Explain Easter Island?

Question

who left behind the massive carved rocks, how old are they, do they have meaning.

Answer 1

The moai (large statues) are not the mystery they were 20 years ago; what's left of the island's original population, plus some archeology, have pieced together the story of what they were for.

* The ancestors of the current natives made them.

* Most are over 200 years old, but one was completed just a few years ago as a project.

* They originally represented certain families; but became an increasingly wasteful competitive status symbol.

The whole story is more complex than can be described here.  I'd suggest more research.

Answer 2

Easter Island (Rapa Nui: Rapa Nui, Spanish: Isla de Pascua) is a Polynesian island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian triangle. The island is a special territory of Chile. Easter Island is famous for its monumental statues, called moai (IPA: /ˈmoʊаɪ/), created by the Rapanui people. It is a world heritage site with much of the island protected within the Rapa Nui National Park.

Easter Island is a volcanic high island, consisting mainly of three extinct volcanoes: Terevaka (altitude 507 metres) forms the bulk of the island. Two other volcanoes, Poike and Rano Kau, form the eastern and southern headlands and give the island its approximately triangular shape. There are numerous lesser cones and other volcanic features, including the crater Rano Raraku, the cinder cone Puna Pau and many volcanic caves including lava tubes.

Easter Island and surrounding islets such as Motu Nui, Motu Iti are the summit of a large volcanic mountain which rises over two thousand metres from the sea bed. It is part of the Sala y Gómez Ridge, a (mostly submarine) mountain range with dozens of seamounts starting with Pukao and then Moai, two seamounts to the west of Easter Island, and extending 2,700 km (1,700 mi) east to the Nazca Seamount.[7]

Pukao, Moai and Easter Island were formed in the last 750,000 years, with the most recent eruption a little over a hundred thousand years ago. They are the youngest mountains of the Sala y Gómez Ridge, which has been formed by the Nazca Plate floating over the Easter hotspot.[8] Only at Easter Island, its surrounding islets and Sala y Gómez does the Sala y Gómez Ridge form dry land.

In the first half of the 20th century, steam came out of the Rano Kau crater wall. This was photographed by the island's manager, Mr Edmunds.[1]

Answer 3

Jared Diamond provides a very lucid discussion of the Easter Islanders and their civilization in his book "Collapse."  If you google around, using strings like "Diamond Easter Island" you can find excerpts of it on the web.  It's worth reading.