abrupt ending? Although the lack of timber could have played a part it is unlikely that it would have caused such a sudden stop, more likely a tailing off.
|
|
Was their a sudden loss of faith in the power of the Moai? Again unlikely, as in the inter-tribal wars that followed the Moai of rivals were pulled down indicating a belief that they had the power to assist their opponents. The Moai were and are still venerated.
|
|
Was there a sickness brought of by malnutrition that ravaged the population, or some natural catastrophe? Possibly, we just don't know.
|
|
Degradation Phase (1500-1722 AD)
|
|
The resource needs of the growing population inevitably outpaced the island's capacity to renew itself and the ensuing environmental degradation, possibly exacerbated by El Nino or the "Little Ice Age" when there was a global reduction in temperature, triggered a social and cultural collapse.
|
|
The most probable cause of decline would seem to have been inter-clan warfare brought on by the diminishing resources and the size of the population. The total population of Rapa Nui reached a maximum of up to 10,000 around the year 1500AD and from then on declined rapidly.
|
|
The clans of the north had poorer land than those to the south and would have felt the effects sooner. Raids would have taken place on the southern clans to obtain food. Efforts that had previously been put into constructing ahu and moai would have been turned over to warfare. The legend of the Long Ear and Short Ear people probably refer to this, the names Long Ear and Short Ear have been mis-translated and should be "short, corpulent people" (Hanau Eepe) and the "tall, thin people" (Hanau momoko).
|
|
Up to this point the island was ruled by a paramount chief (ariki mau) as was typical throughout Polynesia but as a result of the ecological stress his power (mana) to control the individual clans diminished. Result was a decline in the old religion of ancestor worship.
|
|
It would appear that prior to the final fall, in order to appease the gods, the rulers embarked on producing even larger Moai but over time, the chief's omnipotence declined and because the island could no longer feed the chiefs, bureaucrats, and priests who kept the complex society running, chaos resulted.
|
|
Slavery became common and as the amount of protein available fell the population turned to cannibalism. One of the main aims of warfare was to destroy the ahu of opposing clans and break the Moai that looked over and protected their rivals, to do this they where toppled face down and attempts made to break the head from the body by felling the statue across a pillow stone at chest height.
|
|
As the culture declined, the upland locations were abandoned and the decreasing population moved back down to the coast. Archaeologists find more and more evidence of people moving to protected and fortified settlements.
|
|
With the decline of the mana of the ariki mau a powerful warrior class (matatoa) emerged. One result of this power shift was the establishment of a new religion by the matatoa: the Birdman Cult, a religious movement focused on the supernatural powers of a god figure depicted as half-man and half-bird. This cult served to alternate leadership between rival groups from year to year, and the selection of a winner (or "birdman") was based upon a contest or ordeal to acquire the first bird egg of the season. Thus the Rapanui turned from their old religion to a new creator god, Makemake, and to rituals based on fertility. Hereditary power was replaced by achieved status.
|
|
Images of birdmen were carved on hundreds of rocks, concentrated at the cult site of Orongo. This mysterious cult appears to have been a last-ditch attempt to restore order to a decaying world.
|
|
It may have taken a generation for the change over to take place with the older people hanging on to their beliefs whilst the younger established new beliefs.
|
|
Petroglyph of the bird man cult have often been cut into moai and top knots by the lower clans of canoeist and fishermen.
|
|
About this time red moai were produced again probably by adherents to the former cult because this rock is easier to carve. It has been suggested that they could also have been linked to sacrifices.
|
|
By 1700 the population dropped to between one-quarter and one-tenth of its former number.
|
|
European contact (1722 -1786 AD)
|
|
Before the arrival of Europeans there were no diseases on the island.
|
|
In all the years of investigation, between the arrival of the original inhabitants and the coming of the first Europeans no outside contacts have been discovered: not a single Easter Island rock or product has turned up elsewhere, nor has anything been found on the island that could have been brought by anyone other than the original settlers or the Europeans.
