The Truth About Rapa Nui's Collapse | New Genetic Evidence

Indiziert: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]Genetic studies add another layer.

[00:00:02]Researchers used to believe the local population collapsed before the Europeans arrived in the 1700s, but then they analyzed the genomes of 15 historical Rapa Nui individuals and found no sign of a massive population crash in the 1600s.

[00:00:19]In genetics, a real collapse leaves a clear fingerprint called a bottleneck, which means the population shrinks so much that genetic diversity drops sharply.

[00:00:29]The team didn't see that at all.

[00:00:31]Instead, they saw that the population stayed relatively small and stable and likely never exceeded 3,000 people.

[00:00:38]That number lines up much more closely with what early European visitors recorded.