In his “Island at the Edge of the World,” the British archaeologist Mike Pitts delves into the misconceptions and legends ...

Easter Island has long been misunderstood by the West. A new book by Mike Pitts sets the record straight.

In ‘Island at the Edge of the World,’ Mike Pitts tells the story of the people who carved the giant heads on the remotest inhabited place on earth.

A newly reconstructed rainfall record shows that prolonged drought, not societal collapse, reshaped Rapa Nui’s history.

New excavations and high tech scans on one of the world’s most remote islands are forcing archaeologists to redraw the story of how complex societies rise, adapt and endure. On Rapa Nui, better known ...

Archaeologists say a 3D model of a centuries-old quarry of unfinished stone head statues on Easter Island offers new clues about how these monuments were made and the Polynesian society that brought ...

The eight-foot-tall Moai sculpture at the British Museum is called Hoa Hakananai’a, which translates to “the stolen or hidden friend.” This name is fitting, since the four-ton statue was stolen from ...

Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, is often portrayed in popular culture as an enigma. The rationale is clear: The tiny, remote island in the Pacific features nearly 1,000 enormous statues—the ...

Easter Island is world-famous for the giant stone statues, the Moai, that were erected in the 13th-17th centuries as a form of religious protection for its communities, and as a form of religious ...

Now the islanders are hoping desperately to get it back. The statue, known as a "moai" and named the Hoa Hakananai'a, is one of hundreds originally found on the island. Carved by Polynesian colonizers ...