|
|
On Easter Sunday 1722, Easter Island's 1400 years of isolation ended when three ships under the command of Jacob Roggeveen sighted a low flat island. The next morning they noted smoke rising from various locations on the island but stood out to sea due to bad weather. The following day a naked, bearded islander came out to one of the ships in a canoe. He was enthralled by the construction of the Dutch ship. Finally the Dutch made it ashore for a quick look around. They were amazed by the large statues which they thought were made of clay. The equally amazed Rapa Nui brought them some bananas and chickens. There followied an unfortunate slaughter of some 9 or 10 islanders who were shot by nervous Dutch sailors.
|
|
"We originally, from a further distance, have considered the said Easter Island as sandy; the reason for that is this, that we counted as sand the withered grass, hay, or other scorched and burnt vegetation, because its wasted appearance could give no other impression than of a singular poverty and barrenness."
|
|
Fragment from the log by Cornelis Bouwman, captain of the yacht Thienhoven, part of the expedition of three ships of the Dutch West India Company under command of Jacob Roggeveen,
|
Tuesday, April 7, 1722
Tuesday morning or night, the wind variable with strong squalls, thunder and lightning. Stood out to sea and in for the land, approached to the shore at day, but proceeded not much due to the variable weather. At 8 hours a steady breeze came in, on which we draw near a little. Meanwhile we become aware of a small craft close by, in which an old naked person was sitting, which shouted enormously. I sailed with my sloop to the same, and after a lot of resistance brought him on board of the Arent, being a man well into his fifties, of the browns, with a goatee after the Turkish fashion, of very strong physique. He was much astonished at the make of our ship and all that belonged to it, as we could perceive from his expressions. As we could not in the least understand each other, we had to make it out from his expressions and signs. We gave him a small mirror, wherein he looked at himself, at which he was very frightened, as also at the sound of the bell. We gave him a glass of brandywine, which he poured over his face, and when he felt the strength of it he began to open his eyes wide. We gave a second glass of brandywine with a biscuit, none of which he used. He had some shame because of his nakedness when he saw that we were clothed. He went therefore and put his arms and head on the table, appeared by this to make a speech to his deity, as was evident from his actions, and raised his head and hands many times to the sky, used many words in a loud voice, being engaged thus for half an hour, and when he stopped this he began to leap and sing. He showed himself very merry and gay. We tied a piece of sailcloth in front of his private parts, which wonderfully pleased him. He was naturally cheerful of face. He danced with the sailors when they had the fiddle played before him. He was not a little astonished at the sound and make of the instrument. His little craft was made of small pieces of wood and held together by some plant, being provided from within with two pieces of wood. It was so light that one man could easily carry it; it was for us wonderful to see that one man alone dared to proceed in so frail a craft so far to sea, having nothing to help him but a paddle, for when he reached us were about three miles from the shore.
|
|
At this time the island was completely treeless apart from a handful of isolated specimens at the bottom of the deepest extinct volcano crater of Rano Kao, and only a few Moai were still standing.
|
|
Don Felipe Gonzalez de Haedo 1770
|
|
After the Dutch, the Spanish under Don Felipe Gonzalez de Haedo were the next to arrive, in 1770. They claimed the island for the King of Spain in a ceremony that included placing three crosses on the three parasitic cones at Poike. An "official" document was signed by some of the islanders with signs what we call rongorongo symbols, seen today on the famous wood tablets and also in the island's rock carvings.
|
|
But as the island was under populated and lacking in resources no formal colonial occupation ever took place.
|
|
Captain James Cook stopped briefly in 1774, during his second voyage to the South Seas. In need of water and fresh provisions he was disappointed by how little they found on the island. Of all the early visitors to the island, Cook was in the best position to observe them, having already spent considerable time in Polynesia. He immediately recognised the Easter Islanders as being of the same race and origin of other Pacific islanders. Unfortunately, he was suffering from a gallbladder infection and spent little time ashore.
|
|
"put together with manifold small planks and light inner timbers, which they cleverly stitched together with very fine twisted threads. . . . But as they lack the knowledge and particularly the materials for caulking and making tight the great number of seams of the canoes, these are accordingly very leaky, for which reason they are compelled to spend half the time in bailing."
