Moai 7 Mystery Coast Free Download

From the coast, we headed inland to Ahu Akivi, one of the only ahus in the mountains, and where the statues face the ocean. You begin to wonder how they were able to move these statues over such distances and elevations.

Each statue is roughly 14 tons and stands nearly 13 feet tall, with the larger moai weighing up to 65 tons! Historians believe the statues were made sometime before 1600 AD, and evidence supports that the island was once flourishing with palm trees that were used to transport the statues to their ahus all around the island.

Download File 🔥 https://bltlly.com/2y3DeQ 🔥

From the mountains, we headed to the quarry, Rano Raraku, where most (if not all) of the moai were carved. Here, we could view the moai in their varying degrees of creation. Some still lay half-buried and half-carved, while others lean into the hillside at different angles.

Our final stop was Ahu Tongariki, the most iconic ahu of them all, where 15 moai stand side-by-side with the ocean at their backs. A tsunami had destroyed parts of the ahu in the 1960s and it was fully restored in 1995. During the summer solstice, these moai face the sunset, indicating a deep connection to the people of Rapa Nui with their natural surroundings.

In all, nearly 1,000 moai were created by the Rapa Nui people. The statues were the main focus of Rapa Nui religion until they were replaced with the Birdman, which leads us to Rano Kau and Orongo.

Moai is a spiritual being. When the carved stone or wooden objects are properly fashioned, Polynesians believed that the objects could be charged by mana, a magical spiritual essence. Archaeologists believe that the statues symbolize authority and power, both religious and political. It represents deceased ancestors, as ahus were burial grounds. Most of them are located along the coast and facing inland. The statues face the inland as they are watching over the people, except Ahu Akivi, the furthest inland of all the ahus that are facing the ocean. Ahu Akivi face out to the sea to help travelers find the island. All the statues were found toppled after 1722, due to the conflict between clans. Only about 50 moai statues were re-erected to this day on the restored ahus.

Easter Island (Spanish: Isla de Pascua [isla e pas.kwa]; Rapa Nui: Rapa Nui) is an island and special territory of Chile in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian Triangle in Oceania. The island is most famous for its nearly 1,000 extant monumental statues, called moai, which were created by the early Rapa Nui people. In 1995, UNESCO named Easter Island a World Heritage Site, with much of the island protected within Rapa Nui National Park.

Experts disagree on when the island's Polynesian inhabitants first reached the island. While many in the research community cited evidence that they arrived around the year 800, a 2007 study found compelling evidence that they arrived closer to 1200.[3][4] The inhabitants created a thriving and industrious culture, as evidenced by the island's numerous enormous stone moai and other artifacts. But land clearing for cultivation and the introduction of the Polynesian rat led to gradual deforestation.[3] By the time of European arrival in 1722, the island's population was estimated to be 2,000 to 3,000. European diseases, Peruvian slave raiding expeditions in the 1860s, and emigration to other islands such as Tahiti further depleted the population, reducing it to a low of 111 native inhabitants in 1877.[5]

According to oral traditions recorded by missionaries in the 1860s, the island originally had a strong class system: an ariki, or high chief, wielded great power over nine other clans and their respective chiefs. The high chief was the eldest descendant through first-born lines of the island's legendary founder, Hotu Matu'a. The most visible element in the culture was the production of massive moai statues that some believe represented deified ancestors. According to National Geographic, "Most scholars suspect that the moai were created to honor ancestors, chiefs, or other important personages, However, no written and little oral history exists on the island, so it's impossible to be certain."[30]

It was believed that the living had a symbiotic relationship with the dead in which the dead provided everything that the living needed (health, fertility of land and animals, fortune etc.) and the living, through offerings, provided the dead with a better place in the spirit world. Most settlements were located on the coast, and most moai were erected along the coastline, watching over their descendants in the settlements before them, with their backs toward the spirit world in the sea.

