Mighty Maori Guard a Lost Civilisation

Moais on Easter island

Easter Island knows a thing or two about perfect timing, writes Ian Belcher. As its huge canopy of sky explodes into purple and crimson above four enigmatic statues, a local strums his guitar and, right on cue, as the setting sun kisses the South Pacific, a whale breaches off the point.

It’s utterly memorable. Marvellously mysterious. Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, a small, volcanic dot 2,300 miles west of Chile, is an eerie hybrid landscape of Polynesia and Scotland, its moors riddled with 887 moai − vast ancestral sculptures that have long fascinated archaeologists and anthropologists.

The moai, with their flat foreheads, long noses and impassive stares, are reminders of a civilisation that committed terrible self-genocide. Built over a millennium from 500AD, the figures gazed over the ceremonial plazas of different clans who engaged in brutal warfare as the remote island’s resources stretched to breaking point. Once the trees were cut down, there were no boats, no fishing − no escape. When Chile took control in 1888, 111 people remained from a peak of 10,000.

Many statues, smashed in the carnage, have been raised to their original sacred positions. They make compelling theatre. Ahu Akivi’s seven stone figures are believed to represent the first settlers who canoed from Polynesia. What better place to start? But they pale in comparison with the 15 at Ahu Tongariki. Up to 18m high, they show how the moai became more angular, regal and sophisticated. “Feel their strength,” explains my guide, Singa. “They transmitted energy as soon as they were erected.”

Rapa Nui’s secrets are gradually revealed through a series of mesmerizing forays from the lush capital, Hanga Roa, the island’s only settlement. After exploring the remains of dwellings shaped like upturned canoes, ancient boat ramps and caves containing ancestral skulls, I arrive at Ahu Tahai, scene of that perfect sunset. One of the moai has intact eyes — the red coral was the final act of construction, switching on the ancestors’ protective power.

Easter Island - crater of the volcano Rano Raraku

But most intriguing of all are two volcanoes. Rano Kau’s wide, spectacular cone, its slopes plummeting into the ocean, was the site of the annual birdman competition. Participants sprinted down the vertiginous cliffs, dived into the Pacific and swam out to an island to collect a precious bird’s egg. First back received a pale-skinned virgin and his clan governed the island.

On another afternoon, I walk to Rano Raraku, where statues were sculpted from a wall of magma, before being cut free and transported to their altars. Some remain half-finished in the rock face — monuments to the day society imploded. It’s far calmer now for the world’s most unusual lifeguards. Rapa Nui really is no ordinary island.

Words by Ian Belcher