|
|
The canoes, only ten feet long, held at most two people, and only three or four canoes were observed on the entire island.
|
|
J.F.G. de la Pirouse 1786
|
|
J.F.G. de la Pirouse, leading a French expedition, spent 11 hours here in 1786 and made an attempt to introduce plants and animals to help the islanders. He left hogs, goats and sheep and sowed various plants such as citrus and vegetables (none were ever seen again). Pirouse estimated some 1200 natives appeared to greet them. Despite the short visit, members of the expedition visited Rano Kau's crater and described native dwellings; some of the Frenchmen saw Rano Raraku but failed to recognise it as the statue quarry.
|
|
An American ship the Nancy stayed long enough in 1805 to carry off twenty-two inhabitants to work as slaves killing seals on Masafuera Island off the Chilean coast.
|
|
These early visitors spent little actual time on the island. They were searching for water, wood, and food. As the island had few of these items and lacked a safe anchorage, they soon sailed on.
|
|
These explorers all recorded the astonishment of the islanders when they saw the large ships, metal objects, and strange white skinned foreigners. La Pirouse describes some natives who came on board and carefully inspected the ship's cables, anchors, and steering wheel, and returned the next day to repeat the examination. This led the captain to believe that a discussion on shore left them with doubts about the ship's equipment and they came back to re check.
|
|
When the first horse arrived on the island it was brought ashore on a boat with a rider in amour mounted on it. It leapt ashore from the boat and the islanders thought it was a monster with two heads and six legs until they were shown that it was two separate creatures.
|
|
By 1830 it was reported that all the Moai had been toppled.
|
|
In December 1862 Peruvian slavers kidnapped as many as 2000 of the island's natives, to mine guano on the Peruvian coast. The king, his son, and most of the society's scholars and priests where among the victims.
|
|
French diplomatic pressure, via the Bishop of Tahiti, and Peruvian realisation of what they had permitted their citizens and others to do, put an end to the raids in early 1863, but not before damage had been done. Tuberculosis and, from April, 1863, small pox began to take its terrible toll on the Rapanui.
|
|
An attempt was made to repatriate the Easter Islanders, but only around 100 could be found alive. They were put on a ship homeward bound, whereupon smallpox promptly broke out. Only fifteen made it back home alive - just enough to ensure that the disease would be transferred to the general population.
|
|
This all happened well before the first serious studies of the Easter Islanders and their beliefs were undertaken, and so almost no information about the motivations of the moai-builders has come down to us.
|
|
The religious order, Sociiti de Picpus, was charged with Christianising the Eastern Pacific. A grim picture had been described of the situation on Easter Island, and Eugene Eyraud, a lay member of the Sacred Heart Congregation, responded. He landed with equipment to set up a proper mission, including a bell. But, in a short time, all his possessions were confiscated and he became a virtual captive. He was rescued 9 months later, in 1864.
|
|
By 1866, Eyraud was back on Easter Island with backup: a priest from the Sacred Heart order, Father Hippolyte Roussel who succeeded Eyraud, who was killed in an accident. They were later joined by other priests and lay assistants.
|
|
When the missionaries arrived they set up a hospital at Vaihu, the first cemetery was also here. Slowly the population, which was scatter all over the island migrated to this area to be near sick relatives and to benefit from the missionaries gifts.
|
|
Later the mission moved its church to Hanga Roa leaving the hospital at Viahu for isolation.
|
|
After bringing the two French missionaries to the island in 1866 Jean-Baptiste OnC)xime Dutroux-Bornier, a French sea captain and former officer in the Crimean Army quickly visualised the opportunities on a largely unpopulated island without European jurisdiction. Returning in 1868 with plans to take over the island in partnership with the Catholic Bishop Tepano Jaussen and businessman, John Brander, from a Tahitian based family of Scots provenance who were ship owners, merchants and plantation owners.
