Lapita Pottery Research Articles

Book Reviews*

MankindVolume 11, Issue 1 p. 63-80 Book Reviews* First published: June 1977 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1835-9310.1977.tb01168.x * All prices quoted in this section are publishers' recommendations only. AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Abstract Book reviewed in this article: Karavar: Masks and Power in a Melanesian Ritual. By Frederick Karl Errington. Tribes and Boundaries in Australia. Edited by Nicholas Peterson. Bengali Women. By Manisha Roy. World Conqueror and World Renouncer: A Study of Buddhism and Polity in Thailand Against a Historical Background. By S. J. Tambiah. Monks and Magic: An Analysis of Religious Ceremonies in Central Thailand. By B. J. Terwiel. Woman Cross Culturally: Change and Challenge. Edited by Ruby Rohrlich-Leavitt. War. Its Causes and Correlates. Edited by M. A. Nettleship, R. D. Givens and A. Nettleship. Discussions on War and Human Aggression. Edited by R. D. Givens and M. A. Nettleship. Transaction and Meaning. Directions in the Anthropology of Exchange and Symbolic Behaviour. Edited by Bruce Kapferer. Population, Ecology and Social Evolution. Edited by Steven Polgar. Yüan Porcelain and Stoneware. By Margaret Medley. The Art of Easter Island. By Thor Heyerdahl. The Lapita Pottery Style in Fiji and its Associations, By S. M. Mead, Lawrence Birks, Helen Birks and Elizabeth Shaw. People of the Eland. By Patricia Vinnicombe. The Cache River Archaeological Project: An Experiment in Contract Archaeology. Assembled by M. B. Schiffer and John H. House. Human Origins. Louis Leakey and the East African Evidence. Edited by G. LI. Isaac and E. R. McCown. Earliest Man and Environments in the Lake Rudolf Basin. Stratigraphy, Palaeoecology, and Evolution. Edited by Y. Coppens, F. C. Howell, G. LI. Isaac and R. E. F. Leakey. After the Australopithecines. Stratigraphy, Ecology and Culture in the Middle Pleistocene. Edited by K. W. Butzer and G. LI. Isaac. Archaeological Atlas of the World. By David and Ruth Whitehouse. Çatal Hüyük in Perspective. By Ian A. Todd. Black Viewpoints, The Aboriginal Experience. Edited by Colin Tatz. Volume11, Issue1June 1977Pages 63-80 RelatedInformation

Rethinking Polynesians origins: A West‐Polynesia Triple‐I Model

AbstractThe last twenty years has seen an apparent consensus that the immediate origins of Polynesian language, culture and biology lie solely with the Lapita peoples and cultures that settled Samoa and Tonga by 2700 years ago. We suggest that there is increasing evidence that does not sit well with this generally accepted view of Polynesian origins and thus we put forward an alternative model for consideration. Building on Green's suggestion of over 20 years ago, we propose that some of the ideas in his Triple‐I model (Green 1991a) might also be usefully applied to conceptualizing the processes involved in Polynesian origins. Specifically, we suggest that in addition to Lapita origins, there were significant later elements introduced to Polynesia that were fundamental to the development of Polynesian culture and biology prior to the settlement of East Polynesia. Current data suggest that some of these elements are shared with Micronesia and may be ultimately derived from post‐Lapita population movements, perhaps from Island Southeast Asia through the low islands of the Carolines, Kiribati and Tuvalu to West Polynesia.

Among Polynesia's first pots

X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy and petrographic thin section microscopy are applied to a sample of anomalous appearing Lapita pottery sherds from Nukuleka, the earliest archaeological site in Polynesia. Both analyses indicate non-local origins for the ceramic vessels, suggesting they were brought on founding canoes. Mineral inclusions in ceramic tempers eliminate sources to the west of Tonga in eastern Melanesia; rather the temper source is most probably a dacitic high island from a distant island arc of central Melanesia. Polynesian origins and settlement are issues more complex than currently recognized by the orthodox progressive settlement model for Lapita expansion across Oceania.

On the Rat Trail in Near Oceania: Applying the Commensal Model to the Question of the Lapita Colonization

Abstract: Presented here are the most recent results of our studies of Rattus exulans, one of the main commensal animals transported across the Pacific by Lapita peoples and their descendants. We sampled several locations in Near Oceania to determine distribution of R. exulans mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplotypes in the region. We also obtained data regarding distribution of other introduced Rattus species to several islands in the Bismarck Archipelago. Our results suggest that there were multiple introductions of R. exulans to the region, which may suggest a more complex history for Lapita populations in Near Oceania.

Geographical Influences on Settlement‐Location Choices by Initial Colonizers: a Case Study of the Fiji Islands

AbstractFrom 3200 to 2850 cal BP (1250–900 BCE), the Lapita people of the Bismarck Archipelago (Papua New Guinea) undertook voyages eastward that led to their colonization of the eastern outer Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa. The earliest (Lapita) settlements in Fiji were along the Rove Peninsula in southwest Viti Levu Island. At the time of colonization, sea level was 1.5 m higher than today. The Rove Peninsula was then a smaller island off the coast of larger Viti Levu, with a broad, fringing reef along its windward coasts, which was probably the main attraction for Lapita colonizers. As elsewhere during Lapita times in the western tropical Pacific Islands, settlement choice for the initial colonizers of the Fiji Islands was at one level driven by site access, at another by the presence of broad, fringing coral reefs suitable for marine foraging.The earliest settlement along the Rove Peninsula was at Bourewa, occupied first in 3050 cal BP (1100 BCE), where people lived in houses on stilt platforms built along the axis of a subtidal sand barrier; on one side was a broad coral reef, on the other a partly‐enclosed tidal inlet. There is no evidence that the Bourewa settlers practised horticulture or agriculture at this time, their subsistence being predominantly marine foraging. After some 300 years of following this subsistence strategy, the inhabitants of Bourewa responded to sea‐level fall and the arrival of cultivars (of taro and yam) by including horticulture. As sea level fell further, a total of 550 mm during the Lapita era, the tidal inlet dried up and marine‐food resources diminished to a point where the natural environment of the Rove Peninsula could no longer sustain its Lapita inhabitants. All Lapita sites in the area were abandoned about 2500 cal BP (550 BCE), at the same time as the Lapita culture, marked by the end of dentate‐pottery manufacture, came to an end in Fiji.

A short note on banana ( Musa) phytoliths in Lapita, immediately post-Lapita and modern period archaeological deposits from Vanuatu

We present results of phytolith analysis of deposits from three prehistoric settlement sites in Vanuatu: the small islands of Vao and Uripiv off the north east coast of the main island of Malekula and at Mafilau on the west coast of Epi Island. Samples from Vao Island coarsely encompass the period from Lapita times (c. 3000 BP) to the present. The data from this site suggest deforestation by people, with a decrease in palms and increase in grasses. The data from the three sites show evidence of an introduced cultigen during different prehistoric periods. Banana ( Musa) phytoliths were found in one recent Vao layer (500 BP-present) and in Mafilau layers, the latter representing the immediate post-Lapita period (c. 2800–2500 BP). This phytolith type was also found at Uripiv in Lapita layers (c. 3000–2700 BP). Banana phytoliths are diagnostic so their presence in archaeological deposits in Remote Oceania, outside their natural distribution, provides secure evidence of cultivation. This demonstrates the potential of this line of evidence for identifying both the cultigens transported by early colonists and subsequent plant introductions. The data provide the first direct evidence of banana cultivation at a Lapita site in Remote Oceania and support the contention that horticulture was an integral part of the Lapita Cultural Complex.

Faces of the Teouma Lapita People: Art, Accuracy and Facial Approximation

In 2008 we completed facial approximations of four individuals from the early Lapita Culture, a seafaring people who were the first to settle the islands of the Western Pacific circa 3000 years ago. Typically an approximation is performed as a 3D sculpture or using computer graphics. We chose to sketch what we have been able to determine from the remains because the artistic conventions of drawing work with visual perception in ways that are more complementary to the knowledge, theories and methods that make up the facial approximation of human remains.

Mid-Holocene Social Interaction in Melanesia: New Evidence from Hammer-Dressed Obsidian Stemmed Tools

The widespread distribution in Papua New Guinea of obsidian stemmed tools dated to the mid-Holocene has led scholars to postulate the existence of large interaction spheres. A newly reported artifact from Biak Island, West Papua provides the stimulus for reconsidering the role of this tool type in regional social interaction. The tool was hammer-dressed, a technique unknown for obsidian flaked tools elsewhere in the world and only rarely applied to obsidian artifacts in Melanesia. This new find closely resembles hammer-dressed obsidian stemmed tools from Garua Island, Papua New Guinea, but these are characterized by LA/ICPMS, PIXE-PGME, and INAA to the local Baki and Kutau-Bao obsidian sources in New Britain, Papua New Guinea, whereas the Biak tool is sourced to outcrops on Lou Island in Manus Province, Papua New Guinea. Hypotheses for functional, symbolic, and social roles of hammer-dressing are explored and evaluated on the basis of replication experiments and use-wear analyses. We argue that the complex and exceptionally rare technologies used for manufacturing hammer-dressed stemmed tools and applied to obsidian acquired from two widely separated obsidian sources substantially add to previous evidence for wide-scale social interaction during the mid-Holocene. The existence of these social networks might also have provided a mechanism for the rapid, extensive spread of innovations like Austronesian languages or Lapita pottery.

The use of strontium isotopes as an indicator of migration in human and pig Lapita populations in the Bismarck Archipelago, Papua New Guinea

This paper examines the potential use of strontium isotopes ( 87Sr/ 86Sr) for identifying migration within Lapita populations and their commensal animals, specifically the pig ( Sus scrofa). Lapita people (ca. 3300–2200 BP) were the initial colonists of the island groups to the east of the Solomon Islands, spreading from Papua New Guinea to Tonga and Samoa within a few centuries. Mobility is assumed to have been an important mechanism for maintaining cultural solidarity between Lapita communities. It has been previously argued that Lapita populations became progressively more sedentary over time after the initial colonising events. Two Lapita sites, Kamgot and Balbalankin, from the Anir Islands in the Bismarck Archipelago are included in the analysis and fall within the Early (ca. 3300–3000/2900 BP) and Middle (ca. 3000/2900–2700 BP) Lapita periods respectively. Ten tooth enamel samples from Lapita human and pig teeth as well as modern teeth were analysed for strontium isotopes. The mean values for the individuals from both sites were higher than the geological value obtained for the Anir Islands reflecting the incorporation of marine-derived strontium into their tooth enamel taken up in their diet. Although the sample sites have similar environments there was a difference between the local ranges of the strontium isotopic data. One Lapita age pig and one potentially modern pig from Kamgot fell well outside the local distribution for the site and were considered to be non-local. The extreme distribution of the two outliers suggests they came from two geographically separate locations. The results from the Anir Islands when compared with strontium results from other prehistoric Pacific Island populations suggest there is sufficient variation between island groups in terms of the biologically available strontium to justify further research. The present results are discussed in terms of using pigs as a proxy for human mobility as well as an indicator for the ‘local’ range of an archaeological population by treating human and pigs as separate populations. Strontium isotopes therefore provide the opportunity to investigate migration in Lapita populations on a finer scale than was previously possible.

The Temporal and Spatial Patterning of the Initial Settlement of Sāmoa

ABSTRACT Among the Lapita-bearing island groups of the Pacific, Sāmoa is unusual for having a relatively large land area but only one cultural deposit containing Lapita ceramics. Although it has been proposed that additional Lapita settlements may have been distributed along the coasts of much of the archipelago, investigations have not located these deposits nor reliably dated early Polynesian Plainware deposits older than ∼2500 cal BP. We combine a chronometric hygiene protocol and a GIS-based model of the paleoshoreline to examine the temporal and spatial distribution of pre-2000 cal BP archaeological deposits in the islands. Using the currently available suite of radiocarbon dates, it is apparent that only by ∼2300–2000 cal BP were a number of settlements occupied across the archipelago. Acknowledging that a variety of geomorphological processes have changed the Sāmoan landscape, we developed a GIS-based model of the ∼3000 cal BP coastlines of Tutuila and Aunu’u Islands, which suggest that suitable sandy coastal flats had not formed in many areas prior to ∼2500 cal BP, hence limiting settlement by Lapita peoples. Our methodology, which combines an evaluation of early radiocarbon dates with a GIS-based paleoshoreline model, offers a valuable means of incorporating temporal and spatial data for the examination of coastal and island colonization.

From Southeast Asia to the Pacific: Archaeological Perspectives on the Austronesian Expansion and the Lapita Cultural Complex: Edited by S. Chiu and C. Sand

