The So-Called Mystery of Rapa Nui (AKA Easter Island)

Outside/In

NHPR

Natural Sciences, Documentary, Society & Culture, Nature, Science

4.7 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 28 February 2015

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Three hundred years ago on Easter Sunday, 1722, European explorers landed on a South Pacific island that they called “Easter Island.” And they were shocked to see nearly one-thousand giant statues of stoic faces, called “moai”, placed all over the island. Who moved them? And how did they do it? The most popular theory was that this remote civilization destroyed itself – cutting down all the trees to make contraptions for moving statues. But according to the Indigenous people of Rapa Nui, their ancestors didn’t need to cut down any trees to transport the statues. In fact, their oral history has always been clear about how the moai were transported. The real mystery is, why hasn’t anyone been listening? This story originally ran in October 2021, and was updated for the 300th anniversary of first contact between Rapanui and European peoples. Featuring: Sergio Rapu Haoa, Carl Lipo, Terry Hunt, Sergio Mata’u Rapu, and Gina Pakarati SUPPORT Outside/In is made possible with listener support. Click here to become a sustaining member of Outside/In. Subscribe to our newsletter. LINKS A profile of Sergio Rapu Haoa for the 2002 Rotary World Peace Scholars program at Berkeley Eating Up Easter -- a documentary film produced by Sergio Mata’u Rapu, about how the people of Rapa Nui are grappling with environmental and social changes brought on by tourism and economic development. The NOVA-National Geographic Documentary A team of 18 volunteers move a 10-foot 5-ton statue for the NOVA-National Geographic documentary, Mystery of Easter Island A figurine animation demonstrating five different theories of moai-transport through the years. Mystery of Easter Island -- The NOVA-National Geographic Documentary in its entirety Lectures by Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo National Geographic Live Lecture -- Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo: The Statues That Walked Long Now Foundation Lecture: The Statues Walked -- What Really Happened on Easter Island | Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo CREDITS Reported and produced by Felix Poon Edited by Taylor Quimby Executive Producer: Rebecca Lavoie Mixed by Felix Poon Additional Editing: Justine Paradis, Jessica Hunt, Rebecca Lavoie, and Erika Janik Special thanks to Effie Kong, and Daniela Allee for her Spanish and Rapanui voiceovers. Theme: Breakmaster Cylinder Additional Music by Blue Dot Sessions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Outside In, a show about the natural world and how we use it.
0:03.6	I'm Felix Poon.
0:05.2	So there's this small remote islands out in the South Pacific.
0:08.8	And on this island was a man who goes by Matahu.
0:11.9	My name is Sergio Matahu Rapu. I'm a documentary filmmaker from
0:16.8	Rapaoui. Before he was a filmmaker, Matahou used to be a tour guide on Rapanoui.
0:21.6	You can't escape tourism, you know, it like surrounds you.
0:25.8	You're either transporting tourists or feeding them or guiding them or you know cleaning their
0:32.3	rooms.
0:33.0	One day, Matau is hired by a private tourist from Russia.
0:37.0	He's driving him in his van around the island
0:40.0	and telling him stories about different sites.
0:42.0	And we stopped at this one site and he kept sort of prodding me about like how
0:48.9	were they moved.
0:51.3	Rappanue is the indigenous name for a place that you've probably already heard of called Easter Island,
0:58.0	a name that Europeans came up with when they first landed there 300 years ago on Easter Sunday, 1722.
1:05.0	In the tourist, he was talking about those massive statues that the island is famous for.
1:10.0	They're carved from volcanic rock.
1:12.0	They look stoic, with square chiseled jaws, prominent noses,
1:16.5	and unsmiling lips. They're said to represent rapid-oite ancestors, and there's nearly a thousand of them on the islands. Most are lined up
1:25.1	along the ocean where they stand facing inward. They're called mowai and the
1:30.4	heaviest mowai weighs 86 tons, about two fully loaded tractor trailers.
	...

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