|
|
In 1870 Dutroux-Bornier purchased key parcels of land in exchange for trivial gifts and began his despotic rule. To escape Dutroux-Bornier's despotism, in 1871 300 islanders left to work on plantations in Tahiti. Most of the remaining islanders subsequently went to Mangareva Island, led there by Brother Roussel,
|
|
Dutrou-Bornier built a fancy wooden house, proclaimed himself lord of the island, and took a Rapanui wife. When ships arrived at the island, Dutrou-Bornier would row out and advise them where to safely anchor. But he misled them so that when the winds changed, the ships went aground, and Dutrou-Bornier collected the salvage.
|
|
Meanwhile, the missionaries established a church and school at the village, Hangaroa, (then known as Sainte Marie de Rapanui). Dutrou-Bornier co-operated with the missionaries at first, but found himself at war with them when they objected to his claim of authority over the islanders. Dutrou-Bornier wanted to ship islanders to Tahitian plantations, but the missionaries had their own plans to ship the Rapanui to missions in southern Chile or Mangareva.
|
|
For three years they skirmished. Then Bornier led a group of his supporters against the missionaries. Buildings were burned and crops destroyed. The missionaries were recalled. Later, the island was further depopulated as many Rapanui were induced to leave for other islands: nearly 200 went to Tahiti to work on plantations and another 150 were moved to the Gambier Islands. Only about 175 islanders remained under Dutrou-Bornierb
|
|
In 1877, Dutrou-Borniers reign ended when islanders murdered him.
|
|
Pedro Pablo brother of Policarpo Toro who annexed the island for Chile in 1888, ran the sheep ranch operation until 1892, when their ship (and fortunes) sank.
|
|
In 1893 the Toro brothers sold their interests to one Enrique Merlet who took a 20 year lease from the Chilean Government, his strong lead eventually led to the killing of the last king of the island by poison, and the murder deportation of any opposition.
|
|
It was at this time that the islanders were forcibly herded into Hanga Roa, where they remained as prisoners on their own island, behind a secure the wall, supplemented by guards, gates, and fencing. If islanders protested against forced labour, Merlet burned their crops.
|
|
In 1896, Merlet ordered the administrator, Alberto Sanchez-Manterola, to surround with an area of approximately 1000 hectareas around Hanga Roa, to enclose all the islanders. The objective of this measurement that restricted the islanders right of movement about the island, was to leave the prairies free for the sheep and to protect them from being stolen by the Rapanui
|
|
In 1903, a Chilean company, called appropriately Compania Explotadora de la Isla de Pascua, (CEDIP), the took over the interests and remaining lease from Marlet, effectively becoming sovereign of Easter Island. grazing 60,000 head of sheep at their ranch at Vaitea.
|
|
CEDIP was a owned by the Chilean Branch of the English company Williamson, Balfour & Company which had been founded in 1851 by three Scottish retailers in Liverpool, opening a commercial branch in Chile In 1863. The varied and numerous commercial interests associate them with Merlet.
|
|
In 1945 the rights and interests of Williamson, Balfour Company were transferred to a British sheep ranching company owned by Charles Derry, a resident of Chile.
|
|
The renting concession with the Chilean Government continued until 1953, in three consecutive concessions of twenty years, when it was terminated and the Chilean Navy took over the entire running of the island.
|
|
Sheep were removed in the mid 1980s to prevent them damaging the archaeology.
|
|
Small farms, resulting from land gifts for the Rapa Nui people, producing some fruit and vegetables have been established in the valley between Manga Roiho and Manga Tangaroa. Unfortunately some of these gifts have been sold on and so now smaller gifts are made and restrictions applied.
|
|
On 9 September 1888 a Chilean Captain, Policarpo Toro Hurtado, took formal possession of the island in the name of the Republic of Chile. King Atamu Tekena and the Council of Elders ceded sovereignty to Chile "for ever." The land owners who it considered had legitimate rights on the Island - Catholic mission (who bought land in 1868-69); brothers Aru-Paca and Tati Salmon; John Brander and Dutroux-Bornier whose ownership was pending judgement with Brander; and finally, "the natives like primitive owners and gentlemen" were to be compensated for their property, but full payment never took place.
