The anchor chain clinked and clanked through the hawsehole on the Dutch tall ship Oosterschelde until the large anchor set into white coral sands turned periwinkle blue by clear ocean waters. At first light, the volcanic mountains of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) had stepped out of the mist, turning from blue to green as they loomed larger on the horizon.

Sailing from the North and due to high winds from the West, we were directed by the port authorities away from the town on the Western shore. Rapa Nui is shaped like a large triangle. The only town, Hanga Roa, exposed and without the protection of a harbor, takes the brunt of the Westerly winds. We approached a cove sheltered by high cliffs along the Northeast bend of the island.  Anakena, the island’s only sandy beach, is where the first people landed.  Here, we found flat waters harbored by the wind and waves. 

Seven Moai statues turned their backs on us. Among the carefully cut and tightly fitted large stones forming the platform beneath the Moai was an old Moai head in a horizontal position looking our way. More than 2,000 miles from the nearest shore, the people of this far-flung land demonstrate remarkable determination and tenacity to overcome challenges, create art, and prosper.

The seven Moai, overlooking the land and not the sea, tell a story of two cultures uniting to work together. Navigators who hoisted tall masts and sails were one. The other was known for their work with stone. These statues, a significant part of the island’s history, were quarried, raised, and then walked by three teams of men working three lines lashed high, rocking the Moai one way, then the other. This unique collaboration between cultures resonates with the island’s history and people’s resilience.

The joining of stones in the platforms that raised the Moai was so exacting that a razor blade could not be fitted between them. Nowhere else in Polynesia are stones so perfectly fitted together. The precision and craftsmanship of the stonework on Rapa Nui, reminiscent of the stonework in Machu Pichu, was brought by people from South America. Standing up to 35 feet high, the Moai is a testament to the island’s mixed heritage, ingenuity, and skill. 

Rapa Nui is located about 2,500 miles south of the Equator (27°7′S 109°22′W), where the climate is a cooler subtropical land instead of tropical.  According to pollen records, it was once forested with various palms and broad-leafed trees standing more than 12 feet high.  The Polynesians carried plants and animals to sustain them on new lands.  Germinating coconuts would have died on Rapa Nui because the climate was too cold.  Polynesians used coconut leaves for thatch, baskets, and husk fibers to make fishing lines and netting. 

The first settlers brought yams, taro, sugar cane, bottle gourd, and sweet potatoes. Anakena, the oldest inhabited place on the island, is named after an extinct sandalwood shrub brought by the first Polynesians for its nutritious nuts and empty nutshells, which were used as toys. The sandalwood was aromatic and used to make perfume.   

The only water on the island was in the three volcanoes’ steep-sided cratered centers, calderas. Because the volcanic rock is so porous, seawater seeped in, making the water brackish. People had to descend a steep trail into the volcano to collect water. Reeds grown in these wetlands were used for weaving. Not an indigenous plant, reeds were likely brought by the people from South America.

The population inhabiting Rapa Nui grew, and trees fell. By about 1550, the population had grown to 100,000. The great palm forests were gone. With the loss of trees, the biotic pump of evaporation, condensation, and leaves, which released bacteria and fungi into the air, was also lost. Water vapor nucleates around these organic particles to form mist and clouds.  When this happens, air pressure drops to draw in more moist air from off the ocean. A drying wind replaced moist air, and forest lands became arid grasslands. The climate changed.

The intrepid islanders rallied to the challenge. Degraded soil needed tending, and plants required help before crops could grow. Much of the work done naturally by bacteria in concert with microbes in vast mycorrhizal networks with plants stopped. They turned to rock gardening because the volcanic tuff was high in essential trace metals and porous, able to hold water. 

They turned to the centrally-located volcano, Rano Raraku. The tuff is a sedimentary rock made from layers of air-lain, partially fused, and partially cemented volcanic ash that was relatively easy to chip away at with a piece of harder basalt rock. The Rano Raraku tuff is high in trace metals like manganese, boron, and zinc, essential for plant growth. In the pools of water at the base of the quarry grew reeds from South America, a source of phosphorus for the soil.  

