The Easter Island Heads

[Commander]

Easter Island has long been the subject of curiosity and speculation. How and why did its inhabitants carve and transport the massive statues which surround the island? What remains of this culture today, and what lessons can we learn from their legacy?

Easter Island is over 2,000 miles from the nearest population center, (Tahiti and Chile), making it one of the most isolated places on Earth. A triangle of volcanic rock in the South Pacific - it is best known for the giant stone monoliths, known as Moai, that dot the coastline. The early settlers called the island "Te Pito O Te Henua" (Navel of The World). Admiral Roggeveen, who came upon the island on Easter Day in 1722, named it Easter Island.

http://www.netaxs.com/~trance/moai6.jpg

http://www.netaxs.com/~trance/tahai.jpg

[old_abe]

What is the time period for this? People of the past always amaze me with how they were able to build such giant stone statues and move them around.

Is it possible that all these stone structures were carved out of giant boulders that were already there?

[kahn]

It was a lava field, so there was likely very large boulders all around the location. But I bet they lifted them the old fashion way, tied a rope around it an pulled.

It looks like some of the statues are on a slope. The could have used gravity to help pull the stones down hill.

[Nibblungs]

I recently read a book which mentioned Easter Island as an "extinction event".The book "A Short History of Progess "..tells the story of a culture which pays homage to their ancestors by building giant heads as tombstones.In short, this practice got so out of hand that they ended up cutting down all the trees on the island. Not being able to even repair the boats they used for fishing the inhabitants died off... leaving the tombs which you see in the photo.
Here is a web-site for the book which they made into radio show here in Canada:
http://www.carleton.ca/duc/News/news10250401.html

The legacy is a warning: Don't use up all of your resources.

[spaniard]

Erikh von Daaniken has a rational finding to this mystery.
Read : "Chariots of the Gods...Was God an Astronaut?"

There's a topic dedicated to the Easter Island.
It's an interesting read...certainly

[Salah ad-Din]

I presume the famous stone heads of Easter Island were meant to represent gods or ancestral heroes. But is their precise purpose known? And how on earth were they carved and moved into place?

Just curious if anybody has any ideas...

[plutoboyz]

recently they discover polynesian Moai's red hat mystery.
http://news.discovery.com/archaeology/easter-island-red-hats.html

thats the only thing I know.

[okamido]

Some form of ancestor worship that spiraled out of control.

[oshron]

And how on earth were they carved and moved into place?
the same way that the stones of machu pichu were carved and moved

[corrocamino]

If you want to be talked about for a long time, make something really big out of stone!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moai

[Cicero]

Some form of ancestor worship that spiraled out of control.

Yes, there was a good description of what probably happened in Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jarrde Diamond.

[Edratman]

If you want to be talked about for a long time, make something really big out of stone!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moai

Probably sums up the primary motivation behind many artifacts.

[gaius valerius]

I presume the famous stone heads of Easter Island were meant to represent gods or ancestral heroes. But is their precise purpose known? And how on earth were they carved and moved into place?

Just curious if anybody has any ideas...

By a vivid culture on an island filled with trees and no cannibalism... the most cynical example of the ecological impact of humans on their environment.

[Kuon]

It wuz teh Annunaki alien lizard Gods who put them there.

(My needlessly facetious forum comment for the day. I have a quota don'tcha know?)

[sculptingman]

I find it funny that so many modern history types are so astonished and perplexed by ancients moving large stones.

It is not that hard to move large stones. All it takes is some practice and some guile.

Check out this fellow, who moves Moai size blocks single handedly.
http://www.theforgottentechnology.com/newpage1


Ancient peoples were just as smart as we are.
And the notion that they could not come up with elegant solutions to these problems is just silly.

[oshron]

we typically just think of them as being unable to do such a thing because we ourselves are incapable of doing such things without heavy machinery. in short, modern humans are weak.

[sculptingman]

not weak... just mollycoddled.

We don't HAVE to know how, so we don't.

[vera]

I find it funny that so many modern history types are so astonished and perplexed by ancients moving large stones.

It is not that hard to move large stones. All it takes is some practice and some guile.

