Facts about Easter Island

Easter Island has moved from a Polynesian economy, based on cultivating sweet potato, raising chickens, and coastal fishing, to a cash economy based on tourism.

Twentieth century Norwegian anthropologist and explorer Thor Heyerdahl pointed out cultural similarities between Easter Island and South American Indian cultures.

Most of the iconic statues of Easter Island were still standing when Roggeveen arrived.

The pre-Christian Easter Islanders had numerous superstitions and resorted to charms, prayers, incantations, and amulets to bring good luck and ward off evil.

Before the arrival of humans, Easter Island also had vast seabird colonies, no longer found on the main island, and several species of land birds, which have become extinct.

At the 2002 census however, Rapanui were only 60 percent of the population of Easter Island.

The name "Executive Mansion" was often used in official context until President Theodore Roosevelt established the formal name by having the de facto name "White House–Washington" engraved on the stationery in 1901.

Pre-Christian Easter Island society was characteristically Polynesian in that power and “mana” (spiritual power) were focused in the “ariki mau,” or great chief.

Unable to recapture them, the crew shot at them killing all but one, who survived the swim and returned to Easter Island.

Easter Island’s distinctive stone megaliths, or moai, were probably carved in a period from the thirteenth century C.E.

At the 2002 census there were 2269 Rapanui living on Easter Island, while 2378 Rapanui lived in the mainland of Chile (half of them in the metropolitan area of Santiago).

A liking for human flesh drove Easter Islanders' cannibalism, since humans were the only large mammal available.

Easter Island is of considerable archaeological importance because it is the richest site of Pacific island carved stone monuments known as moai and has the only evidence of a form of writing in Polynesia.

Cannibalism did not disappear from Easter Island until after the introduction of Christianity.

Easter Island, known in the native language as "Rapa Nui" ("Big Rapa") or "Isla de Pascua" in Spanish, is an island in the south Pacific Ocean belonging to Chile.

Easter Island enjoys a warm throughout the year and swept by strong trade winds.

Among the most recognized cultural artifacts in the world, the massive stone "heads" of Easter Island are remnants of a complex ancient civilization.

Administratively, Easter Island is a province (containing a single municipality) of the Chilean Valparaнso region.

Located 2237 miles (3600 kilometers) west of continental Chile and 1290 miles (2075km) east of Pitcairn Island, Easter Island is one of the most isolated inhabited islands in the world.

Easter Island is made up of three extinct volcanoes: Poike, Rano Kau and Terevaka.

Eight Peruvian slave ships arrived at Easter Island in December 1862, and kidnapped 1407 Rapanui people, about one-third of the estimated population.