The Moai statues were not gods. Rapa Nui gods were carved into rock faces on the highest points overlooking the sea. More than 50% of their diet came from the ocean. Their rituals celebrated seabirds, turtles, and other marine life.  The Moai represent ancestors who were set up overlooking the fields and people.  Cutting and sculpting rock was hard work. More than quarrymen, these were artisans. To paraphrase Michelangelo, every block of stone has an ancestor inside it, and the sculptor’s task is to discover it. Twelve to 50 men worked on one statue. The heads are over-large, often a three-to-five ratio of head to trunk. Each individual’s facial features are unique and frequently complimented by motifs. While at work and chipping away at an ancestor, they sang songs that have been passed down over the generations. Some, like sea shanties, have a cadence consistent with the rhythm of the work.  

There are 887 Moai statues, more than 95% of which were made at the Rano Raraku quarry. After 500 years, they stopped working, leaving 397 Moai incomplete. Some statues were stopped because a vein of harder rock was revealed. There were possibly hundreds of families, each group working on their ancestor stone. Perhaps they stopped because they had restored the land with sufficient rock, metals, and minerals. 

When the French visited Easter Island, they were astounded by the vitality and prosperity of the islanders. Major Rollin, a member of Jean-François de La Pérouse’s expedition, wrote: “Instead of meeting with men exhausted by famine… I found, on the contrary, a considerable population, with more beauty and grace than I afterwards met in any other island; and a soil, which, with very little labor, furnished excellent provisions, and in an abundance more than sufficient for the consumption of the inhabitants.” 

The first Europeans found Rapa Nui on Easter Sunday, 1722. In a few decades, the Europeans’ diseases decimated the Rapa Nui population.  In 1900, Chile sold most of the island to sheep corporations that paid the islanders to work and then charged them for food and household supplies. By the 1960s, the last indigenous plants were gone, such as the towering Rapa Nui palm and the flowering toromiro tree. Toromiro was the cherished wood that bore rongorongo inscriptions, a system of glyphs that have not been deciphered. The writing went in alternating directions, like a boat tacking back and forth to windward, first left to right and then right to left down the panel. A few pieces survive as evidence that the peoples of Easter Island invented a form of writing, further testimony to their capabilities and wisdom.     

These were peaceful people who met Europeans, not with weapons, but with food offerings. Archaeologists report that less than 2% of examined skulls have fractures or holes, and that sharp knives and spears have traces of sweet potato but no blood. The islanders raised chickens and always let the eggs hatch.  

On Easter Island, the loss of trees changed the climate. The islanders met the challenge by valuing a diversity of skills and resources brought by differing groups.  They came together to tackle tedious, tiresome work (breaking rock) with good cheer. This resulted in thriving rock-mulching agriculture and a society “with more beauty and grace” that became the envy of others. It’s not how much work needs to be done; it’s how the job is done.  

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About The Author

Dr. Rob Moir is a nationally recognised and award-winning environmentalist. He is president and executive director of Cambridge, MA-based Ocean River Institute, a nonprofit providing expertise, services, resources, and information unavailable on a localized level to support the efforts of environmental organizations. Please visit www.oceanriver.org for more information.

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More Articles by Dr. Moir

• Cooling Our Planet: New England’s Battle with Climate Change
• Land & Sea Change for Earth Day, Expanding The Climate Change Narrative
• The Earth and Three Blinkered Scientists
• Fallen Forests and Rising Ocean Fury
• What If There Was a Right Whale National Marine Sanctuary?
• Atlantic Ocean off Florida Spawns a Giant Sargassum Blob Due to Climate Change & Nutrient Pollution
• Emerald Bracelets to Solve Three of the World’s Greatest Environmental Problems
• Slowing Water for Greener Neighborhoods
• Put Down the Federal Stick to Build a Greener Future
• Of Mousy & Elephantine Cycles, Managing The Climate Crisis After Glasgow COP26
• Melting Greenland Ice Sheet, Sea Ice Formation, and the Flow of The Gulf Stream
• A Whale of a Pattern of Thought and Organizing Principle for Community-Based Environmental Management

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