|
|
Until well into the middle of the 20th century the de facto rulers of the island was the company with the sheep grazing rights.
|
|
By 1914, living conditions on the island were appalling; islanders were deprived of their land and access to nearly all drinking water. People were without clothing and often food. If a despairing islander stole a sheep to feed his hungry children, he was deported to the mainland. Leprosy was endemic. In desperation the Rapanui petitioned the Chilean government to allow them to emigrate en masse to Tahiti.
|
|
A revolt and a symbolic feast triggered by a dream of an old prophetess named Angata, that the island once again belonged to the islanders, erupted. At this news, islanders ranged over the previously out-of-bounds parts of the island, slaughtered animals, and broke into warehouses. A small party of foreigners on the island were under siege at Mataveri, just south of Hangaroa village. Rescue came in the form of the ship Banquedano whose captain restored order. However, he was highly critical of CEDIP and thought the Rapanui had behaved very well not to murder the ranch manager. Despite this, several young islanders were exiled to Chile. When Angata died, the revolt ended.
|
|
The Chilean Bishop Rafael Edwards heard of the plight of the islanders, and came to see things for himself in 1916. He found the conditions desperate and shocking, and he laid responsibility directly on the sheep company which had given all the good water to stock, deprived the islanders of land, confined them to the village, and extracted forced labour from them. Edwards exposed these problems and his efforts resulted in termination of company rule.
|
|
In 1935 Easter Island was declared an open air museum by the Chilean Government, to the Rapanui it was just another form of exploitation of their land.
|
|
Naval authorities took control of the island in 1952 because of its "overwhelming geo-strategic importance for national defence." Naval rule simply perpetuated the method of keeping the island under the same autocratic administration. The Navy ran the island as if it were a ship. Military control was arbitrary and any hint of "mutiny" was quickly dealt with. Islanders were still restricted to the village and the Navy had the necessary personnel and firepower to enforce the rules. Rapanui were frustrated and angry. Overbearing and often arrogant Naval Commanders had little regard for their Polynesian subjects, flogging wrongdoers and publicly shaving the heads of men and women who displeased them.
|
|
In 1953, the contract for Williamson, Balfour was terminated and the Chilean Navy took over the entire running of the island.
|
|
Eventually in 1966, the troops withdrew and the island became a fully incorporated part of Chile, the restrictions preventing the islanders from leaving Hanga Roa were finally were removed and free elections held, even a special "Easter Island Law (16442)" was enacted, giving a series of benefits to spur development. This coincided with the coming of a US Air Force base to the island which caused considerable social change in a very few years,
|
|
The first Rapanui to be governor, Mr. Sergio Rapu Haoa, an archaeologist and museum curator, was appointed in 1984. The year before, an Elders Committee had been formed around Alberto Hotu Chavez who organised a letter, with the consent of virtually all the Islanders, to petition the United Nations Committee on De-colonisation for assistance in securing a referendum on independence on Easter Island. Mr. Hotu continued his agitation and community action throughout the 1980s as one of the few voices of protest during the long period of military rule in Chile. In 1992, Mr. Hotu was elected Mayor of the Municipality.
|
|
The population of Rapa Nui is 70% Polynesian, the rest coming mainly from the Chilean mainland.
|
|
The use of the Rapanui language is now declining, the younger generation although able to speak Rapanui have Spanish as there first language and this is re-enforced by radio and television.
|
|
Water is administered by SASIPA, a semi-government company, who also look after the electricity and the agricultural development on the island. Water is drawn from wells in the Hangaroa area and is treated to be safe to drink. Electricity, also widely available, but expensive by world standards, is provided by diesel generators to 220v Chilean standard,
|
|
Alternative Interpretation
|
|
The Norwegian archaeologist Thor Heyerdahl, in his popular book 'Aku-Aku' written in the 1950s, emphasises the strange aspects of the island and the mysteries that lay hidden in its history. He argued that the island was first settled from South America and that from there the people inherited a tradition of monumental sculpture and stone work (similar to the great Inca achievements). To account for the decline he introduced the idea that at a late stage other settlers arrived from the west and began a series of wars between the so-called `long-ears' and the `short-ears' that destroyed the complex society on the island. While this theory is less extravagant than some of the others that have been put forward it has never been generally accepted by other archaeologists.
