Rapa Nui mythology, also known as Pascuense mythology or Easter Island mythology, refers to the

native Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Native Americans (disambiguation) In arts and entert ...

myth Myth is a folklore genre consisting of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not objectively true, the identification of a narrat ...

legend A legend is a genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived, both by teller and listeners, to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human values, and possess ...

s, and

beliefs A belief is an attitude that something is the case, or that some proposition is true. In epistemology, philosophers use the term "belief" to refer to attitudes about the world which can be either true or false. To believe something is to take i ...

of the

Rapa Nui people The Rapa Nui (Rapa Nui: , Spanish: ) are the Polynesian peoples indigenous to Easter Island. The easternmost Polynesian culture, the descendants of the original people of Easter Island make up about 60% of the current Easter Island population a ...

Easter Island Easter Island ( rap, Rapa Nui; es, Isla de Pascua) is an island and special territory of Chile in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian Triangle in Oceania. The island is most famous for its nearl ...

in the south eastern

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the conti ...

Origin myth

According to Rapa Nui mythology

Hotu Matu'a Hotu may refer to: * Hotu Matu'a, legendary first settler of Easter Island * The Yellow River Map The acronym HOTU may stand for: * Home of the Underdogs Home of the Underdogs (often called HotU) is an abandonware archive founded by Sarinee Ach ...

was the legendary first settler and ''ariki mau'' ("supreme chief" or "king") of

. Carlos Mordo, Easter Island (Willowdale, Ontario: Firefly Books Ltd., 2002) ''Hotu Matu'a'' and his two canoe (or one double hulled canoe) colonising party were

Polynesians Polynesians form an ethnolinguistic group of closely related people who are native to Polynesia (islands in the Polynesian Triangle), an expansive region of Oceania in the Pacific Ocean. They trace their early prehistoric origins to Island Sou ...

from the now unknown land of

Hiva In Polynesian mythology, (also rendered as in Cook Islands Māori, in Samoan, in Tahitian, in Hawaiian) is the original home of the Polynesians, before dispersal across Polynesia. It also features as the underworld in many Māori stories. ...

Nuku Hiva, Hiva Oa, Fatu Hiva, Mount Oave, Marquesas Islands, Tahiti, Fenua. They landed at Anakena beach and his people spread out across the island, sub-divided it between clans claiming descent from his sons, and lived for more than a thousand years in their isolated island home at the southeastern tip of the

Polynesian Triangle The Polynesian Triangle is a region of the Pacific Ocean with three island groups at its corners: Hawai‘i, Easter Island (''Rapa Nui'') and New Zealand (Aotearoa). It is often used as a simple way to define Polynesia. Outside the triangle, th ...

until the arrival of Dutch captain Jacob Roggeveen, who arrived at the island in 1722.

Ancestor cult

The most visible element in the culture was the production of massive statues called

moai Moai or moʻai ( ; es, moái; rap, moʻai, , statue) are monolithic human figures carved by the Rapa Nui people on Rapa Nui in eastern Polynesia between the years 1250 and 1500. Nearly half are still at Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry, ...

that represented deified ancestors. It was believed that the living had a

symbiotic relationship Symbiosis (from Greek , , "living together", from , , "together", and , bíōsis, "living") is any type of a close and long-term biological interaction between two different biological organisms, be it mutualistic, commensalistic, or parasit ...

with the dead where the dead provided everything that the living needed (health, fertility of land and animals, fortune etc.) and the living through offerings provided the dead with a better place in the spirit world. Most settlements were located on the coast and moai were erected along the coastline, watching over their descendants in the settlements before them, with their backs toward the spirit world in the sea.

Tangata manu cult

The Tangata manu or ''bird-man'' cult succeeded the island's

Moai Moai or moʻai ( ; es, moái; rap, moʻai, , statue) are monolithic human figures carved by the Rapa Nui people on Rapa Nui in eastern Polynesia between the years 1250 and 1500. Nearly half are still at Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry, ...

era when warfare erupted over dwindling natural resources and construction of statues stopped. The deity Make-make was the chief god of the birdman cult. The cult declined after the island population adopted

Catholicism The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

, though the birdman popularity and memory was not erased and it is still present in decoration of the island's church.

Deities and heroes

* Make-make, creator of humanity *

Uoke Uoke is a tectonic and destroyer deity in Rapa Nui mythology. Myth According to the old story, Uoke was able to lift and sink into the sea large lands, using a huge lever. The legend says Rapa Nui (Easter Island) had once been a territory similar i ...

, tectonic deity *

, legendary king and cultural hero *

Aku-Aku ''Aku-Aku: the Secret of Easter Island'' is a 1957 book by Thor HeyerdahlThor Heyerdahl, ''Aku-Aku: The Secret of Easter Island'', / 9780345238412 / 0-345-23841-9. Hardcover published July 1, 1958 by Rand McNally & Co.; Paperback published 19 ...

, spirits of the dead *

Manana Take Manana Take was a goddess in the Rapa Nui mythology, the original religion on Easter island. She was the consort of Era Nuku, the god of the feathers and farming. Manana Take lived in sky. The Manana once visited earth in the shape of a fish, wh ...

* Tangata manu *

Hanau epe The Hanau epe (also, hanau eepe: supposed to mean "Long-ears") were a semi-legendary people who are said to have lived in Easter Island, where they came into conflict with another people known as the Hanau momoko or "short-ears". A decisive battle ...

* Haua *

Hina-Oio Hina-Oio is a goddess of the sea animals in the mythology of Easter Island. She was married to Atua-Metua and represented the mother of all animals of the sea. Hina is a divine figure common throughout the Polynesian narrative, with prominent va ...

References

External links