An Examination of the Relationship Between Rapa Nui Ahu and Topography Using Structure from Motion GIS
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Date
2015-09
Authors
Pearce, Eliza
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Oregon
Abstract
Recent studies about Rapa Nui (Easter Island) have shed a new light upon the
movement of the island's giant statues ( moai) and platforms ( ahu) showing that they
were purposeful projects created by small communities around the island. What remains
unclear, however, is the full meaning and purpose of the giant structures created by the
ancient Rapanui. A current working theory is that the structures were costly signals to
other clans on the island as a way to mark rare fresh water resources. For this study,
imagery was collected of the south coast of the island and then used in conjunction with
Structure from Motion to create topographic data for the area. Various GIS analyses
were then run on different aspects of the landscape around the different types of ahu
(those with moai and those without). None of the statistics run on the data acquired
from running these analyses indicate any significant difference between the topographic
placement of the two types of ahu. This lack of significance shows that topography does
was not an influential factor in the placement of these features and whatever factors
were involved, they did not have a topographical relationship. This means that other
relationships like water sources were perhaps more important for ahu placement.
Description
122 pages. A thesis presented to the Department of Geography and Environmental Science and the Clark Honors College of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for degree of Bachelor of Arts, Fall 2015.
Keywords
Geography, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Rapa Nui, Structure from motion, Easter Island, Remote sensing, Archeology