Easter Island: awe in the ocean

NATURAL WONDERS


We asked many times as did the Egyptians to build such large pyramids with a few Chinese sinless perfection or worked in more than 8,000 km. wall that extends across the width of your country. This time, we were amazed of the legacy left by an ancient population in a small, isolated island of the Pacific Ocean: Easter Island and its sympathetic and enigmatic moai.Easter Island is a Chilean island located in Polynesia, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. It has an area of ​​163.6 km ², making it the largest island of the insular Chile, and a population of 5,034 inhabitants, mainly concentrated in Hanga Roa, existing capital and only town on the island.
The island is one of the main tourist destinations because of its natural beauty and its mysterious ancient culture of ethnic Rapanui, whose most notable trace corresponds to huge statues known as moai. To preserve these characteristics, the government Conaf administered through the Rapa Nui National Park, while UNESCO declared the park as a World Heritage Site in 1995.5
According to oral tradition, the Rapa Nui people have come to this island from a mythical island called Hiva, being led by Hotu Matua, the first ariki, or king, by the fourth century. According to archaeological research, the origin of this ethnic group come from Polynesia, possibly from the Marquesas Islands. Recent theories postulate that Rapa Iti would be the legendary Hiva which allegedly came from the ancestors of the Easter Island natives as Rapa Nui mythology. In the coastal centers established religious, political and ceremonial (as in Anakena and Akahanga) and worshiped almost deified ancestors represented by the moai. Still do not know how this was done construction and displacement from these sculptures, of which there are about a thousand.
In 1887, Chile wishes to annex the island to the Chilean territory, for which commissions the captain of the Chilean Navy Policarpo Toro, who conducted negotiations through the purchase of land on the island at the request of the Bishop of Valparaíso, owner of 600 acres , together with the brothers Salmon, Dutrou-Bornier and John Brander, of Tahiti, that even though, according to tradition, the land could not be sold.
Then, on September 9, 1888, Chile was able to sign a treaty, represented by Atamu Tekena. Document was drafted in Spanish and one in Rapanui mixed with Tahitian. The Spanish text speaks of transfer of sovereignty to Chile, while reserving to the chiefs who attended the agreement, the titles of which were invested and they enjoyed at the time, without referring to the land.