Ahu Tongariki is the largest ahu on Rapa Nui/Easter Island

Easter Island

Easter Island is a Polynesian island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian triangle. A special territory of Chile that was annexed in 1888, Easter Island is famous for its 887 extant monumental statues, called moai, created by the early Rapanui people...

 (a Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

an island in the Pacific). Its moai

Moai

Moai , or mo‘ai, are monolithic human figures carved from rock on the Chilean Polynesian island of Easter Island between the years 1250 and 1500. Nearly half are still at Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry, but hundreds were transported from there and set on stone platforms called ahu around the...

 were toppled during the island's civil wars and in the twentieth century the ahu was swept inland by a tsunami

Tsunami

A tsunami is a series of water waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, typically an ocean or a large lake...

. It has since been restored and has fifteen moai

Moai

Moai , or mo‘ai, are monolithic human figures carved from rock on the Chilean Polynesian island of Easter Island between the years 1250 and 1500. Nearly half are still at Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry, but hundreds were transported from there and set on stone platforms called ahu around the...

 including an 86 tonne moai that was the heaviest ever erected on the island. Ahu Tongariki is kilometer from Rano Raraku

Rano Raraku

Rano Raraku is a volcanic crater formed of consolidated volcanic ash, or tuff, and located on the lower slopes of Terevaka in the Rapa Nui National Park on Easter Island. It was a quarry for about 500 years until the early eighteenth century, and supplied the stone from which about 95% of the...

 and Poike

Poike

Poike is one of three main extinct volcanoes that form Rapa Nui . At 370 metres, it is the island's second highest peak after Terevaka.right|275 px|thumb|[[Ahu Tongariki]] with Poike in the background...

 in the Rapa Nui National Park

Rapa Nui National Park

Rapa Nui National Park is a World Heritage Site located on Easter Island, Chile. The park is divided into seven sections:*Rano Kau *Puna Pau ....

. All the moai here face sunset during Summer Solstice.

History

Ahu Tongariki was the main centre and capital of the Hotu Iti, the eastern confederation of the Rapanui

Rapanui

The Rapa Nui or Rapanui are the native Polynesian inhabitants of Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, in the Pacific Ocean. The easternmost Polynesian culture, the Rapa Nui people make up 60% of Easter Island's population, with some living also in mainland Chile...

.

Its moai

Moai

Moai , or mo‘ai, are monolithic human figures carved from rock on the Chilean Polynesian island of Easter Island between the years 1250 and 1500. Nearly half are still at Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry, but hundreds were transported from there and set on stone platforms called ahu around the...

 were toppled during the island's civil wars. In 1960, a tsunami

Tsunami

A tsunami is a series of water waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, typically an ocean or a large lake...

 caused by an earthquake off the coast of Chile swept Ahu Tongariki inland.

Ahu Tongariki was substantially restored in the 1990s by a multidisciplinary team headed by archaeologists Claudio Cristino (Director) and Patricia Vargas (Co-director executive team), in a five year project carried out under an official agreement of the Chilean Government with Tadano Limited

Tadano Limited

is the largest Japan-based manufacturer of cranes and aerial work platforms.-History:Founder of Tadano Ltd. Masuo Tadano started as a steel fabricator in 1919 at Fujitsuka-cho, Takamatsu, Japan. In 1948, he founded Tadano Ltd...

 and the University of Chile.

Location

This ahu is on the south coast of Rapa Nui, close to two previous volcanoes, Rano Raraku

Rano Raraku

Rano Raraku is a volcanic crater formed of consolidated volcanic ash, or tuff, and located on the lower slopes of Terevaka in the Rapa Nui National Park on Easter Island. It was a quarry for about 500 years until the early eighteenth century, and supplied the stone from which about 95% of the...

 and Poike

Poike

Poike is one of three main extinct volcanoes that form Rapa Nui . At 370 metres, it is the island's second highest peak after Terevaka.right|275 px|thumb|[[Ahu Tongariki]] with Poike in the background...

.

Poike is one of the three main extinct volcanoes that form Rapa Nui, which last reupted between 230,000 and 705,000 years ago. Rano Raraku is a volcanic crater formed of consolidated volcanic ash

Volcanic ash

Volcanic ash consists of small tephra, which are bits of pulverized rock and glass created by volcanic eruptions, less than in diameter. There are three mechanisms of volcanic ash formation: gas release under decompression causing magmatic eruptions; thermal contraction from chilling on contact...

 or tuff

Tuff

Tuff is a type of rock consisting of consolidated volcanic ash ejected from vents during a volcanic eruption. Tuff is sometimes called tufa, particularly when used as construction material, although tufa also refers to a quite different rock. Rock that contains greater than 50% tuff is considered...

, which compose the carved moai. Indeed, nearly half (hundreds) of the moai are still buried in the slopes of the Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry. The large, flat plain below Rano Raraku

Rano Raraku

Rano Raraku is a volcanic crater formed of consolidated volcanic ash, or tuff, and located on the lower slopes of Terevaka in the Rapa Nui National Park on Easter Island. It was a quarry for about 500 years until the early eighteenth century, and supplied the stone from which about 95% of the...

provided easy access to the tuff.

External links

• Ahu Tongariki Restoration project
• Unofficial Easter Island Homepage
• Easter Island Statue project
• How to make Walking Moai: a hypothesis about how Moai were transported
• Czech who made Moai statues walk returns to Easter Island
• History of Easter Island stones
• Easter Island - Moai Statue Scale
• University of Chile