By Cristian Moreno Pakarati – Historian
Easter Island’s moai did not look at the sea. They faced inland — toward their villages, toward their people. The image of the moai gazing at the ocean horizon is one of the most persistent misunderstandings about Rapa Nui, born from a 19th-century historical accident and reproduced for over a hundred years by writers and journalists who never set foot on the island.
The Moai Faced Inland, Not Out to Sea
The Moai (statue) staring out to sea is one of the most evocative literary images of the Pacific isles. The idea that these statues were the guardians of a remote island and that their colossal size was meant to frighten off possible invaders has found echo in many of the thousands of visitors who come to Easter Island every year. However, this concept of megalithic statues gazing at the horizon is contradicted by scientific discoveries and knowledge that has always existed among the Rapanui people. As innocent as it may seem, the idea that statues contemplate what lies beyond the ocean arises from Western traditions which should be considered within their historical and territorial context.
In 1838, the French Captain Abel Du Petit Thouars, commander of the sloop Venus, had the honor of leading the last foreign expedition to see a statue standing on its ceremonial altar on Easter Island. This statue faced toward the interior, as had all the statues seen previously by European visitors. They were turned toward their people, toward their village and had their backs to the sea. Every moai standing on a ceremonial altar (ahu) faced inland.
The Origin of the Myth: The Moai of Rano Raraku
With the arrival of French Catholic missionaries – the first foreign colonists – on Rapa Nui in the decade of 1860, the Island moved into a new phase. By then, all the Moai were fallen. The only ones remaining erect were those in the quarry at Rano Raraku and were found half buried. And where did these statues, the largest on the Island, seem to be staring? At the foot of the slopes of Rano Raraku, the majority of these figures looked toward the plains of the southern coast and, beyond that, to the intense blue of the Pacific Ocean. The Moai of Rano Raraku became the image of the Island for nearly 100 years. These were the only stone effigies with their faces visible. And they “looked to the sea”.
Scientific ideas, developed as a result of the expeditions of Thomson, Routledge, the Franco-Belgians and the field work carried out over decades by Father Sebastian Englert, made clear that the fallen statues at the ahu (platforms) originally looked inland. Unfortunately, they were no longer in their original positions, unlike those seen a century or two ago by the European explorers. For the public in the Northern Hemisphere who read the books and looked at the black-and-white images of the Island in the first part of the 20th Century, it seemed certain that the Moai when erect had “looked to the sea”.
The Ahu Akivi Restoration and the Persistent Misunderstanding
Some Moai were re-erected as decoration by the (Chilean) governor Tejeda in 1938, looking toward the sea in the area of Hanga Roa o Tai. One of them, the Moai a Hani was knocked down by a tsunami in 1946. The other is still standing and welcomes the visitors who disembark at the quay at Hanga Roa. Tejeda, just like the visitors of those days, was the victim of the false iconography of the Moai looking to the sea.
In October of 1955, however, things began to change. A large team of archaeologists arrived in the greatest archaeological expedition in the history of the Island, financed by the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl. The most relevant event of those months occurred in the summer of 1956 when a group of Islanders re-erected a statue onto its ahu. A bet between Pedro Atán-Pakomio and Thor Heyerdahl led to a dozen locals raising the Moai at Ahu Ature Huki by using only logs and stones. Following several days of work, a Moai was again standing on its stone altar for the first time in 120 years — and it was looking inland.
That was the beginning of a change of paradigm. The archaeologist and member of the 1955-56 Heyerdahl expedition, William Mulloy, returned to the Island four years later and applied the same method to the archaeological restoration of Ahu Akivi. This restoration also received extensive media coverage, but it did nothing to refute the myth that the Moai “looked at the sea”. In spite of the inland location of the seven Moai of Ahu Akivi at 2.6 kilometers (1.6 miles) from the coast, the desolate, treeless terrain produced the illusion that these statues were looking toward the sea. While it is easily explained that a village was situated between the Moai and the ocean, many people even today still call them the “Seven Moai which Look to the Sea”.
A second phase of archaeological restoration began in the second half of the 1960s with work undertaken at Tahai. Three newly restored coastal platforms joined Ahu Ature Huki as sites where the statues clearly looked inland. At the end of the 70s, the Chilean Council of Monuments took the important decision that archaeological restorations would only be possible if sufficient scientific evidence existed regarding the original location of the statue. This ensured the authenticity of each restored site on Rapa Nui and put a definitive end to the myth of the sea-facing moai.
The Truth the Rapanui Always Knew
The irony of this story is that the Rapanui themselves never needed archaeologists to explain which direction the moai faced. That knowledge was always in the oral memory of the community — in the way the ahu are described, in the relationship between the statues and the settlements, in the very logic of the cult of the ancestors: the moai were the forebears watching over their living descendants, facing them, with their backs turned to the sea they had already crossed.
The misunderstanding that persisted for over a century was ultimately a product of the Western gaze upon a culture that was not its own. The real understanding of what the moai of Rapa Nui represent was always kept within the Rapanui community itself.
Frequently Asked Questions about the Moai and the Sea
Which way do the Easter Island moai face?
The moai of Easter Island faced inland — toward their villages, toward their people, with their backs to the sea. They were representations of the ancestors watching over their living descendants. The only moai that appears to look at the sea in Hanga Roa harbour was re-erected by Governor Tejeda in 1938 facing the wrong direction.
Why do people say the moai look at the sea?
The myth arose because after all the moai had fallen from their platforms, the only ones still standing were on the slopes of Rano Raraku, which happened to face toward the southern coast. For almost a hundred years these were the image of Easter Island, and writers who never visited the island reproduced that incorrect image as if it were the rule.
When did archaeologists discover that the moai face inland?
The Rapanui always knew. Archaeological confirmation came in 1956, when Pedro Atán-Pakomio demonstrated to Thor Heyerdahl that he could re-erect a moai at Anakena using logs and stones. When restored to its original position, the moai faced inland. Subsequent restorations throughout the 1960s and 1970s definitively confirmed this orientation.
Do the Ahu Akivi moai look at the sea?
No. The seven moai of Ahu Akivi are located 2.6 kilometers (1.6 miles) from the coast and face inland. The illusion that they look at the sea is created by the treeless terrain between the ahu and the coast. They are popularly known as the ‘Seven Moai that Look at the Sea’, but this description is factually incorrect.
