Rapa Nui culture

Moai and ahu

A moai represents an important ancestor of a lineage. It stood on an ahu, the clan's ceremonial platform, facing the village to protect it with its mana.

Many ahu are also burial places. For the community they are sacred spaces, not ruins: that is why they are never touched or stepped on.

Hotu Matu'a and the settlement

Oral tradition tells that the first ariki (king), Hotu Matu'a, sailed from Hiva, an ancestral land in Polynesia, and landed on Anakena beach.

Archaeology, linguistics and genetics confirm the Polynesian origin of the Rapa Nui people. The exact date of settlement is still debated.

Tangata Manu

After the era of the moai, the cult of the creator god Make Make and of the Tangata Manu, the birdman, gained strength. Each spring, one competitor per clan climbed down the Rano Kau cliff, swam to the islet of Motu Nui and waited for the first egg of the manutara.

Whoever returned first with the egg intact made his chief Tangata Manu for a year. The ritual was centred on the village of Orongo and lasted until the 19th century.

Rongorongo

Rongorongo is a system of signs carved on wooden tablets that has still not been deciphered. Around two dozen pieces survive, all of them off the island.

Many of those who could read it died in the 19th century, during the slave raids and epidemics, and with them the transmission was broken.

Living culture

Rapa Nui is not an open-air museum: it is the territory of a people with its own language, ceremonies and organisation. Since 2018 the community itself has run the National Park.

• Language. Rapa Nui is a Polynesian language that is actively taught and revitalised.
• Tapati Rapa Nui. Every February, two weeks of cultural and sporting competitions between families.
• Crafts. Wood and stone carving, still in the hands of local masters.
• Food. The umu, an underground oven with hot stones, is still part of celebrations.

Glossary