From Southeast Asia to the Pacific: Archaeological Perspectives on the Austronesian Expansion and the Lapita Cultural Complex Edited by S. Chiu and C. Sand Center for Archaeological Studies, Academia Sinica, Taipei, 2007. ISBN 978-986-00-7567-0. Pp. 296. NTD800. This volume emerged out of a round-table meeting held at Academia Sinica (Taipei) in 2005. The editors. Scarlett Chiu and Christophe Sand, have clearly gone to great lengths to present an inclusive volume, with all papers presented in English and Chinese. Starting with a baseline acceptance of the Austronesian migration hypothesis, the various authors elaborate upon different geographic nodes. There are seven papers, with the first two focussed upon Taiwan (Liu and Tsang) with Tsang also discussing the northern Philippines. The other papers discuss the Philippines and Indonesia (Spriggs), the Bismarcks (Summerhayes), Vanuatu (Bedford), and Fiji-West Polynesia (Sand). The final paper is a bioarchaeological overview by Matisoo-Smith. It seems not the intention of the editors to present new research offerings, but rather to draw together and succinctly summarize the current state of knowledge. In this respect, the thoughtful and comprehensive offerings by Liu and Tsang are hugely valuable for the volume's English-speaking readership. Liu's paper was particularly compelling, with careful statements about prehistoric cultural diversity in Taiwan setting clear interpretative caveats on any conceptions of a unified Austronesian culture. Sand and Bedford offer useful reviews of their respective field areas, but the two stand-out papers of the Pacific section of the book are those by Summerhayes and Matisoo-Smith. The western Pacific can seem like a very pottery-focused place, and not without reason. While Snmmerhayes' review is largely focused on Lapita ceramics, his efforts to push beyond dentate-stamping to characterise Lapita ceramics at large is refreshing. The bioarchaeological overview offered by Lisa Matisoo-Smith is a wide-ranging summation of human and animal biological patterning across the region. Her knowledge of both the archaeological and biological issues and clear, incisive writing style make this an insightful, enjoyable and valuable contribution. This volume deals little with the higher levels of theoretical debate that have surrounded the Austronesian migration hypothesis over the decades, although whether this reflects caution or acceptance on the part of the editors is unclear. However from a geographical standpoint, the two regions that perhaps have the most to contribute are handled cursorily or not at all. …

Social networks and the spread of Lapita

Lapita pottery seems to arrive in the Pacific out of the blue, and signal a new social, economic or ideological network. The authors show that widespread interaction, articulated by obsidian tools and stone mortars and pestles decorated with various motifs, was already in existence in New Guinea and New Britain. These earlier networks provide a preview of the social interaction that was to light up with the advent of Lapita.

Correlation of environmental and cultural chronology in New Caledonia

AbstractA case study in New Caledonia explores the changes in the natural and cultural setting at the end of the Lapita period in the first millennium B.C. After the mid‐Holocene highstand, sea level fell about 1.5 m, thereby enlarging coastal plains, altering previous mangrove and marshy settings, and transforming nearshore marine environments. Many of these changes occurred gradually over several centuries, but the termination of finely decorated Lapita pottery coincided with the first signs of loss of coastal habitat optimal for marine‐based horticulturalists in the first millennium B.C. Organized village compounds and extensively cultivated landscapes emerged much later, in the first millennium A.D. The results suggest that, although the Lapita phenomenon represents the founding ancestry of Oceanic societies, it also represents the end of an era and way of life that eventually could not be maintained in a changing world. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Reconstructing the origin of the Lapita Cultural Complex: mtDNA analyses of East Sepik Province, PNG

The colonization of Oceania occurred in two waves. By 32,000 BP, humans had reached New Guinea and settled all intervisible islands east to the Solomon Islands. Around 3,500 BP, a distinct intrusive group from Southeast Asia reached coastal New Guinea, integrated their components with indigenous resources, and gave rise to the Lapita Cultural Complex. Within 2,500 years, Lapita and its descendant cultures colonized the Pacific. To uncover the origin of the Lapita Cultural Complex, we analyzed the hypervariable region I of the mitochondrial deoxyribonucleic acid (mtDNA) in 219 individuals from eight East Sepik Province villages: two villages in each of four environmental zones. Same-zone villages spoke different languages: one Austronesian and three Papuan (Arapesh, Abelam, and Boiken). Our analysis examined whether language or geography better predicted gene flow. In general, language better predicted genetic affinities. Boiken villages across all four zones showed no significant genetic difference (F(ST) P value > 0.05). In contrast, the Austronesian village was significantly different to most other villages (P < 0.05). Only the mountains and coast showed zonal gene flow (P > 0.05). We interpret the data to reflect limited gene flow inland by Austronesians overshadowed by a regional displacement by inland Boiken speakers migrating seaward. These results are consistent with oral histories and ethnographic accounts.

Archaeological Studies of the Middle and Late Holocene, Papua New Guinea. Part II. The Boduna Island (FEA) Lapita site

The FEA Lapita pottery site on Boduna Island, West New Britain, is one of the most important Lapita sites of the Talasea region. Archaeological investigations in 1980 and 1985 concluded that the site has been disturbed and its stratigraphic integrity is insecure. Fieldwork in 1989 targeted this issue, and further work in 2001 examined the island's geological history. This paper describes the 1989 study, and concludes from the pottery from the various excavations and surface collections that there is residual evidence for stylistic change through time. Use of the island began c. 3340–3000 cal. bp, but no firm date can be suggested for the end of pottery use on the island. The island seems too small to have supported permanent occupation without importation of food or use of land elsewhere for gardening, and might have been used only intermittently by local residents or visiting groups, perhaps for special social or ritual activities similar to the use suggested by Kirch for zone C at ECA/B in the Mussau group.

