Palau's Ancient Earthworks - Monumentality

Hidden beneath thick tropical vegetation on these Micronesian islands lie some of the world’s most impressive ancient monumental architecture. Innovative LiDAR technology was harnessed to visually strip away the dense canopy exposing the vast extent, enormous size, and diverse shapes of the island nation’s earthwork landscape.

With sophisticated construction techniques and sustainably used for over a millennium, Palau’s awe-inspiring terraces represent a powerful, wealthy, and highly organized society with a deep knowledge of engineering, architecture, soil mechanics, and hydrology.

The video is part of the project Preserving the Legacy of a Monumental Earthwork Landscape: Oral Traditions, Remote Sensing, and Community Engagement in Palau. It is funded by the U.S. Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservationawarded to Dr. Jolie Liston and the Coral Reef Research Foundation.

About the Filmmaker

Dr. Jolie Liston has conducted archaeological research and cultural resource management projects within Micronesia and Hawai‘i for over 30 years. A long-term resident of Palau, she specializes in community-based heritage preservation, education, and interpretation focusing on the interrelationships between environment and culture. Although her primary passion is exploring the mysteries of Palau's monumental earthwork landscape, Liston served as Chairperson for the community-orientated Pacific Island Archaeology Conference on Palau and was instrumental in the nomination of Palau’s Rock Islands Southern Lagoon as a mixed natural and cultural World Heritage Site. 

On Guam, she led the multi-disciplinary project Legacy of Tarague Embayment and Its Inhabitants that relied on historical ecology, archaeology, and oral history. Partnering with Dr. Kelly Marsh, she developed the Latte in the Mariana Islands: Art, Icon, Archaeology community education book and exhibits.Since 2006, Liston has participated in the missions of Project Recover, LLC. to locate World War II American servicemen still missing in the jungles of Micronesia.