The first European sailors, who landed at the beginning of the 18th century on Easter Island, were amazed by the view that opened up. On this tiny piece of land, located 3,600 kilometers off the coast of Chile, they saw hundreds of incredibly huge statues frozen on the island. The entire mountain range was completely re-cut, and the volcanic rocks were cut like oil. Tens of thousands of tons of massive rocks lay in places where no one could handle them.
Hundreds of giant figures of 10 and 20 meters in height, weighing up to 50 tons, with a challenge "look" today at everyone who enters here. They resemble robots that seem to be waiting to be put back into operation. Some people mistakenly believe that the gaze of the statues is directed towards the ocean, but this is not true. In fact, the giants "look" into the interior of the island.
Initially, hats were also assumed on the heads of these colossus, but they would hardly help explain the mysterious origin of the statues. The stone hat weighing 10 tons was found in a completely different place than the "body". - It is completely incomprehensible how the hat was placed on the owner's head.
Some of these giants were found to have wooden tablets inscribed with very unusual hieroglyphs. Today, in the museums of the world, there are no more than 10 pieces of such tablets, and on those that have survived, no inscriptions can be deciphered for a long time.
Thor Heyerdahl's exploration of the giants of Easter Island has provided visual insights into three distinct cultural periods, the oldest of which turns out to be the most remarkable. The remains of charcoal discovered by Heyerdahl were dated by the scientist to 400 AD. Nothing, however, indicated whether the fireplaces and the found remains had anything to do with the stone giants.
On the rocks and edges of the craters, Heyerdahl found hundreds of unfinished statues and thousands of stone tools: the simplest stone axes and cleavers. The instrument lay as if the work had been interrupted for some terrible reason.
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Easter Island is located at a considerable distance from continents and civilizations. The islanders believe in the moon and stars far more than any other country in the world. No trees grow on the island, a small speck of volcanic rock. The most popular explanation is that the stone giants were delivered on wooden "rollers", although this is completely hard to believe.
Today, Easter Island is home to several hundred natives. Shipping, thanks to which the stonecutters would deliver food and clothing, in those ancient times was hardly imaginable at all. So, who did carve the statues out of the rocks, who processed them and delivered them to the place? How were the giant sculptures transported over rocks and crevasses? How were the statues processed, polished and erected? And the hats were brought from another quarry, not from the one where the material was obtained to create the figures of giants.
If fantasy is still somehow capable of imagining the work of an army of people on the territory of Ancient Egypt in full accordance with the "took and carried" method, then on Easter Island there is simply no place for fantasy to roam, the territory is small.
2,000 people would never be enough - even if they worked day and night long - to create statues of colossi using the most primitive tools from high-strength volcanic rocks. Because part of the population, whatever one may say, had to engage in modest agriculture and the same modest fishing, and a couple of dozen people had to spin fabric and twine ropes.
No, 2000 people with such statues of giants clearly would not have coped. And a larger population on the small Easter Island is simply unthinkable. So someone else was doing this job? Why are statues surrounding the island on its outer border, and not inside? What cult were they for?
Easter Island, the land of the bird people
Unfortunately, in this small piece of land, the first Western missionaries also made their contribution to making the darkness of times even darker: they burned tablets with hieroglyphic inscriptions, banned the ancient cults of the gods and destroyed the legends about them. But no matter how thoroughly and zealously the "gentlemen" got down to business, they could not prevent the natives from calling their island "The Land of Bird People" to this day.
Orally transmitted legends testify that in ancient-pre-ancient times winged people landed on the island and lit a fire. The legend found its confirmation in the sculpture of a winged creature with huge, motionless eyes.
The idea of the relationship between Easter Island and Tiahuanaco comes to mind. There, just like here, we see stone giants belonging to the same artistic style. Arrogant faces with a stoic expression are just perfect for the powerful figures of both monuments.
When Francisco Pizarro in 1532 asked the Incas about Tiahuanaco, they told him that none of the people living on Earth had seen this city other than in ruins, because Tiahuanaco was built in the "night of mankind." In legends, Easter Island is called "the navel of the Universe." The distance from Tiahuanaco to Easter Island is over 5,000 kilometers. In what unknown way could the culture of one world be an example of cultural specimens in another part of the world?
Giant Tiahuanaco.
Perhaps, here we can be helped by the Pre-Incan mythology: in it, the old-old God-Creator Viracocha was called the most ancient and most primordial deity. According to legends, Viracocha created the world when it was in darkness and there was no sun. The Creator hewed out of the stone a kind of giants, and when he "ceased to like" and tired of them, he threw them into a giant river. Then he commanded that the Sun and the Moon rise over Lake Titicaca, thus obtaining light for the Earth.
In his next step, he molded clay figurines of a man and a beast in Tiahuanaco and breathed life into them. After that, he taught the living creatures he created in language, traditions and arts, so that eventually some of his creations on wings would move to different continents. To carry out such a responsible work, the god Viracocha with his two assistants set off on a detour to many lands and countries. God personally decided to check how his instructions are being carried out and to what results their implementation leads.
In the clothes of an old man, Viracocha crossed the Andes and wandered along the coast, sometimes meeting a very inhospitable welcome. Once in Kakha, such a meeting annoyed him so much that, filled with rage, he set fire to the mountain, and it began to burn the whole earth. But when the ungrateful people "realized their guilt" and prayed for forgiveness, Viracocha instantly extinguished the flame. Then the Creator went further, distributing valuable instructions and advice, and many temples were erected in his honor. In the coastal province of Manta, he finally decided to say goodbye to everyone and, jumping on the wave, disappeared into the ocean, having previously promised to return.