'The true and fascinating story of Easter Island and its amazing statues' KEN FOLLETT
'Revelatory... fascinating... [and] wholly convincing' MAIL ON SUNDAY Where did they come
from? How did they get there? Why did they carve the island's colossal iconic statues - and
how? What happened to the civilisation they created? These are just a few of the questions
about Easter Island or Rapa Nui that have puzzled generations. Europeans first encountered
the Islanders in the early eighteenth century bringing back astonishing tales from one of the
most remote inhabited places on Earth. They told fantastic stories of lost continents
cannibalism giants and aliens . Thor Heyerdahl claimed that the island was discovered by
pale-skinned sailors from South America ignoring the rightful claims of the greatest explorers
the world has ever known. Recently the idea that Islanders cut down all the trees causing
mass starvation and social collapse has been espoused by scientists broadcasters and
politicians. Now in archaeologist Mike Pitts's superb investigation Island at the Edge of the
World he provides authoritative new insights into what really happened. Using the latest
scientific and archaeological research plus a huge range of historical accounts Pitts builds
a fascinating new portrait of the Islanders' story. In particular Pitts revives the life work
of Katherine Routledge who spent sixteen months on the island in 1914-15 surviving revolution
and war assembling a priceless but largely ignored archive of excavations and interviews - and
whose legacy reveals the rapacious interference that spawned generations of false histories.
Many questions still remain but this is the most compelling and comprehensive account yet
published of the extraordinary story of Easter Island.
