Those famous Easter Island heads aren't heads — they have full bodies buried | 123 History Facts

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:00]Those famous Easter Island heads aren't heads. They have full bodies buried underground and we've only just started digging them out.

[00:00:08]Around 150 Moai are buried up to the shoulders on a volcano slope. Those are the ones in every photograph.

[00:00:16]The full statues stand up to 10 m tall and weigh 80 tons.

[00:00:21]The bodies were first found in 1914, but UCLA archaeologists only began properly excavating them in 2010.

[00:00:30]Their backs are covered in intricate carvings that centuries of burial kept perfectly preserved.

[00:00:37]The Rapa Nui carved over 1,000 of these between 1100 and 1500 AD.

[00:00:43]Then the civilization collapsed and for decades we blamed them for destroying their own forests.

[00:00:50]New DNA evidence from 2024 says that's wrong.

[00:00:54]The population was stable until European ships arrived bringing disease and slave raids that reduced the island to a fraction of its people.

[00:01:03]Did we spend 200 years blaming the victims?