https:/.../2020-07-06_arh303_moai-easter-island.mp4

Okay.

So, we are now going to turn
to our first key image and --

or images -- and these
are the Moai.

And they are these large --
and I mean large -- some of them are,

you can see here, 36 feet high.

I think the tallest one is
one that's 70 feet high.

They are all different in sizes,
but these massive figures

that are on the Easter Island,
also known as Rapa Nui,

and they're a little early for
our class, you know.

I see here your book is very broad
minded and says 1000?-1500

you know,
they're probably around 1200.

But, you know, how can you have these in
your textbook and not talk about them.

They're just - they're just so amazing.

So, they are volcanic stone
from the island.

This is a -- the islands in all of this
area are either -- for the most part --

either volcanic or they're coral.

Unless you've got a giant place --
continent like Australia,

but for the most part they are either
coral islands or they're volcanic islands.

Volcanic islands tend to be much richer in
growing things because volcanic soil

when the volcanic material breaks down,
it enriches the soil

and it's usually better for crops.

We're going to see there's a
little twist here with this.

And the other reason I just had to show
you these guys is

not only because they're famous
but they're the only artwork, I think,

we're going to talk about that has
its own emoji.

So -- And I don't know when and why at
what point they decided to include

the Easter Island but, you know,
if there's its own emoji

we certainly have to talk about it
so there it is.

Here, this is a tourist photo that I found
on the internet and you can see that

these have been -- some of these
have been re set-up.

And if you notice, for instance,
these are Moai figures,

that's just the name of the figures.

Again, probably some sort of ancestral
figure, but they -- an Ahu is a platform.

And this is the platform at Nau Nau,
which is the name of the site.

So, here you can see this platform may
have been a little refurbished.

You know, this is one of the problems
sometimes with sites

is that they get a little refurbished.

But you can see -- and usually these
are placed in some sort of row

facing out to the ocean.

And you can kind of go all the way
around the island and see these platforms

and see these figures facing outward.

Again, this has been a little fudged,
but that is, presumably,

approximately, what it would've
looked like.

Now, Easter Island is something that is
fascinating in so many ways because

I mean not only are they these absolutely
stupendous, much memed objects here,

but it also is a tremendous
warning sign to all of us.

And if you've ever read "Collapse"
by Jared Diamond, I know my son

had to read it in high school or college
and I can't remember which,

but it's about societies that collapse
and what are some of the features

that cause this. In my former life,
many years ago, I was a geologist

so I'm really interested in this interaction
between some of the sort of

geological and geographic features
and manmade features.

And this is a artist depiction of,
perhaps, what the island looked like

before these people, you know, in
their boats, came all the way across

from other parts of Polynesia
to Easter Island

and saw all these trees
and all these volcanoes.

And then when you go there today
there's essentially no trees.

It is - it is- it is treeless.

They had -- almost all
the palm trees got cut down.

And so, one of the things that a lot of
people talk about and there's a certain --

the popular version is the Jared Diamond,
it's a good easy read,

is that people move-in and they use
the palm trees for all sorts of things.

I mean you use it for fuel, for cooking
things, you use it for, you know,

harvesting the fruit from it, you use it
-- people have even suggested

that they cut down a lot of the trees when
they would quarry these

giant volcanic statues, they would then
use the trees to roll them down the hill

because these things are massive and it
would take a large number of people.

And there are little settlements
all over the island.

Everybody had their own
collection of these statues.

There's also some interest in the
possibility that -- or there is also

some evidence that suggests that on one
of these boats that came over

they brought some rats with them, okay.

And that the rats, in fact, also gnawed at
the palm trees and contributed to this.

So, it was just -- it's just sort of one
event after another collapsing in

and the culture
collapsing in on itself.

Because what happens is, of course,
you know, the European explorers come in

and then they kill off all the natives
with smallpox or something else

and in this instance it's an
interesting sort of counter example

because it appears that
the local indigenous people --

or semi-indigenous people, right,
we know they came from somewhere else --

were, in fact, well along their way of
killing themselves off

and then the Europeans coming was just
the final fluorish

and the population of the island dwindled
I think to a couple hundred at some point.

And then tourism, basically,
has --

an archaeological interest in
these things has brought people back.

But it's fascinating to see that sort of
interaction, you know,

it's like trying to figure out
why Rome fell.

Well, you know, there's
not just one reason.

There's this and there's that and there's
climate things and there's trade issues

and there's governmental issues.

It's all these things that go into a
society collapse this way.

So, trees, no trees.

You're -- many times many places have,
you know, felled forests

and this is almost always a bad thing.

Brazil (laughing) doing that now.

And that is a bad thing.

You know, we do need
these forests.

What I show you on the right is an image
basically of the terrain is treeless.

It's tropical so, you know,
it's lush but it's treeless.

What this is is one of the many
volcanoes that was the quarries.

And the quarries, of course,
had been abandoned.

Nobody is carving new ones.

And they have been turned into these
sort of lagoons or you know --

bogs here in the middle.

Here's a map of the island, and up here --
let's see, up here in the north,

is somewhere, is our --
okay now there we go,

that was the one I was
just showing you.

And you can see here, an Ahu
(a ceremonial platform)

and that was the one I was
just showing you.

But you can see that they're
all the way around,

and as I said, most of them appear
to have been to sort of,

show people because it's hard
to get around the terrain, right,

especially when there were trees,
it was jungle-y and forested and chilly

because of the volcanos, you can see
all the different volcanos here,

and so they would have paddled their boats
around and,

"Look ooh look at their statues,
look at their statues."

And so every little family -- extended
family group would have

their own giant statue so,
it's pretty amazing in many ways.

So, just a (inaudible) of topography here,
and then as I said this is --

I believe it was --

here, this is one of the most --
this is the most important quarry,

right here, that's where that sort of
pond is, in the middle of that.

Here's just one of the others,
it's another Ahu, in fact,

you can see there are several here,
the platforms,

and again, these have almost certainly
been refurbished to some degree,

somebody's probably come in
and put these back up,

this is another, you know, we talked about
this in terms of the Inca,

and many of these early cultures were
very good at carving large blocks

and making these really strong platforms,
or strong walls from these.

We sometimes call them Cyclopean walls
because they're --

it's like a cyclops --
like a giant cyclops carved them,

and so you can see they're forming
the base of these

and then they are looking out
at the scene.

They also apparently wore -- had these
topknots of hair, okay,

they looked kind of like hats, but they
were supposed to be topknots of hair

and this is made from a different
volcanic material,

scoria, that is also from the island
and these were just sort of

sitting down by the side, there were
more of them up, at one point,

they would have had these.

And then they also would have had
eyes in them.

And, I'm gonna suggest to you that
this carving with the eyes

and everything is, you know, the scale
of these things we may think

"This is absolutely incredible,"
but it is not at all unlike, you know,

going out into the America west
and seeing, you know,

an ensemble of four giant heads
of presidents.

But here's the -- this is I think
the one and only example

that still has some of the --
presumably paint,

in through here
with the eyes.

Here you can see just an example of
these things, and you know,

either these have been -- were never
fully brought down to the beach,

some of these are just still
sitting around by the quarries,

or some of them that just have been,
you know, removed and repurposed.

There have been times in which the people
even in the island,

have felt sort of cursed by these
and have retaliated against these,

and so that's something about
something that's a Spirit God,

is that people will sometimes have
an adverse reaction to these things.

But it's certainly is the one reason now
why there is much of an economy on

this island, is from tourism,
from people coming in to see these.

This started almost immediately, people
were fascinated with these as --

people, Westerners, were fascinated
with these almost immediately.

This is a very typical 19th century
rendition,

this is done by an artist who was with
Captain Cook on one of his voyages

throughout this area, and so he
creates these scenes.

And he doesn't quite get
the proportions right,

and the color right, but he --
you can see that this would have been

extraordinarily exotic and interesting
to people at the time.

Although there's a wonderful little
memento mori down here,

not quite to scale, of a skull,
you know, sort of showing,

"Oh, time passed,
and a culture from the past."

So there's this sort of romantic view
of these as showing

this great civilization,
and times passed.

In fact, it may not have been that
sophisticated of a civilization,

it may, in fact, have been an awful lot --
and perhaps too much time

was put into creating these
large structures,

to the point where they basically
deforested their entire island.

So in our next segment, we're going
to turn to another object

that also is related to these sort of
ancestral figures,

and that is a Maori Meeting House
in New Zealand.