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Rano Raraku is a volcanic crater formed of consolidated volcanic ash, or tuff, and located on the lower slopes of Terevaka in the Rapa Nui National Park on Easter Island in Chile. It was a quarry for about 500 years until the early eighteenth century, and supplied the stone from which about 95% of the island's known monolithic sculptures ( moai ) were carved.
Sep 28, 2024 · Five hundred years ago, on the southern slopes of Easter Island's Rano Raraku volcano, the Rapa Nui people skillfully carved monumental moai statues from volcanic rock. The quarry was more than just a workplace. It was also a spiritually significant site. The moai are thought to represent the ancestors of the Rapa Nui people, embodying the ...
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- Overview
- What are the moai—and who built them?
- Why were the moai built?
- How were the moai built?
- What happened to the people who built the moai?
- How are humans affecting the moai?
- How has the fire affected the moai?
Recent blazes chewed through the heritage site, causing “irreparable” damage to hundreds of Rapa Nui’s sacred moai. Here's what you need to know.
One of the most remote inhabited locations on Earth, Easter Island is famous for the thousand or so enigmatic, towering statues that dot its landscape, called moai.
Earlier this month, a fire caused “irreparable damage” to hundreds of moai, according to the local government of the island, known as Rapa Nui to locals.
Although the true toll is still being assessed, the disaster is just one of the many threats to these sacred statues—along with climate change and human activities. To the Rapa Nui people, the risks are profound, says archeologist Jo Anne Van Tilburg, director of the Easter Island Statue Project.
“They cherish the memory of the people that have gone before,” she says. “They’re angry that so much was lost through no fault of their own.”
Much knowledge about the history and traditions of the Rapa Nui people have been lost to time. But there is much we do know about the statues and the rich culture that built them—and how they can be protected for ages to come.
At latest count on the island, there are 1,043 complete moai, enormous statues with prominent heads made from volcanic stone. Contrary to popular belief, they aren’t just heads—they have torsos too, though many are partially or completely buried. On average, they reach 13 feet in height and weigh 10 metric tons.
Most of the statues stand with their backs to the sea on stone platforms called ahu, which hold up to 15 statues. Some moai are adorned with cylindrical red stones called pukao on their heads, which represents a topknot of hair.
But the true number of moai on the island is unknown because many remain buried in the Rano Raraku quarry on the island’s south shore, where the statues were built. The largest discovered moai, named “El Gigante,” is one that never made it out of Rano Raraku—it is 69 feet tall and is thought to weigh about 200 metric tons.
These statues were erected hundreds of years before the first European arrived on the island on Easter Sunday 1722. Van Tilburg believes Polynesians discovered the island around A.D. 1000, and developed advanced social, political, and religious systems that produced the noble moai.
The Rapa Nui people believed that their chiefs were descended from the gods, and that after death they would once again become divine. The statues were built to temporarily contain the spirits of their ancestors. The ahu upon which they stand were once the sites of death rituals—and excavations have found human remains, both cremated and buried, at some sites.
“It is my personal theory [that the moai] are containers into which these moving spirits can be captured and held safe so that they can continue to aid people that were left behind,” Van Tilburg says.
(Here’s how to discover the mysteries of Rapa Nui yourself.)
There’s a clear connection between the Rapa Nui’s moai and similar monoliths found around Polynesia. Experts believe these statues came from a common religion—even if they don’t always look alike.
“Containers in Hawaii, for example, are quite fierce. Their faces are twisted and turned with anger,” Van Tilburg says.“It’s only the Rapa Nui sculpture that says to us, it’s 100 percent human.”
Today, they are still considered sacred—touching the moai is illegal—and a source of spiritual life force, or mana.
The Rapa Nui people carved the moai directly from volcanic tuff, a porous stone made of solidified ash, in Rano Raraku, an extinct volcano.
The moai carvers were considered master craftsmen and honored for their work. Their process was incredibly secretive, Van Tilburg says, and carvers took great care to not offend spirits during construction.
The island’s plentiful resources were quickly depleted as the population grew. By the time the first European came to the island in the 1700s, the island was deforested, likely to make space for crops. Without trees, the people tried to adapt: evidence shows there were isolated efforts to reforest the island, Van Tilburg says.
(Why the Rapa Nui’s weapons were deliberately non-lethal.)
The Rapa Nui also migrated within the island, both inland and to the coast. Inland, farmers created advanced systems for crops like taro and sweet potato that protected them from high winds, temperature fluctuations, and rapid evaporation, according to archeologist Mara Mulrooney, who studies Rapa Nui land usage.
But colonization, slave trading, and several epidemics took their toll. By 1877, the island’s population dwindled to as little as 111.The population has rebounded, with an estimated 2,000 native people living there today in a population of about 7,000. But threats to the island itself remain.
The vast majority of moai line the island’s coast, which is immediately vulnerable to rising sea levels caused by climate change and coastal erosion. The Rapa Nui predicted this centuries ago and built sea walls, some of which are crumbling and require reinforcement, Van Tilburg says.
Van Tilburg says the Rapa Nui people have traditionally been in charge of that upkeep: “It was the responsibility of the group to do things on a seasonal basis that protected their sites—they were supposed to weed them before ceremonies, they were supposed to mend the wall.”
Hundreds of moai, mostly around the Rano Raraku quarry, were damaged in the October fire.
Photographs of the moai show surface damage greater than has been seen in past fires, Van Tilburg says, which could indicate cracking on the interior of the stone. If that’s the case, she says, heavy rains may cause the stone to crumble.
“The statues, the portions of the statutes above ground, have unknowable damage at the moment,” she says.
But with pandemic restrictions preventing visitors from coming to the island, the world must wait to see the true extent of damage.
- Allie Yang
Feb 24, 2024 · Located near the Rano Raraku Quarry, the very cradle of these monolithic figures, El Gigante towers above its counterparts, measuring an astounding 22 meters in height. This monumental statue, although never completed or erected, encapsulates the ambition and the spiritual fervor of the Rapa Nui people, offering insights into their culture ...
Oct 19, 2023 · The Rano Raraku Quarry is not merely a place of stone extraction; it is the birthplace of the iconic Moai statues that have fascinated and puzzled researchers for centuries. Its significance as the primary source of the statues’ construction material and the witness to the intricate sculpting process makes it a vital archaeological site in unraveling the mysteries of Easter Island’s past.
The ancient volcano named Rano Raraku (“furrowed hill”) is 150 meters (490 feet) high and is inactive for many millennia, but was the scene of a titanic master work. The stylized aesthetic of the classic Moai (statues) of Rano Raraku is different from the more natural and rough features of those which are on the platforms.
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What is 'El Gigante' in the Colossus of Rano Raraku?
Rano Raraku The main quarry for Easter Island's statues, this volcanic crater is a virtual moai graveyard. The stone-faced giants lie in various states of production. Some are half carved, many ...
