WEBVTT - How Easter Island Works 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:03.760 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:13.680 Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:13.720 --> 0:00:16.720 I'm editor Kandi Gibson, joined by staff writer Jane mccarno 0:00:16.840 --> 0:00:20.079 pay cannas Jane, I think that if I could go 0:00:20.320 --> 0:00:22.919 any place in the world, it would be Easter Island. 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:25.760 Really is a beautiful place. Have you been. I haven't. 0:00:25.760 --> 0:00:28.040 I've just seen pictures, but it looks beautiful. I am 0:00:28.120 --> 0:00:30.920 kind of obsessed with that. And I was looking at 0:00:31.160 --> 0:00:33.680 videos of Easter Island the other day and I stumbled 0:00:33.880 --> 0:00:37.279 upon this fabulous piece of information, and that is that 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:41.080 Easter Island has its own marathon. And now I love 0:00:41.400 --> 0:00:44.760 love running long distances. I love half marathons and full marathons. 0:00:44.760 --> 0:00:46.519 And I'm very slow. I won't profess to be the 0:00:46.520 --> 0:00:48.839 first of the line or even like the eight hundred, 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:52.199 but I don't think there'd be anything cooler than running 0:00:52.240 --> 0:00:55.680 around the moi of Easter Island. And it's not that 0:00:55.840 --> 0:00:58.160 big of an island. Actually, I was looking at it. 0:00:58.480 --> 0:01:01.680 I mean I saw that it was about sixty four 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:04.800 square miles and that's about I mean, just to see 0:01:04.880 --> 0:01:06.959 the point of reference, Like it's about the same size 0:01:06.959 --> 0:01:10.560 as Washington, d C. It is itty bitty. Furthermore, it 0:01:10.640 --> 0:01:14.160 is in the middle of nowhere. I think it's closest 0:01:14.280 --> 0:01:17.319 land neighbor. I guess a big land neighbor. I think 0:01:17.319 --> 0:01:20.320 there are other islands smattered around. Nearby, but not too 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:23.360 close by would be Chile, and that is about two 0:01:23.400 --> 0:01:27.360 thousand miles away. That's right. If you look at a globe, 0:01:27.360 --> 0:01:29.440 it looks like just a tiny little stock on the globe, 0:01:29.440 --> 0:01:32.360 and it's fascinating that people were able to find it 0:01:32.400 --> 0:01:35.680 as early as they did. Yeah, considering that these are 0:01:35.720 --> 0:01:39.880 the Polynesians who lived probably in South America, we're not 0:01:39.959 --> 0:01:42.080 quite sure where they came from, and we're not quite 0:01:42.080 --> 0:01:45.040 sure why they left, whether there was some sort of 0:01:45.240 --> 0:01:48.360 dispute the Rows, or whether some got ambitious and wanted 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:52.000 to start their own colony elsewhere. But because the Polynesians 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:54.920 are such great sailors and navigators, they were able to 0:01:55.000 --> 0:01:57.600 make it to this island. We know that they sailed 0:01:57.600 --> 0:02:00.320 and wooden boats that were probably lasted together with reds 0:02:00.760 --> 0:02:03.880 wrapped really tightly like ropes, and they were probably a 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:06.360 drift in the ocean for about two weeks before they 0:02:06.440 --> 0:02:09.720 hit land. Easter Island, and that was around four hundred 0:02:09.919 --> 0:02:14.079 a d. And so you can understand how archaeological evidence 0:02:14.160 --> 0:02:17.840 can't really indicate like what exactly motivated these people because 0:02:17.840 --> 0:02:21.480 they ended up being isolated on this island for so long. Furthermore, 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:25.240 speaking of isolation, we're not sure how many went the 0:02:25.280 --> 0:02:28.760 first time, and when they arrived at Easter Island, We're 0:02:28.760 --> 0:02:31.120 not sure if they settled there because they had picked 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:33.000 it and they knew it existed and that was their 0:02:33.040 --> 0:02:35.919 final destination, or if they were so desperate they picked 0:02:35.960 --> 0:02:38.440 any land that they could have seen. And you've regardless, 0:02:38.440 --> 0:02:42.160 they actually came very prepared for for being ready to 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:44.560 survive wherever they landed. Yeah, they had a type of 0:02:44.639 --> 0:02:47.760 leafy green with them to grow. They had sweet potatoes, 0:02:47.800 --> 0:02:49.919 and my fan as I now, who doesn't love a 0:02:49.919 --> 0:02:53.040 sweet potato gosh um. I think they also had a 0:02:53.080 --> 0:02:57.200 couple of chickens. And again when they pulled up to 0:02:57.240 --> 0:03:00.480 Easter Island, I just I can't imagine how they must 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:04.519 have felt because parts of Easter Island