The Australian Research Council (ARC) Laureate Project, The Collective Biography of Archaeology in the Pacific or ‘CBAP’ was funded between 2015-2020 and, due to COVID disruptions, associated events ...continued until the end of 2022. Some of the initial aims included: to create a sub-field of the history of Pacific archaeology; to re-define the development of Australian archaeology within its wider Oceanic context; to re-discover the contribution of both French and German scholars; to recover the considerable amount of archaeological excavation that took place in the Pacific from the 1870s until WWII; to re-conceptualise the perennial issue of trans-Oceanic cultural contacts; to redress the neglect of the role of Indigenous Pacific scholars and of women in archaeology; and to re-engage with descendant communities in the light of our research and its findings. The paper discusses the project’s results in light of these and other emerging aims during the last seven years. It also provides a comprehensive bibliography of publications by the Project’s main contributors.
With a cultural and linguistic origin in Island Southeast Asia the Lapita expansion is thought to have led ultimately to the Polynesian settlement of the east Polynesian region after a time of ...mixing/integration in north Melanesia and a nearly 2,000-y pause in West Polynesia. One of the major achievements of recent Lapita research in Vanuatu has been the discovery of the oldest cemetery found so far in the Pacific at Teouma on the south coast of Efate Island, opening up new prospects for the biological definition of the early settlers of the archipelago and of Remote Oceania in general. Using craniometric evidence from the skeletons in conjunction with archaeological data, we discuss here four debated issues: the Lapita–Asian connection, the degree of admixture, the Lapita–Polynesian connection, and the question of secondary population movement into Remote Oceania.
This paper challenges the oft-repeated conventional story of the beginning of ‘modern’ Australian archaeology, seen as the era of the professional archaeologist that succeeded an undisciplined phase ...of indiscriminate collecting of skulls and stone artefacts by ‘amateurs’ who, on the whole, believed that Indigenous Australians had arrived on the continent so recently that any excavation of archaeological sites would be pointless. Cambridge-trained John Mulvaney’s excavations at Fromm’s Landing on the Murray River in South Australia commencing in January 1956 have been seen most recently as marking the decisive break, one between ‘good’, professional and ethical archaeology and the earlier ‘bad’ amateur period of mere antiquarianism, ignoring the concerns of and trampling upon the rights of Indigenous Australians in the spirit of triumphant colonialism. This contrast is inaccurate, overdrawn, and ignores the positive contribution of many earlier conscientious scholars; labelling all of them as ‘amateurs’ confuses rather than enlightens the history of Australian archaeology.
Objects have many stories to tell. The stories of their makers and their uses. Stories of exchange, acquisition, display and interpretation. This book is a collection of essays highlighting some of ...the collections, and their object biographies, that were displayed in the Uncovering Pacific Pasts: Histories of Archaeology in Oceania (UPP) exhibition. The exhibition, which opened on 1 March 2020, sought to bring together both notable and relatively unknown Pacific material culture and archival collections from around the globe, displaying them simultaneously in their home institutions and linked online at www.uncoveringpacificpasts.org. Thirty‑eight collecting institutions participated in UPP, including major collecting institutions in the United Kingdom, continental Europe and the Americas, as well as collecting institutions from across the Pacific.
While it is certainly the case that Indigenous Australians have suffered the consequences of being treated in an objectifying and derogatory fashion during the nineteenth and much of the twentieth ...centuries by archaeologists and others, they were not mere observers of the creation of a 65,000-year narrative of their history that has become important in the modern story of Australia. Rather, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians were involved in illuminating knowledge of Australia’s deep history from at least as early as the 1830s. This story has not been told up to now. By examining the extent of early Indigenous involvement in the development of Australian archaeology, this paper demonstrates that far from archaeological research having been something simply imposed upon Aboriginal people, their intellectual property has been critical in all stages of its development. At a time when serious gaps are being identified in the ways the history of Australian archaeology has been presented, it is an urgent task to insert this hidden history of Indigenous involvement in Australia’s archaeology. Reading ‘against the grain’, we seek to bring to the fore the role of Aboriginal interlocutors whose opinions and expertise were constantly sought by early archaeologists grappling with establishing archaeological frameworks to understand the deep history of a continent, Deconstructing the current master narratives of the history of Australian archaeology will have significant ramifications for how the discipline is taught and practiced, and for the general public’s appreciation of the role of Indigenous Australians in shaping the nation’s history.
The paper introduces a recently commenced five-year research project on the history of Pacific archaeology, the Collective Biography of Archaeology in the Pacific (CBAP) Project. The justification ...for the project, the background to it, its aims and some discussion of its initial stages and anticipated outcomes are given. At time of writing CBAP has been going for barely a year and so only a brief mention will be made of the research carried out so far during the initial establishment period.
