What happened to the natives of Easter Island? This piece of land, lost in the Pacific Ocean, is rich in scientific mysteries that are intriguing even for the general public - one can recall at least giant stone statues and the possibility of aboriginal contact with the civilizations of pre-Columbian America. The history of the island formed the basis for the concept of "ecocide": it is believed that after the settlement of Rapa Nui, its inhabitants systematically cut down forests and destroyed the fragile ecosystem of the island. As a result, agriculture collapsed, famine led to internecine wars and cannibalism, and the Rapanui practically exterminated themselves even before the arrival of the Europeans in 1722. However, recent research by scientists is destroying this beautiful ecological suicide hypothesis. The true reasons for the collapse of the Rapanui civilization.
Stupid natives
Easter Island (Rapa Nui) is a unique territory in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, one of the most remote inhabited islands in the world (it is located 3514 kilometers from the coast of the nearest mainland). The island's soil (scientists are sure of its volcanic origin) was formed as a result of erosion of the slopes of volcanoes. The most fertile is in the north of the island, where the locals grow sweet potatoes and yams. The main source of fresh water is a lake in a crater, there are no rivers. The flora of the island is very poor (no more than 30 plant species).
The first Europeans on the island were struck by the absence of trees. Without thinking twice, they decided that the forests had disappeared, and, in the words of the traveler Jean-François de La Perouse, "the impudence of their ancestors" is to blame for this. Already in the twentieth century, when scientists examined fossil pollen, it became clear that Easter Island was once covered with vast forests. It was logical to assume that as the population grew - as happened in Europe - forests were cut down to sow the land with agricultural crops, and the wood went to fuel and building materials for houses and canoes. Soil erosion has led to a drop in yields. Further, already according to the oral legends of the Rapanui people, historians learned about the catastrophic population decline, the struggle for scarce resources, slavery and cannibalism. It is believedthat in just a couple of centuries the population of the island decreased from 15 thousand to 2-3 thousand - without any external influence.
Characteristic landscape of Easter Island.
Photo: Bill Bachmann / DanitaDelimont / Globallookpress.com
Promotional video:
This story, in its own way unique for world history, is used to prove various ideas - for example, the Malthusian trap (a situation typical for human communities when population growth outstrips food production growth). Already in the 21st century, popularizing historian Jared Diamond cites the fate of the Rapanui people as an example of "ecocide" - the suicide of society due to the destruction of the natural habitat (perhaps because all resources were thrown into the construction of giant moai statues). “In just a couple of centuries, the inhabitants of Easter Island have destroyed their forests, brought plants and animals to extinction, and their complex society has reached a state of chaos and cannibalism. Will we not follow in their footsteps?.. We ask the question: “Why couldn't they look around, understand what was happening, and stop? What were they thinking when they chopped down the last palm tree? "The fate of the islanders Diamond gives as a lesson to modern mankind, which, he says, is threatened by the same fate. Even Margaret Thatcher, speaking at the UN in 1989, warned that our civilization could follow the Rapanui path.
Malignant rats
Recently, however, this beautiful historical theory has been slowly crumbling, mainly by the works of American archaeologists Terry L. Hunt and Carl P. Lipo. Back in 2006, in the pages of Science magazine, they challenged the traditional dating of the settlement of the island (400-800 AD). Why do the first traces of wood burning (indicating the presence of a person) only point to the 1250s (according to radiocarbon analysis)? It turns out that for 400 years some mysterious, invisible and cautious natives lived on the island, who then (suddenly) began to chop down and burn trees? Charcoal, the bones of rats, as well as fish and birds eaten by people appear in the soil of Anakena Bay only in the 13th century - and evidence of an earlier presence of humans when reanalysed was unreliable.
The fact of deforestation - the disappearance of millions of Paschalococos disperta palms from the island's territory in the XIII-XVII centuries - is not disputed by modern scientists. Another thing is that people could not be to blame. Taking the materials on the Hawaiian Islands for comparison, Hunt and Lipo saw that rats destroy tree populations much faster and more thoroughly.
Pacific rats (Rattus exulans) arrived in Polynesian canoes on previously uninhabited islands. They almost never encountered predators and competitors. They deftly climb trees and, unlike local birds, easily gnaw the seed bolls of palms (even coconut trees!), Which practically deprives the plants of the opportunity to reproduce: due to a lack of seeds, young trees no longer replace old ones. Finally, rats are able to reproduce at a tremendous rate, increasing their population to hundreds of thousands in just a few years. In Hawaii, rodents planted Prichardia palms by the root, and Paschalococos disperta on Easter Island. This, in particular, is evidenced by cracked and gnawed nuts excavated by archaeologists.
Pacific rat.
Photo: Cliff / Wikipedia
Yes, rats have destroyed the forest in 400-500 years, and the change in the landscape has led to soil erosion, droughts and other troubles. But there is no evidence of a sharp decline in the population during this period! The figure of 15-30 thousand, emphasize Hunt and Lipo, was taken from the ceiling - archaeological data do not confirm this. Indirect evidence (the number of inhabited places) speaks of the stability of the population until the second half of the 18th century, when Europeans landed on the island.
That is, the Rapanui people are not ecological suicides, but an example of sustainable development. Despite the destruction brought on by the rats, in conditions of a shortage of all possible resources, they managed to live on Easter Island for several centuries - and not just live, but build a complexly organized society and create unique sculptural monuments. They fell victim not to "ecocide", but the most common genocide. Like the natives of America, they were killed by germs and European firearms, scientists say.
Peace-loving Rapa Nui - geniuses of survival
In his latest study, just presented in the journal Antiquity, Lipo struck another piece of evidence of the collapse of Rapanui society. Morphometric analysis of the mataa, which were considered spearheads (and indicated the extreme belligerence of the islanders), showed that they were unlikely to be used as murder weapons.
The abundance of mataa, the fact that they were made from sharpened obsidian (hard volcanic glass), their external resemblance to spearheads - all this led historians to think about weapons. Lipo and his colleagues analyzed the shape of 400 of these artifacts and concluded that they were completely unsuitable for attack and murder.
“If you look at European or ancient weapons, they are always characterized by a sharpened form. Who needs a weapon that cannot kill? … With the help of mataa, you can cut someone, but not kill in any way,”says Lipo.
Mataa.
Image: Carl Lipo, Binghamton University
Despite the pointed edges, mataa are no more dangerous to humans than ordinary stones. As for their abundance, this can be explained by their multifunctionality - mataa was used to cultivate soil and plants, for ritual scarring and tattoos.
Archaeologists also remind that there are no traces of fatal blows on the ancient skeletons found on the island. Rapa Nui also lacks the powerful defensive structures typical of other islands in the Pacific Ocean, whose inhabitants often fought. Historians took information about fratricidal conflicts from local legends (recorded already in the 20th century), the reliability of which is far from obvious.
Lipo summed up the results of many years of work to debunk the myth of the aborigines who destroyed themselves out of stupidity. “We looked at some of the collapse arguments and tried to show that there is no ground beneath them. When we look at the rocky fields of the island, we do not see success, we see disaster - but in fact, these are signs of success. People perfectly existed in such harsh conditions before meeting the Europeans,”the scientist said.
Now it's up to the opponents of Hunt and Lipo. The glove is thrown - and supporters of the theory of "ecocide" will need to find new arguments in its favor, relying not on the impressions of European sailors and the records of myths, but on reliable archaeological facts.
Artem Kosmarsky