Introduction

Introduction The intent and purpose of this book is to shed light on the ambiguous history of the cultures and history of the west coast of South America, more specifically what is now called Peru, and the islands that lie to the west, as in Easter Island, Tahiti, New Zealand and Hawaii. What the latter 4 have in common, is that they all clearly, whether one accesses western driven academia, or the oral traditions of the Native people, is a clear and historic past, that of the so called Polynesian people. Scholars disagree greatly on the common root of these people, and much of what is written is either at odds with the oral traditions of the people themselves, if and when the latter is or has been consulted. Map of the area under discussion in this book The lack of western academics’ inclusion of the knowledge of Native people is hardly restricted to Polynesia, which is itself a name that the indigenous people never called nor call themselves, but a geographic label, and it is an example, symbol and symptom of colonialism. All of these “Polynesian”, meaning simply “many islands” people have an ancient tradition that speaks of a time when a light skinned people, with reddish or auburn hair and in some accounts green eyes either lived alongside them, or were indeed an ancestral line from which they draw at least part of their genetic inheritance. The coast of Peru is to this very day a place where ancestral skeletons are found, often with reddish hair still attached to their scalps. This is due to the extreme dryness of the area being a perfect place, whether intentionally or by accident for the preservation of human bones and tissues. Thor Heyerdahl, the famous, but much maligned researcher whose perhaps greatest accomplishment was the Kon Tiki expedition, whereby he and 5 of his compatriots successfully sailed from the coast of Peru to the Society Islands in 1947, was adamant that Pacific Islands, such as Easter, were first inhabited by non-Polynesians . The Kon Tiki under full sail It is purely out of curiosity, and without any sort of political or racial agenda, that I pursue this story, which Heyerdahl gleaned from historic accounts of the Inca, Spanish and others, of the existence, in the deep past, of a race, or at least group of people, who bore non Indigenous physical characteristics, and may have left their mark, in the form of stone structures, oral traditions, and descendants throughout Polynesia and perhaps beyond. Many island people, especially in New Zealand, which should properly, in my view, be called by its native name Aotearoa, or “Land of the Long White Cloud”, speak with pride of these mysterious ancestors, much of whose identity seems to be lost in the mists of time. The idea of a lost race or company of tall, light skinned and auburn haired sea farers often brings up the idea that Europeans, especially the Irish or other Celtic people must have traveled the world’s oceans and occupied the ancestral lands of people like the Polynesians long ago. This I immediately dismiss as pure fantasy, and do not include in this book, aside from casual but superficial glimpses. The topic and theory, which basically has no merit nor evidence in my view, will simply attract a storm of racism, from both sides, and controversy which will muddle my intent. Who were these ancient people, and what did they leave behind to tell us the story of their existence? Crimson Horizon: The Mysterious Ancient Sea Kings Of The Pacific Ocean 3500 km west of the Chilean coast of South America sits Easter Island, also known as Isla de Pascua (Spanish) and Rapa Nui (the Indigenous language.) This remote outpost of civilization has fascinated visitors ever since it was first discovered by the Dutch explorer Jakob Roggeveen on Easter Sunday, 1722; he thus named it Easter Island, or more properly Paasch-Eyland (18th century Dutch for "Easter Island") (1) and that name has stuck ever since, much to the consternation of the Native islanders, who knew their home by their own names for hundreds if not thousands of years. The name Rapa Nui, for example, which is the title best loved by the present day population, who are a mix of Polynesian and Chilean descent, means “Big Rapa,” but this term was supposedly coined after the slave raids of the early 1860s, and refers to the island's topographic resemblance to the island of Rapa in the Bass Islands of the Austral Islands group. (2) In the source’s own words, he being William Thompson writing in 1891, ‘Throughout southeastern Polynesia this island is known as Rapa Nui, but the name is of accidental origin and only traces back about twenty years. When the islanders, kidnapped by the Peruvians, were being returned to their homes, there was for a time a question as to the identity of those from Easter Island. The native name of "Te Pito te Henua" was not recognized by the French officials, and finding certain fellow-sufferers hailing from Oparo, an island lying 2,000 miles to the westward, were more successful under the local appellation of Rapa iti (Little Rapa), the euphonious title was dropped and Rapa nui (Great Rapa) substituted.’ Te Pito O te Henua is another native style name, and has been said to be the original name of the island since Alphonse Pinart gave it the romantic translation "the Navel of the World" in his Voyage à l'Île de Pâques, published in 1877. (3) However, there are two words pronounced pito in Rapa Nui, one meaning 'navel' and one 'end', and the phrase can thus also mean "land's end". Yet another name, that being Mata ki te rangi, means "Eyes looking to the sky" and this may be in reference to the famous large stone statues, called Moai, which ring the island and are in the shape of, predominantly, human heads and torsos. And finally, Thor Heyerdahl, the amazing Norwegian explorer best known for his 1947 Kon Tiki adventure, and later the Ra and Tigris expeditions, insisted that Rapa was the original name of Easter Island, and that Rapa Iti was named by refugees from there. (4) Heyerdahl was in fact the first European, and in fact outsider, to conduct archaeological excavations on the island, which is well documented in his book “Aku- aku: the Secret of Easter island written in 1958. What is perhaps most intriguing and perplexing about Easter Island are the recurring stories of two separate people and cultures cohabiting this small island which Roggeveen was the first outsider to witness in 1722. He states that they were "of all shades of colour, yellow, white and brown" and they distended their ear lobes so greatly with large disks that when they took them out they could "hitch the rim of the lobe over the top of the ear". (5) The latter is in reference to the so-called Long Ears, or Hanau epe people, who are generally regarded as having been a high caste group, whereas the Hanau momoko were the Short Ears, and the working class. All of the large stone Moai heads depict Long Ears The Hanau eepe were theorized by Thor Heyerdahl to have come from South America (6), perhaps being the early Inca or the predecessors, while the Hanau momoko were Polynesians, most likely coming from Oparo or Rapa iti island which is in the Australs. Much controversy surrounds the relationships between these people, as well as time lines of conflicts that in fact did occur; however, a full discussion of this will come later. However, Roggeveen clearly indicated that he observed two distinct peoples upon his arrival to Easter Island, the Polynesians and “White” people, whose ear lobes were heavily distended. Not only was their skin colour much lighter than the Polynesians or Hanau momoko, but their hair was also reddish or even blonde. What Heyerdahl purports in Aku-aku is that the evidence exists to show that the island was “invaded” by a white skinned people that arrived on the island about 500 A.D. This race of people had unusual features that included red hair and long thin noses. They were remembered by the natives as the “long ears” because they wore large ear rings that elongated their earlobes. They took possession of the island and forced the natives to work as labourers. Descendants of the long ears still exist on the island today. They are the predominant families, many of them still with red hair and European facial features that set them apart from the dark haired, dark-eyed natives. (7) This is the first example of several instances, on different lands and islands of the Pacific Ocean, and the purpose of this book, to show that our generally accepted theory about the exploration and settlement of the world’s largest ocean is not as simple as we have been led to believe. The area called Polynesia, (from Greek: πολύς "polys" many + νῆσος "nēsos" island) is a subregion of Oceania, made up of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are termed Polynesians and they share many similar traits including language, culture and beliefs. (8) More specifically, it forms what is called the “Polynesian Triangle” which is bordered by Hawaii in the north, Easter Island to the southeast, and New Zealand (Aotearoa) in the southwest. Conventional scholarship believes that the first settlers of this triangle were native people from south-east Asia in the distant past, a subject we shall explore in detail later, and that no other humans were resident in this area prior to these Polynesian people.

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