According to oral tradition, Hotu Matua (their founding chief) came from an island "near the setting sun" - possibly in the Marquesas or Mangareva several thousand kilometers to the northwest.
The original Rapa Nui vocabulary has been lost except for some recorded mixed Polynesian and non-Polynesian words. Aborigines also had their local form of script. In their traditions, the islanders consistently divide themselves into descendants of two distinct ethnic groups, the “Long-Ears” and the “Short-Ears”.
Some features of Easter Island’s civilization notably recall the culture elements of South Americans. Already mentioned in Roggeveen’s notes: “white men had their earlobes slit and hanging to their shoulders”, which is a distinctly non-Polynesian custom. Another example is a sculpture of a kneeling man, with features characteristic of pre-Inca monuments in South America. The aboriginal economy was based on the cultivation of sweet potato, chicken rising and coastal fishing. The division of labor had to be clear, because the building of the statues required a lot of labor for a long period of time.

Moais – What, When, How and Why
Moais is the name of the huge statues on the Easter Island. We can find more than 600 sculptures carved from a single block of soft volcanic stone. Their size ranges from few to tens feet of height, from few to more than 80 tons of weight. A question arises: are they somehow special among other monuments built by indigenous civilization? The answer is: yes, at least because they were built by a civilization completely isolated from the rest of the world, thinking that they are the only people on this world having a small island and a water all around. The fact of enormous interest that these statues attract might also be explained by their aestetical nearness to the West civilization. Their poise, for instance, may unconsciously resemble to us a satisfied man with hands in his pockets. They are definitely much more simple and realistic that any other totemic statues. Just imagine how different is the look of traditional African art or the shrines of Hinduist gods. The question of how were these statues built is already quite well answered. Many scientists had interpreted the results of the archeological excavations and tried to repeat the islanders’ work. The process of carving was eased by the softness of the volcanic stone. Making the stones move was achieved by a group of volunteers with self-made rope and wooden rollers more easily than would be generally expected.