If Only They Could Talk by James Herriot

The land which was cleared was fragile and quickly eroded, so fewer crops could be grown – this process of clearing the land was an early example of an ecological disaster, according to Diamond. Building and moving the moai needed many people and used up the island’s forest resources. More recently, Pulitzer Prize winner Jared Diamond has suggested that the moai contributed to the downfall of the islanders.

Researchers have tended to assume the ancestors dragged the statues somehow, using ropes and wood. Modern science – linguistic, archaeological and genetic evidence – has proved the moai builders were Polynesian but not how they moved their creations. He thought the statues had been created by pre-Inca people from Peru, not by Polynesians.

Several decades ago, the Norwegian adventurer Thor Heyerdahl, helped ignite the world’s curiosity about Easter Island. ‘Without it,’ says Mahina Lucero Teao, head of tourism, ‘everyone would be starving on Easter Island.’ And the tourists go there for only one thing: the moai. Just about every job on Easter Island depends on tourism. Nowadays 12 flights arrive every week from Chile, Peru and Tahiti, and in 2011 those planes delivered 50,000 tourists, ten times the island’s population. The island lies 2,150 miles west of South America and 1,300 miles east of its nearest inhabited neighbour, Pitcairn. When the first Polynesian settlers arrived at Rapa Nui (Easter Island), there were probably only a few dozen of them. ‘This is something produced from my culture, the Rapanui.’ He shakes his head. ‘It’s something strange and energetic,’ he says. As Tuki stares at their faces, he feels a connection. They were carved long ago with stone tools and then transported up to 11 miles to massive stone platforms. The statues range from four to 33 feet and some weigh more than 80 tons. Tuki sat on the sand and gazed at the colossal human statues – the moai. On a winter night last June, José Antonio Tuki, a 30-year-old artist on Easter Island, did one of the things he loves best: he left his house on the southwest coast and hiked north across the island to Anakena beach. Archaeologists are still trying to figure out how – and whether their story is a cautionary tale of environmental disaster or a celebration of human ingenuity.

The statues walked, Easter Islanders say.

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If Only They Could Talk by James Herriot