were just gorgeous, 0:03:04.560 --> 0:03:07.799 a very verdant paradise. I think that today archaeologists suspect 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:10.640 that there may have been at one time sixteen million 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:13.000 palm trees, just you know, an Eden in the middle 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:15.600 of the ocean. But the part that they docked at 0:03:16.240 --> 0:03:19.440 was a less welcoming landscape. And that's the thing about 0:03:19.440 --> 0:03:22.080 Easter Island. As tiny as it is, this little triangle 0:03:22.080 --> 0:03:25.600 shaped island has very diverse landscapes that has white sandy beaches, 0:03:25.639 --> 0:03:28.000 and then it has these very jagged and forbidden cliffs, 0:03:28.000 --> 0:03:31.240 and it has a volcano and volcanoes and palm trees. 0:03:31.400 --> 0:03:34.200 So who is what they thought. But they set to 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:37.720 task and they did pretty well. They cultivated the land, 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:41.600 and they increased their population and they became a very 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:44.840 sophisticated society. Yeah, you can see how it was probably 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:47.320 pretty hard at first, especially because they brought most of 0:03:47.320 --> 0:03:49.400 their sustenance with them, as we said, and what was 0:03:49.480 --> 0:03:51.680 actually on the island itself before they came there was 0:03:51.720 --> 0:03:54.200 not much. There were there were lizards, maybe an insects 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:57.240 um but that. But they actually had to start from 0:03:57.280 --> 0:03:59.960 the ground up mostly exactly. They were able to hide 0:04:00.320 --> 0:04:02.600 dolphins and other types of fish in the waters. But 0:04:02.680 --> 0:04:05.280 it's important to note that Eastern Island is not just 0:04:05.400 --> 0:04:07.920 remote as far as people go and animals. Like you 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:10.600 were saying, there aren't very many nutrients in the water, 0:04:10.720 --> 0:04:13.000 or there weren't at that time, and so not much 0:04:13.040 --> 0:04:16.120 could be sustained. So there were birds that would pass over. 0:04:16.200 --> 0:04:17.880 And some people think that's how it got to be 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:20.920 such a verdant little paradise, is that the birds would 0:04:20.920 --> 0:04:23.760 bring seeds that they deposited. And for this is actually 0:04:23.760 --> 0:04:26.200 a point of contention about like how things got there 0:04:26.279 --> 0:04:30.040 and and um, etcetera, because some historians claim, like, we're 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:31.840 trying to figure out where the original people came from, 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:35.040 and some historians claim, oh, these people came from Chile, obviously, 0:04:35.120 --> 0:04:39.800 like that's the closest land. Um. But when explorers eventually 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:43.560 stumbled upon the island, a European explorers, uh, a Polynesian 0:04:43.640 --> 0:04:46.320 on the ship was actually able to converse with the 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:49.200 people there, and so that's so they were obviously speaking 0:04:49.200 --> 0:04:51.800 of variation on Polynesian. So they think the people came 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:55.400 from Polynesia. And so we could tell y'all about Easter 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:57.480 Island all day, and if you don't know much about it, 0:04:57.560 --> 0:04:59.720 you may be saying, Okay, sure, so it's a tiny 0:04:59.800 --> 0:05:02.479 little island, things are green, people came from nowhere. Great. 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:08.320 But the really important thing about Easter Island is the Moai, 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:13.719 and ultimately the Moai brought about the height of the 0:05:13.760 --> 0:05:17.760 civilization and then they're very very darkest hour and the 0:05:17.920 --> 0:05:20.240 history of Easter Island. Not just how they got there, 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:22.279 because that part is interesting in and of itself, but 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:25.480 it gets so haunting and it really gives me to 0:05:25.520 --> 0:05:27.960 chills every time I think about it. These people had 0:05:28.240 --> 0:05:32.880 a very specific religion and culture, and um their spirituality 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:37.080 was manifested through art, you know, storytelling and string figures 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:40.400 and sculpture. And so they got to Easter Island. The 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:43.640 volcanoes