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| Name | |
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Easter Island, Sala y Gómez, South America and the islands in between
Orthographic projection centered on Easter Island
The name "Easter Island" was given by the island's first recorded European visitor, the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, who encountered it on Easter Sunday 1722, while searching for Davis or David's island. Roggeveen named it Paasch-Eyland (18th century Dutch for "Easter Island").[6] The island's official Spanish name, Isla de Pascua, also means "Easter Island".
The current Polynesian name of the island, Rapa Nui, "Big Rapa", was coined after the slave raids of the early 1860s, and refers to the island's topographic resemblance to the island of Rapa in the Bass Islands of the Austral Islands group.[7] However Thor Heyerdahl argued that Rapa was the original name of Easter Island, and that Rapa Iti was named by refugees from there.[8]
The phrase Te pito o te henua has been said to be the original name of the island since Alphonse Pinart gave it the romantic translation "the Navel of the World" in his Voyage à l'Île de Pâques, published in 1877. However, there are two words pronounced pito in Rapa Nui, one meaning 'navel' and one 'end', and the phrase can thus also mean "land's end". This was apparently its actual meaning: Churchill (1912) inquired about the phrase as was told that there were three te pito o te henua, these being the three capes (land's ends) of the island. He was unable to elicit a Polynesian name for the island itself, and concluded that there may not have been one.[9] According to Barthel (1974), oral tradition has it that the island was first named Te pito o te kainga a Hau Maka "The little piece of land of Hau Maka".[10] Another name, Mata ki te rangi, means "Eyes looking to the sky".[citation needed]
Tags:Spanish,European,East,Utc,Polynesian,Sala Y Gómez,Dutch,Jacob Roggeveen,Easter Sunday,Davis Or David's Island,Rapa,Bass Islands,Austral Islands,Thor Heyerdahl,Alphonse Pinart,Oral Tradition,Slave,Ce, | |
| Location and physical geography | |
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Easter Island is one of the world's most isolated inhabited islands. Its closest inhabited neighbour is Pitcairn Island, 2,075 km (1,289 mi) to the west, with fewer than 100 inhabitants. Easter Island's latitude is close 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). Isla Salas y Gómez, 415 km (258 mi) to the east, is closer but is uninhabited.
The island is about 24.6 km (15.3 mi) long by 12.3 km (7.6 mi) at its widest point; its overall shape is triangular. It has an area of 163.6 square kilometres (63.2 sq mi), and a maximum altitude of 507 meters (1,663 ft). There are three Rano (freshwater crater lakes), at Rano Kau, Rano Raraku and Rano Aroi, near the summit of Terevaka, but no permanent streams or rivers.
Tags:Terevaka,Rano Kau,Chile,Latitude,Lota,Lebu,Crater Lakes,Rano Raraku,Rano Aroi, | |
| Geology | |
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Easter Island is a volcanic high island, consisting mainly of three extinct coalesced volcanoes: Terevaka (altitude 507 metres) forms the bulk of the island. Two other volcanoes, Poike and Rano Kau, form the eastern and southern headlands and give the island its roughly triangular shape. Lesser cones and other volcanic features include the crater Rano Raraku, the cinder cone Puna Pau and many volcanic caves including lava tubes.[11] Poike used to be a separate island until volcanic material from Terevaka united it to the larger whole. The island is dominated by hawaiite and basalt flows which are rich in iron and show affinity with igneous rocks found in the Galápagos Islands.[12]
Easter Island and surrounding islets such as Motu Nui and Motu Iti form the summit of a large volcanic mountain rising over 2,000 metres (6,600 ft) from the sea bed. The mountain is part of the Sala y Gómez Ridge, a (mostly submarine) mountain range with dozens of seamounts. The range begins with Pukao and next Moai, two seamounts to the west of Easter Island, and extends 2,700 km (1,700 mi) east to the Nazca Ridge.[13] The ridge was formed by the Nazca Plate floating over the Easter hotspot.[14] The movement of Nazca and formerly the Farallon Plate over the hotspot has created a long underwater ridge, the Nazca Ridge, whose eastern end is being subducted under Peru. Only at Easter Island, its surrounding islets and Sala y Gómez does the Sala y Gómez Ridge form dry land.
