Lapita sites of the Bismarck Archipelago

C. Gosden; J. Allen; W. Ambrose; D. Anson; J. Golson; R. Green; P. Kirch; I. Lilley; J. Specht; M. Spriggs

doi:10.1017/s0003598x00076559

Lapita sites of the Bismarck Archipelago

Antiquity ◽

10.1017/s0003598x00076559 ◽

1989 ◽

Vol 63 (240) ◽

pp. 561-586 ◽

Cited By ~ 50

Author(s):

C. Gosden ◽

J. Allen ◽

W. Ambrose ◽

D. Anson ◽

J. Golson ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Western Pacific ◽

Bismarck Archipelago ◽

The Western Pacific

The Lapita questionThe prehistory of the western Pacific has, for the last 30 years, been dominated by the problem of the origins of the present Polynesian and Melanesian cultures (Terrell 1988). In 1961 Golson drew attention to the distribution of highly decorated Lapita pottery, now known to date from between 3500 BP and 2000 BP, which crossed the present-day division between Melanesia and Polynesia. Furthermore, sites with Lapita pottery represented the first evidence of occupation on Tonga and Samoa, the most westerly Polynesian islands from which it was thought that the rest of Polynesia was colonized. Lapita pottery came to be associated with a movement of people from Melanesia to Polynesia and was seen to represent the founding group ancestral to later Polynesian groups.

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Early setlement of Island Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific

Antiquity ◽

10.1017/s0003598x00076535 ◽

1989 ◽

Vol 63 (240) ◽

pp. 547-547 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Matthew Spriggs ◽

Christopher Chippindale

Keyword(s):

Southeast Asia ◽

New Guinea ◽

Western Pacific ◽

Tropical Islands ◽

Island Southeast Asia ◽

Early Settlement ◽

Bismarck Archipelago ◽

The Western Pacific

It was a quarter of a century ago that ANTIQUITY first announced the ‘Pleistocene colonization of Australia’, when Mulvaney (1964) reported secure dates before 12,000 b.p. from Kenniff Cave, Queensland. The last three years alone have seen dates from New Guinea of around 40,000 b.p., early dates from the offshore islands of the Bismarck Archipelago, and dates from Australia itself that show a rapid colonization of both the arid central desert and cold, wet Tasmania – environments very different from the tropical islands of Southeast Asia, whence the first Australasian populations must surely have come. It is a record with great implications for early settlement elsewhere, most plainly of the American continents.

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The nature of prehistoric obsidian importation to Anir and the development of a 3,000 year old regional picture of obsidian exchange within the Bismarck Archipelago, Papua New Guinea. In A Pacific Odyssey: Archaeology and Anthropology in the Western Pacific. Papers in Honour of Jim Specht

Records of the Australian Museum Supplement ◽

10.3853/j.0812-7387.29.2004.1411 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 29 ◽

pp. 145-156 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

Glenn R. Summerhayes

Keyword(s):

Papua New Guinea ◽

New Guinea ◽

Western Pacific ◽

Bismarck Archipelago ◽

The Western Pacific

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Ancient DNA from Guam and the Peopling of the Pacific

10.1101/2020.10.14.339135 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Irina Pugach ◽

Alexander Hübner ◽

Hsiao-chun Hung ◽

Matthias Meyer ◽

Mike T. Carson ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Ancient Dna ◽

New Guinea ◽

The Philippines ◽

Western Pacific ◽

Source Population ◽

Mariana Islands ◽

Close Link ◽

Bismarck Archipelago ◽

The Western Pacific ◽

Lines Of Evidence

AbstractHumans reached the Mariana Islands in the western Pacific by ~3500 years ago, contemporaneous with or even earlier than the initial peopling of Polynesia. They crossed more than 2000 km of open ocean to get there, whereas voyages of similar length did not occur anywhere else until more than 2000 years later. Yet, the settlement of Polynesia has received far more attention than the settlement of the Marianas. There is uncertainty over both the origin of the first colonizers of the Marianas (with different lines of evidence suggesting variously the Philippines, Indonesia, New Guinea, or the Bismarck Archipelago) as well as what, if any, relationship they might have had with the first colonizers of Polynesia. To address these questions, we obtained ancient DNA data from two skeletons from the Ritidian Beach Cave site in northern Guam, dating to ~2200 years ago. Analyses of complete mtDNA genome sequences and genome-wide SNP data strongly support ancestry from the Philippines, in agreement with some interpretations of the linguistic and archaeological evidence, but in contradiction to results based on computer simulations of sea voyaging. We also find a close link between the ancient Guam skeletons and early Lapita individuals from Vanuatu and Tonga, suggesting that the Marianas and Polynesia were colonized from the same source population, and raising the possibility that the Marianas played a role in the eventual settlement of Polynesia.Significance StatementWe know far more about the settlement of Polynesia than we do about the settlement of the Mariana Islands in the western Pacific. There is debate over where people came from to get to the Marianas, with various lines of evidence pointing to the Philippines, Indonesia, New Guinea, or the Bismarck Archipelago, as well as uncertainty over how the ancestors of the present Mariana Islanders, the Chamorro, might be related to Polynesians. We analyzed ancient DNA from Guam, from two skeletons dating to ~2200 years ago, and found that their ancestry is linked to the Philippines. Moreover, they are closely-related to ancient Polynesians from Vanuatu and Tonga, suggesting that the early Mariana Islanders may have been involved in the colonization of Polynesia.

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