and the quarries had all of this ash that 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:47.440 was perfect for making sculpture, and so they made these 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:51.600 giant heads and they're very stylized looking. If you've never 0:05:51.600 --> 0:05:53.680 seen a picture of them, I would encourage you to 0:05:53.720 --> 0:05:56.480 look at the Easter Island Moi and what people usually 0:05:56.520 --> 0:05:59.520 asso associate with Easter Island is these huge hits, huge 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:02.400 And what I found interesting is that there actually found 0:06:02.400 --> 0:06:05.360 other places, like other other cultures did have something like this, 0:06:05.520 --> 0:06:08.760 but it was the Easter Islanders who actually like they 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:11.200 had the most sophisticated and the biggest and the most 0:06:11.240 --> 0:06:14.000 incredible ones. Well, and you have to wonder too, I 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:16.839 think they might have gotten bored, and there was a 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:19.760 sense of competitiveness among them because they would build these 0:06:19.800 --> 0:06:21.840 giant giant heads. And just to give you guys an 0:06:21.880 --> 0:06:25.560 idea average average wise, they could weigh up to eighty 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:28.280 two tons instead up to thirty two ft high. They 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:30.840 were huge. They were just giant heads. They didn't have nacks, 0:06:30.839 --> 0:06:33.159 but they had these really long earlobes, and they were 0:06:33.240 --> 0:06:36.000 very stylized, and their features with their long noses and 0:06:36.040 --> 0:06:39.599 their eyes were sometimes ornament with coral or obsidian. But 0:06:39.680 --> 0:06:44.800 they look very phallic, and perhaps archaeologists say that's because 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:48.800 the population was always struggling to reproduce and they were 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:52.200 fertility guys. I believe they were. They were so they 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:56.800 could be phallic in homage to fertility GUIDs and um. 0:06:56.800 --> 0:06:59.480 Speaking of which, because the population was the challenge they 0:06:59.480 --> 0:07:01.600 had to end read and so even to this day 0:07:01.600 --> 0:07:03.800 you'll find some Easter Islanders who have six toes on 0:07:03.839 --> 0:07:06.400 each foot. It's very interesting, and I guess it also 0:07:06.480 --> 0:07:08.440 probably stems from the fact that they had a class 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:11.680 system even within this tiny island. Um their population had 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:13.560 a class of like an upper class and a working 0:07:13.560 --> 0:07:17.040 class sort of thing. And I imagine that contributed to 0:07:17.320 --> 0:07:20.960 separating how people bread. I think so, and when it 0:07:21.040 --> 0:07:24.200 came to the Moi, this was such a manifestation of 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:27.240 honor and spirituality. I think everyone was a participant, no 0:07:27.280 --> 0:07:29.120 matter the class. I don't know that far a fact, 0:07:29.160 --> 0:07:31.720 but I would assume that people would come together and 0:07:31.880 --> 0:07:34.680 there was a very specific process with creating the moi. 0:07:34.840 --> 0:07:36.760 The artist would start in the quarry and start, you know, 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:39.480 putting the rock together and carving it down and chiseling it, 0:07:39.960 --> 0:07:42.400 and essentially it would be sort of on like a 0:07:42.440 --> 0:07:45.320 little block when Tommy finished carving it, and they would 0:07:45.840 --> 0:07:49.480 create these deep rivets alongside the block. So finally there 0:07:49.560 --> 0:07:51.440 was just like a tiny little sliver of stone that 0:07:51.480 --> 0:07:55.280 connected the head to the quarry, and this was the keel. 0:07:55.280 --> 0:07:57.720 And once they could sever the keel, they would lay 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:01.640 the head on a series of logs, we'd imagine, and 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:06.200 archaeologists are in dispute about how they transported these heavy, 0:08:06.280 --> 0:08:09.600 heavy monoliths, and it's sort of like the stone Hinge 0:08:09.760 --> 0:08:13.160 of Eastern Island, because people are historians are boggled by 0:08:13.160 --> 0:08:15.960 the fact how could these people have the technology in 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:18.840 the in the in the ingenuity, I guess to move 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:22.440 these humongous structures, and that's like a huge feat it is. 