Orongo Site (Easter Island)

Orongo (Rapa Nui: Oroŋo) is a stone village and ceremonial center at the southwestern tip of Rapa Nui (Easter Island). It consists of a collection of low, sod-covered, windowless, round-walled buildings with even lower doors positioned on the high south-westerly tip of the large volcanic caldera called Rano Kau. Below Orongo on one side a 300-meter barren cliff face drops down to the ocean; on the other, a more gentle but still very steep grassy slope leads down to a freshwater marsh inside the high caldera. In 1974 UNESCO sponsored a project to restore Orongo. Under the supervision of William Mulloy, with the support of Rapanui archaeologist Sonia Haoa Cardinali, the first half of the ceremonial village's 53 stone masonry houses was investigated and restored in 1974. The remainder was completed in 1976 and subsequently investigated in 1985 and again in 1995. Orongo now has World Heritage status as part of the Rapa Nui National Park.