The ancient Polynesians who settled the island of Rapa Nui – formerly known as Easter Island – may have worked out an ingenious way to make their iconic moai statues 'walk'.

It's not just local legend; it's physics, say anthropologists Carl Lipo and Terry Hunt, and it could be yet another reason the self-destructive 'ecocide' theory of Rapa Nui is wrong.

In a new paper, Lipo and Hunt argue the ancient people of this remote island hadn't recklessly cut down their trees to transport moai statues on wooden rollers, as the popular tale goes; they didn't need to – they had an easier option.

For centuries, the Indigenous people of Rapa Nui have shared a rhythmic song that tells the story of their ancestors, who knew how to make their statues walk.

Western scholars have long dismissed these

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