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:26.080 And so people either imagine that about seventy men got 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:30.280 together and pulled them with ropes fashioned from parts of trees, 0:08:30.640 --> 0:08:32.600 or else they laid them on a series of logs 0:08:32.600 --> 0:08:35.160 in which two layers of logs be perpendicular to each other. 0:08:35.160 --> 0:08:37.400 They'd grease them with palm oil and they'd roll them 0:08:37.720 --> 0:08:40.000 on a platform. And I imagine this was such a 0:08:40.000 --> 0:08:42.360 painsticking process. I think that it could take up to 0:08:42.440 --> 0:08:46.199 two weeks to move the moi. Important to them exactly, 0:08:46.240 --> 0:08:48.520 It's very important to them because they put such labor 0:08:48.559 --> 0:08:51.679 into it, and their final resting spot were on ahu 0:08:51.840 --> 0:08:55.520 or platforms, and the moi faced inland towards the island. 0:08:55.520 --> 0:08:58.320 It was obviously meant to watch over the residents and 0:08:58.360 --> 0:09:01.280 to protect them. So they with these around the perimeter, right, 0:09:01.320 --> 0:09:03.360 it's like, and so all of these all around the perimeter, 0:09:03.400 --> 0:09:06.040 we're looking inward. Yeah, and it's really interesting. We think 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:08.480 over the course of five years, about nine hundred of 0:09:08.520 --> 0:09:12.200 them were carved, and you can see where the artists 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:14.440 got competitive because there were so many that were left 0:09:14.480 --> 0:09:18.160 unfinished in the quarry and archaeologists found them later. On um. 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:21.840 Ones that had a flaw maybe are ones that were broken, 0:09:21.960 --> 0:09:24.720 you know, whether in transit or whether in construction, they 0:09:24.720 --> 0:09:28.360 were just abandoned completely. And they were perfectionists. They were 0:09:28.360 --> 0:09:30.720 a perfectionist. This is, you know, how they were expressing 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:33.040 their division to the gods. And they got bigger over 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:35.880 time too. They started out more modest, and then there 0:09:35.960 --> 0:09:38.800 was one that they call El Gigante, and it's so big. 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:40.760 Of course it's in the quarry. No one could possibly 0:09:40.800 --> 0:09:44.719 have moved it. But here in lies the problem with 0:09:44.760 --> 0:09:47.280 what they were doing. Uh yeah, So if we go 0:09:47.320 --> 0:09:50.720 back to how they transported them, they obviously candid suggested 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:53.560 that they were using logs and and it must have 0:09:53.600 --> 0:09:56.080 taken a lot and obviously they made a lot of 0:09:56.120 --> 0:09:58.800 these moi. So they ended up cutting down a whole 0:09:58.840 --> 0:10:01.920 lot of trees and ended up being their huge flaw. 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:06.040 They're they're huge mistake. You're right, because over time they 0:10:06.080 --> 0:10:08.439 had such an abundance of resources. I think that they 0:10:08.559 --> 0:10:11.960 used it throwing cautins to the wind and Credaly, we 0:10:12.000 --> 0:10:14.480 sort of think of trees as the most renewable resource 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:18.120 there is, but of course, like on that isolated island, 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:22.160 they must have just used. No, you're right. When you're 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:25.280 living in isolation like that, when you use up your resources, 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:27.600 no matter how renewable it is, if you're not getting 0:10:27.640 --> 0:10:30.480 any more seeds to plant and you're cultivating the landscape, 0:10:30.760 --> 0:10:33.480 it's over. And that's what happened, because not only did 0:10:33.480 --> 0:10:36.760 they cut down all the trees, but they essentially caused 0:10:36.760 --> 0:10:39.120 all the top soil on the island to wash away 0:10:39.160 --> 0:10:41.679 because the roots were in there to hold it down. Furthermore, 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:43.880 they were using the trees to make boats to go 0:10:43.920 --> 0:10:47.360 out and fish for dolphins and purposes. This is especially 0:10:47.360 --> 0:10:49.600 said to me. It's just that they couldn't make boats anymore. 0:10:49.679 --> 0:10:51.719 You know, they couldn't fish because they couldn't make both 0:10:51.760 --> 0:10:54.559 because they didn't have trees. And what's worse than that, 0:10:54.679 --> 0:10:56.480 not only did they not fished on only at they 0:10:56.480 --> 0:10:58.960 not grow crops. After they realized that they had destroyed 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:01.600 their island and all the treas were gone, they didn't 0:11:01.600 --> 0:11:04.800 have anything left to make pots with to flee the ivan. 