Posted on 09/11/2004 2:39:03 PM PDT by blam
The Pacific's Pompeii
11.09.2004
Stuart Bedford displays a piece of Lapita pottery. Picture/ Amos Chapple
When New Zealand archaeologist Dr Stuart Bedford was handed a large piece of ancient broken pottery in Vanuatu this year he thought it was a joke. At Port Vila for a wedding, all thoughts of the nuptials deserted him as he stared at the piece of highly decorated Lapita pottery. "I thought I must have been in another country," he said.
Finds of Lapita, the distinctive patterned pottery that marks the movement of the first settlers into eastern Melanesia and western Polynesia, are relatively uncommon on Vanuatu's main island, Efate. This piece was of exceptional quality.
It had been accidentally unearthed by a bulldozer driver who was working an area last year about 10 minutes' drive southeast of Port Vila. He also noticed a lot of shellfish, cooking stones, some human bones and other broken pottery.
Nothing further happened until the driver was chatting to a Vanuatu Cultural Centre field worker who knew about Lapita after being on a training programme run by Bedford.
Bedford wasted no time in getting to the site, called Teouma. On first inspection he found a range of distinctive vessels represented by sherds eroding out of the area the digger had cut into. "It was clearly a very, very early and well-preserved site."
Though the site has still to be carbon dated, the pottery style showed it was at least 3200BP (before present, as dated from 1950). But the pottery was only the start. Bedford, a New Zealand Historic Places Trust archaeologist and research fellow at Auckland University, was soon organising an excavation, funded by the Pacific Biological Foundation and the Royal Society of New Zealand through a Marsden Faststart grant.
The site, buried under volcanic ash, was partly excavated in July by a team co-led by Bedford and Professor Matthew Spriggs from the Australian National University, in collaboration with the Vanuatu Cultural Centre.
Because of island uplift and silt infill from the large Teouma River, the site of the once-coastal settlement was now about 800m inland and 7m above sea level. Bedford estimates it was buried by a volcanic eruption from Nguna Island to the north 2300 years ago, about 400 years after the village was deserted.
"It can be likened, in part, to the Pompeii of the Pacific."
Most excitingly, the site contained a burial area which held the skeletal remains of the Lapita people, the first inhabitants of Vanuatu, who subsequently went on to settle New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa.
The remains were well-preserved because of the island uplift and later volcanic eruptions, which buried the site with ash up to one metre in some places. It represented the oldest and most intact burial site discovered in the Pacific. "It is the first time group burials of this age have been associated with Lapita."
The pottery was the archaeological signature of human colonisation of the Pacific beyond the main Solomon Islands chain more than 3000 years ago - about when the Vanuatu site was inhabited, making the discovery significant. "Why has this site caused a sensation? Because of the burials."
Bedford said since the first European explorers arrived in the region, people had wondered where the Pacific Islanders came from. "Now, after decades of research we finally have a chance to establish the profiles of a group of some of the earliest settlers."
Lapita pottery has been found from the Bismarck Archipelago off Papua New Guinea to Samoa and Tonga, and is linked through human settlement with the spread of domestic animals, such as pigs and chickens, and horticulture.
Fifty years of research have so far uncovered about 200 recorded Lapita sites, but often the predominantly coastal sites were in poor condition. Bedford said other previously excavated Lapita burials dated to some 700 or 800 years later than those found at Teouma and, of those, only two other sites had anything more than one or two burials or parts of skeletons.
"This site holds the missing section of the necessary information about the human map of the Pacific. These are the first burials discovered from the first human settlement of remote Oceania, the vast region that lies beyond the main Solomons chain."
The 20sq/m excavation revealed 13 headless skeletons, 12 adults and a youth, and in another spot the remains of a baby's skeleton which included cranial fragments.
The skeletons were probably buried intact and the skulls removed after decomposition, as a few teeth were found where the heads would have been. The skulls would have been displayed elsewhere, as was common practice in much of the Melanesian region until the arrival of Christianity, Bedford said.
Three skulls were eventually found during the last week of the excavation, grouped together, enclosed in what looked like a small rock wall feature and above the chest of one skeleton. Only basic grave goods were associated with the burials, such as shellfish being placed in the pelvic region or, in one case, under the femur.
Bedford said it appeared the site had been occupied for up to 600 years but with probably only a small initial founding population, possibly only two or three extended families.
The pots associated with the burial area were a distinct form of cylinder decorated with face-like motifs, and were part of some sort of ceremonial process. "The pottery is extremely well preserved. Some of it looks like it was discarded just last week."
Last year, during excavations at Vao Island in northern Vanuatu, Bedford also found the first example of painted Lapita. "This suggests the decorated sections of pots were completely painted over but, apart from sherds that are deposited in the most ideal conditions for preservation, the paint does not survive."
Bedford said the Teouma site also contained obsidian flakes from New Guinea and the remains of food, pigs, chicken, shellfish, fish and fruit bats. The find was like "winning the jackpot" and would fill in a crucial missing portion of the Pacific story.
For decades, researchers have tried to explain the cultural and physical differences of people across the Pacific. Some argue the Lapita people were ancestral Polynesians from Southeast Asia who migrated east, some groups settling long term on islands, while others carried on. They believe Lapita people were the ancestors of the inhabitants of eastern Melanesia who now look different because of later waves of migration.
Other academics believe Polynesians may have come later and were not associated with the Lapita people. Without physical remains of the early migrants the verdict is still open.
Bedford said it was expected the bones of these Lapita people at Teouma would yield ancient DNA and point to links with present Pacific populations. The DNA analysis would be carried out at the anthropology department at Auckland University.
Analysis of the bones using different techniques is likely to reveal information about the health of the people and their diets.
Bedford said there would be at least two more seasons of excavation and further study of the material involving experts from New Zealand and around the world.
Emeritus Professor Roger Green of the university's anthropology department said it was a wonderful find that would help to settle debate over the origins of Pacific people.
He believed the skeletal analysis would show they were Oceanic paleo-people, the great ancestors of Polynesians and also the indigenous people of Fiji, Vanuatu and New Caledonia.
later
There is no evidence of great conflict between the Melanesian / Australian people and the Mongolian Southeast Asian people perhaps originating in the Mekong and Red River drainage. In fact, there is every indication that without population pressures such as those in the Mesopotainian / Anatolian region, the two "races" merged or at least coexisted in the areas of present day Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippines.
Thanks.
What an exciting find!
BTTT
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"Analysis of the bones using different techniques.."
Muttly volunteer to give bones his Official Taste Test, if that would help, as long as they're not those crunchy "fossil" thingies.
It would help Muttly, anyway.
It's got a Celtic Cross look to it. :')
It DO !
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