Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, never experienced a ruinous population collapse, according to an analysis of ancient DNA from 15 former inhabitants of the remote island in the Pacific Ocean.

The new research “challenges commonly accepted ideas about the development” of ancient cultures. Groundbreaking research undertaken by Uppsala University and published in the journal Antiquity (via ...

Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island (a name given to it by Europeans), is located in the southeast Pacific and is famous for its approximately 1,000 carvings of moai, human-faced statues. The island ...

Gear-obsessed editors choose every product we review. We may earn commission if you buy from a link. Why Trust Us? For decades, archeologists have debated whether the writing system of Rapa Nui ...

Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, is often portrayed in popular culture as an enigma. The rationale is clear: The tiny, remote island in the Pacific features nearly 1,000 enormous statues—the ...

Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story: A new study suggests that the island of Rapa Nui, otherwise known as Easter Island, didn’t develop in the extreme manner of isolation that we thought ...

The "walking moai hypothesis" could end a long-time debate over how ancient engineers moved these iconic statues around Easter Island. Reading time 3 minutes The moai statues of Easter Island have ...

Picture a place 2,000 miles off Chile’s coast, only 14 miles long. Yet, it’s home to about 1,000 giant moai statues. Some are ...

A high-resolution three-dimensional scan of the main quarry complex of Rapa Nui reveals at least thirty independent work zones, dismantling the theory of a centralized production of the colossal ...

The Pacific island of Rapa Nui — also called Easter Island by the Europeans that arrived there on a Sunday in 1722 — is arguably most famous for its iconic human-like volcanic rock statues called moai ...

When Polynesian explorers landed on Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, around 1200 C.E., they found nearly 20 million palm trees; by the time Dutch explorers arrived in 1722, they found only ...