How the Statues of Easter Island Walked Into Place

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Ccarved in volcanic rock, the mysterious statues of Easter Island, the moai– have occupied an important place in the imagination for centuries. The provenance of these massive stone sentinels has long been the subject of wild theories, including those of extraterrestrial transporters and artisans from long-vanished civilizations. But some archaeologists have focused on a logistical question: How did these multi-ton giants get to their final resting place from the quarry from which they were carved several miles away?

One school of thought holds that the statues were transported flat on their backs, rolled along a series of constantly repositioned logs. According to oral traditions of the Rapa Nui people who carved them between 400 and 1,000 years ago, the statues walked there. New research published in the Journal of Archaeological Sciences suggests that this is exactly what happened.

Anthropologist Carl Lipo of Binghamton University and Terry Hunt of the University of Arizona studied more than 900 moaifocusing on the statues clustered along the roads of Easter Island. After creating high-resolution 3D digital models, Lipo and Hunt determined these interior routes. moai have distinct characteristics that distinguish them from coasts ahu moai.

According to Lipo and Hunt, it’s all in the head and the “feet.” The road moai have rounded D-shaped bases that are wider than those of their coastal counterparts. They also lack the deep-set eyes that give the ahu moai their iconic expression. These two features working in concert may have allowed the Rapa Nui to “walk” the statues several kilometers with relatively minimal, but highly coordinated, effort, the researchers say.

According to Lipo and Hunt, two strings attached to moai the heads could be held up by teams of movers on either side to swing the statues in a zigzag pattern, moving them forward, while a third rope held from behind kept them from tipping completely. The road the moais the rounded base facilitated this swinging motion while their heavier eyeless heads kept them tilted forward to maintain momentum.

To test their operation moai hypothesis, the researchers created a 4.35 ton moai of their own accord. Using just 18 people split into three teams, they managed to travel over 325 feet with their massive test subject in just 40 minutes. “Once you get it moving, it’s not difficult at all: people pull with one arm. It saves energy and moves very quickly,” Lipo said in a statement. “The hardest part is getting things done in the first place.” The speed of the iconic walking statues may not have been enough to win a foot race, but it was an impressive pace – and feat – for people who worked thousands of years ago without the benefit of modern technology.

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Main image: Carl Lipo / Binghamton University

• Jake Currie

  Published on October 14, 2025

  Jake Currie is a writer based in Brooklyn, New York.