Check out this fellow, who moves Moai size blocks single handedly.
http://www.theforgottentechnology.com/newpage1


Ancient peoples were just as smart as we are.
And the notion that they could not come up with elegant solutions to these problems is just silly.
Very true.:)

[okamido]

I find it funny that so many modern history types are so astonished and perplexed by ancients moving large stones.

It is not that hard to move large stones. All it takes is some practice and some guile.

Check out this fellow, who moves Moai size blocks single handedly.
http://www.theforgottentechnology.com/newpage1


Ancient peoples were just as smart as we are.
And the notion that they could not come up with elegant solutions to these problems is just silly.

That was interesting, good link.

[sculptingman]

Here's an interesting thing...

You can see on that site an image of a wooden thing he labels as Egytptian 'cradles"... this is significant as artifacts of this kind are plentiful, and have long mystified archaeologists as to their purpose.

The Use this guy puts them to is kind of a means for rolling a square stone over a series of these cradle shapes... however, 4 of these objects could also be strapped to 4 faces of a large stone to turn the entire stone into a wheel. A rope tied to the top of a ramp, looped down and around such a cradled stone and back up to the top of the ramp would turn the stone into the moving block on a pulley system... essentially halving the weight of the stone in terms of rolling the stone up the ramp.

This is just more evidence that we seem to have a failure of imagination in trying to understand how ancients saw themselves and their world.


20th century estimates of manpower and time to build the Pyramids are almost certainly off. There is no evidence that slaves were used to build the pyramids.

The evidence currently available indicates that the quarries were worked year round by specialist masons who lived on site and were, essentially, government workers... experts in stone working. These relatively small teams were highly enough valued that they had tombs in the shadow of the pyramid. They would work all year cutting and staging all the stones that were to be installed in a given year.

Then would come the flood. For 3 months, the arable land of Egypt would be unworkable, and many of the homes of the farming class, unlivable... the government was faced with a huge idle population that needed to be fed and housed, temporarily, every single year.


For this reason it is likely that, in exchange for government granary storage of a persons' produce, and the government's assistance in re-establishing property lines after the flood, that the government expected every able bodied man who was made idle by the flood to volunteer for public works projects.

Every year around flood time, folks would be assigned to travel to distant places and set up tent cities, or live in temporary housing, and spend 2 or 3 months providing the muscle power to build massive structures.

On Giza, this flood of men would arrive to find thousands of stone blocks lined up and ready to be moved.

Chances are they were organized into competing teams, and incentives of food or drink or prizes, offered for the fastest team, or the team that moved the most weight each day or week.

Evidence suggests that the construction crews partied frequently in the evenings... their women often came along, doing the camp cooking, and fetching water, or grease for the skid or whatever else needed doing to support the labor.

I can envision that this was a break in the monotony and isolation of farming the land, that you got to go to the big cities, and meet new people and, though working hard, working at something you could feel was important and lasting.

You made friends, and had fun...
There was laughter and joking and ribbing going on on Giza.

In a few months time- using intelligence and enthusiasm, all the stone that was prepped could be moved... I have seen a team of 8 guys sliding a 4 ton stone block up a hill with nothing more than fine beach sand for the stone to slide on... they were RUNNING up that hill.

That is how the pyramids were built... by folks who were enjoying the task.
By Friendly rivalry and a management team that understood how to get folks to put out tremendous effort.

As the flooded land dries out enough to begin farming, these labor crews would disperse and the rest of the year the quarrymen would be cutting next years blocks and the masons would be fine tuning and fitting all the stone that had been moved that year--- moving the handful of really massive stones that needed to be fit just so.

Things like Karnak and the Great Pyramid are not the work of drudges...
Its the work of men proud and excited by what they could accomplish.

[Comnena]

Yes, there was a good description of what probably happened in Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jarrde Diamond.

Yeah, that was very interesting.

He also emphasized that it got so out of hand because there were several clans competing with each other. This created the need to rapidly build bigger, higher statues in quick succession (as in the neighbours bought an expensive car, we will buy an even more expensive one, even if it means we eat peanut butter for the rest of the decade).

Speculating, it might have been totally different if there had been one overlord in the island that would build perhaps only one statue a reign. Or perhaps no statues would have been made then.