There are two quarries on Easter Island
Ranu Raraku
The biggest and most valuable archaeological
site on the island, it was a quarry for about
500 years until the early 18th century and supplied the stone from which
about 95% of the moai were carved. There
are still 397 moai in various forms of construction.
It is still not known how the giant, heavy
statues were moved to their final destination,
although there are several theories. The
incomplete statues in the quarry are remarkable
both for their number, for the inaccessibility
of some that were high on the outside crater
wall and for the size of the largest; at
21.6m in height, almost twice that of any
moai ever completed and weighing an estimated
270 tonnes, many times the weight of any
transported. You can see some moai midway
in construction and understand how the carvers
worked to create the statues and free them
from the wall of the volcano.
On the outside of the quarry are a number
of moai, some of which are partially buried
to their shoulders in the spoil from the
quarry. They are distinctive in that their
eyes were not hollowed out, they do not have
pukao and they were not cast down in the
island's civil wars.
Tukuturi is an unusual moai. Its beard and
kneeling posture distinguish it from standard
moai. Tukuturi is made of red scoria from
the Puna Pau, but sits at Rano Raraku, the
tuff quarry. It is possibly related to the
Tangata manu cult in which case it would
be one of the last moai ever made.
