Statues of Easter Island (10th – 16th Century) Easter Island, Chile

Discovered on Easter Sunday, 1722 by Dutch explorer Jakob Roggeveen, this collection of 25 meter-high stone sculptures still puzzles historians and archaeologists as to its origins. It is believed that a society of Polynesian origin settled here in the 4th century and established a unique tradition of monumental sculpture. Between the 10th and 16th centuries, they erected the enormous stone figures, known as the Moai, which have long fascinated the entire world and endowed this island with a mythical atmosphere.