Geology textbooks describe the Earth's mantle beneath its plates as a well-mixed viscous rock that moves along with those plates like a conveyor belt. But that idea, first set out some 100 years ago, ...

New excavations and high tech scans on one of the world’s most remote islands are forcing archaeologists to redraw the story of how complex societies rise, adapt and endure. On Rapa Nui, better known ...

Two recent studies have cast doubt on a popular theory that the ancient residents of Easter Island suffered a societal collapse because they overexploited their natural resources, an event often ...

Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, never experienced a ruinous population collapse, according to an analysis of ancient DNA from 15 former inhabitants of the remote island in the Pacific Ocean.

For decades, archeologists have debated whether the writing system of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), known as Rongorongo, was invented independently or influenced by Europeans. A new study that uses ...

Finding out what actually happened in the deep past can be a slog, so when ancient history is packaged as mystery—spine-tingling but solvable—it’s hard to resist. Who doesn’t want to know how a lost ...

The mystery of Easter Island just became darker. Hidden beneath the giant Moai statues lies evidence of buried civilizations, ...

See more of our trusted coverage when you search. Prefer Newsweek on Google to see more of our trusted coverage when you search. A genetic study has revealed that a self-inflicted population collapse ...

There is no place in the world like Easter Island, also known as Rapa Nui. It feels like it is not even of this world. Located more than 2,000 miles from South America's mainland, it is one of the ...