Archaeological Studies of the Middle and Late Holocene, Papua New Guinea. Part III. The Lagenda Lapita site (FCR/FCS), Talasea area

The FCR/FCS site has played a major role in defining the history of Lapita pottery in the Bismarck Archipelago region of Island Melanesia, but hitherto few details have been published about the site. As the site has been largely destroyed, information about it is dependent on surface collections only. The pottery includes a range of dentate-stamped and incised designs comparable with other Lapita sites of the region, particularly in the Arawe Islands of south New Britain. It lacks several features of form and decoration present in the surface collections of FEA on Boduna Island in the Talasea area and those excavated in Area B of the ECA site on Eloaua Island, Mussau group. The start and end dates for pottery use can only be defined by comparisons with other sites. These suggest a starting date of about 3300–3000 cal. bp and an end-date no later than 2900–2600 cal. bp, though several sherds may be of slightly later date.

Lapita and Later Archaeology of the Malolo and Mamanuca Islands, Fiji

The first populations in Fiji arrived approximately 3000 BP. These people made and used Lapita pottery and the similar decorative styles found in Fijian Lapita assemblages indicate widespread interaction or cultural transmission across the archipelago. Although a general picture of prehistoric cultural transmission in Fiji is emerging (e.g., Clark and Murray 2006), detailed patterns of transmission within and between populations are less well known. WithintheYasawaIslandsofwesternFiji

Special section on volcanic glass] THE CONTRIBUTION OF USE-WEAR/RESIDUE STUDIES OF OBSIDIAN ARTEFACTS FOR UNDERSTANDING CHANGES IN SETTLEMENT AND SUBSISTENCE PATTERNS IN WEST NEW BRITAIN, PAPUA NEW GUINEA

This paper considers how patterns in use-wear/residues relate to debates about the nature of the day-to-day lives of the people who created the Lapita Cultural Complex. Changes in subsistence and settlement patterns have often been proposed as being the result of the introduction of new kinds of agriculture to the Bismarck Archipelago by people using Lapita pottery (Green 2002:95-120; Kirch 1997:45-52; Spriggs 1997:67-106). In contrast, several recent use-wear/residue studies of stone tools in West New Britain, Papua New Guinea have reconstructed a complex pattern with a much longer term trend toward the intensification of resource exploitation and a decrease in mobility (Fullagar 1992:135-43; Torrence 1992:11126; Torrence et al. 2000:225-44). To further examine the impact of Lapita on subsistence and settlement patterns, a use-wear/residue study was made of a large number of obsidian artefacts excavated from two test pits at the FAO site on Garua Island. The sample included artefacts dating from both before and during the time of Lapita pottery. My preliminary analyses indicate there were no differences between these periods in terms of the kinds of tool use or the nature of the activities apparent at the site.

Lapita period modelled ceramic face from New Caledonia

ABSTRACT I report here a new Lapita period clay modelled face from the Lapita (WKO013A) site. This is similar to the seven Lapita period faces already known. I discuss the role that such faces could have played in Lapita culture and suggest they could have been made by distinct groups.

Phylogeny and ancient DNA of Sus provides insights into neolithic expansion in Island Southeast Asia and Oceania.

Human settlement of Oceania marked the culmination of a global colonization process that began when humans first left Africa at least 90,000 years ago. The precise origins and dispersal routes of the Austronesian peoples and the associated Lapita culture remain contentious, and numerous disparate models of dispersal (based primarily on linguistic, genetic, and archeological data) have been proposed. Here, through the use of mtDNA from 781 modern and ancient Sus specimens, we provide evidence for an early human-mediated translocation of the Sulawesi warty pig (Sus celebensis) to Flores and Timor and two later separate human-mediated dispersals of domestic pig (Sus scrofa) through Island Southeast Asia into Oceania. Of the later dispersal routes, one is unequivocally associated with the Neolithic (Lapita) and later Polynesian migrations and links modern and archeological Javan, Sumatran, Wallacean, and Oceanic pigs with mainland Southeast Asian S. scrofa. Archeological and genetic evidence shows these pigs were certainly introduced to islands east of the Wallace Line, including New Guinea, and that so-called "wild" pigs within this region are most likely feral descendants of domestic pigs introduced by early agriculturalists. The other later pig dispersal links mainland East Asian pigs to western Micronesia, Taiwan, and the Philippines. These results provide important data with which to test current models for human dispersal in the region.