|
|
The Rapa Nui were ancestor worshipers and only had one deity - Make Make.
|
|
According to legend, Rapa Nui was discovered by an expedition led by Hotu Matu'a, and eventually landed fortuitously on the shores of Rapa Nui.
|
|
Legend says the moai at Ahu Akivi represent the seven sons of a Maori sorcerer sent from the Marquesas Islands to search for Rapa Nui - a home for the Polynesian king Hotu Matu'a, who with his family fled his distant island home after being defeated in war. They are among the few moai that face the sea, they are supposed face the spot where the first inhabitants come ashore. Nearby are some caves
|
|
Many Rapa Nui people believe that the Moai were moved and erected by 'mana' a spiritual force. Great kings of a long-gone era simply used their mana to command the moai to move to the distant sites and stand there. Mana is a word and concept you hear frequently in South Seas lore. The people of Rapa Nui believed that the moai also possessed mana, which was instilled at the time their white coral eyes were put in place, and that the moai used their mana to protect the people of the island. Today none of the moai have genuine coral eyes - and thus the mana is no more, though the moai are still venerated and the ahu regarded as sacred places.
|
|
On the Poike Peninsula, a famous legendary battle was said to have taken place between the Hana'u E'epe and Hana'u Momoko (the so-called Long Ears and Short Ears).
|
|
Off Orongo, at the southern-most point of Easter Island are three tiny islands. Each year, during the nesting season, the largest of these, Motu Nui, plays host to large numbers of sooty terns.
|
|
After the demise of the statue building, there arose a cult of the Birdman (Tangata Manu). The birdman was seen as the representative on earth of the creator god Make Make, and eventually, this cult surpassed the traditional power of the king Ariki. Itb
|
|
Once a year in spring until at least 1864, all the clans would gather first in the cannibal cave Ana Kai Tangata where they would decorate their bodies before going by procession up to the ceremonial village of Orongo at the edge of a thousand-foot cliff. Here they would prepare for the egg collection by going down into Rano Kau crater to collect reeds from which to make a small boat which the swimmer could use to support himself and on which he could carry some food.
|
|
The competitors would swim through turbulent waters out to the island of Motu Nui nearly a mile away to await the first egg of the sooty tern, while the rest of their clans watched from Orongo.
|
|
When the first egg was found the swimmer would climb to the top of the island and shout out the name of his clan to others listening in a cave below Orongo. They would then come up to Orongo and light a beacon depending on which of the two confederations, South East or North East, the clan he was a member of belonged.
|
|
The winner, then swam back with the egg through the shark-infested waters to the mainland, carried it up the precipitous cliff and presented it unbroken. He or the man he represented became Bird Man, an important status position giving the Birdman the power to rule for the next year. The Birdman then went down to Mataveri and from there was led in procession to the south-west exterior slope of Rano Raraku, where he remained in seclusion for the year.
|
|
The benefits of being birdman are not obvious to the modern mind: the birdman was not allowed to cut his hair, or his nails, to bathe, or to have sex for the whole year of his tenure
|
|
As a reward for hid efforts the swimmer would be presented with a virgin.
|
|
The birdman cult provided a means by which rule could be changed annually without resorting to warfare.
|
|
A petroglyph was carved at Orongo to celebrate the winner, over 130 have been identified.
|
|
Every Easter Islander knows that his ancestors were kai-tangata, 'man-eaters'. Some make jokes about it, others take offence at any allusion to this custom which has become in their eyes barbarous and shameful.
