Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0114/01141.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 13KB | 223 lines

$Unique_ID{COW01141}
$Pretitle{294C}
$Title{Easter Island
Chapter 1.    General Information}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Melinda W. Cooke}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{island
easter
chilean
islanders
chile
government
first
local
population
small}
$Date{1984}
$Log{Map of Easter Island*0114101.scf
Flag of Easter Island*0114102.scf
}
Country:     Easter Island
Book:        Oceania, an Area Study: Easter Island
Author:      Melinda W. Cooke
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1984


[See Map of Easter Island]

[See Flag of Easter Island]

Chapter 1.    General Information

Official Name        Easter Island
                       (Isla de Pascua)
Previous Names       Rapa Nui; Pito-O-Te
                       Henua
                       (The Navel of the
                       World)
Political Status     Province of Chile
Capital              Hanga Roa
Population           1,867 (1981
                       year-end estimated)
Land Area            180 square
                       kilometers
Currency             Chilean
                       peso (Ch$)

     One of the most isolated islands in Oceania, Easter Island lies almost
2,000 kilometers from the Pitcairn Islands, its nearest Polynesian neighbor,
and nearly 4,200 kilometers from Chile. It is triangular in shape and contains
three extinct volcanoes and several parasitic cones, all joined by a lava
plain. The largest of the volcanoes, Mount Terevaka, rises 507 meters above
sea level. Lava flows have created numerous underground caves and sprinkled
the island's rather thin soil with volcanic stones. Fresh-water lakes in three
of the volcanic craters provide the only surface water. Droughts have occurred
on occasion, rainfall in the semitropical climate averaging about 1,250
millimeters annually but subject to great variation.

     The island has no protected harbors or coral reefs, and its shores are
precipitous in many areas. Weather permitting, most landings are made at one
of four small, sandy beaches. A very small island off the southwestern tip,
Motu Nui, was the scene of a "bird-man" ceremony recorded in the
mid-nineteenth century. At that time servants of leading islanders would swim
out to Motu Nui to await the arrival of a migratory bird, the sooty tern. The
master of the first to find an egg would then be placed in seclusion for
several months, presumably as the representative of the god Makemake.

     Easter Island once supported large stands of forest, but these had been
badly depleted by the time the Europeans first arrived in the eighteenth
century; by the turn of the twentieth century, the island was grass covered
and virtually treeless. There has been some effort to replant trees in recent
years, particularly eucalyptus, pine, and fruit trees.

     The prehistoric society of Easter Island had been completely destroyed by
the time detailed records were first made in the mid-1800s. The unreliability
of what evidence is available and its incomplete, confusing, and sometimes
contradictory nature have given rise to wide-ranging speculation over the
island's prehistory, some of the most extreme theories centering on mythical
sunken continents or extraterrestrial astronauts. The great body of
responsible scholarship appears to indicate, however, that the island could
have been peopled as early as A.D. 400 by Polynesian migrants who were then
almost completely isolated from outside contact until the coming of the
Europeans. The original settlers are believed to have increased their numbers
to as many as 10,000, for several years building impressive statues and
monuments until internal conflict and serious environmental degradation
associated with the decimation of the original forest forced a decline in both
population and culture.

     One other school of thought, chiefly represented by Norwegian
anthropologist Thor Heyerdahl, posits a major influence of South American
migrants on prehistoric Easter Island culture. Although skeletal evidence and
most artifacts are clearly Polynesian, there is insufficient evidence to
refute this theory altogether or to exclude the possibility of some contact
with South America. New World plants, including the Andean sweet potato, among
others, were found on Easter Island and could have been introduced either by
migrants or by natural methods. A minority of artifacts not of clear
Polynesian type and sharing similarities to South American artifacts can also
be explained either as products of spontaneous development during long
isolation or as evidence of direct South American influence.

     Whatever their origin, Easter Islanders left behind an impressive
collection of artifacts for which the island has become famous. These include
some 600 carved stone statues, a few over 20 meters high, but most between six
and nine meters high. Of these, approximately 150 are still unfinished in
their quarry. These statues were originally mounted on stone platforms called
ahu, of which the remains of about 300 are still to be found. The
archaeological record also includes numerous stone petroglyphs as well as the
remains of stone-walled houses, some boat-shaped in form, which are grouped in
large clustered settlements. The significance of the statues and the ahu
remains uncertain, but there are some indications that they are stylized
portraits of important ancestors or chiefs.

     One final subject of mystery is presented by several inscribed wooden
boards that were kept in some houses. These were first noted in 1864, at which
time no islander could read the script in which they were written. Known as
rongorongo, that script consists of about 120 elements, many based on human or
bird-man symbols. Some elements have also been found in petroglyphs or in
signatures by island representatives to a treaty with Spain in 1770. As of the
early 1980s rongorongo had not been satisfactorily translated. Theories
explaining the inscribed boards posit variously that they are unique
prehistoric examples of a written Polynesian language, were used as
pictographs or mnemonic devices, or were essentially ornamental. It has also
been suggested that the script was developed in emulation of European writing
after the arrival of the Spanish.

     By the time the island was first discovered by Europeans, on Easter Day
in April 1722 by Admiral Roggeveen, a major cultural decline was already under
way, and the population stood at an estimated 3,000. Observers from later
French, Spanish, British, and other expeditions noted evidence of an
egalitarian society, dominated by warring groups that competed for scarce
resources. By 1774 all statues had been toppled, presumably during internal
upheavals. These visitors rarely stopped for long or had any grasp of the
local language, however, and their observations are lacking in detail and are
of questionable reliability.

     The first close-and for the islanders, disastrous-contact with the
Western world came during 1862-63, when about 1,000 islanders were captured
and taken to Peru as slaves. Protests by missionaries and others soon forced
their repatriation, but by that time most had died. The 15 who actually
survived to return in 1863 carried smallpox and tuberculosis, which then
ravaged the remaining population.

     During these times of trouble Roman Catholic missionaries settled on the
island, by 1868 baptizing the remaining islanders. That same year a French
adventurer arrived on the island and began buying up land to establish a sheep
ranch. Conflict over the ranch led some islanders and the missionaries to
leave Easter Island for Mangareva Island in French Polynesia. Other islanders
went to work in Tahiti. By the time the adventurer was killed in 1877, the
population stood at 115. Of these, 15 couples, as well as a few outsiders who
arrived later, were to be the ancestors of modern-day Easter Islanders.

     After Easter Island was annexed in 1888 by Chile, life on the island was
very quiet. The sheep ranch was taken over by a Chilean firm