Human Discovery and Settlement of the Remote Easter Island (SE Pacific)

Abstract

The discovery and settlement of the tiny and remote Easter Island (Rapa Nui) has been a classical controversy for decades. Present-day aboriginal people and their culture are undoubtedly of Polynesian origin, but it has been debated whether Native Americans discovered the island before the Polynesian settlement. Until recently, the paradigm was that Easter Island was discovered and settled just once by Polynesians in their millennial-scale eastward migration across the Pacific. However, the evidence for cultivation and consumption of an American plant—the sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas)—on the island before the European contact (1722 CE), even prior to the Europe-America contact (1492 CE), revived controversy. This paper reviews the classical archaeological, ethnological and paleoecological literature on the subject and summarizes the information into four main hypotheses to explain the sweet potato enigma: the long-distance dispersal hypothesis, the back-and-forth hypothesis, the Heyerdahl hypothesis, and the newcomers hypothesis. These hypotheses are evaluated in light of the more recent evidence (last decade), including molecular DNA phylogeny and phylogeography of humans and associated plants and animals, physical anthropology (craniometry and dietary analysis), and new paleoecological findings. It is concluded that, with the available evidence, none of the former hypotheses may be rejected and, therefore, all possibilities remain open. For future work, it is recommended to use the multiple working hypotheses framework and the strong inference method of hypothesis testing, rather than the ruling theory approach, very common in Easter Island research.

Climate change, deforestation patterns, freshwater availability and cultural shifts on prehistoric Easter Island (SE Pacific)

“…The first of these droughts took place between 500 CE and 1200 CE during the Medieval Climatic Anomaly (MCA), when warm and dry conditions prevailed in the South Pacific basin (Nunn & Britton, 2001;Nunn, 2007). The time interval proposed by different authors for the Polynesian settlement of the island (800-1200 CE) falls within this arid phase (Rull, 2019). The second drought occurred between 1570 CE and 1720 CE, during the Little Ice Age (LIA) and just before European contact (Cañellas-Boltà et al, 2013), and was associated with the occurrence of several drought phases in the Pacific basin during the same period (Nunn, 2000(Nunn, , 2007.…”

“…The Rapanui civilization that Europeans encountered on the island was not familiar with writing or metals; therefore, 1722 has been considered the end of their prehistory and the Neolithic culture on Easter Island. The prehistoric Rapanui civilization was of Polynesian origin -see Rull (2019) for a discussion on the discovery and initial settlement of the island-and is well known for its main worship subjects, the megalithic anthropomorphic statues called moais (Fig. 1).…”

Pristinity, degradation and landscaping: the three angles of human impact on islands

“…Geographically, the island is part of Polynesia, but politically, it has belonged to Chile since 1888. Several hypotheses and theories have been proposed regarding the timing of its colonization and the origin of the first settlers, but archaeological evidence indicates that the island was settled between 800 and 1200 CE by Polynesian navigators, who established the Rapanui culture, which is still present, although with significant modifications, on the island [27]. This island is perhaps the most famous example of total landscape degradation as a consequence of human disturbance.…”

“…Another interesting finding is that forest clearing seems to have started well before Polynesian settlement, as suggested by palynological records of forest retraction and grassland expansion in approximately 450 BCE, coinciding with an increase in fire incidence and the appearance of Verbena litoralis, a weed of American origin linked to human presence [35]. However, this earlier human presence has been interpreted in terms of presettlement ephemeral/intermittent occupation events that did not leave relevant ecological imprints or archaeological remains on the island [27]. The true degradation process began with postsettlement deforestation.…”

Drought, freshwater availability and cultural resilience on Easter Island (SE Pacific) during the Little Ice Age

“…The island is famous for its ritual megalithic statues (moai) (Fig. 1B) built by an ancient Polynesian culture that settled the island between 800 CE and 1200 CE, and this settlement time depends on the authors (Hunt and Lipo, 2006;Wilmshurst et al, 2011;Rull, 2019). This culture is assumed to have caused its own destruction by overexploitation of natural resources prior to European contact (1722 CE) (Flenley and Bahn, 2003;Diamond, 2005).…”