Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-v2bm5 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-09T06:18:22.288Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Palaeoenvironmental evidence for human colonization of remote Oceanic islands

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Patrick V. Kirch  and
Joanna Ellison
Patrick V. Kirch
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley CA 94720, USA
Joanna Ellison
Affiliation:
Department of Biogeography & Geomorphology, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Not every first footstep on a virgin shore leaves enduring trace, nor every first human settlement an enduring deposit that chances to survive, and then chances to be observed archaeologically. Good environmental evidence from Mangaia Island, central East Polynesia, gives — it is contended — a fairer picture of the human invasion of remote Oceania than the short and sceptical chronology recently published in ANTIQUITY.

Type
Papers
Information
Antiquity , Volume 68 , Issue 259 , June 1994 , pp. 310 - 321
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 1994

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, A. 1991. The chronology of colonization in New Zealand, Antiquity 65: 767–95.Google Scholar
Barrau, J. 1961. Subsistence agriculture in Polynesia and Micronesia. Honolulu (HI): Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Bulletin 223.Google Scholar
Bayliss-Smith, T. Bedford, R. Brookfield, H. & Latham, M. 1988. Islands, islanders, and the world. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Beggerly, P.E.P. 1990. Kahana Valley, Hawai’i: a geo-morphic artifact: a study of the inter-relationships among geomorphic structures, natural processes, and ancient Hawaiian technology, land use, and settlement patterns. (Ph.D dissertation, University of Hawaii.)Ann Arbor (MI): University Microfilms.Google Scholar
Carlquist, S. 1974. Island biology. New York (NY): Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Crosby, A.W. 1986. Ecological imperialism: the biological expansion of Europe, 900–1900. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Culliney, J.L. 1988. Islands in a far sea: nature and man in Hawaii. San Francisco (CA): Sierra Club Books.Google Scholar
Dawson, S. 1990. A chemical and mineralogical study of a sediment core from Lake Tiriara, Mangaia, southern Cook Islands with special reference to the impact of early man. (B.Sc Hons, dissertation, University of Hull).Google Scholar
Elliot, M.B. Flenley, J.R. & Sutton, D.G. In press. Late Holocene palaeoecology of the Lake Tauanui Catchment, Northland, New Zealand, Journal of Paleolimnology.Google Scholar
Elliot, M.B. Striewski, B. Flenley, J.R. & Sutton, D.G. 1993. Date of colonization of Northland, Part I, Year 1. Report on work done in 1992. Massey University.Google Scholar
Ellison, J. 1994. Paleo-lake and swamp stratigraphic records of Holocene vegetation and sea–level changes, Mangaia, Cook Islands, Pacific Science 48: 1–15.Google Scholar
Faegri, K. & Iversen, J. 1972. Textbook of pollen analysis. New York (NY): Hafner.Google Scholar
Flenley, J.R. King, A.S.M. Jackson, J. Chew, C. Teler, J.T. & Prentice, M.E. 1991. The late Quaternary vegeta–tional and climatic history of Easter Island, Journal of Quaternary Science 6: 85–115.Google Scholar
Fosberg, F.R. 1963a. The island ecosystem, in Fosberg, F.R. (ed.), Man’s place in the island ecosystem: 1–7. Honolulu (HI): Bishop Museum Press.Google Scholar
Fosberg, F.R. 1963b. Disturbance in island ecosystems, in Gressitt, J.L. (ed.), Pacific Basin biogeography: 557–61. Honolulu (HI): Bishop Museum Press.Google Scholar
French-Wright, R. 1983. Proto-oceanic horticultural practices. (Unpublished MA thesis, University of Auckland, New Zealand).Google Scholar
Green, R.C. 1991. Near and remote Oceania — disestablishing ‘Melanesia’ in culture history, in Pawley, A. (ed.), Man and a half: essays in Pacific anthropology and ethnobiology in honour of Ralph Bulmer: 491–502. Auckland: Polynesian Society.Google Scholar
Hather, J. & Kirch, P.V. 1991. Prehistoric sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) from Mangaia Island, central Polynesia, Antiquity 65: 887–93.Google Scholar
Hope, G.S. & Sfriggs, M.J.T. 1982. A preliminary pollen sequence from Aneityum Island, Southern Vanuatu, Bulletin of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association 3: 88–94.Google Scholar
Hunt, T.L. & Holsen, R.M. 1991. An early radiocarbon chronology for the Hawaiian Islands: a preliminary analysis, Asian Perspectives 30: 147–61.Google Scholar
Irwin, G. 1981. How Lapita lost its pots: the question of continuity in the colonization of Polynesia, Journal of the Polynesian Society 90: 481–94.Google Scholar
Irwin, G. 1992. The prehistoric exploration and colonisation of the Pacific. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