|
|
According to Father Roussel, cannibalism did not disappear until after the introduction of Christianity. Shortly before this, the natives are said to have eaten a number of men, including two Peruvian traders. Cannibal feasts were held in secluded spots, and women and children were rarely admitted. The natives told Father Zumbohm that the fingers and toes were the choicest morsels.
|
|
The captives destined to be eaten were shut up in huts in front of the sanctuaries. There they were kept until the moment when they were sacrificed to the gods.
|
|
The Easter Islanders' cannibalism was not exclusively a religious rite or the expression of an urge for revenge: it was also induced by a simple liking for human flesh that could impel a man to kill for no other reason than his desire for fresh meat. (Man was the only large mammal whose flesh was available). Women and children were the principal victims of these inveterate cannibals. The reprisals that followed such crimes were all the more violent because an act of cannibalism committed against the member of a family was a terrible insult to the whole family.
|
|
As among the ancient Maoris, those who had taken part in the meal were entitled to show their teeth to the relatives of the victim and say, 'Your flesh has stuck between my teeth'. Such remarks were capable of rousing those to whom they were addressed to a murderous rage not very different from the Maly amok.
|
|
When someone died their body would be placed in front of the ahu watched over by two men while it dried out. Bones and sometimes tattooed skin were then removed both for family keep sakes and the thigh bone for making fish hooks and needles.
|
|
The remaining bones were then burnt and the ashes placed in a cremation pit behind the Ahu.
|
|
Old people would sometimes commit suicide by going to a cave and closing the entrance behind them with a stone.
|
|
The main Polynesian god is Tangaroa god of the ocean, he was born in a sea shell from which he constructed the sky, his consort was Hina goddess of the moon. The Moai statues link the earth with the sky.
|
|
Two forces are at play in controlling Rapa Nui society, they are Mana, a spiritual force and power contained within everything, but stronger in some elements than others ie. Moai statues, once they have had their eyes opened contain enormous amounts of Mana, as do tribal chiefs. Tapu from which our word taboo derives are the rules and rituals that must be observed in order to safely handle the mana of an object.
|
|
Mana became manifest in humans as outstanding talents, intelligence, strengths, and leadership charisma. Tapu were prohibitions instituted to protect the flow of mana from disruption and conserve it against accidental loss or theft by persons not entitled to it
|
|
To release the mana from the toppled Pukao top knots, shallow holes have been drilled into them.
|
|
Mahute (Rapanui) - Tapa (Moari) -
|
|
The Rapanui use a bark cloth made from the Mahute Tree for their clothing.
|
|
To make it they first strip off the thin outer bark from a branch and then put a cut down the length of the branch to the depth of one years growth. They then beat the branch against a stone to separate a layer of wood from the branch.
|
|
This rectangular piece of wood is pliable and by beating with a stick can be made both thinner and wider to take on the texture of cloth.
|
|
Mahute Trees are a valuable resource, people who know their whereabouts keep the information secret.
|
|
The symbol of Rapanui is the pendent warn by the paramount chief.
|
|
Tattooing starts at the feet and work up through the body over life telling the story of the persons life.
|
|
Chickens played an important role in Rapanui life as well as being a source of food. Well constructed chicken houses were constructed in which to house them. Chickens were sacrificed and there feathers were also used for decoration.
|
|
Turtles are reincarnations of humans and can be sacrificed in place of humans.
|
|
Since 1971 a huge festival has taken place in the late summer on the island (January/ February).
|
|
The Tapati is a competition between families for the right to crown their candidate as Queen, a mixture of an Eisteddfod, a minor olympiad and a fashion parade,. To win this right members of each family and their friends take part in various events ranging from Kai Kai (performing Cats Cradle) to mat weaving, costume design and deep sea harpooning, with many other events between. With much excitement and appeals to rule books points are awarded and at the end of the two week festival the Queen is crowned, but not necessarily the winner on points as the audience on the final evening has the last word and it isn't unknown for the underdog to be acclaimed.
|
|
Although a relatively new event the Tapati is proving to be a major feature of Rapanui life. Not only is it helping to preserve the culture and traditional skills in the face of modern life it is also a tourist puller.
|
|
|
