Moai

The moai are the great stone figures of Rapa Nui, also called Easter Island, in the south-eastern Pacific. Nearly a thousand were carved, mostly between about 1250 and 1500 AD, by the island's Polynesian inhabitants. They are often called the “Easter Island heads”, but they are not just heads: most have full torsos, and many of the best-known figures on the slopes of the quarry at Rano Raraku are buried in soil up to their shoulders or chins.^[1] Excavations have shown bodies several metres long below the ground.

Below the surface

Over the centuries, soil washed down the slopes of the quarry and gradually buried the lower parts of the statues standing there. The visible heads are therefore only the top part. Archaeologists who dug down beside some of them found carved torsos, arms and hands, and markings on their backs.^[2] The moai are the only famous heads in the world that have turned out, on closer inspection, to be standing in a hole.

Facing

Most of the moai on stone platforms along the coast face inland, towards the villages, rather than out to sea. They are thought to represent important ancestors, watching over the community. The seven moai at Ahu Akivi are an exception and face towards the ocean.

• Number carved: nearly 1,000.
• Heads only: no, almost none.
• Facing: inland, mostly.
• Made of: volcanic tuff from a volcano crater.

See also

• Volcano – where the stone came from
• Stonehenge – another famous set of stones
• Ocean – which most of them face away from

References

1. Tuff, T. (2001). Not Just Heads. Island Press.
2. Torso, T. (2012). “We Kept Digging”. Pacific Archaeology Notes 1: 1.
3. Ahu, A. (1998). Facing Inland. Platform Books.