Pukao, Moai and Easter Island were formed in the last 750,000 years and are the ridge's youngest islands. The most recent eruption was a little over 100,000 years ago.
In the first half of the 20th century, steam reportedly came out of the Rano Kau crater wall. This was photographed by the island's manager, Mr Edmunds.[15] According to geologists the last volcanic activity on the island occurred 10,000 years ago.
An alternative explanation for the islands is the activity of the Easter Fracture Zone.
Tags:Poike,Motu Nui,Moai,Volcanic,High Island,Volcanoes,Cinder Cone,Puna Pau,Lava Tubes,Hawaiite,Basalt,Igneous Rocks,Galápagos Islands,Mountain Range,Seamounts,Pukao,Nazca Ridge,Nazca Plate,Easter Hotspot,Farallon Plate,Subducted,Peru,Easter Fracture Zone, | |
| Climate and weather | |
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See also: Climate of Chile
The climate of Easter Island is subtropical maritime. The lowest temperatures are recorded in July and August (18 °C or 64 °F) and the highest in February (maximum temperature 28 °C or 82 °F[16]), the summer season in the southern hemisphere. Winters are relatively mild. The rainiest month is April, though the island experiences year-round rainfall.[17] Easter Island's isolated location exposes it to winds which help to keep the temperature fairly cool. Precipitation averages 1,118 millimetres or 44 inches per year. Occasionally, heavy rainfall and rainstorms strike the island. These occur mostly in the winter months (June–August). Since it is close to the South Pacific High and outside the range of the ITCZ, cyclones and hurricanes do not occur around Easter island.[18]
Climate data for Easter Island
Month
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
Jun
Jul
Aug
Sep
Oct
Nov
Dec
Year
Record high °C (°F)
36
(97)
37
(99)
34
(93)
31
(88)
31
(88)
27
(81)
27
(81)
29
(84)
31
(88)
33
(91)
36
(97)
37
(99)
37
(99)
Average high °C (°F)
25
(77)
26
(79)
25
(77)
24
(75)
22
(72)
21
(70)
20
(68)
20
(68)
21
(70)
21
(70)
22
(72)
24
(75)
22.6
(72.6)
Average low °C (°F)
21
(70)
21
(70)
21
(70)
20
(68)
18
(64)
17
(63)
16
(61)
16
(61)
16
(61)
16
(61)
18
(64)
19
(66)
18.3
(64.9)
Record low °C (°F)
15
(59)
16
(61)
7
(45)
3
(37)
10
(50)
7
(45)
9
(48)
7
(45)
10
(50)
7
(45)
12
(54)
3
(37)
3
(37)
Precipitation cm (inches)
9
(3.5)
8
(3.1)
8
(3.1)
11
(4.3)
12
(4.7)
10
(3.9)
9
(3.5)
8
(3.1)
8
(3.1)
7
(2.8)
8
(3.1)
9
(3.5)
113
(44.5)
Source: Weatherbase [19]
Tags:Climate Of Chile,South Pacific High,Itcz, | |
| History | |
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The first known painting of Easter Island in 1775 by William Hodges
Rapa Nui National Park *
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Country
Chile
Type
Cultural
Criteria
i, iii, v
Reference
715
Region **
Latin America and the Caribbean
Inscription history
Inscription
1995 (19th Session)
* Name as inscribed on World Heritage List
** Region as classified by UNESCO
Main article: History of Easter Island
The history of Easter Island is rich and controversial. Its inhabitants have endured famines, epidemics, civil war, slave raids, colonialism, and near deforestation; its population declined precipitously more than once.
Ahu Tongariki near Rano Raraku, a 15–moai ahu excavated and restored in the 1990s
Estimated dates of initial settlement of Easter Island have ranged from 300 to 1200 CE, approximately coinciding with the arrival of the first settlers in Hawaii. Rectifications in radiocarbon dating have changed almost all of the previously-posited early settlement dates in Polynesia. Rapa Nui has more recently been considered to have been settled in the narrower range of 700 to 1100 CE. An ongoing study by archaeologists Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo suggests a still-later date: "Radiocarbon dates for the earliest stratigraphic layers at Anakena, Easter Island, and analysis of previous radiocarbon dates imply that the island was colonized late, about 1200 CE. Significant ecological impacts and major cultural investments in monumental architecture and statuary thus began soon after initial settlement."[20][21]
According to oral tradition, the first settlement was at Anakena. Jared Diamond notes that the Caleta Anakena landing point provides the best shelter from prevailing swells, as well as a sandy beach for canoe landings and launchings, so it seems likely to have been an early place of settlement.[22] However, this hypothesis contradicts radiocarbon dating, according to which other sites preceded Anakena by many years, especially the Tahai, whose radiocarbon dates precede Anakena's by several centuries.
