Kava Kava

Long ago, a king on the island of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) sought refuge from a rainstorm in the quarry where they make the top knots. The stones of the top knots apparently erode rather fast and those left uncompleted in the quarry have gained small tunnels through them, big enough to fit a person. While this king waited out the storm, he noticed two figures laying in the grass. Fear took hold of him as he realized these two were spirits. Customs dictated that it was not wise to see such spirits for calamity and misfortune Will strike you with the spirit's wrath. 

now there are many versions of what happens next. One version of the story says that the king was stopped three times by three different people who asked him what he saw. He said nothing or didn't say the truth. These three people with the spirits in disguise trying to get information out of him. The next version is that he ran straight home without stopping to chat or anything. Then the story is a lying again because when he returned home he began to carve what he saw into a wooden statue. The figures that he saw were skeletal in appearance, looking like elderly men, with long bony fingers and a wild expression in their eyes. These spirits were known as Kava Kava, dark beings who brought misfortune. 

Now in the museum in Chicago there is a statue of another dark spirit. both this spirit and the Kava Kava statues turned into protective totems for homes. The End of the kings story in yet another version tells that the spirits eventually visited him but were scared away by the statue. The statue now wards off evil.