To get an idea of the size of the great heiau Iliili-Opae built on Mapulehu Ridge, Molokai, imagine a stone floor twice the size of Kawaiahao Church.
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| Front entrance to Kawaiahao Church, Honolulu, HI |
The platform remains of Iliili-Opae today measure 268 feet in length and 85 feet wide, a total surface of 20,340 square feet.
Kawaiahao Church measures 196 feet in length and 63 feet in width, a total floor surface of 12,348 feet.
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| Inside chapel of Kawaiahao Church |
OXEN AND SLEDS
The construction of Kawaiahao Church was considered a great feat - but the builders used oxen, sleds and wheelbarrows to move the great stones and building materials required.
All construction work on Iliili-Opae heiau was done by hand. Ropes and timber slings were the only aid Hawaiians had.
Their axes were made of hard stone - their saws were sharp-edged shells and their ropes were made of morning glory vine.
NOT SLAVES
Unlike the Egyptian kings who built the pyramids, the Hawaiian kings did not have a slave population which they could drive with whips.
The Hawaiian king had to treat his men decently, else they would desert him for a kinder chief.
The Hawaiian had to be induced to work with promises of religious rewards or with threats of being made a human sacrifice.
WOULD RUN AWAY
Too many threats would make the independent Hawaiian run away.
Just to have built a temple the size of the ruins today would have been a big undertaking, but historians tell us that the first Iliili-Opae temple covered three times the area of today's ruins.
Probably today's ruins are those of the temple proper.
HAD A SCHOOL
At the time the original temple was built, it covered a site sufficiently large to house a school of priests and other small buildings which clustered about.
The construction of Kawaiahao Church was comparatively simple compared to the work of building the great terraces which led to the main platform at both ends of the rectangular platform and the wide stone steps along the entire length of the platform.
NEXT: Use of Heiau
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