The island was most likely populated by Polynesians who navigated in canoes or catamarans from the Gambier Islands (Mangareva, 2,600 km (1,600 mi) away) or the Marquesas Islands, 3,200 km (2,000 mi) away. When James Cook visited the island, one of his crew members, a Polynesian from Bora Bora, was able to communicate with the Rapa Nui. The language most similar to Rapa Nui is Mangarevan with an 80% similarity in vocabulary. In 1999, a voyage with reconstructed Polynesian boats was able to reach Easter Island from Mangareva in 19 days.[23]
According to oral traditions recorded by missionaries in the 1860s, the island originally had a strong class system, with an ariki, high chief, wielding great power over nine other clans and their respective chiefs. The high chief was the eldest descendent 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 statues called moai that represented deified ancestors. It was believed that the living had a symbiotic relationship with the dead where 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 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.
Diamond suggested that cannibalism took place on Easter Island after the construction of the Moai contributed to environmental degradation when extreme deforestation destabilized an already precarious ecosystem.[24] Archeological record shows that, by the time of the initial settlement, the island was home to many species of trees, including at least three species which grew up to 50 feet or more: Paschalococos - possibly the largest palm trees in the world at the time, Alphitonia zizyphoides, and Elaeocarpus rarotongensis, as well as at least six species of native land birds. Barbara A. West wrote, "Sometime before the arrival of Europeans on Easter Island, the Rapanui experienced a tremendous upheaval in their social system brought about by a change in their island's ecology... By the time of European arrival in 1722, the island's population had dropped to 2,000 – 3,000 from a high of approximately 15,000 just a century earlier." [25] By that time, 21 species of trees and all species of land birds went extinct through some combination of overharvesting/overhunting, rat predation, and climate change, the island was largely deforested, and it did not have any trees more than 10 feet tall. Loss of large trees meant that residents were no longer able to build seaworthy vessels, significantly diminishing their fishing abilities. This was further exacerbated by the loss of land birds and the collapse in seabird populations. By the 18th century, residents of the island were largely sustained by farming, with domestic chickens as the primary source of protein.[26]
As the island became overpopulated and resources diminished, warriors known as matatoa gained more power and the Ancestor Cult ended, making way for the Bird Man Cult. Beverly Haun wrote, "The concept of mana (power) invested in hereditary leaders was recast into the person of the birdman, apparently beginning circa 1540, and coinciding with the final vestiges of the moai period."[27] This cult maintained that, although the ancestors still provided for their descendants, the medium through which the living could contact the dead was no longer statues, but human beings chosen through a competition. The god responsible for creating humans, Makemake, played an important role in this process. Katherine Routledge, who systematically collected the island's traditions in her 1919 expedition,[28] showed that the competitions for Bird Man (Rapanui: tangata manu) started around 1760, after the arrival of the first Europeans, and ended in 1878, with the construction of the first church by Roman Catholic missionaries who formally arrived in 1864. Petroglyphs representing Bird Men on Easter Island are exactly the same as some in Hawaii, indicating that this concept was probably brought by the original settlers; only the competition itself was unique to Easter Island.
European accounts from 1722 and 1770 mention standing statues, but Cook's 1774 expedition noted that several moai were lying face down, having been toppled in war.