Species of fish were collected in Easter Island for one month in different habitats including shallow lava pools and deep waters. Within these habitats, two holotypes and paratypes, Antennarius randalli and Antennarius moai, were discovered. These are considered frog-fish because of their characteristics: "12 dorsal rays, last two or three branched; bony part of first dorsal spine slightly shorter than second dorsal spine; body without bold zebra-like markings; caudal peduncle short, but distinct; last pelvic ray divided; pectoral rays 11 or 12".[56]

Easter Island was closed to tourists from March 17, 2020 until August 4, 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[59] Then in early October 2022, just two months after the island was reopened to tourists, a forest fire burned nearly 148 acres (60 hectares) of the island, causing irreparable damage to some of the moai.[60] Arson is suspected.[61]

Easter Island is one of the world's most isolated inhabited islands.[68] Its closest inhabited neighbour is Pitcairn Island, 1,931 km (1,200 mi) to the west, with approximately 50 inhabitants.[69] The nearest continental point lies in central Chile near Concepcin, at 3,512 kilometres (2,182 mi). Easter Island's latitude is similar to that of Caldera, Chile, and it lies 3,510 km (2,180 mi) west of continental Chile at its nearest point (between Lota and Lebu in the Biobo Region). Isla Salas y Gmez, 415 km (258 mi) to the east, is closer but is uninhabited. The Tristan da Cunha archipelago in the southern Atlantic competes for the title of the most remote island, lying 2,430 km (1,510 mi) from Saint Helena island and 2,816 km (1,750 mi) from the South African coast.

Terevaka formed around 0.77 Ma of tholeiitic to alkali basalts, followed by the collapse of its summit into a caldera. Then at about 0.3Ma, cinder cones formed along a NNE-SSW trend on the western rim, while porphyritic benmoreitic lava filled the caldera, and pahoehoe flowed towards the northern coast, forming lava tubes, and to the southeast. Lava domes and a vent complex formed in the Maunga Puka area, while breccias formed along the vents on the western portion of Rano Aroi crater. This volcano's southern and southeastern flanks are composed of younger flows consisting of basalt, alkali basalt, hawaiite, mugearite, and benmoreite from eruptive fissures starting at 0.24 Ma. The youngest lava flow, Roiho, is dated at 0.11 Ma. The Hanga O Teo embayment is interpreted to be a 200 m high landslide scarp.[73]

Trees are sparse, rarely forming natural groves, and it has been argued whether native Easter Islanders deforested the island in the process of erecting their statues,[97] and in providing sustenance for an overconsumption of natural resources from a overcrowded island.[citation needed] Experimental archaeology demonstrated that some statues certainly could have been placed on "Y" shaped wooden frames called miro manga erua and then pulled to their final destinations on ceremonial sites.[97] Other theories involve the use of "ladders" (parallel wooden rails) over which the statues could have been dragged.[98] Rapa Nui traditions metaphorically refer to spiritual power (mana) as the means by which the moai were "walked" from the quarry. Recent experimental recreations have proven that it is fully possible that the moai were literally walked from their quarries to their final positions by use of ropes, casting doubt on the role that their existence plays in the environmental collapse of the island.[99]

Almost all (95%)[citation needed] moai were carved from compressed, easily worked solidified volcanic ash or tuff, found at a single site on the side of the extinct volcano Rano Raraku. The native islanders who carved them used only stone hand chisels, mainly basalt toki, which lie in place all over the quarry. The stone chisels were sharpened by chipping off a new edge when dulled. While sculpting was going on, the volcanic stone was splashed with water to soften it. While many teams worked on different statues at the same time, a single moai took a team of five or six men approximately a year to complete. Each statue represented the deceased head of a lineage.[citation needed]

Only a quarter of the statues were installed. Nearly half remained in the quarry at Rano Raraku, and the rest sat elsewhere, presumably on their way to intended locations. The largest moai raised on a platform is known as "Paro". It weighs 82 tonnes (90 short tons) and is 9.89 m (32 ft 5 in) long.[111][112] Several other statues of similar weight were transported to ahu on the north and south coasts.

Possible means by which the statues were moved include employment of a miro manga erua, a Y-shaped sledge with cross pieces, pulled with ropes made from the tough bark of the hau tree[113] and tied around the statue's neck. Anywhere from 180 to 250 men were required for pulling, depending on the size of the moai. Among other researchers on moving and erecting the moai was Vince Lee, who reenacted a moai moving scenario. Some 50 of the statues were re-erected in modern times. One of the first was on Ahu Ature Huke in Anakena beach in 1956.[114] It was raised using traditional methods during a Heyerdahl expedition. 2351a5e196