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There are still mysteries on earth about which science has no infallible answer. The pyramids of Egypt, for instance, are still defying orthodox scientific explanation. Modern archaeology has the tools to correctly ascertain the age of an ancient structure. But it may not be that certain about how that structure was built. So there are more than one hypothesis with plausible explanations about the technology, primitive though, used to build those huge structures. But there are still a lot of buts prejudicing a satisfactory answer to those riddles.
Similarly, has anyone a foolproof answer to the Neolithic stone mystery known as the Stonehenge? In the same way, have the scientists known who built the huge stone megaliths in Easter Island in the Pacific Ocean? Some2300 miles from Chile, the beguiling Easter Island is spread over some 63 square miles in the South Pacific. It was settled by the Polynesians some 1600 years ago.
The grass covered speck of island lost in the vast expanse of the Pacific remained hidden from the civilisation until 1722 when the Dutch circumnavigator admiral Jacob Roggeveen stumbled upon it. The day was Easter Sunday when he anchored off the island and hence its name. The world at large then came to know what surprise this insignificant barren piece of rocky, volcanic island held for it for hundreds of years,
Roggeveen saw there hundreds of enormous human-shaped statues, called moai, lined the coast. Not only Roggeveen, the entire civilised world was intrigued. How the primitive people, who lived on that island, could build those huge stone behemoths? Because, as the island was practically barren, they did not have any help from a large number of slaves, who helped build the pyramids for the Egyptian pharaohs. Neither the islanders probably had any forest on that islet from which the builders could get their timbers to make carriages; there were possibly no draft animal there to cart away the megaliths to the seashore. Reports sparked the interest of other voyagers, and soon ships from Spain and England and France were headed there.
But by the time Capt. James Cook arrived in 1772, something important had changed - the moai were all lying in the grass. This, of course, spawned another question: What had caused the statues to fall?
This is how Jennifer Vanderbes narrates her experience as she visited the island recently (in 2003) in search of a plot for her first novel.
"To visit Easter Island today - the inhabitants call it Rapa Nui - is to explore these mysteries up close, to wander through a centuries-old open-air archaeological museum. The town of Hanga Roa is small, consisting of mostly simple one-story homes and basic shops, nestled in one corner of the island's triangular landscape - the rest is rustic and generally uninhabited. The moai still line the coasts, toppled except for the roughly three dozen that have been restored upright in recent years. Almost all the sites are without ropes, barriers or signs. The ruins remain au naturel, and the statues now standing look as they did when Roggeveen first saw them."
"You must seek out Easter Island. I did because I needed answers: I was at work on a novel, my first, and had chosen Easter Island as the setting. In the course of my research, I found myself falling in love with the island's history.
I decided to begin my visit at the moai quarry, an extinct volcanic crater named Rano Raraku, about eight miles outside the village.
Quiet definitely improves the experience of this site. Here the island's famous megaliths were carved from the crater's soft volcanic tuff, and some 394 statues remain unfinished in this vast volcanic workshop, some still attached to the inner rock, some upright on the crater's outer slope, as if frozen on their way out. These quarry moai reveal an interesting pattern: the statues here are markedly larger than those on the coast. The largest, El Gigante, measures some 65 feet and is estimated to weigh up to 270 tons, while the largest moai ever erected on the coast measures about 32 feet, leading archaeologists to believe an "obsession" in moai building was under way and ended abruptly (carving tools were left at the site, though they have since been removed) at the time the coastal statues fell.
What caused the islanders to abandon their statue building? And why were the statues toppled? Scholars think the moai were most likely moved to the coast by means of the timber of trees that were extinct by the time Roggeveen arrived.
Pollen analysis has revealed that thick-trunked palm trees once forested the island; their trunks were probably used as levers or rollers to manipulate the statues. Many scholars assume that moai building played a critical role in the island's deforestation, and that environmental collapse was a factor in the abandonment of the effort.
From Rano Raraku, it's a short walk toward the coast to Tongariki, where a Chilean archaeologist directed the restoration of a row of 15 moai, completed in 1995, with workers using special resins to piece together the decaying statues. The moai were hoisted into position by a hydraulic crane built and donated by the Tadano Corporation of Japan (a reminder of how impressive a feat it was to move the statues without mechanical power). The sight of these towering figures on their original ceremonial platform, or ahu, begins to suggest the magnificence Roggeveen saw, when hundreds of such statues skirted the island, facing inland, worshipped by the islanders as sacred chiefs and divine ancestors.
Anakena, one of the island's two sand beaches, is on the north shore. (Legend says that the first king, Hotu Matua, landed his canoe here.) This is a great place for a picnic lunch, beneath the grove of coconut palms; shade is a rarity on this mostly treeless island, and should be enjoyed when found. Just beyond the beach stands the very first moai re-erected, restored in the mid-50's by Thor Heyerdahl (author of "Aku-Aku: The Secret of Easter Island"). Anakena is a great place for a swim, but if you prefer a slightly less crowded beach, Ovahe is just down the road. The water at this small, secluded cove is crystal clear and calm. On the way back from Anakena to Hanga Roa is Puna Pau, the quarry for the red scoria topknots (pukau) that once crowned the moai.
There are many archaeological sites unrelated to the moai. Orongo, on the rim of the largest volcanic crater, dates from the mid-16th century. This ceremonial village was the axis of the cult of the birdman, a religion centered on a creator god, Makemake, that replaced the ancestor worship of the moai religion. The birdman cult initiated an annual event in which young men competed to find the sooty tern's first egg of the season.
Petroglyphs of a half-bird, half-man figure and Makemake adorn the rocks near this site, and the ceremonial houses where the participants would sleep still remain. On the road back to Hanga Roa is the coastal cave Ana Kai Tangata, rumoured to have been the site of cannibalism, but notable mostly for the beautiful bird paintings on its high-vaulted ceiling."
Theories abound about the appearance and sudden disappearance of the people who once inhabited this island and built these strange statues. The present residents, even if they are really the descendants of the original settlers of the island, have no written records about their proud ancestors with their rich culture. However, the very ability to build those imposing megaliths speaks volumes for them.
The mysteries of the ancient world have important lessons for modern man. There is no reason to be complacent, as our rockets are exploring the solar system and science is delving deep into the heart of matter. For, we are still far from deciphering our own past.
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