Motu Nui islet, part of the Birdman Cult ceremony
According to Diamond and Heyerdahl's version of the island's history, the huri mo'ai—"statue–toppling"—continued into the 1830s as a part of fierce internal wars. By 1838 the only standing moai were on the slopes of Rano Raraku, in Hoa Hakananai'a in Orongo, and Ariki Paro in Ahu Te Pito Kura. There is little archaeological evidence of pre–European societal collapse. Bone pathology and osteometric data from islanders of that period clearly suggest few fatalities can be attributed directly to violence.[29][citation needed]
The first–recorded European contact with the island was on April 5 (Easter Sunday), 1722, when Dutch navigator Jacob Roggeveen visited the island for a week and estimated a population of 2,000 to 3,000 inhabitants. The number may have been greater, since some may have been frightened into hiding by a misunderstanding that led Roggeveen's men to fire on the natives, killing more than a dozen and wounding several more. The next foreign visitors (on November 15, 1770) were two Spanish ships, San Lorenzo and Santa Rosalia. The Spanish reported the island as largely uncultivated, whose seashore was lined with stone statues. Four years later, in 1774, British explorer James Cook visited Easter Island; he reported that some statues had fallen over. The British ship HMS Blossom arrived in 1825 and reported seeing no standing statues. Easter Island was approached many times during the 19th century, but by then the islanders had become openly hostile to any attempt to land, and very little new information was reported before the 1860s.
A series of devastating events killed or removed most of the population in the 1860s. In December 1862, Peruvian slave raiders struck. Violent abductions continued for several months, eventually capturing around 1,500 men and women, half of the island's population.[30] Among those captured were the island's paramount chief, his heir, and those who knew how to read and write the rongorongo script, the only Polynesian script to have been found to date. When the slave raiders were forced to repatriate the people they had kidnapped, they disembarked carriers of smallpox together with a few survivors on each of the islands. This created devastating epidemics from Easter Island to the Marquesas islands. Easter Island's population was reduced to the point where some of the dead were not even buried. Tuberculosis, introduced by whalers in the mid–19th century, had already killed several islanders when the first Christian missionary, Eugène Eyraud, died from this disease in 1867. About a quarter of the island's population succumbed along with him. In the following years, the managers of the sheep ranch and the missionaries started buying the newly available lands of the deceased, and this led to great confrontations between natives and settlers.
"Queen Mother" Koreto with her daughters "Queen" Caroline and Harriette in 1877
Jean-Baptiste Dutrou-Bornier bought up all of the island apart from the missionaries' area around Hanga Roa and moved a couple of hundred Rapanui to Tahiti to work for his backers. In 1871 the missionaries, having fallen out with Dutrou–Bornier, evacuated all but 171 Rapanui to the Gambier islands.[31] Those who remained were mostly older men. Six years later, only 111 people lived on Easter Island, and only 36 of them had any offspring.[32] From that point on the island's population slowly recovered. But with over 97% of the population dead or gone in less than a decade, much of the island's cultural knowledge had been lost.
Alexander Salmon, Jr., a son of an English Jewish merchant and Pōmare dynasty princess, eventually worked to repatriate workers from his inherited copra plantation. He eventaully bought up all lands on the island with the exception of the mission, and was its sole employer. He worked to develop tourism on the island, and was the principal informant for the British and German archaeological expeditions for the island. He sent several pieces of genuine Rongorongo to his niece's husband, the German consul in Valparaíso, Chile. Salmon sold the Brander Easter Island holdings to the Chilean government in 1888 January 2 and signed as a witness to the cession of the island. He returned to Tahiti in December of that year. He effectively ruled the island from 1878 until his cession to Chile in 1888.
Easter Island was annexed by Chile on September 9, 1888, by Policarpo Toro, by means of the "Treaty of Annexation of the Island" (Tratado de Anexión de la isla). Toro, then representing the government of Chile signed with Atamu Tekena, designated "King" by the Chilean government after the paramount chief and his heir had died. The validity of this treaty is still contested by some Rapanui. Officially, Chile purchased the nearly all encompassing Mason-Brander sheep ranch, comprised from lands purchased from the descendants of Rapanui who died during the epidemics, and then claimed sovereignty over the island.
Until the 1960s the surviving Rapanui were confined to Hanga Roa. The rest of the island was rented to the Williamson-Balfour Company as a sheep farm until 1953.[33] The island was then managed by the Chilean Navy until 1966, at which point the island was reopened in its entirety. In 1966 the Rapanui were given Chilean citizenship.[34]
Tags:Orongo,Rapanui,Annexation,Annexed,World Heritage Site,Unesco,Archaeologists, | |
| 21st century | |
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On 30 July 2007, a constitutional reform gave Easter Island and the Juan Fernández Islands (also known as Robinson Crusoe Island) the status of "special territories" of Chile. Pending the enactment of a Tags: | |
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