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:08.280 They were prisoners of their own making, and that's when 0:11:08.280 --> 0:11:13.000 things got really dark and really dangerous. Beau started starving. 0:11:13.200 --> 0:11:17.400 Some scholars posit that maybe some may have resorted to cannibalism. Yeah, 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:19.920 that's true. And this is a point of contention because 0:11:20.040 --> 0:11:25.319 some some historians, notably UM Jared diamond says that these 0:11:25.400 --> 0:11:29.280 Um Islanders resorted to cannibalism after like other food sources 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:35.000 dwindled UM and he points to how cannibalism is the 0:11:35.000 --> 0:11:37.600 their oral tradition. The islanders oral tradition is rife with 0:11:37.600 --> 0:11:39.960 with cannibalism and talk of it. And there's a little 0:11:40.000 --> 0:11:44.719 bit of archaeologic archaeological evidence that um human bones were 0:11:44.760 --> 0:11:48.800 found in these pits of of garbage that where these 0:11:48.800 --> 0:11:50.720 are the pits where they threw their their food trash 0:11:51.240 --> 0:11:55.520 and so um people like Jared Diamonds used this to 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:57.960 to say, oh, well they must have resorted to cannibalism. 0:11:58.200 --> 0:12:00.520 Other historians are like, oh no, there's not an evidence 0:12:00.600 --> 0:12:02.640 to say then we shouldn't say that unless it's unless 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:04.800 were sure, and they say that maybe you know, after 0:12:04.920 --> 0:12:07.839 people naturally died, they there were rituals that people did 0:12:07.840 --> 0:12:10.080 with people, don'tes we know what that happened too, So 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:13.040 it's a point of contention. So however you interpret these 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:15.440 relics of bones, you can look at the things that 0:12:15.480 --> 0:12:18.600 are alongside them that the date to around the same time, 0:12:19.240 --> 0:12:21.400 and you see that this is the first time and 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:25.240 Eastern Island that they've manufactured weapons like spears and arrows 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:29.320 and things like this. Between the tribes were yeah, and 0:12:29.360 --> 0:12:31.280 we know that when they came there were very very 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:33.959 few of them. Around eleven fifty day, the population was 0:12:34.000 --> 0:12:37.560 somewhere from seven thousand to nine thousand, sixteen hundreds. That 0:12:37.640 --> 0:12:40.120 was the height of the civilization. It was around ten 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:43.959 thousand population done. But then when things started declining and 0:12:44.000 --> 0:12:47.120 the population started dwindling, we say that people broke off 0:12:47.120 --> 0:12:50.600 into different clans and essentially they were all fighting for 0:12:50.760 --> 0:12:54.000 the very tiny parcels of arable land that were left. 0:12:54.480 --> 0:12:57.800 And it was very, very difficult to stake a claim 0:12:57.840 --> 0:13:00.240 to this because I think that the Easter Islanders they 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:03.839 were respectful of their gods and they're respectful of women 0:13:03.840 --> 0:13:06.520 and children. Even the scholars who point the fact that 0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:09.880 they may have resorted to cannibalism point out that women 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:13.040 and children never watched this happen, which I don't know 0:13:13.080 --> 0:13:15.280 if that means that men were the only ones who 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:18.000 resorted to cannibalism if they ate it in private away 0:13:18.040 --> 0:13:20.560 from women and children, but I think that they you know, 0:13:20.600 --> 0:13:23.679 they were still trying to hold their civilization together, but 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:27.400 it got harder and harder, and finally there was this 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:30.559 cult that rose out of all the distress, and it 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:33.680 was called the Birdman cult. And the premise was pretty simple. 0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:36.920 Be the first person to grab the egg from a 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:39.400 city turned nest and you're gonna be the leader for 0:13:39.440 --> 0:13:42.000 twelve moons. And that may sound like a pretty simple feet, 0:13:42.120 --> 0:13:46.160 but the city turns nests are in the highest cliffs 0:13:46.160 --> 0:13:48.560 on the islands. It would involve like a swim and 0:13:48.600 --> 0:13:51.400 the rock climb and then a massive track back to 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:53.760 be the first person to have this egg. And if 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:56.440 you lost this contest, it was all bets off because 0:13:56.440 --> 0:14:00.920 the losers were typically expected to stab themselves with spears. 