Why is rapa nui important

Here, the moai are more 'standardized' in design, and are believed to have been carved, transported, and erected between AD and They stand with their backs to the sea and are believed by most archaeologists to represent the spirits of ancestors, chiefs, or other high-ranking males who held important positions in the history of Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, the name given by the indigenous people to their island in the s.

Archaeologist Jo Anne Van Tilburg , who has studied the moai for many years, believes the statues may have been created in the image of various paramount chiefs. They were not individualized portrait sculptures, but standardized representations of powerful individuals. The moai may also hold a sacred role in the life of the Rapa Nui, acting as ceremonial conduits for communication with the gods.

According to Van Tilburg, their physical position between earth and sky puts them on both secular and sacred ground; secular in their representation of chief and their ability to physically prop up the sky, and sacred in their proximity to the heavenly gods.

Estimates of when people first reached the island are as varied, ranging from the first to the sixth century A. And how they ever found the place, whether by design or accident, is yet another unresolved question. Some argue that the navigators of the first millennium could never have plotted a course over such immense distances without modern precision instruments.

One archaeoastronomer suggests that a new supernova in the ancient skies may have pointed the way. But did the voyagers know the island was even there? For that, science has no answer. The islanders, however, do. Benedicto Tuki was a tall year-old master wood-carver and keeper of ancient knowledge when I met him. Tuki has since died. His piercing eyes were set in a deeply creased, mahogany face. There, he could recount the story in the right way. Platforms are called ahu, and the statues that sit on them, moai pronounced mo-eye.

As our jeep negotiated a rutted dirt road, the seven moai loomed into view. Their faces were paternal, all-knowing and human—forbiddingly human. These seven, Tuki said, were not watching over the land like those statues with their backs to the sea.

These stared out beyond the island, across the ocean to the west, remembering where they came from. These moai represent the original ancestor from the Marquesas and the kings of other Polynesian islands. Tuki himself gazed into the distance as he chanted their names. His tattooist and priest, Hau Maka, had flown across the ocean in a dream and seen Rapa Nui and its location, which he described in detail. After a voyage of two months, they sailed into Anakena Bay, which was just as the tattooist had described it.

There is a museum, the R. Sebastian Englert Museum of Anthropology, which supports research and conservation efforts. A management plan is in place which undergoes periodic review and there is a team in charge of Park administration. Nevertheless, site management becomes complex because of cultural differences and the reluctances from part of some sectors of the local community about State intervention.

Visitor management is a great imperative, with challenges in establishing carrying capacity and providing infrastructure of basic services and interpretation. Also, it is necessary that the local population effectively support the conservation effort, for example, through livestock control.

A better dialogue is necessary among researchers to reach conclusions on the available knowledge and to manage it in a functional manner conducive to conservation; to systematize the information produced and generate a periodic, comprehensive and sustainable monitoring system. Additional staff and resources are needed for the administration and care of the site, to reinforce the number and training of the park rangers team, and to increase the operating budget.

There is a constant pressure on park lands; the State must prevent its illegal occupation. The essential requirement for the protection and management of this property lies in its multifaceted status as a World Heritage site, as a reference point and basis for the development of the population of the island, and repository of answers to fundamental questions that are far from being revealed. About us. Special themes. Major programmes. For the Press. Help preserve sites now!

Join the , Members. Search Advanced. By Properties. Cultural Criteria: i ii iii iv v vi Natural Criteria: vii viii ix x. Monumentum, Autumn Death of a Moai. Related Projects. Active Project. Easter Island, a special territory of Chile that was annexed in , is most famous for the hundreds moai statues scattered throughout its coastline.