Ancient Rapanui genomes reveal resilience and pre-European contact with the Americas.

ABSTRACT: Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island) is one of the most isolated inhabited places in the world. It has captured the imagination of many owing to its archaeological record, which includes iconic megalithic statues called moai¹. Two prominent contentions have arisen from the extensive study of Rapa Nui. First, the history of the Rapanui has been presented as a warning tale of resource overexploitation that would have culminated in a major population collapse-the 'ecocide' theory^2-4. Second, the possibility of trans-Pacific voyages to the Americas pre-dating European contact is still debated^5-7. Here, to address these questions, we reconstructed the genomic history of the Rapanui on the basis of 15 ancient Rapanui individuals that we radiocarbon dated (1670-

SUBMITTER: Moreno-Mayar JV 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11390480 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature