History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v1.c14.8

v1.c14.8

The Easter Islands are isolated from the rest of Polynesia but here one finds "Stone houses massively built, and placed in rows of streets : platforms from 200 to 300 ft. in length and 15 ft. to 20 ft. high, on the outer or seaward side, constructed of hewn stones dovetailed together ; stone statues 3 ft. to 30 ft. high, representing the upper portion of a human figure, sometimes standing on the platform and sometimes on the ground ; and sculptured rocks, the subject being generally the human face. On the heads of the larger pillars crowns made from a red volcanic stone were fitted."[¹] "One peculiar feature of these statues is the disproportionate size of the ears" which we find in Jain and Buddhist images of India from the Gupta period downwards. The platforms on which these images were placed are pyramidal in shape and the people who built them were agriculturists of an advanced type as the remains of an irrigation system found on the island prove.[²] Similar stone ruins have been discovered in Hawaii where there are huge pyramidal temples and stone tombs made for kings. The modern inhabitants of Hawaii use irrigation for cultivation. Similar stone images and buildings have been found on the uninhabited Necker Island, 450 miles north-west of Honolulu, and in Fanning's Island near Christmas Island. But the remains on the Marquesas group bear strong resemblance to those of the Easter Islands." Several statues with points of resemblance to the remains of the Easter Islands have been found in the Marquesas. In Nuku-hiva, Porter saw a statue of stone, about the height of a man, but larger in proportion in every way, round which the dead were exposed in canoes. This figure differed from those of Easter Islands in being in the squatting position, but a greater similarity is present in a statue found by Christian in the Island of Riva-oa. This is about 8 ft. high, and in the position of the arms and general characters of the features definitely resembles the statues of Easter Island.... The ma'ae or sacred places had two or more platforms, but there is no evidence of a pyramidal form.¹ The statues were placed on pyramidal altars and the platforms were surrounded with upright stones. There are traces of a considerable irrigation system which are also to be found in the Paumotus.² In the Pitcairn Island foundations of stone temples were discovered while stone images or statues have been found at Raivaivai of the Austral Islands. In the case of the latter the existence of these great stone statues is a puzzle. In the Society Islands, Tahiti possesses a large number of these pyramidal structures. Captain Cook describes one of them :—"It is a long square stone-work built pyramidically; its base is 267 ft. by 67 ft.; at the top it is 250 ft. by 8 ft. It is built in the same manner as we do steps leading up to a Sun-dial or fountain erected in the middle of a square, where there is a flight of steps on each side. In this building there are eleven of such steps, each step is about 4 ft. in height, and the breadth 4 ft. 7 in., but they decrease both in height and breadth from the bottom to the top. On the middle of the top stood the image of a bird carved in wood; near it lay the broken one of a fish carved in stone. There was no hollow or cavity in the inside, the whole being filled up with stone.