Re: Polynesian canoes (Re: Rat genes solve mystery of great Pacific odyssey

From: Duncan Craig (dunkers_at_pacbell.net)
Date: 07/24/04 

Date: 24 Jul 2004 02:15:54 -0700

benlizross <benlizro@ihug.co.nz> wrote in message news:<4101B4F8.4AED@ihug.co.nz>...
> Duncan Craig wrote:
> >
> > pashby@blueyonder.co.ruk (Peter Ashby) wrote in message news:<1ghdcy9.1jtz2n4nwq9zyN%pashby@blueyonder.co.ruk>...
> > > G Horvat <g-horvat@shaw.ca> wrote:
> > >
> > > > >There is, however, to my mind, one possibility.
> > > > >That either Lapita, Melanesian or Polynesian in their exploration and
> > > > >settlement of the Pacific Ocean landed at places on the American
> > > > >mainland and their genes were added to the local populations.
> > > >
> > > > The earliest reported ancient New World haplogroup B sequence dates to
> > > > 8,000 BP (Hourglass man, Colorado) and, therefore, predates
> > > > Polynesians.
> > >
> > > And any known deep ocean technology. So how many other ways are there to
> > > get from Asia to America as well as Asia to SE Asia without being too
> > > silly?
> > >
> > > I agree that it makes sense for geneticists to steer clear of the whole
> > > 'Polynesian' or 'Caucasian' looking skull thing, that does not mean it
> > > is sensible to work as though there is no other evidence of prehistoric
> > > population movements. If you find a haplotype in Tierra del Fuego and
> > > Tasmania do you immediately tell archaelogists that they must have
> > > missed a major ancient deep ocean capability or do you try and track the
> > > haplotype up the Americas and down through SE Asia to Australia?
> > >
> > > Peter
> >
> > I Don't think one can dismiss an ancient deep ocean capability. There
> > was an extensive coastal network that exhibited some deep sea
> > capability.
> > See Title: TAIWAN, COASTAL SOUTH CHINA AND NORTHERN VIET NAM AND
> > THE NUSANTAO MARITIME TRADING NETWORK
> > Author(s): Wilhelm G. Solheim II
> > Source: Journal of East Asian Archaeology Volume: 2 Number: 1
> > Page: 273 -- 284
> > and:
> >
> > Title: Maritime Adaptations in Prehistoric Southeast Chine:
> > Implications for the Problem of Austronesian Expansion
> > Author(s): Tsang Cheng-Hwa
> > Source: Journal of East Asian Archaeology Volume: 3 Number: 1
> > Page: 15 -- 46
> >
> > I also recall an article about the New Hebrides obsidian trade that
> > was much older than the 7000-8000 BP discussed above.
> >
> > Duncan Craig
>
> There was nobody in the New Hebrides (aka Vanuatu) at 7000-8000 BP.
> You may be thinking of New Britain.
> One item that has been discussed here is the appearance of obsidian from
> Manus at a site in Borneo, the date IIRC somewhere around 6000 BP.
> But none of this (including the alleged Nusantao network) requires more
> than coasting or hops of up to 200 km from island to island.
>
> Ross Clark

 Hi Ross,
Yeh, you're right. I get those neo-colonial names mixed up; New
Hebrides, New Britain, New Jersey....
The hour glass man aside, I take it that you would disagree with this
statement
from Tsang Cheng-Was paper:
         
               "Some linguists (e.g. Dyan 1971,Pawley and Green 1973,
Blust 1976)have inferred from the vocabulary of the proto-Austronesian
languages that the ancestors of the Austronesians lived in a tropical
coastal environmentand that the populations of that time already
cultivated yam, rice taro, millet and fruit but also practiced hunting
and fishing; and their material culture comprised ceramics as well as
stone, wood and bamboo artifacts, weaving, pile dwellings, tapa, the
extensive use of seashells and that they possessed a highly developed
sea-faring technique. Such linguistic inference has already to a large
extent been borne out by archaeological work along Chinas southeastern
coast; at
the same time, it can serve to corroborate my emphasis on marine
adaptations."

  It's difficult to define when island and coastal hopping becomes
"a highly developed sea-faring technique". Buckminster Fuller used to
speak quite a bit about how seafaring, by its very do-or-die
multi-disciplinary nature, developed rapidly and exponetially.
  So is the work of Dyan, Pawley, Green, Blust outdated? or is it
misapplied?

Duncan Craig

Relevant Pages