Remote Oceania was colonized ca. 3000 BP by populations associated with the Lapita Cultural Complex, marking a major event in the prehistoric settlement of the Pacific Islands. Although over 250 ...Lapita sites have been found throughout the Western Pacific, human remains associated with Lapita period sites are rare. The site of Teouma, on Efate Island, Vanuatu has yielded the largest burial assemblage (n=68 inhumations) of Lapita period humans ever discovered, providing a unique opportunity for assessing human adaptation to the environment in a colonizing population. Stable isotope ratios (δ13C, δ15N, δ34S) of human bone collagen from forty-nine Teouma adults were analyzed against a comprehensive dietary baseline to assess the paleodiet of some of Vanuatu's earliest inhabitants. The isotopic dietary baseline included both modern plants and animals (n=98) and prehistoric fauna from the site (n=71). The human stable isotope data showed that dietary protein at Teouma included a mixture of reef fish and inshore organisms and a variety of higher trophic marine (e.g. marine turtle) and terrestrial animals (e.g. domestic animals and fruit bats). The domestic pigs and chickens at Teouma primarily ate food from a C3 terrestrial environment but their δ15N values indicated that they were eating foods from higher trophic levels than those of plants, such as insects or human fecal matter, suggesting that animal husbandry at the site may have included free range methods. The dietary interpretations for the humans suggest that broad-spectrum foraging and the consumption of domestic animals were the most important methods for procuring dietary protein at the site. Males displayed significantly higher δ15N values compared with females, possibly suggesting dietary differences associated with labor specialization or socio-cultural practices relating to food distribution.
We are a group of archaeologists, anthropologists, curators and geneticists representing diverse global communities and 31 countries. All of us met in a virtual workshop dedicated to ethics in ...ancient DNA research held in November 2020. There was widespread agreement that globally applicable ethical guidelines are needed, but that recent recommendations grounded in discussion about research on human remains from North America are not always generalizable worldwide. Here we propose the following globally applicable guidelines, taking into consideration diverse contexts. These hold that: (1) researchers must ensure that all regulations were followed in the places where they work and from which the human remains derived; (2) researchers must prepare a detailed plan prior to beginning any study; (3) researchers must minimize damage to human remains; (4) researchers must ensure that data are made available following publication to allow critical re-examination of scientific findings; and (5) researchers must engage with other stakeholders from the beginning of a study and ensure respect and sensitivity to stakeholder perspectives. We commit to adhering to these guidelines and expect they will promote a high ethical standard in DNA research on human remains going forward.
Debating Lapita Stuart Bedford, Matthew Spriggs
12/2019, Volume:
52
eBook
Open access
This volume comprises 23 chapters that focus on the archaeology of Lapita, a cultural horizon associated with the founding populations who first colonised much of the south west Pacific some 3000 ...years ago. The Lapita culture has been most clearly defined by its distinctive dentate-stamped decorated pottery and the design system represented on it and on further incised pots. Modern research now encompasses a whole range of aspects associated with Lapita and this is reflected in this volume. The broad overlapping themes of the volume—Lapita distribution and chronology, society and subsistence—relate to research questions that have long been debated in relation to Lapita.
Ancient DNA from Vanuatu and Tonga dating to about 2,900–2,600 years ago (before present, BP) has revealed that the “First Remote Oceanians” associated with the Lapita archaeological culture were ...directly descended from the population that, beginning around 5000 BP, spread Austronesian languages from Taiwan to the Philippines, western Melanesia, and eventually Remote Oceania. Thus, ancestors of the First Remote Oceanians must have passed by the Papuan-ancestry populations they encountered in New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, and the Solomon Islands with minimal admixture 1. However, all present-day populations in Near and Remote Oceania harbor >25% Papuan ancestry, implying that additional eastward migration must have occurred. We generated genome-wide data for 14 ancient individuals from Efate and Epi Islands in Vanuatu from 2900–150 BP, as well as 185 present-day individuals from 18 islands. We find that people of almost entirely Papuan ancestry arrived in Vanuatu by around 2300 BP, most likely reflecting migrations a few hundred years earlier at the end of the Lapita period, when there is also evidence of changes in skeletal morphology and cessation of long-distance trade between Near and Remote Oceania 2, 3. Papuan ancestry was subsequently diluted through admixture but remains at least 80%–90% in most islands. Through a fine-grained analysis of ancestry profiles, we show that the Papuan ancestry in Vanuatu derives from the Bismarck Archipelago rather than the geographically closer Solomon Islands. However, the Papuan ancestry in Polynesia—the most remote Pacific islands—derives from different sources, documenting a third stream of migration from Near to Remote Oceania.
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•The population of Vanuatu in the Pacific was largely replaced 2,900–2,300 years ago•This second wave of migrants came from New Britain, east of New Guinea•A third wave spread different ancestry to the far-flung islands of Polynesia
Lipson, Skoglund, et al. analyze ancient DNA from the Pacific island chain of Vanuatu over its entire span of occupation. After humans first arrived around 3,000 years ago, there was a nearly complete replacement of the original inhabitants by 2,300 years ago, and this second wave forms the primary ancestry of people in Vanuatu today.
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