0:14:01.480 --> 0:14:05.959 So the Barman cult dies sound pretty drastic, but through 0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:09.400 this there actually wise every birth and arable land and 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:11.600 cultivation of crops. I think the sweet potater reared its 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:14.640 head again, so I think goodness for tuvers. Yeah, and 0:14:14.800 --> 0:14:16.720 they were struggling. They were they were still struggling to 0:14:16.920 --> 0:14:19.960 to um an extent, and this is when you know 0:14:20.040 --> 0:14:23.440 Europeans actually started stumbling upon these people and they finally 0:14:23.480 --> 0:14:26.600 had sort of contact and access to the outside world. 0:14:27.000 --> 0:14:30.080 But this ended up causing a lot of harm as 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:36.360 well as good, um because like obviously Europeans come uh 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:40.160 with their own diseases like that they have become immune to, 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:44.720 and so they exposed these diseases to the islanders at 0:14:44.720 --> 0:14:47.240 the time, and so that hurt their population even more. 0:14:47.680 --> 0:14:51.520 And I think that when the nineteenth century came around, 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:54.640 the population had dwindled to unlate gosh, just a little 0:14:54.680 --> 0:14:57.480 over a hundred maybe a hundred ten Easter Islanders. And 0:14:58.000 --> 0:15:01.560 not only did the Westerners bring their diseases, they also 0:15:01.680 --> 0:15:05.240 brought their religion and their ideas. And one of the 0:15:05.280 --> 0:15:07.600 reasons it's called Easter Island is because when it was 0:15:07.640 --> 0:15:10.520 first discovered I guess, discovered by Europeans was that it 0:15:10.560 --> 0:15:14.600 was Easter Sunday. And it's interesting and throughout the the 0:15:14.840 --> 0:15:18.360 I guess the nineteenth century, eventually Christian missionaries did come 0:15:18.360 --> 0:15:22.200 over and start and start converting the islanders um to uh, 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:24.840 most of them, I guess, And they ended up sacrificing 0:15:25.040 --> 0:15:27.080 a lot of their culture, which is of course necessary 0:15:27.080 --> 0:15:30.560 when you sacrifice um your religion. Right when the Christian 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:33.320 missionaries came the exchange for giving up their religion and 0:15:33.520 --> 0:15:36.600 their culture, like their storytelling and their their tattoos and 0:15:36.800 --> 0:15:40.640 there's everything. Else was that they learned how to use 0:15:40.680 --> 0:15:43.000 their land to be a ranch essentially, so they had 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:45.120 livestock and they were able to say, okay, so we 0:15:45.160 --> 0:15:47.840 have this very treeless land. Now that's not good for much, 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:50.640 but it is good for using as a ranch. And 0:15:50.760 --> 0:15:53.720 at this time the Easter Islanders, I think for the 0:15:53.720 --> 0:15:57.240 most part, they were very wearied with their culture, and 0:15:57.600 --> 0:16:00.680 when things had gotten really dark, they turned to the 0:16:00.720 --> 0:16:03.640 moi and what and rather they blamed them, blame the 0:16:03.680 --> 0:16:07.840 gods for what had befallen them, or whether they realized 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:11.680 that it was their own, you know, very overenthusiastic production 0:16:11.840 --> 0:16:14.400 of the sculptures that brought them down. They started knocking 0:16:14.440 --> 0:16:16.800 them down, and you know, like you said, like, we're 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:19.520 not really sure why it happened. I remember reading One 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:23.760 theory was that, like when when the population split into 0:16:23.800 --> 0:16:27.040 different clans, one clan would destroy those those statues because 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:28.720 they believe those are the source of their power, the 0:16:29.080 --> 0:16:32.760 opposite clans power. And so there's all kinds of theories 0:16:32.800 --> 0:16:36.600 about this, but um regardless, it is interesting that they 0:16:36.600 --> 0:16:38.840 made such amazing feats and yet they ended up tearing 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:40.680 it down. They did, and you can you can see 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:43.480 where they galuged out the eyes, then a city and eyes, 0:16:43.560 --> 0:16:46.920 and they would arrange really sharp stones underwear. The head 0:16:46.920 --> 0:16:48.960 would fall so and then when they knocked it from 0:16:48.960 --> 0:16:50.920 the yahoo, the head with sever So they were in 0:16:51.080 --> 0:16:56.160 essence decapitating these gods. And it wasn't until archaeologists came 0:16:56.200 --> 0:16:59.080 back and tried to restructure them that they were able 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:01.640 to rehoist the moai. And I think that today the 0:17:01.720 --> 0:17:04.400 Easter Islanders very much accept that as part of their culture. 0:17:05.000 --> 0:17:09.280 But another thing that they lost forever was their language, 0:17:09.440 --> 0:17:13.600 which was Wrongo wrongo, and it actually came about from 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:15.720 a very dirty trick that the Spanish pulled back in 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:19.680 seventy two. They came over and essentially they tricked the 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.560 tribal leader into signing a treaty that turned Easter Island 0:17:23.640 --> 0:17:27.200 over to Spanish control. So while that in itself was 0:17:27.280 --> 0:17:31.080 not diplomatic to any extent, it inspired the Easter Islanders 0:17:31.119 --> 0:17:32.960 to create their own system of writing. And so there 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:35.600 are still tablets today with Wrongo wrongo that exists, and 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:38.439 I think Easter Islanders continue to carve these little symbols 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:41.440 that no one knows what it means, because again, part 0:17:41.480 --> 0:17:44.520 of giving up the culture to Christian missionaries was getting 0:17:44.640 --> 0:17:48.320 you know, ranches established and getting their crops re established 0:17:48.359 --> 0:17:52.640 and essentially surviving. So they made that choice. That's interesting 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:55.560 that both the introduction of writing sort of hurt and 0:17:55.760 --> 0:17:59.200 helped them sort of in a way like, uh, it's 0:17:59.280 --> 0:18:01.320 certainly in a trick to be like, hey, this is 0:18:01.359 --> 0:18:04.280 what writing is. Write anything on this line and you're 0:18:04.400 --> 0:18:06.960 sacrificing your island and knowingly sort of thing. But it 0:18:07.040 --> 0:18:09.080 also brought about to fall up the Birdman cult too, 0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:12.680 because the tribal leader was able to reassert his power 0:18:13.080 --> 0:18:16.200 through writing. So it's just such an interesting history and 0:18:16.240 --> 0:18:18.359 the Easter Islanders are very very proud of their history. 0:18:18.400 --> 0:18:21.160 I think that today there are maybe around two thousand 0:18:21.240 --> 0:18:24.200 people on the island. Yeah, their population is really rebounded. 0:18:24.280 --> 0:18:27.280 Thankfully they have and they have i think joint citizenship 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:29.639 with Chile, so they can go back and forth. And 0:18:29.920 --> 0:18:31.800 if you want to go to Easter Island, I think 0:18:31.840 --> 0:18:33.320 that you have to fly to Chile first, and then 0:18:33.359 --> 0:18:35.399 there are flights certain days of the week that go 0:18:35.520 --> 0:18:37.560 out to Easter Island. And that's what I mean. It's 0:18:37.560 --> 0:18:40.360 awesome that Easter Island has has an um an airport 0:18:40.440 --> 0:18:43.000 now and so people can come and they like argaelogist 0:18:43.040 --> 0:18:45.400 can study and tourists can can find out the rich 0:18:45.440 --> 0:18:48.680 culture and it's pretty interesting. And yeah, they had Chili 0:18:48.720 --> 0:18:50.840 actually has control over it because they annexed it in 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:53.320 eighty eight. We should probably mention that. But um, but 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:56.040 the culture of Easter Island is still alive. The people 0:18:56.080 --> 0:18:59.520 are incredibly friendly, and I think that people have written 0:18:59.600 --> 0:19:02.120 that as I've traveled to Easter Island. If hotel rooms 0:19:02.119 --> 0:19:04.960 are booked, you can stay with any Easter Island family 0:19:05.000 --> 0:19:07.880 in their house and they'll happily welcome you. So it's 0:19:07.920 --> 0:19:09.560 just it seems like such a great place to visit. 0:19:09.680 --> 0:19:12.280 I can't wait to go. Mark my words. If I'm 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:15.119 not there or someone comes, shake me please. So if 0:19:15.160 --> 0:19:17.240 you want to learn even more about Easter Island and 0:19:17.320 --> 0:19:20.440 other ancient civilizations, be sure to check out how stuff 0:19:20.480 --> 0:19:24.760 works dot com for more on this and thousands of 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:28.199 other topics. Does it how stuff works dot com? 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