Known as Rapa Nui to its earliest inhabitants, Easter Island was also named by the Dutch explorer, Jacob Roggeveen who was searching for
Terra Australis (Southern Land) and Davis Land, but instead
found Easter Island. He landed here on Easter Sunday 1722.
The large stone statues, (Moai), were carved by natives of the island. And,
archaeological evidence suggests there were three distinct cultural phases: the early period (700-850 A.D.), the middle period (1050-1680) and the late period (post-1680).
So far, 887 monolithic
stone statues have been inventoried, but there may be up to as many as 1,000 on the island.
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| A group of men observe the giant statues on Easter Island, Polynesia. December 1922. Photograph by J. P. Ault. |
Each sculpture required a couple hundred men to move it to other parts of the island and some of the largest which weighed 82 tons, were placed upright upon stone platforms facing the ocean.
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| The large stone statues, (moai), were carved by natives of Easter Island |
It has been discovered, that the Easter Island statues are not only monumental stone heads: they have
bodies buried beneath the earth.
One of the Easter Island Moai statues that was carved but never erected shows how the states were carved. It would have
stood 72ft tall (the tallest standing is 33ft high) and weighing more than 2 Boeing 737's.
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One of the Easter Island Moai statues that was carved but never erected,
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Interestingly, a drug called Rapamycin, (also known by its generic name, Sirolimus) was isolated from a bacterial species,
Streptomyces hygroscopicus, found on the island of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in 1972. The target of rapamycin (mTOR) is a protein kinase that controls cell growth, proliferation, and
survival
Easter Island (Rapa Nui), a small island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, is a special territory of Chile.