James, H. 1991. Prehistoric extinctions of Hawaiian birds: an update. Paper presented in the symposium Environmental and Landscape Change in Prehistoric Oceania. XVIIth Pacific Science Congress, Honolulu (HI).Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. 1982. The impact of the prehistoric Polynesian on the Hawaiian ecosystem, Pacific Science 36: 1–14.Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. 1986. Rethinking East Polynesian prehistory, Journal of the Polynesian Society 95: 9–40.Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. 1991. Polynesian agricultural systems, in Cox, P.A. and Banack, S.A. (ed.), Islands, plants, and Polynesians: an introduction to Polynesian ethnobotany 113–34. Portland (OR): Dioscorides Press.Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. Flenley, J.R. & Steadman, D.W. 1991. A radiocarbon chronology for human–induced environmental change on Mangaia, southern Cook Islands, Radiocarbon 33: 317–28.Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. Flenley, J.R. Steadman, D.W. Lamont, F. & Dawson, S. 1992. Ancient environmental degradation: prehistoric human impacts to an island ecosystem: Mangaia, Central Polynesia, National Geographic Research and Exploration 8: 166–79.Google Scholar
Kirch, P.V. & Green, R.C. 1987. History, phylogeny, and evolution in Polynesia, Current Anthropology 28: 431–56.Google Scholar
Lamont, F. 1990. A 6,000 year pollen record from Mangaia, Cook Islands, South Pacific: evidence for early human impact. (B.Sc (Hons) dissertation, University of Hull).Google Scholar
Lepofsky, D. 1994a. Prehistoric human-induced ecosystem changes and agricultural production in the Opunohu Valley, Society Islands. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Ethnobiology.Google Scholar
Lepofsky, D. 1994b. Prehistoric agriculture in the Society Islands. (Ph.D dissertation, University of California, Berkeley (CA)).Google Scholar
Marshall, P. 1927. Geology of Mangaia. Honolulu (HI): Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Bulletin 36.Google Scholar
Merlin, M.D. 1991. Woody vegetation on the raised coral limestone island of Mangaia, southern Cook Islands, Pacific Science 45: 131–51.Google Scholar
Olson, S.L. & James, H.F. 1984. The role of the Polynesians in the extinction of the avifauna of the Hawaiian Islands, in Martin, P.S. & Klein, R.G. (ed.), Quaternary extinctions: 768–80. Tucson (AZ): University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Pirazzoli, P.A. & Montaggioni, L.F. 1988. Holocene sea-level changes in French Polynesia, Paleogeography, Paleoclimatology, Paleoecology 68: 153–75.Google Scholar
Sinoto, Y.H. 1970. An archaeologically–based assessment of the Marquesas Islands as a dispersal center in East Polynesia, in Green, R.C. & Kelly, M. (ed.), Studies in Oceanic culture history 1: 105–32. Honolulu (HI): Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Pacific Anthropological Records 11.Google Scholar
Spriggs, M. 1986. Landscape, land use and political transformation in southern Melanesia, in Kirch, P.V. (ed.), Island Societies: archaeological approaches to evolution and transformation: 6–19. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Spriggs, M. 1989. The dating of the island Southeast Asian Neolithic: an attempt at Chronometrie hygiene and lin-guistic correlation, Antiquity 63: 587–613.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spriggs, M. 1990. Dating Lapita: another view, in Spriggs, M. (ed.), Lapita design, form and composition: proceedings of the Lapita Design Workshop, Canberra, 1988: 6–27. Canberra: Department of Prehistory, Australian National University. Occasional Papers in Prehistory 19.Google Scholar
Spriggs, M. & Anderson, A. 1993. Late colonization of East Polynesia, Antiquity 67: 200–17.Google Scholar
Steadman, D.W. 1989. Extinction of birds in Eastern Polynesia: a review of the record, and comparisons with other Pacific Island groups, Journal of Archaeological Science 16: 177–205.Google Scholar
Steadman, D.W. & Kirch, P.V. 1990. Prehistoric extinction of birds on Mangaia, Cook Islands, Polynesia, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 87: 9605–9.Google Scholar
Stoddart, D.R. Spencer, T. & Scoffin, T.P. 1985. Reef growth and karst erosion on Mangaia, Cook Islands: a reinterpretation, Zeitschrift für Geomorphologie 57: 121–40.Google Scholar
Stuiver, M. & Reimer, P. 1986. A computer program for radiocarbon age calibration, in Stuiver, M. & Kra, R.S. (ed.), Proceedings of the 12th International 14C Conference, Radiocarbon 28 (2B): 1022–30.Google Scholar
Sutton, D.G. 1987. A paradigmatic shift in Polynesian prehistory: implications for New Zealand, New Zealand Journal of Archaeology 9: 135–55.Google Scholar
Terrell, J. 1986. Prehistory in the Pacific islands. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Williamson, M. 1981. Island populations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar