Hawaiki, Ancestral Polynesia: An Essay in Historical Anthropology

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Hawaiki, Ancestral Polynesia An Essay in Historical Anthropology

The power of an anthropological approach to long-term history lies in its unique ability to combine diverse evidence, from archaeological artifacts to ethnographic texts and comparative word lists. In this innovative book, Kirch and Green explicitly develop the theoretical underpinnings, as well as the particular methods, for such a historical anthropology. Drawing upon and integrating the approaches of archaeology, comparative ethnography, and historical linguistics, they advance a phylogenetic model for cultural diversi®cation, and apply a triangulation method for historical reconstruction. They illustrate their approach through meticulous application to the history of the Polynesian cultures, and for the ®rst time reconstruct in extensive detail the Ancestral Polynesian culture that ¯ourished in the Polynesian homeland ± Hawaiki ± some 2,500 years ago. Of great signi®cance for Oceanic studies, Kirch and Green's book will be essential reading for any anthropologist, prehistorian, linguist, or cultural historian concerned with the theory and method of longterm history. patrick vinton kirch is Professor of Anthropology, and Director of the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum, at the University of California at Berkeley. A member of the National Academy of Sciences, he has authored some ten previous books on Paci®c archaeology and prehistory, including Anahulu: The Anthropology of History in the Kingdom of Hawaii (1992) (co-authored with Marshall Sahlins), which won the J. I. Staley Prize in Anthropology. roger c. green is Emeritus Professor of Prehistory at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. A member of the National Academy of Sciences and a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand, he is the author of several important monographs on Paci®c Islands archaeology and prehistory.

Frontispiece: Mata o Tangaloa (``Face of Tangaloa''), by Fatu Feu'u

Hawaiki, Ancestral Polynesia An Essay in Historical Anthropology

PAT R I C K V I N TO N K I RC H University of California, Berkeley

and RO G ER C . G R E EN University of Auckland, New Zealand

   Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge  , United Kingdom Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521783095 © Cambridge University Press 2001 This book is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published in print format 2001 - isbn-13 978-0-511-06700-6 eBook (NetLibrary) - isbn-10 0-511-06700-3 eBook (NetLibrary) - isbn-13 978-0-521-78309-5 hardback - isbn-10 0-521-78309-7 hardback - isbn-13 978-0-521-78879-3 paperback -  paperback isbn-10 0-521-78879-X Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of s for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

To TheÂreÁse and Valerie, for their love and support; and to the late Bruce Biggs, preeminent Polynesian linguist

Contents

List of ®gures page viii List of tables x Preface xiii List of language abbreviations

xvi

Prologue: on historical anthropology

1

Part I The phylogenetic model: theory and method 1 2 3

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology 13 Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model 32 Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit 53 Part II Rediscovering Hawaiki

4 5 6 7 8 9

Introductory remarks 95 The Ancestral Polynesian world 99 Subsistence 120 Food preparation and cuisine 143 Material culture 163 Social and political organization 201 Gods, ancestors, seasons and rituals 237 Epilogue: on history, phylogeny, and evolution Notes 285 Glossary of terms 313 References 317 Subject Index 357 Index of Proto Polynesian Reconstructions

vii

369

277

Figures

Frontispiece Mata o Tangaloa (``Face of Tangaloa''), page ii by Fatu Feu`u 1.1 Map of the Polynesian triangle and the Polynesian Outliers 17 1.2 Kirch's 1984 model of phylogenetic differentiation in Polynesia 20 2.1 The higher-level subgrouping of the Austronesian languages, down to the Oceanic level 39 2.2 The geographic distribution of higher-level subgroups in the Austronesian phylum 40 3.1 The major subgroups of Oceanic form a ``rake-like'' tree structure 56 3.2 The geographic distribution of major subgroups within the Oceanic branch of Austronesian languages 57 3.3 The Proto Central Paci®c dialect chain 58 3.4 North±south dialect differentiation within Proto Polynesian 59 3.5 A ``family-tree'' type classi®cation of the Polynesian languages 61 3.6 Islands in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region linked by voyaging circles of 24 hours or less 62 3.7 The Paci®c region with Near Oceania, Remote Oceania, and the Andesite Line and ``continental'' type islands indicated 64 3.8 Canoe regions of the Paci®c 67 3.9 The geographic distribution of sibling classi®cation types in Oceania 68 3.10 Relationships among Polynesian biological populations as indicated by distance analysis of thirty-eight non-metric cranial traits 75 3.11 A graphic representation of the ``density'' of available archaeological information for major Polynesian cultural sequences 76 3.12 Locations of key archaeological sites dating to the Ancestral Polynesian phase 84 4.1 The central Paci®c region, showing the location of the Andesite Line 108 4.2 The hierarchical structure typical of folk biological classi®cations 110 viii

List of ®gures

5.1 5.2 6.1 6.2 6.3 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 7.6 8.1 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 9.5

Cobbles with ®nger-grips from site FU-11, Futuna, interpreted as hammers for opening hard-shelled nuts, such as Canarium Turbo shell ®shhooks from the To`aga site The earth oven, a central feature of Ancestral Polynesian cooking, attested by an example at the Lolokoka site (NT-90) on Niuatoputapu Ethnographic examples of coconut graters, made up of a stool or other wooden base to which a shell grater is lashed Straight-sided pits, lacking evidence of burning, may have been used as silos for the fermentation and storage of breadfruit paste Pottery vessel shapes in Ancestral Polynesia Conceptual terms for Proto Polynesian containers, and their realization in plainware pottery vessels of the Ancestral Polynesian culture Industrial tools: adzes in Ancestral Polynesian culture Industrial tools: Saw, ®les, whetstones, grinding stones, stone and coral abraders, drill points and bow drill Ornaments from archaeological sites of the Ancestral Polynesian phase Excavation plan of the Sasoa`a site in the Falefa Valley, Samoa Social groups and leadership roles in Ancestral Polynesian societies Plan of a Tikopia fare house with attached marae Annual tributary presentation of the ®rst yams on the ceremonial plaza (malae) at Mu`a, Tongatapu Perspective renderings of three variants of Tuamotuan marae The southern sky as it would have appeared an hour before sunrise on May 16, 500 BC, from an island in Western Polynesia, showing the heliacal rising of the Pleiades (*Mataliki) Diagrammatic summary of the reconstructed Ancestral Polynesian ritual cycle and calendar

ix

124 133 148 153 161 169 174 179 181 188 195 236 250 252 253 266 274

Tables

2.1 3.1 3.2 4.1 4.2 4.3 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 7.6 7.7 7.8 8.1

POLLEX database entry for PPN *waka, `canoe' page 47 Cultural traits distinguishing Western and Eastern Polynesian regions 72 Selected archaeological sites and assemblages associated with the Ancestral Polynesian period 82 Selected Proto Polynesian terms for the physical world 103 Proto Polynesian life-form terms 111 Proto Polynesian terms for reef and shoreline invertebrates 112 Proto Polynesian crops 123 Proto Polynesian terms associated with horticulture 127 Distribution of ®shing methods in tropical Polynesia 136 Proto Polynesian terms associated with marine exploitation 138 Proto Polynesian terms for raw, cooked, and taste 145 Proto Polynesian terms associated with the cookhouse, earth oven, and cooking equipment 150 Proto Polynesian terms for food preparation and cooking methods 155 Proto Polynesian terms associated with the pudding complex 158 Perishable and durable components of Polynesian material culture inventories 165 Proto Polynesian terms for things 166 Proto Polynesian terms for containers 167 Proto Polynesian terms for industrial tools 176 The Proto Polynesian bark cloth complex, clothing, ornaments, and tattooing 186 Proto Polynesian terms for warfare, sports and games, and musical instruments 191 Proto Polynesian terms relating to household units and their architectural features 194 The Proto Polynesian canoe complex and cordage 198 Proto Austronesian (PAN), Proto Malayo-Polynesian (PMP), and Proto Oceanic (POC) words for settlements and architecture 206 x

List of tables

8.2

Linguistically indicated changes in architectural forms from Proto Oceanic to Proto Polynesian interstages 8.3 Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *kainanga, including extra-Polynesian witnesses 8.4 Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *kaainga 8.5 Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *saqa, `social group' 8.6 Proto Polynesian terms relating to exchange or trade 8.7 Proto Polynesian terms for persons 8.8 Proto Polynesian kinship terms 8.9 Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *qariki 8.10 Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *fatu, leader of the *kaainga 9.1 Proto Polynesian terms relating to gods, spirits, and ancestors 9.2 Proto Polynesian terms relating to ritual practitioners and spaces 9.3 Proto Polynesian terms associated with ritual 9.4 Key aspects of Polynesian calendrical systems 9.5 Selected Fijian and Polynesian lunar calendrical lists 9.6 Reconstructed lunar month names for various Polynesian proto-languages 9.7 Probable reconstruction of the Proto Polynesian lunar calendar, and its transformations in subsequent Polynesian proto-languages 9.8 Some post-Proto Polynesian lexical and semantic innovations in ritual terminology

xi

207 212 216 219 221 222 223 229 233 240 246 258 262 268 270 271 275

Preface

Enchanted by the seductively salubrious atmosphere of California's Napa Valley, we gazed over sun-drenched vineyards with the 1993 harvest ripening on the vine, sipping the last of a lush Cabernet while intently arguing the intricacies of some Proto Polynesian term. Perhaps ± given the blissful feeling this setting inspired ± we might have been excused our conceit that we would conspire to write ``a little essay between covers.'' The notion, naive in retrospect, was to expand slightly on our 1987 article on ``History, phylogeny, and evolution in Polynesia'' (Kirch and Green 1987), so as to address certain critiques of the phylogenetic approach to historical anthropology, and to elaborate what we call a ``triangulation method'' for historical reconstruction. The proposition seemed straightforward enough. Yes, a ``little essay,'' perhaps a hundred pages or so. Over plates of roast Petaluma duck and grilled sword®sh, our wives had seconded the idea, insisting that we should keep the essay lean and trim. Nearly a decade later, our ``essay'' has taken shape as a book, a more ponderous volume than we at ®rst envisioned. Its writing has occupied far longer than anticipated, requiring several international trips and much longdistance collaboration. Yet we do not regret the transformation that our project has undergone, because out of it we have gained a deeper respect for the possibilities of a truly integrative historical anthropology. We were trained (at Penn and Yale, New Mexico and Harvard, respectively) in the classic holistic perspective of Americanist anthropology, and although we are both primarily archaeologists of the Paci®c, each of us in our respective careers has endeavored to bring a full spectrum of anthropological evidence and approaches to bear in our research programs. Green early on incorporated historical linguistics into his models of Polynesian settlement (e.g., Green 1966), while Kirch integrated ®eld ethnography into his work on prehistoric ecology and economy (e.g., Kirch 1994a). This book re¯ects the maturing of those long-standing interests, a statement of our conviction that anthropology at its best is always holistic and integrating. At a time when at least one prominent biologist is crying out for ``consilience'' between the social and biological sciences (Wilson 1998), we would point out that anthropology has always heeded that call. xiii

xiv

Preface

While engaged in drafting several chapters during June of 1997, in Berkeley, we became overtly conscious of how our respective ethnographic and linguistic experiences in a diversity of Polynesian venues critically aided the construction of the arguments we were striving to advance. Comparative ethnography can, in theory, be carried out by the proverbial ``armchair'' scholar, but there can be no doubting the value of personal ethnographic experience over a range of Polynesian cultures and societies. The most astute comparativists in the Oceanic ®eld themselves had the advantage of original ®eldwork in at least two or more locales: Handy, Hiroa, Burrows, Emory, Oliver, and Sahlins, among them. As with our predecessors, we likewise have spent much time residing and working in many Polynesian societies, including: Anuta, Tikopia, Taumako, Tonga, Futuna, Samoa, `Uvea, Mangaia, Mo`orea, Mangareva, Aotearoa, Rapa Nui, and Hawai`i. Between us we speak or have made signi®cant efforts assembling vocabularies of the following Polynesian languages: Anutan, Tikopian, Taumako, Futunan, Tongan, Samoan, Tahitian, Mangarevan, and Hawaiian. This ethnographic and linguistic background, acquired through a combined total of seven decades of continuous effort in the Polynesian ®eld, has proved invaluable for the task we set ourselves. All this, need we say, has been in addition to our primary efforts as archaeologists in the same islands, where we have endeavored to generate materially documented historical sequences of cultural change. We underscore this point here not to assert our authority, but rather to stress the necessity in historical anthropology of erudition based on broad comparative knowledge. Quite possibly, the kind of work we would wish to see undertaken and extended is, in fact, only possible through collaboration, for it is doubtful that any one individual can command either the necessary depth of methodological and theoretical expertise, or the range of speci®c knowledge acquired through ®eld or library research. Writing this book has been a true collaboration. But one of us writes books, having honed the necessary skills, while the other does not; the order of authors recognizes that reality. Of course, each of us read, emended, edited, and critiqued the drafts of the other, so the ®nal book truly re¯ects a joint effort. Acknowledgments Green thanks the Miller Institute for Basic Research in Science, University of California at Berkeley, for a Visiting Miller Professorship which brought him to Berkeley in the fall of 1994, and allowed us to begin our collaboration. Kirch gratefully acknowledges the support of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, California, which provided him

Preface

xv

with ideal working conditions during the ®nal stages of writing and editing. Kirch also thanks the National Science Foundation, which partially funded his 1997±98 CASBS Fellowship (Grant No. SBR-9601236). We owe a great debt to our colleagues in Paci®c historical linguistics, without whose decades of careful work in lexical reconstruction we would not have been able to undertake this book. In particular, the late Emeritus Professor Bruce Biggs of the University of Auckland provided a major underpinning for our research through his POLLEX database of Proto Polynesian reconstructions which he has tirelessly compiled since 1965. Professor Biggs gave us free access to his computerized database, for which we are immensely grateful. It was with great sadness, as this book was in ®nal proof, that we learned of his passing. Other linguists, especially Andrew Pawley, Malcolm Ross, Ross Clark, and Bob Blust, have provided us with information, insights, and helpful critiques over the years. We are especially grateful to the following colleagues who took the time to read and critique draft versions of various chapters: Peter Bellwood, Bob Blust, Janet Davidson, Ward Goodenough, Steve Hooper, John Moore, Frank Lichtenberk, Andrew Pawley, and Marshall Sahlins. David Tuggle kindly provided simulated southern hemisphere sky charts for the mid-®rst millennium BC, including that reproduced as Figure 9.4. Hans Schmidt kindly provided us with his transcriptions, in English and Rotuman, of selected excerpts from the manuscript notes of A. M. Hocart, housed in the Alexander Turnbull Library. Serge TcherkeÂzoff shared with us a copy of his manuscript paper on Samoan matai. In the ®nal stages of manuscript preparation, Sara Diamond (Berkeley) and Dorothy Brown (Auckland) provided invaluable assistance with word processing and bibliography. Joan Lawrence prepared the illustrations from our rough copy. It gives us great pleasure to dedicate this book to our wives, TheÂreÁse Babineau and Valerie Green. They shared our early enthusiasm, encouraged us through the rough spots, and reminded us of the larger signi®cance of our project. Patrick Vinton Kirch Roger C. Green

Abbreviations

Language abbreviations Proto-language abbreviations PAN Proto Austronesian PCE Proto Central Eastern Polynesian PCEMP Proto Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian PCP Proto Central Paci®c PEC Proto Ellicean PEP Proto Eastern Polynesian PMP Proto Malayo-Polynesian PMQ Proto Marquesic PNP Proto Nuclear Polynesian POC Proto Oceanic PPN Proto Polynesian PTA Proto Tahitic PTO Proto Tongic Modern language abbreviations, and geographic af®nity AIT ANU AUS EAS ECE EFU EUV FIJ HAW KAP MAE MAO MFA MIA

Aitutaki (Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia Anuta (Cherry Is.), Outlier Austral Is. (French Polynesia), Central Eastern Polynesia Easter Is., Marginal Eastern Polynesia Tuvalu (Ellice Is.), Western Polynesia East Futuna (Horne Is.), Western Polynesia East Uvea (Wallis Is.), Western Polynesia Fiji Hawai`i, Marginal Eastern Polynesia Kapingamarangi, Outlier Emae (Vanuatu), Outlier New Zealand Maori, Marginal Eastern Polynesia Mele-Fila (Vanuatu), Outlier Mangaia (Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia xvi

List of language abbreviations

MKI MOR MQA MQN MQS MRA MVA NIU NKO NKR OJA PEN PIL PUK RAR REN ROT RUR SAM SIK TAH TAK TIK TOK TON TUA WFU WUV or WEV WYA

xvii

Manihiki (Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia Mooriori (Chatham Is.), Marginal Eastern Polynesia Marquesas (French Polynesia), Marginal Eastern Polynesia Northern Marquesan dialect (French Polynesia), Marginal Eastern Polynesia Southern Marquesan dialect (French Polynesia), Marginal Eastern Polynesia Manihiki/Rakahanga (Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia Mangareva (French Polynesia), Central Eastern Polynesia Niue Is., Western Polynesia Nukuoro, Outlier Nukuria (Solomons), Outlier Luangiua (Ontong-Java, Solomons), Outlier Penrhyn (Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia Pileni (Solomons), Outlier Pukapuka (Northern Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia Rarotonga (Cook Is.), Central Eastern Polynesia Rennell and Bellona Is. (Solomons), Outlier Rotuma (Fiji) Rurutu (French Polynesia), Central Eastern Polynesia Samoa, Western Polynesia Sikaiana (Solomons), Outlier Tahitian (French Polynesia), Central Eastern Polynesia Takuu (Solomons), Outlier Tikopia (Solomons), Outlier Tokelau Is., Western Polynesia Tonga, Western Polynesia Tuamotu (French Polynesia), Central Eastern Polynesia West Futuna (Vanuatu), Outlier West Uvea (Ouvea, New Caledonia), Outlier Waya, Western Fiji

Prologue: on historical anthropology Our problem may be metaphorically de®ned as the translation of a two-dimensional photographic picture of reality into the threedimensional picture which lies back of it . . . The gaining of an historical perspective will mean the arrangement in as orderly temporal sequence as possible, within as de®nitely circumscribed absolute time limits as circumstances will allow, of the processes studied by our science, the carriers of these processes being generally de®ned more inclusively than in documentary history.

sapir 1916:2

Polynesians called it Hawaiki (or sometimes, Kahiki, or Pulotu), the distantly remembered homeland, source of their ancestors, mythical site of the creation of culture, and spirit realm to which their own souls would voyage after death.1 They honored this ancestral homeland in chant and song, and named newly found islands after it: Savai`i in Samoa, and the large island of Hawai`i, among them. But was there ever in reality such a ``Hawaiki,'' or does it exist only in the shadowy realms of cosmogonic myth? Archaeologists, after a half-century of intensive pursuit of the question of Polynesian origins, would answer af®rmatively. More precisely, they would ®x the coordinates of this ancestral homeland in time and space: the archipelagos of Tonga and Samoa (with their immediate smaller neighbors), in the ®rst millennium BC. Through an unbroken sequence of cultural change that begins with the arrival of small groups of Early Eastern Lapita peoples around 1100±1000 BC, a distinctive Ancestral Polynesian culture had developed four to ®ve centuries later. While archaeologists con®dently point to various settlements and sites of this period and to their characteristic material assemblages of Polynesian Plainware pottery and plano-convex adzes, securely ®xed in time by numerous radiocarbon dates ± what do we really know about this Ancestral Polynesian world, this Hawaiki? Is it possible to move beyond the strictly material evidence of potsherds, adzes, and shell ®shhooks, postmolds and earth ovens? Simply stated, this is the problem that has energized us to write this book, for we would maintain that twentieth-century anthropology has 1

2

Hawaiki, ancestral Polynesia

indeed developed powerful tools and methods for recovering and writing the deep history of ``peoples without history.'' Yet we are perturbed that as the twenty-®rst century dawns, the academic and scholarly rush toward specialization and even sub-specialization (not to mention the current postmodern conceit that ``culture'' or ``history'' are anything other than academic constructions) threatens to erode the essential strength of a holistic vision of anthropology as an integrated set of perspectives and methods trained upon a diversity of evidence. The founders of the unique Americanist tradition in anthropology ± Boas, Kroeber, Sapir, and others ± reacted in part to the theoretical excesses of a generalizing ``evolutionary'' approach, and advocated a more rigorous ``historical particularism.'' They saw the advantage to be gained from multiple lines of investigation and evidence, and thus bundled ethnography, archaeology, linguistics, and physical anthropology together in a way that the European academic world never fully embraced. Eighty years ago Edward Sapir advanced a charter for historical anthropology in his short monograph on Time Perspective in Aboriginal American Culture: A Study in Method (Sapir 1916). This paper ± once famous but now seldom cited ± laid out the potential contributions to historical reconstruction to be made by combining the direct evidence of documentary writings, native testimony, and archaeological ®nds, with the inferential evidence provided by physical anthropology, ethnology, and linguistics.2 Sapir envisioned a historical anthropology that ± as a joint intellectual enterprise ± required contributions from all of these ®elds, each with its own unique evidential sources. The historical goals that motivated Sapir have waxed and waned in anthropology over the intervening decades, and the paradigms and methods of the ``sub®elds'' (archaeology, ethnology, biological anthropology, and linguistics) have also changed dramatically.3 Despite some interesting proposals in the interim (e.g., Romney 1957; Vogt 1964, 1994a), few integrated data-rich explorations along the lines conceived by Sapir have evolved. Nonetheless, in the ®rst decade of the twenty-®rst century a renewed interest in matters historical may be discerned in the several sub®elds into which anthropology has been partitioned. These trends lend cautious optimism that our present endeavor ± fundamentally similar to Sapir's, but here applied to Polynesia ± may be of more than strictly regional interest.4 Like Sapir, we aim to advance a historical anthropology, but one that brings to bear the myriad advances in data, methods, and theory developed throughout the twentieth century. Sapir devoted most of his attention to linguistics and ethnology; he only brie¯y mentioned documentary sources, oral history, and physical anthropology, and relegated archaeology to a single page of his monograph. Sapir's ethnolinguistic bias is understandable, given the embryonic state of New

Prologue: on historical anthropology

3

World prehistory in 1916. Even for the Old World, where archaeology had an earlier start, existing knowledge was then encompassed within the boldest of schemes: Palaeolithic, Neolithic, Bronze Age, and Iron Age. But a growing subdiscipline of anthropological archaeology, especially in North America, increasingly became the main player in historical anthropology, where during the ®rst half of the twentieth century it struggled to develop methods for establishing relative or absolute chronology (Taylor 1948; Trigger 1989a). At the same time that archaeology concentrated on cultural homologies (similarities due to common ancestry) and synologies (similarities produced by diffusion or borrowing), within what became known in North America as ``culture history,''5 ethnology increasingly rejected historical reconstruction. Following Radcliffe-Brown's pejorative characterization of ethnology's earlier efforts in this direction as ``conjectural'' or ``pseudohistory'' (1941:1, 1950:1±2), developments in social and cultural anthropology moved steadily toward synchronic orientations.6 In the Paci®c, the ethnographies of Raymond Firth, Gregory Bateson, and Margaret Mead provide examples. Interest in historical sources and problems was largely relegated to the temporally restricted topic of ``ethnohistory'' (Dening 1966). Attempts to weld the shorter-term perspective of ethnohistory to the longerterm trajectories revealed by archaeology, proposed by some North American scholars, came to be known as the ``direct historical approach'' (Wedel 1938; Steward 1942; Strong 1953). Although the direct historical approach fell out of favor in the post-World War II era, it now shows signs of renewed application (Lightfoot 1995). Archaeology too, at least in North America, went through its own phase in which the particular contingencies of history were devalued in favor of a more ``scienti®c'' orientation that sought universal ``laws'' of cultural process. The New Archaeology of the 1960s and 1970s replaced the earlier emphasis on homologous change with a concern for analogous change, driven in part by a paradigm of archaeology as an experimental and even predictive social science (e.g., Watson et al. 1971). Anthropological linguistics, in contrast, has always retained to varying degrees its historical component (Hock 1986:v±vi), even while it underwent a range of transformations in its more mainstream descriptive, theoretical, and sociological varieties (Hymes 1964). These continuing historical linguistic enterprises ± largely independent of archaeology ± have culminated in a series of language-family histories based on genetic subgroupings, for many of the world's languages (Blench 1997: table 2). Finally, like linguistics, biological anthropology has long maintained its evolutionary interests in the genetic history of human populations.7 In spite of these varied efforts in anthropological history over the course of the twentieth century ± or perhaps just because they remained largely

4

Hawaiki, ancestral Polynesia

uncoordinated as the subdisciplines burgeoned and specialized ± a genuinely systematic, methodologically rigorous, and theoretically sophisticated historical anthropology of the kind that Sapir envisioned eighty years ago failed to materialize. However, that situation has begun to change, and especially in the Paci®c. The varied strands of a new historical orientation are contained within what Trigger (1989a, 1989b, 1991) calls ``holistic archaeology,'' an approach he sees as forming ``a new synthesis for archaeological explanation.'' Echoing Sapir, Trigger proposes to combine archaeological data with the ®ndings of historical linguistics, oral traditions, historical ethnography, and historical records so as to produce a more rounded view of prehistory, as well as of ethnohistory and historical archaeology. Trigger (1991:562) argues that such interdisciplinary approaches ®rst developed as early as the 1950s, citing examples from Africa (e.g., Murdock 1959; McCall 1964; Trigger 1968). Early efforts were, however, largely rejected by the emerging and rapidly dominant ``processual'' archaeologists. Renewed efforts at tackling sequences of homologous change are noted by Trigger as recurring in the late 1970s and early 1980s in North America, the Mayan region, and Polynesia, as well as in Africa.8 They are one basis for Trigger's claim that ``the direct historical approach is perhaps the most challenging and potentially important task confronting archaeology today,'' requiring archaeologists to become ``still more open to using non-archaeological forms of data to study the past'' (Trigger 1991:563). Other recent examples include the collaborative works of Kent Flannery and Joyce Marcus (1983; Marcus and Flannery 1996) on the long-term historical evolution of the Zapotec and Mixtec peoples of Mesoamerica, and Kirch and Sahlins' collaborative work on the Hawaiian Kingdom (1992).9 Calls for a renewed historical orientation within anthropology are not limited to archaeology. Throughout the 1980s some sociocultural anthropologists became increasingly historicized (Ohnuki-Tierney 1990:1±6), taking their lead in part from the well-developed Annales tradition of encompassing social history as practiced by Marc Bloch, Fernand Braudel, Georges Duby, and others. Marshall Sahlins incorporated and modi®ed aspects of Braudel's (1980) famous ``wavelength'' scheme of history in his brilliant work on Captain Cook and the con¯uence of Hawaiian and British cultures in 1778±79 (Sahlins 1981, 1985, 1995). At the same time, Greg Dening ± a historian with anthropological training ± was moving in his studies of Marquesan ethnohistory and early European contacts in the Paci®c toward what he calls ``history's anthropology'' (1980, 1988, 1992). The pioneering efforts of Sahlins and Dening have been extended by others (e.g., Linnekin 1990; Thomas 1991, 1997). Such historicization of social anthropology was, moreover, by no means con®ned to the Paci®c arena (see Cohn 1980, 1981;

Prologue: on historical anthropology

5

Ohnuki-Tierney 1990). Biersack, in her introduction to Clio in Oceania, a book with the notable subtitle ``Toward a Historical Anthropology,'' writes: In varying degrees, the issues of history and theory rehearsed herein bear on other branches of anthropology [in addition to archaeology] and serve as core issues around which the sub®elds of anthropology may coalesce and enter into collaboration . . . Positioned among historical and cultural studies and at a powerful con¯uence of subdisciplines within anthropology, historical anthropology provides a forum within which to perpetuate the debates of the last two decades but on new and less parochial terrain. To historical anthropology is thus transferred the theoretical commissions of the discipline: past, present, and future. (1991:25)

A concrete expression of these merging historical interests within social anthropology and archaeology is the collaborative work of Kirch and Sahlins, Anahulu: The Anthropology of History in the Kingdom of Hawaii (1992). This project ± combining the data and perspectives of a historical ethnologist and an archaeologist, focused on a particular geographic and historic space, the Anahulu Valley ± is a book-length example of research that purposively merges subdisciplinary approaches. That more collaboration between archaeologists and historical ethnographers has not been undertaken may re¯ect a long-standing ± and in most cases implicit rather than explicit ± bias toward those last few hundred years of global European expansion, and an implicit privileging of textual records (Wolf 1982).10 Thus Sahlins, while discovering that the ``peoples of the Paci®c I had studied indeed had a history,'' could still remark that ``these exotic histories . . . as recorded do not go very far back'' (1985:xviii). And Dening can claim that ``the history of Polynesian cultures could only be written out of sources that were European'' (1991:372, emphasis added). These comments for the Paci®c are echoed in Ohnuki-Tierney's more general remark that ``the longue dureÂe is not easily accessible for histories of nonliterate peoples'' (1990:3, fn. 2). Thus turning their backs to archaeological colleagues often housed in the very same academic departments of anthropology, historical ethnographers have often haughtily disdained anything except the documentary form of the literate world's historical texts, usually European-authored. In such agendas, the archaeological record is assumed to be either irrelevant to history, or relevant only to a short segment of it.11 But the historical ``texts'' of the longue dureÂe are encoded not just in the ciphers of Western scribes; they exist equally as material traces dispersed over landscapes and sedimented in their depths, no less as patterns of cognate words in the linguists' comparative lexicons, or as indigenous traditions transmitted orally over long generations. Only when archaeologists, as valued interpreters of their unique historical ``texts,'' are accorded seats in the same seminar room will historical

6

Hawaiki, ancestral Polynesia

anthropology truly be able to encompass the longue dureÂe of nonliterate societies. Also damaging to the effort to develop a historical ethnography has been the postmodernist critique in anthropology (e.g., Clifford and Marcus 1986), which among other things has eschewed or rejected regional and comparative perspectives.12 For a Paci®c example, in his book on South Coast New Guinea Cultures, Knauft struggles with the problem of describing and comparing ethnographic regions in the face of the postmodernist stance that such regions in and of themselves are no more than ``the result of a Western academic discourse that projects its own cultural biases and assumes incorrectly that these characterizations re¯ect other people's reality'' (1993:3; see also Knauft 1999). Signi®cantly, Knauft ®nds a key to the reinvigoration of ethnographic comparison in the analysis of ``historical context.'' While we do not dispute the potential validity of the critique that concepts such as ``cultural regions'' are anthropological constructions, we do ®nd disturbing the postmodernist tendency to dismiss such constructions out of hand, rather than on the basis of a critical examination of empirical validity. With respect to linguistics, we detect a renewed and more weighty interest in the intersection of its disciplinary contribution to the historical concerns among the various subdisciplines of anthropology. An example from the 1970s, notable for its methodological rigor, is Dyen and Aberle's (1974) reconstruction of Proto Athapaskan kinship systems. Marshall (1984) offered an exposition on the culture history of structural patterning in Oceanic sibling classi®cations, a line of inquiry more recently taken up by Hage and Harary (1996). A return to an interest in linguistics and archaeology is evident as one major theme selected for the 1994 World Archaeology Congress, stimulated in part by provocative ideas of Colin Renfrew (1987, 1989, 1992) on the spread of Indo-European (Blench and Spriggs 1997, 1998). Two of the most robust regional endeavors linking archaeological and linguistic evidence focus on Africa, and on the Paci®c. The ®rst includes the work of Ehret and his collaborators (Ehret and Posnansky 1982; Ehret 1998) on Mashariki Bantu origins and their spread in sub-Saharan Africa, and on Nubian speakers in the Sudan. In the Paci®c, collaborative linguistic, archaeological, and anthropological research has burgeoned since the 1970s. In his extensive writings leading toward the reconstruction of the Proto Austronesian lexicon, Blust (e.g., 1980, 1985, 1987, 1995a) advances many important hypotheses regarding early Austronesian social organization and culture, as well as the locations of homelands and particular protolanguages, stimulating new archaeological research. The Comparative Austronesian Project of the Australian National University (Fox, ed., 1993;

Prologue: on historical anthropology

7

Pawley and Ross 1994; Fox and Sather 1996; Ross et al., eds., 1998) has likewise adopted a research methodology explicitly incorporating a historical perspective, and drawing upon linguistic, comparative ethnographic, and archaeological approaches. Some of these trends in the study of the Austronesian language family and culture history are reviewed by Pawley and Ross (1993). Recently, McConvell and Evans (1997) attempt to bring archaeology and linguistics closer together, with a geographical emphasis on Australia. For those who, like us, would advance anew the cause of historical anthropology, Pawley and Ross (1993) make several salient claims. Although they concur that the job of the culture historian is to make sense of resemblances as well as differences by aligning the evidence compiled by various disciplines, Pawley and Ross point out a number of methodological challenges. One is the sizable gaps in the data sets provided by each contributing ®eld of study. A second issue ± the problem of synthesis ± is more serious and not so readily corrected. Whereas each discipline and subdiscipline has its own kinds of data and particular array of methods for their interpretation, historical anthropology (or ``culture history'' in their terms) as yet has no equally reliable procedures for marrying the evidence of different disciplines.13 A third problem is ``that much writing on culture history is marred by a weak understanding of linguistic methods'' (Pawley and Ross 1993:428). Nonetheless their conclusion is worth quoting in full: The problem of culture history is that it is an interdisciplinary enterprise, but the methods and data used by each of its major constituent disciplines are not readily comparable. Nonetheless such comparisons are necessary in order to evaluate competing hypotheses within disciplines and to gain a more complete picture of the past than any single method can provide. The AN[Austronesian]-speaking region offers exceptionally favorable conditions for such interdisciplinary research. Until recently, most prominent hypotheses about the culture history of the AN-speaking regions originated in the data of comparative linguistics or comparative ethnography, with scholars from these two disciplines generally working independently. Archaeology has been a vigorous latecomer. Early attempts at integrating linguistic and archaeological evidence concentrated on centers and directions of AN dispersal, with archaeology providing a chronological framework for linguistically-based scenarios. Currently, the focus of culture historical syntheses is shifting toward comparisons of the lexicons of reconstructed languages with the content and environmental contexts of various archaeological assemblages. There has been no serious attempt to square the recent ®ndings of historical human biology with those of other disciplines, but there are signs that this too is under way. (1993:452, emphasis added)

In sum, not since Sapir has there been such renewed interest in developing an interdisciplinary approach to historical anthropology. What Trigger, an

8

Hawaiki, ancestral Polynesia

archaeologist, espouses under the umbrella of ``holistic archaeology,'' the social anthropologist Biersack advocates under the rubric ``historical anthropology,'' while linguists Pawley and Ross label the same endeavor a kind of ``culture history.'' (Biological anthropologists might subsume it all under ``co-evolution'' and wonder about all the fuss.) This kind of ``culture history,'' moreover, is quite different from (although a congruent development out of ) ``traditional archaeology'' (Feinman 1997; Renfrew and Bahn 1991:407) or ``Americanist culture history'' (Willey and Sabloff 1980; Lyman et al. 1997) of the ®rst half of the twentieth century. One would be tempted to call such a project a ``New Culture History,'' were that label not already appropriated by others (e.g., Hunt, ed., 1989). Although the current emphasis on history has its ``new'' elements, its roots in anthropology run deep indeed, as a rereading of Sapir reminds us; the adjective ``new'' is hardly required. We thus ®nd the rubric ``historical anthropology'' elegantly suited to our purposes. These varied subdisciplinary efforts, not always coordinated but clearly tending toward a common direction of historical anthropology, might be seen on a larger canvas of late twentieth-century science as part of a movement toward increased sophistication of the ``historical sciences.'' Thus Stephen Jay Gould has drawn a distinction between two modes of science (1989:277±91).14 The ®rst mode (including traditional physics and chemistry, for example) is the Newtonian form concerned with universal laws of invariant expression, able to make predictions about a deterministic universe. In these largely experimental sciences, time is motion, and history is irrelevant. The second mode, of which geology is a good exemplar, is thermodynamically based, concerned with open (rather than closed) systems in which time and history ``matter'' (Gould 1986). This is the terrain of the historical sciences including cosmology, historical geology, evolutionary biology and ± notably ± archaeology and historical linguistics, in which retrodiction rather than prediction must be to the fore. As Gould (1980), Ernst Mayr (1982, 1997), and others have eloquently argued, in such historical sciences the recognition of contingency and a historical narrative mode of explanation become not only philosophically valid, but essential. As Gould cogently writes, ``If the primacy of history is evolution's lesson for other sciences, then we should explore the consequences of valuing history as a source of law and similarity, rather than dismissing it as narrative unworthy of the name science'' (1986:68). Our book integrates a study in method with a substantive, data-rich case: the reconstruction of the world of the Ancestral Polynesian homeland, of ``Hawaiki.'' Polynesia offers exceptionally favorable conditions for historical anthropology, a model region in which to investigate the congruence of

Prologue: on historical anthropology

9

history, phylogeny, and evolution (Kirch and Green 1987). We intend to explicate more fully the theoretical issues involved, as well as the methodological procedures required to forward a phylogenetic approach in historical anthropology. Biersack (1991:25), commenting on our 1987 contribution in Current Anthropology, wrote that ``judging by the responses to their . . . article, the effort [of Kirch and Green] to produce a historical archaeology . . . will prove as theoretically and methodologically challenging and as fraught with contention as the parallel effort in cultural anthropology has proved.'' The contention is anticipated. Such is inevitably the case with scholarship that aims, not to sit conformably and comfortably within its own disciplinary cocoon, but rather to reach across disciplinary boundaries, to engage in dialogue across ingrained scholarly traditions. We have written a work that dares to draw upon not just the theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches of our own ®eld of archaeology, but also those of historical linguistics and comparative ethnography. Our hope is that this effort will inspire a renewed appreciation of the power of a holistic, ``historical anthropology.'' Most importantly, if this book manages to move us closer to the kind of integrative anthropology envisioned decades ago by Edward Sapir, we shall be pleased.

part i

The phylogenetic model: theory and method As a problem, recognized since Aristotle, natural similarities come in two basic, largely contradictory styles. We cannot simply measure and tabulate; we must factor and divide. Similarities may be homologies, shared by simple reason of descent and history, or analogies, actively developed . . . as evolutionary responses to gould 1986:66 common situations.

Chapter 1

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology Physical type and language, we would say, have no causal relationship; there is no functional reason why a given physical type should occur within a given language family. Therefore, when these two variables do show signi®cant concordance in their distribution this may well represent an important historical fact, namely that the explanation for their concordance can be traced to a common point somewhere in the past. A demonstration that these two factors are also uniquely accompanied by a systemic culture pattern . . . romney 1957:36 strengthens the belief in a common origin.

The ``phylogenetic model'' has a long pedigree within historical anthropology, traceable in its essentials to Sapir's 1916 monograph. In the 1950s, it was formally developed under the label of ``the genetic model,'' a term that might be confused with a strictly biological perspective of somatic (genetic) inheritance, and which we (Kirch and Green 1987) therefore replaced with ``phylogenetic model.'' This revised label emphasizes historical sequences of cultural differentiation or divergence within related groups, regardless of the mechanism of transmission. Indeed, in the complexities of human history, both somatic and extra-somatic modes of trans-generational inheritance are salient (Durham 1982, 1991; Boyd and Richerson 1985). Thus a phylogenetic model within historical anthropology must incorporate data and perspectives from the full range of anthropological subdisciplines, including biological anthropology, archaeology, historical linguistics, and comparative ethnology. In this introductory chapter we will sketch the intellectual history of the phylogenetic model within anthropology, including its applications in Polynesia; discuss some current issues surrounding its applicability; compare its principal methods with phylogenetic (cladistic) approaches in biology and linguistics; and, ®nally, argue the fundamental signi®cance of a phylogenetic understanding of homologous change within historical anthropology. Our aim, in short, is to lay out the theoretical background and framework necessary for developing speci®c methods for an integrated historical anthropology, especially as these apply to Remote Oceania and Polynesia. 13

14

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

A brief history of the phylogenetic model Kim Romney (1957) ®rst delineated the speci®c criteria for cultural phylogenetic units, building upon Fred Eggan's proposals (1954) regarding ``controlled comparison'' in anthropology (see also Goodenough 1957). Basing his argument upon the fundamental anthropological observation that there is no necessary relation or correspondence between language, biology, and culture, Romney outlined the essentials of what he termed the ``genetic model'': The genetic model takes as its segment of cultural history a group of tribes which are set off from all other groups by sharing a common physical type, possessing common systemic patterns, and speaking genetically related languages. It is assumed that correspondence among these three factors indicates a common historical tradition at some time in the past for these tribes. We shall designate this segment of cultural history as the ``genetic unit'' and it includes the ancestral group and all intermediate groups, as well as the tribes in the ethnographic present. The genetic unit represents a substantive segment of cultural history while the term ``genetic model'' refers to the conceptual framework which serves as a tool to order the data. (1957:36)

Romney's seminal proposals were expanded and re®ned by Evon Vogt (1964) in his introductory essay to a volume on Maya cultural development (see also Vogt 1994a). Vogt, like Romney, stressed that a ``common historical tradition'' in any area, such as the Maya, would need to be de®ned on independent criteria of (1) common physical type, (2) common systemic cultural patterns, and (3) genetically related languages. Vogt elaborated on the theoretical implications of the ``genetic model,'' explicitly comparing it to models of adaptive radiation in biology: In brief, the genetic model assumes that genetically related tribes, as determined by related languages, physical types, and systemic patterns, are derived from a small proto-group with a proto-culture at some time in the past. The model resembles that of the zoologist who views a certain species of animal as evolving and making an adaptive adjustment to a given ecological niche and then radiating from this point as the population expands into neighboring ecological niches. As the population moves into different ecological settings, further adaptive variations occur in the species. But these variations are traceable to the ancestral animal, or, in other words, back to the proto-type. In the genetic model, as applied to human populations, we assume that a small proto-group succeeds in adapting itself ef®ciently to a certain ecological niche and in developing certain basic systemic patterns which constitute the basic aspects of the proto-culture. If the adaptation proves to be ef®cient, the population expands, and the group begins to radiate from this point of dispersal. As members split off from the proto-group and move into neighboring ecological niches, they make appropriate adaptations to these new situations and begin to differentiate ± that is,

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

15

there are adaptive variations from the proto-type over time as the members of the genetic unit spread from the dispersal area. (1964:11±12)

Vogt moved the ``genetic'' model beyond a strictly theoretical concept, and proposed a series of methodological steps and procedures for its implementation in historical anthropology. These required ``the combined use of a number of linguistic, archaeological, physical anthropological, ethnological, and historical methods bringing to bear the full range of anthropological data as these become available from ®eld and archival research'' (Vogt 1964:12). Vogt gave primacy to the evidence of language, suggesting that an anthropologist should commence with ``the de®nition of genetic units in terms of genetically related languages.''1 As Sanders put it: ``Methodologically speaking, the basis of de®ning such genetic units should be linguistic because of the relative exactness of linguistic methods as compared to those of ethnography and archaeology'' (Sanders 1966). However, this was primacy only in using linguistic data to de®ne which groups to include within a speci®c genetic unit; linguistic data were always to be cross-checked against those provided by other sub®elds, and thus were not in any ultimate sense privileged.2 Vogt (1964:10±13) advocated eight steps for the application of the ``genetic'' model to a speci®c ``segment of cultural history'': 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

plot the geographical distribution of related languages; calculate time depth, using lexicostatistics and glottochronology; locate the dispersal area and spread of the proto-group; reconstruct the proto-language and proto-culture using the linguistic methods of lexical reconstruction; use archaeological data to test speci®c hypotheses generated by steps 3 and 4; check the sequences of divergence derived from linguistic and archaeological analyses with the independent evidence of physical or biological anthropology; use ethnohistorical materials to ``provide readings on the various branches of the genetic unit'' between the time of ®rst European contact and the present; and add ethnographic data on contemporary communities to ``map variations in systemic patterns that have survived from earlier time levels and to detect cultural `drifts' or trends that are still occurring in these living systems.''

These steps constitute an integrated methodology for delineating an evolutionarily meaningful unit, one whose branches have diverged from a

16

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

common ancestor, according to a historical sequence that can be temporally and geographically de®ned. Despite some necessary modi®cations and re®nements to Vogt's research procedure (to be discussed below), Vogt's methodology remains eminently sound and reasonable. In effect, Vogt proposed to bring the full holistic power of twentieth-century anthropology to bear on the problems originally outlined by Sapir (1916) nearly a halfcentury earlier. Despite its potential, Vogt's research strategy was not widely applied, in part because of the move by sociocultural anthropologists away from an interest in historical and evolutionary issues, as discussed in our Prologue. Archaeologists, too, increasingly downplayed history and homologous change. Flannery and Marcus (1983), however, explicitly used Romney and Vogt's ``genetic model'' in their insightful study of divergence among the Zapotec and Mixtec populations of Mesoamerica. It was an initially independent reading of their work that inspired the two of us to collaborate on a joint application of the phylogenetic model to Polynesia (Kirch and Green 1987). Controlled comparison in Polynesia Edwin G. Burrows (1938a, 1940) ®rst championed the Polynesian cultures as an exemplary unit for controlled comparison. His classic monograph, Western Polynesia: A Study in Cultural Differentiation, drew explicitly on Sapir's methodology (1916) and established Polynesia as a cultural area (Figure 1.1). Burrows lacked the advantages of a developed archaeological record, and of careful historical linguistic analyses of relationships between Polynesian groups; these were to come only later. Thus, his evidence was con®ned to comparative ethnography, examining the distribution of a range of cultural ``traits,'' including material culture, kinship systems, cosmogony, and religious beliefs. Nonetheless, Burrows deduced a series of ``historical processes which had apparently brought about the differentiation of western from central-marginal Polynesia'' (1938a:92), including diffusion, local development, and abandonment or rejection of speci®c cultural traits.3 In the context of a renewed emphasis on Paci®c regional studies after World War II, Ward Goodenough (1957) authored a programmatic agenda for comparative research in Oceania. Marshall Sahlins (1958) produced the ®rst new comparative study of Polynesia, now theoretically situated within a cultural evolutionary framework (Sahlins and Service 1960), and explicitly invoking a phylogenetic analogy by describing Polynesian cultures as ``members of a single cultural genus that has ®lled in and adapted to a variety of local habitats'' (1958:ix). Sahlins, however, was interested neither in phylogenetic analysis per se, nor in the reconstruction of historical trajectories of change

Fig. 1.1

Map of the Polynesian triangle and the Polynesian Outliers.

18

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

within Polynesia. Nor were such historical issues the main concern of Goldman (1955, 1970), who like Sahlins regarded Polynesia as a group of genetically related societies admirably suited for comparative analysis. Goldman (1970) nonetheless incorporated newly emerging archaeological data into his work, which, along with genealogically based oral traditions and related ethnohistorical records, provided a historical context for his comparative analysis of the Polynesian ``status system'' and of descent group organization. Motivated by broad theoretical questions of cultural evolution, both Sahlins and Goldman were more interested in ``process'' (analogic change) than in particular sequences of homologous change. Moreover, their enterprises relied on synchronic data sets ± the ethnographic record ± only minimally integrating information from historical linguistic and archaeological sources. As a consequence, particular ethnographic endpoints in their evolutionary schemes inevitably stood as exemplars of putative earlier stages in the historical process. To use Goldman's model as an example, the ``Traditional'' societies of Tikopia, Pukapuka, or Ontong-Java represented an original, ancestral form of Polynesian society. Such a strategy ± we now know ± simply will not work for, to paraphrase the great evolutionist George Gaylord Simpson, ``one cannot be one's own ancestor.'' Ethnographically attested societies are not the changeless descendants of their ancestors, even though they may be assessed as culturally conservative. Thus the pioneering strategies of Sahlins and Goldman ± although they yielded valuable insights through systematic ethnographic comparison ± are not suitable as models for a theoretically rigorous historical anthropology. The phylogenetic model applied to Polynesia In the early 1980s, Kirch (1980, 1984a) attempted a broad synthesis of historical change within Polynesia, using an explicitly comparative and evolutionary approach, and according archaeological evidence primacy over the ethnographic data emphasized by Burrows, Sahlins, or Goldman. Although unaware at the time of Romney's or Vogt's ``genetic'' models, Kirch (1984a:5±8) proposed an essentially identical type of ``study of internal differentiation of Polynesian societies,'' one designed to draw on the power of holistic anthropology: Precisely because Polynesia as a region consists of a series of discrete, but historically related societies ± all derived from a common ancestor ± and because there was direct historical continuity between the ``ethnographic present'' and the prehistoric past, we are in an excellent position to draw upon ethnohistoric, ethnographic, and linguistic data, as well as upon strictly archaeological evidence in an attempt to understand the region's prehistory. The Polynesian ethnographic baseline does not

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

19

provide mere analogies for the interpretation of archaeological data; it illuminates directly the endpoints of indigenous developmental sequences. (Kirch 1984a:5)4

A graphic model, reproduced here as Figure 1.2, illustrated the process of differentiation within Polynesia. It was fundamentally a phylogenetic model, in which the ethnographically attested Polynesian cultures and societies were regarded as ultimately derived from a proto-group, termed ``Ancestral Polynesian Society'' (abbreviated APS in the diagram). Although Kirch emphasized a series of successive colonization events (migrations out of the original APS homeland, and out of later daughter communities), and the effects of subsequent isolation between descendent populations, he explicitly pointed out that cultural contact and borrowing had occurred between some island groups (as depicted by the double-arrow linking W3 and X3 in the diagram). Kirch singled out the reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian Society as a critical step in any evolutionary study of cultural differentiation within Polynesia. Knowledge of the APS ``baseline'' was necessary in order to assess or measure later historical changes in the descendent cultural traditions within Polynesia. Only by ®rst having some reasonable idea of the social and technological bases of APS would it be feasible to determine which later features were retentions, adaptations, or elaborations of older patterns, and which were entirely new innovations, borrowing, or at times convergences. Recognizing that archaeology alone was insuf®cient to reconstruct some aspects of APS (such as social structure), Kirch drew upon evidence from linguistics to outline important aspects of APS, including technology, production systems, and social relations (Kirch 1984a:53±69). His methods for such reconstruction were in retrospect insuf®ciently developed, and some of his reconstructions were later challenged (e.g., Sutton 1990, 1996). We will redress these initial methodological shortcomings, and signi®cantly extend and improve his interpretations of Ancestral Polynesia in Part II. In 1987, Kirch and Green put forward an analysis of Polynesia, for the ®rst time explicitly referring to Romney's ``genetic'' model. Others had already delineated Polynesia's advantages for historical anthropology; we sought to extend those advantages by adopting a formal set of procedures under the label of the ``phylogenetic model.'' These derived initially from the analytical steps outlined by Vogt (1964), to whose work we had been introduced through our reading of Flannery and Marcus' monograph, The Cloud People (1983). We demonstrated how Vogt's procedural steps could be more rigorously applied in Polynesia, but also argued some ``initial propositions'' regarding ``evolutionary process'' within the Polynesian region. We emphasized the critical importance of ``establishing homologies, thus clearing the path for the analysis of evolutionary process'' (1987:432). We

20

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Fig. 1.2

Kirch's 1984 model of phylogenetic differentiation in Polynesia (from Kirch 1984a: ®g. 1).

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

21

found inspiration in Stephen Jay Gould's assertions regarding what he called the ``triumph of homology, or why history matters'' (Gould 1986). In Gould's succinct phrasing, ``once we map homologies properly, we can ®nally begin to ask interesting biological questions about function and development ± that is, we can use morphology for its intrinsic sources of enlightenment, and not as an inherently ¯awed measure of genealogical relationships'' (1986:68). Although Gould wrote as a biologist, his arguments apply equally to issues of cultural evolution (with the proviso that similarities in culture can result from contact and borrowing, as well as from descent). By ®rst determining the sequence of phylogenetic divergence within Polynesian societies, and by reconstructing as thoroughly as possible the baseline of Ancestral Polynesian culture, we could ``get our history under control,'' thus enabling far more rigorous analyses of cultural evolutionary process. Although we hardly intended our 1987 paper as an exhaustive study of such evolutionary processes (let alone a thorough reconstruction of APS) we did outline several ``mechanisms of divergence,'' ``parallel evolutionary processes,'' and processes of ``convergence,'' which we thought would prove to be of signal importance in Polynesia. Among potential mechanisms of divergence, we discussed: (1) isolation; (2) founder effect or drift; (3) colonization, including adaptation to new and contrastive environments; (4) long-term environmental selection resulting both from natural and from human-induced environmental changes; and (5) external contact.5 Among the parallel evolutionary processes alluded to in our 1987 paper are: (1) demographic factors, such as a cultural analogue of the well-known r/K selection continuum in evolutionary ecology; (2) intensi®cation and specialization of production; and (3) increased competition over time. We also commented on the ``analogic emergence of similar traits or structures'' in Polynesian societies that had not been in direct contact with each other, and where such structures were evidently convergences. A key aspect of the phylogenetic model insuf®ciently developed in our 1987 paper was the procedure for reconstructing the ancestral culture and proto-language, that stand at the base or root of any phylogenetic unit. This procedure, which we here call the ``triangulation method,'' is a main thrust of this book, and the subject of Chapter 2. Necessary modi®cations to Vogt's methodology By 1987, we were both aware of problems or inadequacies in Vogt's (1964, 1994a) proposed phylogenetic methodology. We especially took issue with his reliance upon lexicostatistics and glottochronology, not only to determine the subgrouping relationships among the languages under consideration, but also to calculate the time depth of cultural differentiation within a particular

22

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

``segment of cultural history.'' Vogt's recommended procedure had been used by Marcus (Topic 2 in Flannery and Marcus 1983) to outline a sequence of linguistic divergence among the ``Otomangueans'' who include the modern Zapotec and Mixtec. In reading Flannery and Marcus' otherwise brilliantly argued volume, we realized that Polynesian scholars had surpassed our Mesoamerican colleagues, because historical linguists in the Paci®c had already recognized the pitfalls associated with a strictly lexicostatistical approach. Paci®c lexicostatistical studies in the 1950s and 1960s (e.g., Dyen 1965) had failed to provide the same level of acceptable propositions about subgrouping as the comparative method. Lexicostatistics and glottochronology have little following today among Paci®c scholars, and we do not employ them, for reasons detailed below.6 In retrospect, we should have made this point more prominently in our 1987 paper; the subgrouping model for Polynesian languages that we used there (Kirch and Green 1987: ®g. 2, after Biggs 1971) was based not on lexicostatistics, but rather on a great deal of careful comparative work on phonology, lexicon, and morphology.7 It was a subgrouping model based on signi®cant numbers of shared innovations (as opposed to retentions, or generalized similarity), a methodological advance comparable to the paradigm shift from phenetic to cladistic methods in biological phylogenetics (see discussion, below). Furthermore, in Polynesia we did not rely on the questionable method of glottochronology to calculate the time depth of differentiation, as archaeological work in the Western Polynesian ``homeland'' area had independently established this temporal frame on the basis of radiocarbon dating (Green 1981). We cannot overstress the importance of applying the ``genetic comparative method'' in historical linguistics when developing a phylogenetic model in historical anthropology. For reasons detailed in Chapter 2, this is the approach we follow and strongly advocate for historical anthropology in general.8 It is the only approach that leads directly to a corpus of soundly based lexical reconstructions for a proto-language's content (Ross 1997:254). In Polynesia, the comparative method has provided increasingly precise models of subgrouping, and in turn a large and well-attested set of lexical reconstructions. A similar situation obtains even in the more subtle and entangled dialect continuum of Fiji, where a strict family tree model is even less appropriate (Geraghty 1983; Pawley 1999). The same is true at higher levels in the Austronesian language family, where the comparative method yields both the major Oceanic subgroup (Pawley and Ross 1993:433±34), and various internal subgroups within it (Ross 1988; Pawley and Ross 1993:439±40; ®g. 2; Green 1997b, ®g. 4).9 The value of subgrouping based on the genetic comparative method likewise holds for the highest-order subgroups within Austronesian (Pawley and Ross 1993:435±39). Beyond the

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

23

Austronesian region, experience with several language families (IndoEuropean, Austronesian, Niger-Congo, etc.) again indicates that the comparative method has the most to recommend it, especially when integration with archaeological and other lines of evidence is intended. Dendritic versus reticulate models in historical anthropology After decades of relative neglect, a phylogenetic perspective in historical anthropology has again become the focus of debate.10 In two notable papers, John Moore (1994a, 1994b) challenges the view that human societies have typically differentiated in a branching or phylogenetic manner, arguing instead that rhizotic or reticulate processes of ``ethnogenesis'' are more common in human prehistory. Moore's critique, which extends generally to the application of cladistic methods within historical anthropology, was motivated in part by adverse reactions to the overextended claims of CavalliSforza and others associated with the Human Genome Diversity Project (Cavalli-Sforza et al. 1988, 1994); these authors implied that virtually all of human history can be reduced to a kind of master ``family tree'' with unambiguous links between biological populations and major language families. Moore's ``ethnogenetic'' approach is in¯uenced by his own ethnographic and ethnohistorical research among Native American populations in central and southeastern North America, where, for example, he convincingly demonstrates historical fusion as well as ®ssion among groups such as the Lakota and Cheyenne. Nevertheless, Moore does not wholly reject a phylogenetic or cladistic model, and he points to Polynesia as one region where such models are useful and appropriate (Moore 1994b:14). In contrast, Ruth Mace and Mark Pagel (1994) just as cogently argue the necessity of applying a formal comparative method within anthropology, one that explicitly incorporates a cladistic or phylogenetic method. They write: The critical point . . . is that the validity of comparative methods for anthropology depends upon correctly counting independent instances of cultural change. Independent instances of cultural change, in turn, cannot be identi®ed without the construction of a phylogeny (or cladogram) showing the patterns of hierarchical descent of the cultures being studied. (1994:551)

As in Vogt's method (which they seem to be unaware of and do not cite), Mace and Pagel (1994:552) argue that ``all the evidence available, be it genetic, linguistic, archaeological, historical, or cultural'' should be drawn on in the complex task of constructing phylogenies. As with Vogt and ourselves, Mace and Pagel see linguistic evidence as occupying a critical position, for ``whilst being far from perfect, [language] may offer the best

24

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

general method of reconstructing cultural phylogenies that we have'' (1994:553). But Mace and Pagel are not so naive as to think that the construction of cultural phylogenies is identical to the process of phylogeny construction in biology. This is due to the problem of ``horizontal transmission'' between human cultures, what anthropologists (and linguists) classically labeled ``diffusion'' or ``borrowing'' (what we here call synologies). They thus recognize the issues raised in Moore's critique, but do not regard them as overwhelming. Dendritic versus rhizotic ± or phylogenetic versus ethnogenetic ± models have been explicitly debated by historical anthropologists working within the vast Austronesian-speaking region, including Polynesia. Bellwood et al. (1995), for example, see much merit in applying a phylogenetic model to the entire realm of Austronesian-speaking societies and cultures.11 For Madagascar, Dewar (1995) argues the relative strengths of reticulate versus dendritic processes in that island's cultural history. John Terrell and his associates (Terrell 1986, 1988; Welsch et al. 1992; Welsch and Terrell 1994; Welsch 1996), on the other hand, insist that there is no phylogenetic patterning discernible in the region of Near Oceania, and Terrell et al. (1997) extend this argument to the whole of Oceania, proclaiming the death knell of a phylogenetic and comparative approach. They would see the Paci®c as a sea of islands criss-crossed by so many reticulate pathways of interaction that any attempt to infer cultural phylogeny is inherently doomed to failure. Yet Terrell et al.'s own north coast New Guinea research, which they hold up as a model case in point (Terrell et al. 1997), fails to support their contentions. Rather, as Moore and Romney (1994, 1996; Roberts et al. 1995) have cogently demonstrated, the New Guinea data set developed by Terrell and Welsch yields strong patterns of association between language and culture, even though much contact (``horizontal transmission'') between Austronesian and Non-Austronesian cultures has occurred in the region for at least 3,500 years. Moreover, recent molecular genetic work (Merriwether et al., 1999) indicates strong associations between Austronesian languagespeaking populations and certain genetic traits, such as a particular 9-base pair deletion, reinforcing earlier indications of strong biological±linguistic correlates in dermatoglyphs and other features (Froehlich 1987). Thus, although rhizotic or reticulate processes of cultural interaction have been signi®cant in the cultural history of Near Oceania over the past several millennia (Kirch 2000), in our view these were not so pervasive as to have wholly masked or eliminated underlying phylogenetic patterns. Bellwood (1996a) casts the debate over phylogeny versus reticulation more broadly, arguing that both approaches have their place in the repertoire of historical anthropological models, a point we enthusiastically second. As

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

25

Bellwood observes, much depends on the temporal and spatial scales at which an investigator works. As in Moore's case examples from the American southeast, we think that Bellwood is right to point out that these concern ``societies already under the in¯uence, whether bene®cial or malignant, of colonial authorities,'' and these societies, moreover, had suffered from several centuries of severe demographic collapse. Societies under adverse colonial in¯uence differed entirely from those associated with earlier expansions of agricultural peoples in various parts of the world, beginning in the early Holocene, fueled by demographic increase. Bellwood expresses our own viewpoint quite eloquently: Large-scale and fairly integrated colonizations did happen in prehistory; human cultures and languages can, to varying degrees depending upon time and space coordinates, be organized in phylogenetic arrays. The generation of human diversity in the past has not been entirely reticulate and dependent on processes of in situ interaction between peoples of different ethno-linguistic background. Neither has it been entirely radiative and dependent upon adaptation in isolation. But to rule out phylogeny as of any signi®cance in the patterning of difference and similarity between human cultures is surely no more than a ``whimsical view.'' (Bellwood 1996a:888)

Phylogenetic analysis in biology, linguistics, and anthropology A phylogenetic model of cultural evolution obviously has close parallels with its more widely understood application in evolutionary biology, as the study of divergence or radiation among groups of historically related lineages (Gould 1980; Mayr 1982). Yet there are signi®cant differences, resulting from the nature of ``dual transmission'' in cultural evolution (Durham 1982, 1991; Boyd and Richerson 1985) and from the complications arising from ``horizontal transmission,'' as discussed above. A brief comparison of basic theoretical tenets of modern phylogenetic theory and practice in biology (what is today commonly referred to as ``cladistics'') with those underpinning the genetic comparative method in historical linguistics is instructive. Such comparisons reveal the same fundamental emphasis on procedures for discovering characters that are truly innovative and hence exclusively shared by a set of sister groups (whether these be species or languages); they also emphasize that truly evolutionary phylogenies must be based on analysis of ``derived'' characters. As Mayr (1982:209±21) points out, Darwin recognized that ``af®nity is proximity of descent,'' and that phylogenetic systematics should therefore be based on a principle of monophyletic classi®cation, but later practitioners of macrotaxonomy largely ignored the ``splendid start'' he had made. The

26

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

inconsistent procedures for macrotaxonomy that developed among systematists throughout the ®rst half of the twentieth century set the stage for a new approach, which seized hold of the opportunities for large-scale numeric quanti®cation and statistical comparison provided by the development of high-speed computers. This approach, at ®rst called ``numerical taxonomy'' and later ``numerical phenetics,'' or simply ``phenetics'' (Sokal and Sneath 1973), used large arrays of metric or discrete characters, for which statistical assessments of ``similarity'' were then calculated ``by the mechanical operations of the computer'' (Mayr 1982:222).12 The phenetic approach enjoyed a short period of dominance in the ®eld of biological taxonomy, but it was doomed to failure because it equally weighted all characters, and it wilfully ignored phyletic information. Speci®cally, phenetics made no attempt to discriminate characters that were shared retentions of a much older common ancestor (and thus found in more taxa than just those of the sister groups under comparison), from characters that were uniquely inherited from the immediate ancestor of the species being considered. The greatest advance in phylogenetic analysis in biology, which has come to be known as ``cladistics,'' was initially developed by Willi Hennig (1965, 1966).13 Hennig's advance ± which was in effect merely a return to the principles advocated by Darwin ± was to hold that phylogenetic classi®cations should seek to represent genealogy, or common descent. Hennig (1965:101±2, ®g. 1) distinguished between three quite different categories of morphological resemblance, categories that had not been suf®ciently discriminated among by prior generations of systematists, and worse, had been wholly ignored by the pheneticists. Hennig termed these categories: (1) plesiomorphy, similarity that results from using ancestral characters which may be shared among taxa well beyond the ``sister group'' under consideration; (2) convergence, similarity owing to analogous (as opposed to homologous) innovations; and (3) synapomorphy, similarity that truly re¯ects mutually exclusive derivation among a sister-group of taxa, and which therefore is the only kind of similarity which can truly be used for phylogenetics.14 Since Hennig's initial proposals and the development of a core methodology, there has been a vast outpouring of literature on the theory and methods of cladistics, much of which is worthy of consideration by historical anthropologists (and indeed has in¯uenced such scholars as Mace and Pagel [1994]).15 A thorough review of these materials would digress well beyond our intended scope. Here we simply point to the core of Hennig's cladistic methodology, in Ernst Mayr's clear prose: The crucial aspect of cladistics is the careful analysis of all characters in the comparison of related taxa and in the partitioning of these characters into ancestral (plesiomorph) and uniquely-derived (apomorph) characters. Branching points in the phylogeny are determined by the backwards tracing of uniquely derived characters

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

27

(synapomorphies) because such apomorph characters are believed to be found only among the descendants of the ancestor in which the character ®rst occurred. (1982:227)

The development of historical linguistics ± a discipline also fundamentally concerned with the methodology of historical reconstruction ± displays remarkable similarity to that of biological macrotaxonomy during the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.16 The early philologists, beginning with Jacob Grimm, Friedrich Schlegel, and Franz Bopp, and continuing with others such as Brugmann (1884), had worked out a series of principles of historical reconstruction and of the subgrouping of related languages. These were codi®ed in several classic texts of the early to mid-twentieth century (e.g., Bloom®eld 1933; Hoenigswald 1960), and laid out such principles as the working out of regular sound correspondences, based on careful, systematic comparison of cognate morphemes from a set of languages hypothesized to be related (Hoenigswald 1963; Allan 1994). In the 1950s and 1960s, motivated by the development of radiocarbon dating in archaeology and by the desire for a comparable method that could give quick and precise results, some historical linguists began to advocate a set of strictly quantitative procedures, called ``lexicostatistics.'' In many respects, this paralleled the phenetic approach in biology. The inventor and chief proponent of this approach was Morris Swadesh (1952, 1955; see also Gudchinsky 1956), who extended the method of numerical comparison to a core list or ``basic lexicon,'' which he reasoned could then be used as a method for absolute dating of pairwise language separations. As Trask (1996:362) points out, however, lexicostatistics ``can be applied only after the languages of interest have been shown to be related and after cognate words have been securely identi®ed''; that is, after the basic hard work of the comparative method has been done. Unfortunately, lexicostatistics has sometimes been used as a substitute for the comparative method itself. One example was Dyen's (1965) vast statistical comparison of Austronesian languages (requiring access to newly developed high-speed computing), leading to a ``family tree'' or classi®cation that has proven to be completely at odds with the tree resulting from application of the comparative method (Grace 1966; Guy 1980; Blust 1981b). For reasons discussed by Wang (1994:1,446), glottochronology ± as an extension of lexicostatistics ± was also fraught with uncritical assumptions, and is little used today. Most historical linguists have now returned to the properly cladistic methodology for subgrouping which has been available to them for more than a century (i.e., since Brugmann 1884). Lexicostatistics and glottochronology were remarkably parallel, in both theory and method, to the approach of the ``numerical taxonomists'' or

28

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

``pheneticists'' in biology. Neither paid proper attention to the weighting of characters (in linguistics, lexemes), or to a method for discriminating ancestral (i.e., plesiomorphic) from derived (i.e., synapomorphic, or innovative) characters, so essential in the construction of rigorous phylogenetic models. This brief comparison of phylogenetic theory and method in biology and historical linguistics has critical implications for historical anthropologists who would seek to advance phylogenetic analysis and reconstruction using archaeological and ethnographic data. The signi®cance of phylogeny for historical anthropology We believe that a phylogenetic approach should be a central component of the tool kit of the historical anthropologist; we do not claim it should be the only component, or even necessarily the most important component, in that kit. To draw an analogy again with biology, our position closely parallels that of Eldredge and Cracraft (1980), who argue the necessity of integrating phylogenetic systematics with the study of evolutionary process, especially macro-evolutionary process.17 The cultural equivalent of microevolution is probably best observed in the short-term ethnographic (or ethnohistoric) record, and hypotheses concerning cultural change in the short term do not necessarily require close historical analysis (i.e., synchrony can be assumed). When we turn to the macroevolutionary equivalent in cultural evolution ± the longue dureÂe of change that leads to the emergence of new cultural con®gurations out of older ± control over history becomes essential. Boyd et al. (1997:376) make this same point when they state that ``reconstructing the histories of peoples without written records requires that one distinguish between homologies . . . analogies . . . and synologies (similarities produced by diffusion or borrowing).'' Just as the testing of macroevolutionary hypotheses in biology, then, ``require[s] a cladogram'' (Eldredge and Cracraft 1980:327), we would argue that the testing of hypotheses of long-term cultural change necessitates the careful working out of cultural phylogenies. And we hasten to add ± lest we be misunderstood on this point ± that phylogenetic analysis would certainly include the testing of the null hypothesis that any particular group of cultures under consideration does not, in fact, constitute a monophyletic unit, or that similarities between them have arisen from signi®cant interaction, diffusion, or borrowing (rather than from common descent). Many contemporary archaeologists ± if not all those in related disciplines who might consider themselves to be ``historical anthropologists'' ± operate within one or another evolutionary theoretical framework. But these frameworks vary considerably in various aspects of their epistemology and in their

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

29

premises about the fundamental processes of evolution with respect to culture (Spencer 1997). Although most archaeologists would now probably regard a unilineal or progressive evolution by stages (sometimes called, unfortunately, ``cultural evolution'') as naive and outdated, they are by no means agreed on what model should replace it. At least two principal camps can be discerned, termed the ``processualists'' and the ``selectionists'' by Spencer (1997:210).18 It seems to us, however, that the essential problem of disentangling homology from analogy or synology is equally critical to both schools, and as Neff and Larson write in a recent review of the methodology of comparison in evolutionary archaeology, ``evolutionary archaeology is as much about history as it is about ecology and economics'' (1997:83±4). They go on to note that ``history matters . . . because use of comparative data to test hypotheses about cultural adaptation requires independence of the cases being compared.''19 Lyman and O'Brien, representing the contemporary selectionist school of evolutionary archaeology, likewise insist that ``history matters'' (1998:622±23). Certainly not all historical anthropologists are interested in evolution, and not even all archaeologists. But the importance of ``getting one's history right,'' of working out particular historical trajectories of cultural change and sequences of cultural differentiation and divergence, is not con®ned to evolutionary approaches within anthropology or archaeology.20 In our view it applies equally to schools of thought that regard themselves as distinct from either evolutionary ``processualists'' or ``selectionists,'' for example explicitly Marxist theorists (McGuire 1992). It was, after all, Marx himself who said that men make their own history not ``just as they please,'' but rather ``under circumstances directly found, given and transmitted from the past.'' In his famous phrase, ``the tradition of all the dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living'' (Marx 1978:595). We will not further belabor our point, but simply conclude by stressing that, for us, the determination of phylogenetic sequences is not an end in itself, although it has intrinsic interest. Rather, phylogenetic analysis in historical anthropology provides the means to the following ends: (1) it offers a degree of methodological rigor necessary for the reconstruction of ancestral cultural patterns; and (2) it allows for a more controlled and rigorous study of change among descendent groups. Objectives of this book Ward Goodenough, an early champion of controlled comparison, more recently proclaimed that: ``Remote Oceania, where we can presume that we are dealing with phylogenetically related cultural traditions, as well as with phylogenetically related languages, is an excellent area in which to conduct

30

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

. . . systematic examination of structurally homologous traditions'' (1997:24). In our view, this exercise requires a well-developed program in historical linguistics (using the genetic comparative method), paralleled by an ethnographic corpus that can be engaged with historical issues, and by an archaeology whose outcomes are solid enough to address wider historical interests. We agree with Pawley and Pawley that ``for doing culture history several disciplines are, ultimately, better than one'' (1998:209). Sapir wisely concluded his pioneering essay, Time Perspectives in Aboriginal American Culture, with the comment that ``anything like real completeness is, of course, entirely out of the question'' (1916:460). Heeding Sapir's words, we do not aim here at a full and systematic method for historical or evolutionary analysis. Our more modest objective is to explore some fruitful avenues of phylogenetically based reconstruction that have emerged in Polynesia, part of the Remote Oceanic region viewed by Goodenough as particularly favorable to phylogenetic study. A truly sophisticated methodology for historical anthropology is something that will develop only over time and through practice, as others apply it to varied units of time and space, in regions well outside the Paci®c. An exhaustive application of the phylogenetic model would require tracing each different local branch and divergence within Polynesia historically, and examining each instance of a parallel trend or convergence. Such a grand enterprise is not our purpose here (although we hope to see it someday accomplished). Rather we will explore more fully the ``commonly inherited structural base'' (Kirch 1984a:262), what we call Ancestral Polynesian culture. We limit ourselves to this aspect of the phylogenetic model in Polynesia for two reasons. First, reconstruction of the ancestral, structural base from which all later Polynesian societies and cultures arguably descended is an essential step that must be accomplished before more sophisticated analyses of cultural divergence and evolution can proceed. Second, believing that the methods for historical reconstruction themselves need further re®nement, we hope to contribute to the general ®eld of historical anthropology by working these methods out through their application to Polynesia. These may then be applied beyond the particular timespace constraints of our own study region. In Chapter 2, we consider in detail the theoretical principles and methodological procedures for correlating linguistic and archaeological evidence, speci®c problems of lexical and semantic reconstruction, and the application of the direct historical approach, all in the context of Polynesia. This is followed, in Chapter 3, by a discussion of the speci®c linguistic, biological, ethnographic, and archaeological evidence permitting us to circumscribe Polynesia as a discrete and well-de®ned phylogenetic unit, and to delineate its major internal branches. These two chapters develop the

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

31

conceptual and methodological tools allowing us to tackle the substantive problem in Part II, the historical reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian culture and societies. It may be that in Polynesia we have chosen an unusually simple case, and some will say that it would be dif®cult or impossible to apply our approach in more complicated situations. We are not so pessimistic. By focusing on a ``peripheral'' region such as Polynesia, where time depth is relatively shallow and where linguistic diversity is restricted to a single subfamily of Austronesian, we can work out our principles and methods most clearly.21 But we would argue ± as has Goodenough (1997:22±24) ± that the phylogenetic approach is just as applicable elsewhere in Remote Oceania. We believe it can be applied productively even in Near Oceania, complicated as that region is by a time depth of more than 30,000 years, by signi®cant cultural complexity, and by great linguistic diversity at the family level. Moreover, we are convinced that a phylogenetic approach in historical anthropology holds great promise for other regions of the world.22

Chapter 2

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model Anthropologists have long recognized that cultural traditions in different societies can be related phylogenetically in that they derive historically from a common ancestral tradition in the same way that languages can be related phylogenetically. Problems of method for convincingly establishing such relations for cultural traditions have remained unresolved. Remote Oceania, where we have reason to assume that nearly all existing cultural traditions are phylogenetically related, offers possibilities for comparative study to illustrate the goodenough 1997:16 methodological issues to be resolved.

Sophisticated application of a phylogenetic model in historical anthropology requires a rigorous methodology. Using our Polynesian case, we begin with the problem of correlating linguistic and archaeological evidence, followed by possible models for linguistic divergence. We will show that such models are not limited to strictly ``tree-like'' branching models; historical linguists have recently developed ``network-breaking,'' or ``dialect-chain'' models that are more appropriate to Paci®c history. This in turn leads to matters of de®ning ``homelands,'' and of establishing time depth. All of these issues are essential to establishing a proper phylogenetic framework. The second half of this chapter examines what we call the ``triangulation method'' in historical anthropology, which allows one to achieve a reconstruction of the ancestral culture which lies at the root of a phylogenetic ``tree.'' The procedural details of the triangulation method will take us into the realm of lexical and semantic reconstruction, especially the ``recovery of meaning'' by using comparative ethnographic materials to develop speci®c semantic history hypotheses. Correlating linguistic and archaeological evidence in Polynesia In his pioneering formulation of a phylogenetic method, Vogt (1964; see also 1994a) advocated commencing with linguistic evidence, in order to de®ne the scope of a particular ``segment of cultural history'' (see Chapter 1). 32

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

33

However, matters are more complicated than Vogt imagined, necessitating some modi®cations. For reasons explained in Chapter 1, we reject lexicostatistics and glottochronology as inadequate for determining the time depth of linguistic splits within a language family. Moreover, we see the need to identify linguistic ``homelands'' ± within which one can search for archaeological correlates of any given proto-language ± as a necessary part of a linguistic methodology. For Remote Oceania including Polynesia, Pawley (1966, 1967) and Green (1966) initially applied family tree models based on the comparative method, and tried to work out their implications for Polynesian archaeology and prehistory. Building upon these early endeavors, Pawley and Green (1973) outlined ®ve principles, which we also take as our starting point for applying linguistic evidence in historical reconstruction. They began by labeling ``the language of the ®rst well-established population in an island the foundation language, and the language of any later arrivals an intrusive or invading language'' (1973:38). Equivalent terms can be applied to archaeological sequences with the ®rst well-established cultural traditions in a region being the foundation culture, and later traditions designated as intrusive or invading cultures. Pawley and Green equated the foundation culture with the earliest cultural tradition appearing in the archaeological record. For the western sector of Remote Oceania (i.e., the Reef/Santa Cruz Islands, Vanuatu, Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia, and Fiji±Western Polynesia) this foundation culture is the Lapita cultural complex (Green 1979a, 1997b; Spriggs 1984, 1991, 1997; Kirch 1997a). Green (1997b) argues that the only apparent intrusive cultures in this sector occur on the island of NendoÈ (Santa Cruz) and in the main Reef Islands, during the last 1,000 years. Possible intrusive cultures occur from Vanikoro to Tikopia and through northern and central Vanuatu to New Caledonia in the form of the Mangaasi culture,1 while invading cultures are well documented for various of the Polynesian Outliers such as Tikopia and Anuta (Kirch and Yen 1982; Kirch 1984b). For this same region, the foundation languages all fall within a set of closely related subgroups deriving from a late stage of Proto Oceanic (Ross 1988; Green 1997b).2 Again, intrusive language replacements include only Reef/Santa Cruz (Wurm 1969, 1970, 1978, 1992),3 while invading languages are represented by the various Polynesian Outlier languages (Pawley 1967), and by the northern Tongan case described by Pawley and Green (1973:39). Thus, within the vast Remote Oceanic area ± permanently settled only 3,200±3,300 years ago on radiocarbon chronology ± the linguistic and archaeological histories coincide remarkably, allowing the following principles to be advanced as guidelines (the following is paraphrased from Pawley and Green 1973:39±41):

34

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Principle 1. Under the conditions obtaining in the Paci®c in pre-contact times, the foundation language of a remote island group could seldom be replaced by an intrusive language. A remote island group is one isolated by more than 450 km of open sea. The principle does not apply to non-remote island groups, although it may be that the de®nition of ``remote island group'' can be made more sophisticated, and that under certain conditions a distance of less than 450 km was suf®cient to reduce the frequency of two-way contact. The same claim cannot be made about the kinds of materials with which the archaeologist deals. Fusion of distinct cultural traditions occurs commonly, and a small intrusive population may have a large effect on the material culture of a region. For these reasons an analogous principle cannot be applied to material culture, or at least can be applied only with important reservations. Principle 2. Once a language X has become established on two island groups, separated from each other by more than 450 km of open sea, linguistic splitting (gradual divergence into separate dialects Y and Z) is inevitable. Principle 3. After 1,000 years Y and Z will have diverged to the point of being separate languages or will be very close to that point. (There are various criteria for determining whether two speech traditions are separate languages or dialects of one language. A low degree, or lack of, mutual intelligibility is one criterion of distinctness; some would give less than 80 percent, or less than 70 percent, cognation in basic vocabulary as another, more arbitrary, index.) Principles 2 and 3 make predictions about diversi®cation only between relatively isolated islands, not within an island group or archipelago. One might reasonably ask how long the language of a Neolithic society can persist as a unity in an island group where some neighboring islands are separated by shorter distances of 50 or 100 km. Is linguistic splitting inevitable under such conditions? The Tongan and Samoan cases show that linguistic unity can be maintained over single archipelagos of widely dispersed islands for more than 2,000 years. In fact, there are no known cases of separate languages developing in the same archipelago anywhere in Polynesia.4 We now turn to the contribution archaeology can make to the dating of linguistic splits. The following principles are suggested as the most economical way of relating certain archaeological and linguistic facts for a given island group. Principle 4. For a given island group, the foundation language can be equated with the foundation culture in the archaeological sequence, provided that the latter is well established and widely distributed throughout the group. Principle 5. If the archaeological sequence in a remote island group is continuous, i.e., if one tradition has not replaced another at some stage, then the foundation language is ancestral to the present language or subgroup spoken in that region.

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

35

In sum, there are logical reasons for expecting that the language of a remote island or island group will in most cases be descended from the languages spoken by the ®rst society to establish a sizable population there. Yet, even with these principles, more realistic models than those conveyed solely by classic ``family tree'' diagrams are essential to the joint archaeolinguistic enterprise. Linguistic models of divergence Historical connections among related languages are typically conveyed by the graphical device of the ``family tree,'' or ``dendrogram.'' The linguistic splits thus depicted are usually taken to imply that a high degree of isolation (or, conversely, a low level of continuing contact and lexical borrowing) obtained between each of the branches. Such claims usually have a strong geographical and distributional underpinning (cf. Terrell 1986:248±49, ®gs. 87, 88). But, as Terrell (1986:247) ± reiterating Biggs (1972) ± observed, scholars working in the Paci®c have repeatedly warned against converting such family tree subgroupings into ``simple A to B to C models'' of prehistory. Ross (1997:213) likewise comments, ``although the model is isomorphic enough with a wide-angle view of linguistic prehistory, it can be inimical to more narrowly focused research.'' Green (1981) documented the use (and misuse) of a narrowly focused branching model, its problems, and the need for an alternative in the search for the putative location of the Polynesian ``homeland.'' As the ``wave theorists'' and dialect geographers of Indo-European and other languages have long been aware (Diebold 1987), linguistic histories are typically more complicated than implied by the family tree model. Such trees are indeed ``often unsatisfactory for making sense of and for representing historical relationships among languages'' (Pawley and Ross 1995:51). Thus, Austronesian comparativists have given increased attention to the problems that ancient dialect chains present in determining subgrouping models, and in lexical reconstruction (Pawley and Ross 1993:437). Pawley and Ross cite numerous instances where ``in early Oceanic, dialect differentiation and network-breaking were the rule rather than the exception'' (1995:51). For example, it would be quite inappropriate to transform a typical branching family tree diagram of the closely related Polynesian, Fijian, and Rotuman languages into a simple sequence of settlement steps commencing in island A as the homeland of the founding proto-language, proceeding on to island B, and thence to C, D, and so on. Pawley and Green (1984) addressed this problem directly by setting out two models within which the linguistic evidence for Oceania may be framed:

36

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

In work on Austronesian subgrouping since the 1950s there has been a tendency to conceive of subgroups as being formed by what we will call the radiation model. This model posits an initial period of uni®ed development undergone by a localized, homogenous language community, followed by a period of geographic expansion, leading to the creation of dispersed, isolated daughter communities which develop independently from the time of dispersal. (1984:138)

However, as more detailed evidence accumulated, it became apparent within many Austronesian-speaking regions that other conditions have frequently obtained, and that linguists had ± especially for Remote Oceania ± underestimated the capacity of the early Austronesians to spread quickly over a vast area, and to maintain a fairly uni®ed speech tradition across a network of local communities dispersed across an archipelago ± a unity that may last for many centuries, even millenia [sic], before there is a decisive divergence of local dialects. In some cases it is clear that the location of the ancestral language was approximately equal to the area now occupied by all of its daughter languages. That is to say, it is not necessary for there to be a geographic expansion for the proto-language to break up. A gradual weakening of ties between the network of sister dialects suf®ces: eventually, sharp language boundaries appear. Call this the network-breaking model. (Pawley and Green 1984:138±39, emphasis added)

A network model is especially relevant for ascertaining the probable linguistic correlates of: (1) the Lapita cultural complex which spread rapidly through much of Remote Oceania and was ancestral to Polynesian culture (Pawley 1981; Green 1997b); (2) the Ancestral Polynesian stage centered in the western Polynesian archipelagos (see Chapter 3); and (3) the early Eastern Polynesian stage centered in the Cook±Society±Marquesas region (Kirch 1986a; Green 1988). The formation and break-up of proto-languages in a networking model assumes a ¯ow of lexical and grammatical innovations across the dispersed local communities. What one is really studying are situations of dialect geography that require a different approach, as Geraghty (1983) amply demonstrates in the Fijian and pre-Polynesian case. While the spread of innovations will never be entirely constant or always congruent throughout the network, as long as they continue to be fairly even, the entire dialect chain will continue to change as a unity or partial unity. In these circumstances, there is no single point in time that can be equated with the breakup of the proto-language. Instead, there is a period during which unity declines; when one dialect has ceased to be intelligible to the rest, or has ceased to take part in the ¯ow of innovations, the breakup may be said to be complete. (Pawley and Green 1984:139)

For these reasons, Pawley and Green (1984:139) argued that ``if pressed, most linguists would probably have always conceded that subgroups are

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

37

sometimes formed in this general manner.'' However, in doing lexical reconstruction it is often more convenient (and hence less ``messy'') to simply assume that each descendent of the proto-language is an independent witness to the parent stage. In 1984, Pawley and Green found that with respect to the Oceanic branch of Austronesian languages, it is necessary ``to employ both the radiation and network-breaking models (for different stages). Both permit the construction of family trees and proto-languages'' (1984:139). In many of the Oceanic cases listed by Pawley and Green (1984: fn. 30), both kinds of models are required to account for different phases of the family tree sequence. Similarly, in the classi®cation of western Oceanic languages, Ross (1988) drew a distinction between the well-marked subgroups that result from complete splits, and those that form imperfect linkages. Such alternative models to the radiation or family tree types in Oceania have now reached considerable sophistication, and differ from the IndoEuropean ``wave model'' which does not seek family trees and is best used in dialect studies (Pawley and Ross 1995:64±65, fn. 9). For the Oceanic languages, we now have innovation-de®ned subgroups based on isolating mechanisms, and innovation-linked subgroups where continuing linkages are to the fore (Pawley and Ross 1995:50±51; Ross 1997:222±25). Pawley (1997:472±73) calls these ``perfect'' and ``imperfect'' subgroups (the latter category including persisting dialect linkages), and has shown that the second category has major application not only for Oceanic, but for the higher-order Malayo-Polynesian level as well. Ross (1997) has formalized and theorized the entire process in a ground-breaking article on social networks and on kinds of speech community events, a paper we recommend to all ``linguistic prehistorians'' (1997:211), those who would practice any form of archaeolinguistics. The current situation in the ®eld can be summed up in two quotes from Ross: It is only in the last twenty or so years that linguistic prehistorians have become more adept at recognizing that there are different kinds of linguistic divergence, and that there are also varieties of linguistic convergence re¯ecting community contact and integration (1997:213, emphasis in original). It is obvious that the social network diagram can not replace the family tree as a means of representation. (1997:254)

In sum, the family tree: (1) functions as the presentation of event sequences and the subgroups that are their outcomes; (2) determines what words are reconstructable in the proto-language; and (3) is crucial to locating the homeland of a proto-language (Ross 1997:254±55). We cannot overstress that both linguistic strategies ± trees as well as networks ± are required; it is not a case of one or the other. In Oceania we have both

38

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

dispersed dialect chains, and localized homogeneous languages and protolanguages, and we ®nd extended periods of continuing contact as well as points of fairly sharp diversi®cation when a population moved to a distant island group creating a sharp break.5 Dispersal centers and homelands Sapir (1916:456±57) discussed some of the principles for inferring ``historical centers of distribution'' for related languages, based on historical evidence for signi®cant linguistic differentiation in certain regions. Dyen (1956) formalized these and related propositions into a set of speci®c procedures. The objective is to infer from the linguistic evidence the most probable dispersal centers or homelands for any given language family, once the main internal relationships within the family have been established. Inferences about movement are based on identi®cation of those regions exhibiting the greatest genetic diversity according to a subgrouping of the languages concerned, rather than simply those displaying the greatest number of daughter languages. Invoking the principle of parsimony, regions that served as primary dispersal centers should also require the fewest subsequent moves for all subgroups and daughter languages to have achieved their contemporary geographic distribution. Lexical reconstructions ± for a given protostage ± of words for the environment and distinctive physical features, as well as for plants and animals of restricted range, can also be explored to test hypotheses of former homelands of a language family or its subgroups (the WoÈrter und Sachen method). However, in our opinion these should not be relied on as a primary means of homeland identi®cation. Rather, as Ross (1997:255) indicates, ``a well-argued tree is . . . crucial to locating the homeland of a proto-language.'' Pawley and Ross (1993:440±42) discuss the historical conclusions drawn from the evidence for the higher-level subgroupings within Austronesian (see Figures 2.1 and 2.2). At the level of Proto Austronesian they start in Taiwan and the northern Philippines, and proceed south and east through several interstages to northern Halmahera and Cenderawasih Bay in New Guinea, a likely homeland for Proto Eastern Malayo-Polynesian. They place the primary dispersal center for the Oceanic subgroups in western Melanesia, speci®cally the Bismarck Archipelago possibly including the northern coast of New Guinea (1993:441). In Chapter 3, using similar procedures, we will consider probable dispersal centers in Remote Oceania for the various eastern Oceanic subgroups, especially Proto Central Paci®c and Proto Polynesian.

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

Fig. 2.1

39

The higher-level subgrouping of the Austronesian languages, down to the Oceanic level (after Pawley 1996a).

Establishing time depth Linguistic methods for establishing time depth can yield only relative sequences of events, not precise chronology. Only a general sense of age is obtained from the internal structure of family trees; for example, it is clear that the closely related Polynesian languages have differentiated more recently than those of most other Oceanic or other higher-level subgroups of Austronesian. Likewise, Polynesian ties to the various western Austronesian subgroups (e.g., the Formosan languages of Taiwan) where the languages are far more differentiated, are even more remote in time. However, precise chronological estimates for dispersals from a series of centers by linguistic methods alone are not possible, as the Austronesian case indicates. Grace (1964) originally proposed a time frame of roughly 1500 BC to AD 500 for the movement of Malayo-Polynesian speakers into Oceania. Drawing on lexicostatistical analysis and referring to the great diversity among Austronesian languages of western Island Melanesia, Dyen (1971) suggested that Oceanic speakers of Austronesian had been present in that region for at least 5,000±6,000 years.6 By attempting to correlate the linguistic evidence from Remote Oceania (and especially Fiji and Polynesia) with the archaeological evidence, Pawley and Green (1973:53) reduced

Fig. 2.2

The geographic distribution of higher-level subgroups in the Austronesian phylum.

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

41

Dyen's estimate to 4,000±5,000 years, and subsequently on further consideration (Pawley and Green 1984) to c. 3,600±4,000 years. In Chapter 3, we will revisit in greater detail the evidence for dating the Proto Central Paci®c subgroup of the Oceanic languages through its correlation with radiocarbon-dated archaeological assemblages of the Eastern Lapita complex, found in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region. Our view is that key intersections between an independently dated archaeological record and speci®c internal subgroups within a language family can yield convincing estimates of time depth for a sequence of proto-languages. As stressed earlier, while lexicostatistics and glottochronology might be consulted as independent lines of evidence, these are marred by inherent methodological ¯aws, and cannot be relied on as the primary means for calculating time depth. Terminology and units of analysis It is essential to de®ne unambiguously a few key terminological units that we employ, terms suggested previously (Kirch and Green 1987:434, 451). Drawing upon the ®eld of historical linguistics, we use the well-established convention of a proto-language to refer to each separately reconstructed node or stage in a linguistic sequence, whether based on a radiation or on a networkbreaking model. In this study, we focus primarily on the Proto Central Paci®c (PCP) and Proto Polynesian (PPN) stages, and to a lesser extent the Proto Nuclear Polynesian (PNP) and Proto Tongic (PTO) stages which followed upon the breakup of PPN. The period of accumulating language change following a previous node, and leading up to the next, is usually described as the pre-stage (i.e., pre-Polynesian or pre-Central Paci®c). To avoid any confusion between reconstructions which derive from separate sets of data, we strongly inveigh against attempts to use these linguistic terms simultaneously as cultural or biological designations. Thus we employ the tripartite terminological set of: proto-languages, parental populations, and ancestral cultures (and societies) to clarify this distinction. At any given time in the past, a parental population of interbreeding individuals, organized into one or more social units, spoke a common proto-language, and shared an ancestral culture. Having been remonstrated with by several colleagues over the label ``Ancestral Polynesian Society,'' we emphasize our view that archaeological units must ± in a phylogenetic approach ± be on a level commensurate with those used by historical linguists (i.e., languages, dialects, dialect chains, and communalects), and by biological anthropologists (i.e., inter-breeding or potentially inter-breeding populations). As we wrote in our earlier paper: Polynesian culture and society will not do. Rather what we are talking about are Samoan, Tongan, and other ancestral societies, and not ancestral Polynesian society,

42

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Lapita, or any other societal or cultural entity in the general sense. (Kirch and Green 1987:451, emphasis added)

One way of addressing this issue is to use existing archaeological designations ± Lapita cultural complex (and its regional variants such as Eastern, Western, Far Western, or Southern Lapita; see Kirch 1997:69±74), and Ancestral Polynesian culture ± as the temporally successive cover terms for these two broadly based archaeological entities, each of which is known to exhibit variation from island group to island group. It is then possible to speak of Ancestral Polynesian societies in the plural, recognizing the variation that obtained from site to site, between localities, and within and between regions, as well as to more accurately re¯ect the small size of the social and political entities and therefore settlement units involved. In short, this focuses discussion at the community and island or island group level. The triangulation method and its application to the phylogenetic model We seek to develop a triangulation method in which the subdisciplines of historical linguistics, archaeology, comparative ethnology, and biological anthropology independently contribute their data and assessments to the common objective of historical reconstruction. We derive the label from a surveying metaphor, which should be immediately understood by most ®eld archaeologists at least.7 In the classic method of survey by triangulation, sightings are taken from two or more points along a known baseline to an unlocated point which one wishes to ®x in space. As these sightings begin to converge on that point, a ``triangle or polygon of error'' is de®ned, within which the real point lies. So it is with our proposed triangulation method. Our ``sight-lines'' are those provided by the independent evidence of historical linguistics, archaeology, comparative ethnography, biological anthropology, or even oral traditions. As these converge and cross-check each other, the target of our sightings ± some aspect of the historical record ± comes increasingly into focus, and the ``polygon of error'' decreases in size. Of course, our focus on the historical ``reality'' may never be crystal clear, but, as in surveying, triangulation is always preferable to estimating the position of a point from backsights taken from a single station. While Sapir (1916) distinguished ``direct'' historical evidence (i.e., written documents, oral history, and archaeological materials) from ``inferential'' evidence (i.e., data from ethnology, linguistics, and living biological populations), the situation is arguably more complicated. Archaeologists have come to realize that their data too exist in the present, and that interpretations of past events are accomplished through a variety of inferential techniques.

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43

The same restrictions apply to the study of ancient skeletal remains (although biological anthropologists also have information derived from living populations). In both cases, once the effects of taphonomy are removed from remains created at some past time ± that time being determinable through a variety of ``absolute'' dating techniques such as radiocarbon ± analysis of such remains does offer a kind of ``direct'' evidence on those events. In contrast, the evidence from ethnology or linguistics permits only a relative sequence of past events to be inferred, and chronological dates must be obtained through correlations with non-ethnographic or linguistic evidence of a historical kind. The triangulation method brings to bear these two distinct classes of evidence, those which are truly diachronic in that they derive directly from past events and can be ``dated'' in real chronological time, and those that permit the construction of relative time sequences through systematic comparison of synchronic, but historically related, evidence.8 The analytical power of the triangulation method ± and the robustness of the historical reconstructions derived from it ± only holds, however, if one treats each data source separately, respecting the relevant subdisciplinary methods, inferences, and conclusions as they are developed independently, based exclusively on the evidence from that ®eld.9 A brief example from Polynesia ± the problem of reconstructing ancestral ®shing strategies (Green 1986) ± illustrates this principle of independence. Based strictly on the evidence of ethnographic observations, one might conclude that simple (one-piece) ®shhooks, consistently absent in museum collections from Western Polynesia, were an Eastern Polynesian innovation (Anell 1955). Indeed, initial archaeological excavations in such Eastern Polynesian islands as Hawai`i and the Marquesas yielded an abundance of shell and bone hooks, and, combined with the absence of such hooks from sites in Tonga or Samoa, seemed to con®rm this hypothesis. However, the independent evidence of historical linguistics indicated that a term *mataqu, `®shhook,' could be reconstructed at the Proto Polynesian stage ancestral to both Western and Eastern Polynesian cultures. Of course, the reconstructed word ± while evidently meaning some kind of ®shhook ± gave no speci®c clues as to form, materials of manufacture, or frequency of use. It was only after more extensive archaeological excavations in Western Polynesia increased our sample sizes, that simple one-piece ®shhooks in Turbo shell were shown to have been present in the Western Polynesian region at an early time depth (Kirch and Dye 1979). These archaeological discoveries were consistent with the Proto Polynesian reconstruction from linguistics, permitting us to infer that one-piece ®shhooks had indeed been part of the Ancestral Polynesian ®shing kit, but had later been abandoned in Western Polynesia. Moreover, the archaeological evidence also indicates that the ubiquitous simple ®sh-

44

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hooks of Eastern Polynesia (present in both early and late contexts) derive from the ancestral Turbo-shell hook tradition in Western Polynesia (Kirch et al. 1990:11), but for environmental reasons (Allen 1992) came to be made predominantly of pearl shell (Pinctada sp.) in the eastern archipelagos. This case, albeit a simple example, illustrates how alternative historical inferences can be developed on independent lines of evidence, and when taken together and submitted to cross-examination, permit a more rigorous reconstruction. The advantage of the triangulation method is underscored by the philosopher of science Allison Wylie (1989, 1992, 1993, 1999), discussing problems of con®rmation in archaeology. Disavowing either an objectivist or a relativist stance, Wylie notes that employing independent sources of data and analysis in any given reconstructive-evaluative argument ensures that the constituent arguments are not merely mutually reinforcing but also ± and crucially ± mutually constraining. We are in¯uenced ± but not monolithically controlled by ± our current understanding which makes us largely see or understand what our background knowledge and theoretical commitments prepare us to see. For this reason, each subdiscipline initially arrives at a slightly different conclusion regarding a particular historical phenomenon. But we can also assess our data differently when the circumstances change, and we can be forced by the evidence to consider alternative interpretative possibilities to those we have previously entertained (Wylie 1989:16). In short, ``if diverse evidential strands all converge on a given hypothesis ± if you can use different means to triangulate on the same postulated set of conditions or events ± then you may be able to provide it decisive, if never irreversible, support simply because it is so implausible that the convergence should be the result of compensatory error in all the in¯uences establishing its evidential support'' (Wylie 1992:28). In Part II we employ this triangulation method to develop a set of hypotheses about a given ``domain'' in the ®eld of Polynesian culture (such as subsistence, cooking, or social organization). Lexical reconstruction and meaning In their assessment of Austronesian historical linguistics, Pawley and Ross (1993) observe that most lexical work has concerned itself chie¯y with historical phonology, paying little attention to the ®ne grain of semantics. Fortunately, increasing attention is now paid to ``the history of particular semantic ®elds, especially those of interest for cultural history, and to specifying reconstructed meaning more precisely'' (1993:441). These endeavors have focused particularly on lexicons for the Proto Austronesian, Proto Malayo-Polynesian, Proto Oceanic, and Proto Polynesian stages.10 Our concern is with Proto Polynesian (PPN), and our approach follows the

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

45

practice of proceeding by semantic ®eld or domain, as will be evident in Part II. Different procedures for the reconstruction of meaning have been developed, beginning with Dyen and Aberle's (1974) pioneering work on Athapaskan kinship, and more recently by Dyen (1985), Blust (1987), and Ross, Pawley, and Osmond (1998:4±7). Green (1994) examines these methods from the point of view of an archaeologist concerned with ``culture history'' (what we prefer to call ``historical anthropology''). Unfortunately, there is a high degree of skepticism among Paci®c archaeologists concerning the use of linguistic evidence, partly because of the problems posed by meaning.11 The focus of such archaeological criticism of linguistic culture history is not on the morphological or phonological reconstruction of a given lexical form ± a task most archaeologists are happy to leave to the linguists ± but on the assignment of likely former meanings to these reconstructed etyma, given the often multiple meanings for cognates in the various daughter languages. The problem, naturally, is one of concern both to the archaeologist cum historical anthropologist, and to the historical linguist. Following Blust (1987:81), we make a critical distinction between lexical reconstruction and semantic reconstruction as separate approaches.12 Semantic reconstruction asks the question, ``what was the probable meaning of protomorpheme `X' within a given semantic ®eld,'' while lexical reconstruction asks the question, ``what was the proto-morpheme which probably meant `X.' '' Green, favoring the methodology of semantic reconstruction, observed that ``this method is more likely to provide the kind of former meanings and subsequent changes in them which archaeologists would be inclined to explore using their own data, rather than the limited, rather stark and still currently preserved sameness of meaning resulting from the Dyen and Aberle approach'' (1994:177).13 In Green's view there is a need for wellworked-out versions of what Dyen (1985) called ``semantic history hypotheses,'' or what Diebold (1987:56) refers to as a ``strong diachronic semasiology.'' Historical linguists making lexical reconstructions need to spend more time and effort attending to how they construct their meaning glosses; so do archaeologists who wish to employ their data. Most recently, Ross, Pawley, and Osmond (1998:4±7) have elaborated a methodology for ``terminological reconstruction,'' which is similar to Blust's semantic reconstruction. Essentially, they use semantic history hypotheses informed not only by linguistic evidence, but by comparative ethnography, as we do also in Part II of this book. Their method is as follows: First, the terminologies of present-day speakers of Oceanic languages are used the basis for constructing a hypothesis about the semantic structure of corresponding POc terminology, taking account of (i) ethnographic evidence . and (ii) the geographical and physical resources of particular regions of Oceania .

as a .. ..

46

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Secondly, a search is made for cognate sets from which forms can be reconstructed to match each meaning in this hypothesized terminology . . . Thirdly, the hypothesized terminology is re-examined to see if it needs modi®cation in light of the reconstructions. (Ross, Pawley, and Osmond 1998:4)

In the ®rst of a projected ®ve-volume set dealing with the lexicon of Proto Oceanic, Ross et al. (eds., 1998) elaborate a series of terminological reconstructions dealing with aspects of material culture, such as architecture, horticulture, ®shing, canoes, and related domains. Careful semantic or terminological reconstruction provides historical anthropologists with strong arguments, particularly when there is what Dyen (1985) terms ``prime semantic agreement'' (PSA), a sameness of meaning (homosemy) ``between cognates belonging to members of different branches'' of a language family or subgroup (1985:358). Examples of stable prime semantic agreement from Proto Polynesian down through other interstages to the various modern daughter languages include PPN *talo, `taro' (Colocasia esculenta), and *toki, `adz/axe/chisel' (Green 1994:178±79). However, PSA applies in only a limited number of cases, and when there is disagreement in the meanings of the cognate terms a ``semantic history hypothesis'' is required to explain how multiple and often quite varied daughter language meanings (among words still judged to form a cognate set) could have developed.14 The issue of meaning must always be kept to the fore when one is doing semantic reconstruction in historical anthropology. The POLLEX project Polynesianists ®nd themselves especially well positioned to apply the triangulation method because ± in addition to having a sophisticated subgrouping model based on the genetic comparative method ± the work of lexical reconstruction for the ancestral PPN interstage is well advanced. Thanks to decades of careful research by Bruce Biggs and his students and colleagues,15 a lexical database called POLLEX (Biggs 1998) has been developed, containing more than 2,300 speci®c PPN reconstructions, a monumental achievement.16 Table 2.1 shows a typical data array for one such PPN term, *waka, `canoe.' The POLLEX ®le lists the re¯exes of *waka for thirty-two modern Polynesian languages plus a few external witnesses (keyed according to standard three-letter abbreviations for language names, see list of language abbreviations (pp. xvi±xvii)), along with brief glosses derived from dictionary or other sources. Since *waka is a case of prime semantic agreement, there is little hesitancy in accepting Biggs' reconstructed PPN gloss of `canoe.' 17 Note also that in this case PPN *waka is itself derived from yet older cognate terms that can be reconstructed for antecedent interstages of Austronesian,

Methodologies: implementing the phylogenetic model

Table 2.1. POLLEX database entry for PPN *waka, `canoe' .AN *0 *4 *41 *5 *6 = *8 *9 *PN* ANU SAAEAS ECE EFU EUV FIJ HAW KAP MAE MAO MFA MQA MQA1 MTA MVA NIU NKO OJA PEN RAP PUK RAR REN ROT SAASAM SIK TAH TAK TIK TOK TON TUA WEV WFU WYA

WAKA.A 5/11/96. POC *wa9ka ``boat'' (Ply. 1973). PCEMP *wa9ka ``canoe'' (Bst. 1993a). PMP *va9ka9 (Dpf ). PAN *wa9ka ``boat'' (Ply. 1973), *ba9kaq ``canoe'' (Rss. 1988). Note. (Bst. 1993a) argues that *wa9ka9 (Dpf ) is a Chinese loanword. PBN *vaka ``ship'' (Lvy. 1979). :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe (Yen). . Baka. :Boat, vessel. Vaka. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe. Waqa. :Canoe. Wa`a. :Canoe. Waga. :Canoe (Lbr). Vaka. :Canoe, ship (Clk). Waka. :Canoe. Vaka. :Old word for canoe. Vaka (MQN). :Canoe (Bgs). Va`a. :Canoe. Aka. :Canoe (Cdn). Vaka. :Embarcation, navire, radeau, pirogue (Rch). Vaka. :Canoe. Vaga. :Big ship/Canoe. Va`a. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe (Stk). Vaka. :Canoe (Bge). Vaka. :Canoe. Baka. :Canoe, vehicle, receptacle (Ebt). Vaka. :Canoe. . VA`A. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe. VA`A. :Canoe. Va`a. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe (Fth). Vaka. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe. Vaka. :Canoe, boat, ship, vessel etc. (Stn). Vaka. :Embarcation, pirogue, bateau (Hmn). Vaka. :Canoe. Waqa. :Canoe.

Note that ``9'' in POLLEX stands for ``ng'' sound.

47

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such as POC and PCEMP (Proto Central-Eastern Malayo-Polynesian), but not for PMP or PAN (Pawley and Pawley 1998:178). These deeper (higherlevel) lexical reconstructions are listed at the top of the data set, although the extensive list of cognates in extra-Polynesian languages from which these pre-PPN reconstructions are derived are not given in POLLEX. Without POLLEX, we would have hesitated to even attempt the sort of historical analysis undertaken in Part II. Nonetheless, the POLLEX project has concentrated primarily on lexical reconstruction, with (until recently) minimal attention to semantic or terminological reconstruction, and no effort to spell out detailed semantic history hypotheses for the many cases in which the varied glosses for the modern cognates do not closely agree in meaning. Taking the lexical items in POLLEX as our starting point, we have paid close attention to semantic reconstruction. Moreover, consistent with our triangulation method, we have done this not by relying on dictionary glosses, but by systematically mining the rich ethnographic corpus for Polynesia. Ethnographic evidence If dictionaries provide less than ideal sources for semantic reconstruction, a major resource for expanding on the meanings encapsulated in words are ethnographies. These, however, do far more than simply ®ll out the domain of meaning covered by a term; they also contextualize the lexicon within the broader systemic cognitive patterns and behaviors of a particular society and its culture. Unlike Vogt (1964), for whom the use of ethnohistorical and ethnographic data formed later steps (7 and 8) of his phylogenetic method, our strategy considers these sources in conjunction with the initial linguistic data (steps 1±4). The outstanding comparative ethnographic sources begin with E. G. Burrows' monograph (1938a), Western Polynesia: A Study in Cultural Differentiation, an explicit analytical adaptation of some of the methods outlined by Sapir (1916). Burrows examined distributions of distinct resemblances between geographically adjacent cultures to infer historical relationships (1938a:7). Differential distributions of a highly selected set of cultural traits were then interpreted within the historical processes of diffusion, local development, and abandonment or rejection (1938a:92). Everything from items of material culture through kinship terms to the ``nights of the moon'' is included in these distributional analyses. Burrows argued that all three kinds of historical processes played their part in the differentiation of Western Polynesian culture from either a central or a central-marginal grouping, together with unspeci®ed responses to a changed natural environment (1938a:153), thus laying the long-standing basis for the distinction between Western and Eastern Polynesia.18 Burrows' 1938 study contrasted markedly

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with the two- and three-strata migration models previously employed by anthropologists such as E. S. C. Handy (1930). Indeed, Burrows rejected such multiple-strata migrations and concluded with respect to ``the remote period of ®rst settlement'' that a ``fundamental unity of Polynesian culture'' was indicated (1938a:156), and further suggested how that unity might be demonstrated. Subsequent explorations of systematic regularities within Polynesian societies and cultures, such as those of Sahlins (1958) and Goldman (1970), drew upon Burrows' notion of an underlying Polynesian unity. Sahlins highlighted the importance of natural resource distribution and its variations in Polynesia, and the role that a hitherto neglected environmental component had played in the elaboration of social arrangements. In a similar vein, Goldman's exercise in carefully controlled comparisons revealed orderly patterns of social variability in Polynesia (1970:545±49), and principles of status differentiation (1970:551±54) which he regarded as the outcome of tension within the status system (1970:567). The most recent contribution in this comparative genre is Howard and Borofsky's (eds., 1989) Developments in Polynesian Ethnology. The contributors to this volume examine social organization, mana and tapu, chieftainship, art and aesthetics, and other topics within several kinds of framework, all having one or more of three goals: (1) they should aim at illuminating underlying structural patterns shared among Polynesian groups as well as explaining variations on common themes; (2) they should strive to illuminate key variables that have facilitated continuity and change through time; and (3) they should look for similarities and differences between Polynesia and other areas within Oceania and beyond. (Borofsky and Howard 1989a:287)

Within these goals two types of comparisons are delineated (Borofsky and Howard 1989a:287±88): (1) controlled comparisons of particular island groups with similar institutions where convergences (as well as differences) arise from parallel conditions or constraints acting on a commonly inherited structural base; and (2) broader multi-island comparisons of the Burrows/ Sahlins/Goldman kind which explore general patterns within Polynesia as a whole. Borofsky and Howard (1989a:289) also draw attention to the possibilities for broader comparisons between Polynesia and other parts of Oceania. In short, a rich tradition of ethnographic analysis employing comparative frameworks and goals is available to inform a renewed historical anthropology of Polynesia. These works, of course, are not without recognized defects. As one of the more telling critiques suggests, problems with these works ``go deeper than has been previously acknowledged'' so that speci®c

50

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

misinterpretations are consistently generated, even though they cannot be totally written off on grounds of theoretical or ideological contamination (Thomas 1989:79). Thus it is claimed that ``the earlier forms of ethnography have been discredited to an extent quite out of proportion to the actual differences between such texts and modern anthropological writing'' (Thomas 1989:79); this applies particularly to the Polynesian museum ethnographies of the 1920s and 1930s (1989:32±33). In his phylogenetic model, Vogt (1964) called for separating ethnohistory (his step 7) from more recent ethnographic endeavors (his step 8), in order to assess changes during the period of European contact, colonialism, and emergence of traditional societies into the present world system (see Chapter 1). Some of the problems posed by this era of rapid change are covered in Borofsky and Howard's chapter (1989b:241±75) on the early contact period in Polynesia. Discussion of this complex period within Polynesia has reached a new level of sophistication, moving well beyond pre-World War II decades of ``museum ethnographies'' much criticized by Thomas (1989:32±33, 41±49). We now have the ``island-centered'' approaches of the Paci®c historians, with the attempts at careful reconstruction by anthropologists of selected Polynesian cultures or their institutions at the time of initial Western contact (e.g., Oliver 1974; Valeri 1985), as well as a multi-faceted approach to that period from both a European and local perspective of the agents and processes of change involved in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (e.g., Dening 1980; Sahlins 1981, 1985; Hooper and Huntsman 1985; Salmond 1991, 1997; Kirch and Sahlins 1992). If these improved reconstructionist enterprises (Vogt's step 7) are thus combined with the greater depth in content offered by modern ethnographic perspectives (Vogt's step 8), the latter can allow us ``to gain insights into the cultural logics formerly at work in Polynesian societies'' (Borofsky and Howard 1989b:248), thus highlighting some of the enduring structures of history.19 While Thomas (1989:32±33) rightly criticizes the bookshelf of museum ethnographies of Polynesia for what they failed to do, and for their naõÈvete in viewpoint and approach to their data, this corpus remains much valued by archaeologists dealing with indigenous material culture. Just as stark linguistic meanings taken from dictionaries can often be ampli®ed and enhanced through ethnographic inquiry, so also are the methods for production, function, and use of archaeologically recovered objects greatly illuminated by museum collections and descriptions of them in these sources. Nonetheless, as with the reassessments undertaken for ethnographic accounts, a new level of evaluation has been required in the study of museum-based collections. Te Rangi Hiroa certainly distinguished contact and earlier period pieces from those of later manufacture (Hiroa 1944:412±13), but a great deal of work has been required since to

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distinguish and to authenticate the full range of genuine early items (Kaeppler 1971, 1978b). With better documentation, these museum collections time and again prove their worth not only to archaeologists seeking to understand the manufacture and use of the bits and pieces which they recover through excavation, but also as to how these traditional productions once ®tted within the now-transformed societies. Granted that Te Rangi Hiroa's comparative analysis at the conclusion of Arts and Crafts of the Cook Islands (1944:410±526), with its three-period temporal separation of material culture traits into early, late, and postEuropean contact, has been completely superseded, but the basic descriptive data on the known distribution and the techniques of manufacture, use, and function of these items within Polynesian traditional societies during the early contact period have not. One has only to cite the work of Duff (1956, 1959), especially that on stone adz heads, to see how the approaches of Burrows and Hiroa in¯uenced some of the initial interpretations of archaeologically recovered materials within a prevailing ethnological paradigm that lasted well into the 1960s. Interpretations of archaeological data typically have deep roots within ethnology, as is evident in Polynesia where the transition from one data set to another is virtually seamless. Archaeology and the direct historical approach Several factors favor a direct historical approach for Oceania. The ®rst is strong support, especially in Polynesia, for continuity in dated, well-attested, and connected local chronologies ranging from 1,200 to 3,300 years in length and exhibiting changes over time, but with little or no signs of population replacement. Such continuities, indeed, seem to be a feature of most local sequences in Remote Oceania during the past 3,200±3,300 years (Green 1997b); they also occur, at least in parts of Near Oceania, over the last 2,000 to 6,000 years (Spriggs 1997; Kirch 2000). While there certainly are instances of contact between related societies and their cultures within various subregions of Polynesia (see Chapter 3), evidence for exchanges with either extra-Oceanic or more distantly related cultures (e.g., South American, Fiji, Eastern Micronesia) is fairly circumscribed prior to the eighteenth century. Greater intersocietal contact, and even occasional displacements by distantly related or even unrelated societies and their cultures, is evident for western Remote Oceania, while in Near Oceania the need to consider contacts between totally unrelated societies and cultures (and occasions of replacement of one by another) rises sharply. In sum, a main contribution of archaeological data to an integrated historical anthropology is to reveal local, materially evidenced cultural sequences providing a wide spectrum of information on technological,

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The phylogenetic model: theory and method

economic, social, political, and even religious practices. These sequences serve as an independent basis for formulating constructions about some period or periods in the past, as well as for testing and cross-checking constructions based on linguistic or ethnographic data sources. Despite its invariably partial nature (see Chapter 7), the archaeological record provides historical anthropologists with the means to convert comparative synchronous, or only relatively sequenced diachronous, constructions of former events and cultural patterns as offered by linguists, ethnographers, and biological anthropologists, into accounts that truly re¯ect deep time.

Chapter 3

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

The Polynesian cultures derive from a common source; they are members of a single cultural genus that has ®lled in and adapted to sahlins 1958:ix a variety of local habitats. . . . in many instances race, language, and culture do coincide to establish an authentic ethnic coherence. Polynesia seems to be such goldman 1970:xxiii an instance.

Space, time, and content must be the prime de®nitional axes for any phylogenetic entity in the kind of historical anthropology for which this book is an extended argument. We insist that the issue itself requires multiple perspectives: linguistic, ethnological, biological, and archaeological. Having laid out speci®c methods and procedures by which a phylogenetic model can be promulgated, we now scrutinize the Polynesian case, searching for congruence among independent lines of evidence to test whether Polynesia meets the criteria for a discrete ``segment of cultural history.'' We will demonstrate, ®rst that the linguistic subgrouping of Polynesian languages is closely mirrored by systemic ethnographic patterns across Polynesian societies, and second that there is biological coherence as well among the various Polynesian populations. It is also essential for us to de®ne precisely what is meant by ``Ancestral Polynesian'' culture and societies. This is not some vague notion of a putative cultural stage loosely corresponding to a set of reconstructed Proto Polynesian words. On the contrary, we will identify a discrete group of archaeological sites and their artifactual assemblages, dating to the second half of the ®rst millennium BC, as the physical manifestations of those Ancestral Polynesian societies and communities that ¯ourished in the Tonga±Samoa homeland region prior to the diaspora that ultimately put Polynesians on virtually every habitable island in the vast eastern Paci®c. These archaeological materials allow us to ground the root of the Polynesian phylogenetic tree in time and space. 53

54

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Polynesia as an emic category The very term Polynesian is, need we say, a European construction which nonetheless has acquired a certain cogency since its de®nition by the French explorer Dumont d'Urville (1832) in the early nineteenth century. Anthropologists have consistently regarded Polynesia as a group of related societies within a geographic area possessing a high degree of homogeneity in language, culture, and human biology. But from an insider perspective, the concept of a region inhabited by people of like culture, speech, and physical appearance is a matter of substantial antiquity. Thus in the Proto Polynesian lexicon itself we ®nd the term *tangata ma(a)qoli, which probably meant something very close to `indigenous person, one of our own kind.'1 And present-day, indigenous populations in various islands groups within Polynesia use re¯exes of *maqoli to demarcate themselves as maaori (New Zealand, Cook Islands), maohi (Tahiti), or maoli (Hawai`i) in opposition to nonindigenous occupants, bringing the concept squarely into the present. In ancient Polynesia, where the *tangata ma(a)qoli were invariably the ®rst human occupants on island after island as these were discovered and settled, it was unnecessary to have a contrastive term, hence the confusing diversity of appellations which were given to the European `invaders' when these appeared from the seventeenth century onwards: papalagi, popa`aa, papa`aa, pakeha, haole, and so on. The obvious af®nities of language, culture, and biology that link the various Polynesian groups have probably always been recognized by the indigenous peoples of this region, as they continue to be today. Moreover, this native perspective was not lost on early European explorers, traders, missionaries, and settlers, and would only be further reinforced by later nineteenth-century investigators such as Abraham Fornander or Percy Smith, and ®nally encoded within the canons of early twentieth-century anthropology. Thus the notion of a fundamental category ± call it Polynesian or call it Maoli ± has from an ethnic point of view substantial and longstanding historical relevance (Green 1987), suggestive of its potential claim to the status of a phylogenetic unit. To forward that claim now requires that we examine the category ``Polynesia'' from the standpoints of linguistics, comparative ethnology, archaeology, and some aspects of human biology. Linguistic perspectives Linguistic relatedness contributes in high degree to attributions of ethnic identity, and is one basis for promulgating historical connections among now-dispersed peoples who speak related languages. Fortunately, the place of

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

55

the Polynesian (PN) subgroup of languages within the larger Austronesian (AN) language family is unusually well understood.2 The Oceanic subgroups The Austronesian language family, dispersed geographically from Madagascar to Easter Island and encompassing most of the indigenous languages of the Paci®c island world, includes several high-level subgroups (Blust 1985), of which the most easterly is Oceanic (OC; Pawley and Ross 1995:43). The distribution of these major subgroups within the western part of the Paci®c (see Figure 2.2) ± with the Oceanic subgroup occupying the entire eastern portion ± points to an Austronesian homeland in Island Southeast Asia. On more detailed linguistic evidence, the favored immediate homeland region for Oceanic is the Bismarck Archipelago (speci®cally the Admiralty [Manus] and Mussau Island groups), although the region extending along the north New Guinea coast remains a possibility (Pawley and Ross 1995:57±58; Pawley 1997). Oceanic itself encompasses approximately nine higher-order subgroups (Figure 3.1).3 Five of these lie in Remote Oceania, a region not inhabited until about 3,300 years ago; one subgroup (Southeast Solomonic) is situated at the most eastern end of Near Oceania, occupied for at least 6,000 years and probably much longer (Figure 3.2). Attempts to show that this cluster of six easterly subgroups of Oceanic constituted a single higher-order unit (termed Eastern Oceanic) have not proved convincing (Pawley and Ross 1995:65, fn. 6). Rather, these six subgroups constitute the widely dispersed set of language groups in Oceanic that cannot be included in any of the internally complex high-order subgroups to the west (i.e., in Near Oceania), the region which is thought to be the homeland region for Oceanic itself. The best interpretation of this cluster of six Oceanic subgroups extending eastwards from the southeast Solomons is that their wide distribution over the previously unoccupied island groups of Remote Oceania re¯ects a former dialect chain or linkage. This linkage resulted from an early, but not initial, stage of Oceanic speakers who ®rst expanded into this region from the southeast Solomons, and thereafter differentiated into the ®ve primary subgroups found today in Remote Oceania (Pawley 1981). These became the foundation languages for each of the separated regions, replaced at a much later time only in the case of an intrusive group of non-Austronesian languages in NendoÈ (Santa Cruz) and the Main Reef Islands, and on some of the Polynesian Outliers (Green 1997b). The spread of these Oceanic languages from eastern Near Oceania throughout Remote Oceania has been linked with the initial expansion of the Lapita cultural complex through the Outer Eastern Islands of the Solomons group, to Vanuatu and

56

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Fig. 3.1

The major subgroups of Oceanic form a ``rake-like'' tree structure.

New Caledonia, between about 3,300 and 3,200 years ago (Pawley and Green 1984; Green 1997b; Kirch 1997a; Spriggs 1997). This colonization proceeded uninterrupted into the Fijian archipelago and to the islands of Western Polynesia (Tonga, Samoa, Futuna, `Uvea). The archaeological assemblages of dentate-stamped Lapita pottery which mark initial settlements throughout Remote Oceania are dated to a fairly narrow time horizon of 200±300 years duration (Kirch 1997a:57±63). Using the principles we set out in Chapter 2, it is possible to link the foundational Oceanic language subgroups with the foundational Lapita cultural assemblages in Remote Oceania.4 These were the cultural complexes upon which all later cultural developments would build. Proto Central Paci®c and the emergence of Proto Polynesian The Central Paci®c (CP) subgroup of Oceanic (see Figure 3.2) includes the languages of Rotuma and Fiji, and all those of Polynesia. The Proto Central Paci®c (PCP) interstage, however, is only weakly attested by lexical innovations (Geraghty 1983, 1996a; Pawley 1996a, 1997), suggesting that it was temporally ephemeral. Proto Central Paci®c consisted of a geographically extensive dialect chain stretching throughout the rapidly settled Fiji±Western Polynesian region. In the terminology of Pawley and Ross (1995:52), Central Paci®c is an innovation-linked subgroup, and language differentiation within that dialect chain did not follow a strict family tree type of model (Geraghty 1983; Pawley 1996a, 1999). Rather, there was a process of network-breaking and reemergence, resulting in successive subgroups whose boundaries

Fig. 3.2

The geographic distribution of major subgroups within the Oceanic branch of Austronesian languages.

58

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Fig. 3.3

The Proto Central Paci®c dialect chain.

shifted and re-formed through time (Figure 3.3); the details need not detain us here. The soon-to-be Polynesian portions of this PCP dialect chain, at its eastern geographic end (what Geraghty [1983] calls Tokalau±Fijian±Polynesian), accumulated in their pre-Polynesian stage a signi®cant range of innovations not shared with Rotuman or any languages in the Fijian region (Pawley 1996c). These extensive innovations include ®fteen phonological, fourteen morphological, and eight syntactic changes exhibited only by languages in the Polynesian subgroup (Pawley 1996a:392±95). More importantly, the POLLEX lexical ®les contain upwards of 1,300 reconstructed Proto Polynesian (PPN) lexemes lacking cognates outside of Polynesian, or which continued old forms with new semantic innovations. 5 Thus Polynesian (PN) constitutes a well-marked, innovation-de®ned language subgroup. In sum, out of dialectal variation in PCP, one innovation-de®ned subgroup of languages ± called Polynesian ± ®rst differentiated in the eastern part of the region covered by the original PCP dialect chain. Yet this Polynesian subgroup already exhibited some dialectal variation, and as Pawley (1996a:401) remarks, the elegant family trees that are often drawn by historical linguists do not satisfactorily re¯ect the processes of differentiation

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

Fig. 3.4

59

North±south dialect differentiation within Proto Polynesian (after Pawley 1996a).

involved. In its pre-PN stage, internal dialectal variation within the subgroup can be detected, with northern and southern dialect clusters (Figure 3.4). These clusters were to become the basis for the two highest-order subgroups within PN itself, the Tongic (TO) and Nuclear Polynesian (NP) subgroups (Pawley 1996a:401±2). Thus linguistic variation was present right from the beginning in the formation of the Polynesian subgroup. What is normally reconstructed as PPN, therefore, represents the point at which this subgroup ®nally broke apart; this would also have been at the approximate time that parts of central Eastern Polynesia and certain Polynesian Outliers6 to the

60

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

west were initially settled.7 It is to this late stage of PPN that the approximately 2,300 lexical reconstructions in POLLEX, assembled by Bruce Biggs, belong. Internal classi®cation of Polynesian The long-standing internal genetic classi®cation of the Polynesian languages (Elbert 1953; Green 1966; Pawley 1966), usually graphed as a family tree (e.g. Clark 1979), has recently undergone some modi®cations (Figure 3.5).8 The Eastern Polynesian branch remains more-or-less intact, with only minor alterations at the lower levels (Marck 1996c), and has been considerably strengthened by additional evidence. However, modeling Proto CentralEastern Polynesian (PCE) and its dissolution requires application of a dialect chain-network breaking model (similar to that discussed above for PCP; see Green 1988; Pawley 1996a:403; Marck 1999b). These revisions are informed by evidence of grammatical (especially pronominal) innovations, and for geographical distributions (isoglosses) of irregular changes in some lexemes (Wilson 1985; Marck 1999b). This evidence allows us to revise signi®cantly: (1) how the numerous Outlier languages group (or do not group) under the Nuclear Polynesian umbrella; (2) how the Proto Ellicean (PEC, Tuvalu) subgroup includes certain Outlier languages, as well as Tuvalu and Tokelauan under one sub-branch, and Samoa under another; and, (3) how Eastern Polynesian joins these two as a third sub-subgroup category. The implications of these revisions are multiple (Marck 1999b, in press), but most importantly they demonstrate that all the higher-order subgroups within Polynesian ± and thus true genetic diversity, as opposed to simple language diversity ± lie in the Western Polynesian region, and unequivocally mark that zone as the PPN homeland. This conclusion has long been supported by environmental lexical evidence. Words such as PPN *malau, `megapode, incubator bird,' and the archaeologically recovered bones for one extant and several extinct megapode species in the Fiji±Tonga±Samoa region but not elsewhere in Polynesia, provide one example (Clark 1982; Steadman 1997:74; see Chapter 4). Likewise the PPN word *palolo for the marine seaworm, present only in the central islands of Western Polynesia, is telling among a long list of such lexical items (Pawley and K. Green 1971:21±23). However, such lexical environmental evidence is hardly necessary to identify the Proto Polynesian homeland, de¯ecting any critique from those who regard WoÈrter und Sachen methods as questionable (e.g., Renfrew 1987; see Mallory 1997). Far more important for Polynesian are arguments that depend on language distribution, delimiting the area of greatest genetic diversity (Sapir 1916), and invoking the principle of parsimony that requires the

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

Fig. 3.5

61

A ``family tree'' type classi®cation of the Polynesian languages (modi®ed after Marck 1999a).

fewest and shortest moves necessary to account for the geographic distribution of the higher-order Polynesian subgroups (Dyen 1956). In short, language admirably identi®es Polynesia as a discrete phylogenetic unit. Moreover, it isolates that part of the vast region now covered by its daughter languages (the well-known Polynesian ``Triangle,'' plus the

62

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Fig. 3.6

Islands in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region linked by voyaging circles of 24 hours or less (after Marck 1999a).

``Outliers'' in Melanesia and Micronesia) in which the initial homeland lay, and shows how early dialect variation within PPN became the basis for later, high-level subgroup emergence within the homeland zone. The process of language differentiation does not require an A to B to C sequence of moves from one island group to another, as Biggs (1972) cautioned against (see also Green 1981). Differentiation in the early stages of Polynesian was not strictly the outcome of isolation, but occurred within a zone over which interaction was continuous for some 3,000 years (Green 1975, 1996), a zone in which an overnight voyage permitted few real isolates (Marck 1999a:13, map 1.3), yet encouraged dialectal differentiation into discrete subgroups, then languages, over several millennia (Figure 3.6).9 Ethnological perspectives Cultural regions in Oceania No consensus exists regarding major cultural areas in the Paci®c. In anthropology, many scholars have de®ned Oceania as encompassing the

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

63

nineteenth-century categories of Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Others have included Australia within the Oceania framework (e.g., Oliver 1989). But it has become clear that such categories are of limited value for historical analyses. Green (1991, 1994), in trying to overcome some of these problems, identi®ed a vast region in the western Paci®c ®rst settled by humans c. 50,000±40,000 years ago, which he termed Ancient Near Oceania.10 Archaeological evidence suggests that by about 6,000 years ago ± still some millennia before people began to expand into the farther reaches of the central Paci®c ± the Ancient Near Oceanic zone might have been divided into three distinct cultural entities: Island Southeast Asia (Bellwood 1997), Australia (Lourandos 1997), and modern Near Oceania (Kirch 1997a; Spriggs 1997). Each of these units, which are de®nable by 6000 BP, was to have a somewhat separate history thereafter (Figure 3.7). The large island of New Guinea, along with the immediately adjacent Bismarck Archipelago and Solomon Islands, is usually regarded as a linked but environmentally divergent part of ``Sahul'' or ``Greater Australia'' (White and O'Connell 1982; Allen 1993, 1996). ``Island Melanesia'' has recently been accorded its own separate archaeological analysis (Spriggs 1997). Delineating possible phylogenetic units within such broad zones as these will be challenging, although the Comparative Austronesian Project has shown the value of language as an index.11 Two possible units for application of a phylogenetic approach, as indexed by language, are Oceanic (see Kirch 1997a for discussion), and the Trans-New Guinea Phylum which occurs within New Guinea (Pawley 1995; Ross 1995b). Echoing the views of Bellwood, Fox, and Tryon (1995:3±4) that phylogenetic models have considerable analytic power for Austronesian studies as a whole, we are con®dent that historical analyses informed in part on such language relationships, as well as other kinds of indices, will emerge in time. 12 Whatever analytical units may develop through future research, these surely will not be the overworked and outdated categories of ``Melanesia'' and ``Micronesia.'' From our knowledge of the histories and diversity of these two regions ± whether in linguistic, biological, or cultural terms ± there can be no doubt that these units are fatally ¯awed (see Kirch 2000). We employ instead the distinction between Near Oceania and Remote Oceania (Fig. 3.7). Polynesia, the phylogenetic unit of interest to us, geographically occupies a large part of the Remote Oceanic zone, and it is the only one of Dumont D'Urville's original tripartite classi®cation of Oceanic peoples to have survived the test of anthropological scrutiny. Based on an increasingly sharp pattern of radiocarbon dates, human expansion into Remote Oceania began approximately 3,300±3,200 years ago, proceeding as a rapid series of colonization events (Irwin 1992, 1997; Kirch 1997a, 2000; Green 1997c). Initial expansion into the southwestern

Fig. 3.7 The Paci®c region with Near Oceania, Remote Oceania, and the Andesite Line and ``continental'' type islands indicated (after Green 1994).

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

65

part of Remote Oceania encompassed the Reef/Santa Cruz, Vanuatu, Loyalty, New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa archipelagos. Occupation of Nuclear Micronesia and of Eastern Polynesia did not occur until somewhat later. The reason for this pause in the geographical advancement of people, its duration, and its explanation are all hotly debated issues among Paci®c prehistorians.13 Within Remote Oceania, we can de®ne four regions with separate and internally intertwined historical trajectories, and these exhibit striking differences ethnographically: (1) Nuclear (sometimes referred to as Central/ Eastern) Micronesia; (2) western Remote Oceania (encompassing the Outer Eastern Islands of the Solomons, Vanuatu, Loyalties, and New Caledonia); (3) the Fijian archipelago; and (4) Polynesia. In our view, each of these regions potentially constitutes a valid phylogenetic unit. However, our concern in this book is only with Polynesia. Within Remote Oceania, Polynesia is perhaps the most viable, ethnographically well-attested unit, comprised of related societies possessing numerous cultural regularities, many of which were surely inherited from the ancestral culture. Many of the speci®c systematic patterns that mark Polynesia off as a distinctive unit will be discussed in detail in Part II. In the following section we will support our claim that at their ethnographic endpoints (i.e., from the time of effective European contact to the present), the various Polynesian societies may be grouped together as a phylogenetic unit. Systemic cultural patterns that de®ne Polynesia We agree with Shore (1989:164) when he writes that ``no coherent vision of local variation in Polynesia is possible without a prior clari®cation of what common characteristics make it a real culture area.'' Certain ethnographic domains more explicitly set Polynesia off from both Island Melanesia and Fiji than others. We will canvas just a few of these, seeing no point in attempting to be exhaustive. In the domains of food and food production, Polynesia does not particularly stand out from regions to the west, except perhaps in its attention to the breadfruit, something also found in Micronesia (Yen 1971, 1973; Oliver 1989:188). When one turns to domestic architecture and domiciliary arrangements, however, Polynesia exhibits a contrasting set of patterns from Fiji, or from those of societies in Island Melanesia. Thus Oliver (1989:339±41) treats Fiji's nucleated settlement pattern and its distinctive house forms, men's clubhouses, and a temple-like god house as quite different from the Micronesian or Polynesian cases (1989:337±38). Oliver paraphrases Green (1970; see also Green 1986) in describing some regularities in physical layout of tropical Polynesian communities:

66

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Throughout Polynesia the most common pattern consisted of a dispersed or loosely clustered neighborhood of relatively small households each located on its own kinconnected land and all focused, socially and religiously, on a common complex of edi®ces that usually included, or was close to, the household of the community's chief. In most places the household buildings housed groups of extended-family composition. They consisted of one or more sleeping houses, a cookhouse, a canoe shed (if located near the coast), occasionally a separate hut for menstruating women, and occasionally a family god house or some other type of religious shrine. In most Polynesian societies the household compounds of chie¯y persons tended to be larger, mainly because of the larger number of persons in residence, but it was only in the more highly strati®ed societies (Tonga, Society, Hawaii) that the chie¯y domestic buildings were superior in terms of workmanship or elaborateness. (Oliver 1989:348)

One could add other public buildings for secular assemblies, and sleeping houses for bachelors and/or young people, in contrast to the strongly gender-restricted men's houses of Fiji or Island Melanesia. Sea-craft and ocean travel in the Paci®c have been ethnographically surveyed many times (e.g., Hornell 1936; Haddon 1937; Haddon and Hornell 1938; Doran 1974; Oliver 1989:361±422), and the topic has been recently studied from the viewpoints of historical linguistics (Pawley and Pawley 1994, 1998) and of prehistoric Paci®c colonization strategies (Irwin 1992; Finney 1994, 1996). As Doran (1974) shows, a distinctive Polynesian sea-craft complex, overlapping in some of its elements with Fiji, may be mapped from the available ethnographic sources. We reproduce Doran's map here as Figure 3.8. External (long-distance) exchange systems throughout Island Melanesia have long been seen by ethnographers as contrasting with the lack of similar networks in Polynesia. Of Fiji, Oliver (1989:577) writes: ``it has separate exchange institutions of both Melanesian and Polynesian types, along with some that contained a blend of both.'' Polynesia exhibits several noteworthy contrasts, and Oliver lists some reasons for this (1989:563±65). For one, there are much greater traveling distances in Polynesia, that not only would have minimized the quantities of cargo able to be transported, but which also would offer fewer possibilities for the development of distinctly localized production, and hence a ``goods-focused'' exchange. The exceptions are in the Tonga±Samoa-Fiji area (Kaeppler 1978a; Kirch 1984a:217±42), and in the Tahitian±Tuamotuan sphere (Oliver 1989:565±66, 1,177±81). Classic ethnographies of Polynesian societies contain relatively little information about inter-community circulation of goods other than in chie¯y tribute or in exchanges between chie¯y persons as part of marriage (Oliver 1989:564±65). Archaeology, using advanced methods of sourcing unevenly distributed resources such as ®ne-grained basalt, is now beginning to

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

Fig. 3.8

67

Canoe regions of the Paci®c (after Doran 1974).

demonstrate that there may have been more extensive or frequent interisland exchanges at deeper time levels in Polynesian prehistory (Weisler and Kirch 1996; Weisler 1997; 1998). With regard to internal as opposed to external exchange,14 however, ethnographic data indicates that the former is of widespread signi®cance within Polynesia, and hence a systemic pattern: ``Formalized exchange is an essential part of social life in Polynesia and operates at every level of society, from the domestic to the apically political'' (Howard and Kirkpatrick 1989:84). In short, the ethnographic differences between the exchange systems of Polynesia and Melanesia lie in how they were structured ± in the one case largely internally, and in the other externally ± and the ways in which contrast in emphasis in the two regions based on this distinction has been developed.15 To several generations of Oceanic scholars, the chief/big man distinction was paradigmatic of the differences between Polynesia and Melanesia. Marcus (1989:178±80) revisited the concept of chieftainship in Polynesia,

Fig. 3.9

The geographic distribution of sibling classi®cation types in Oceania (after Marshall 1984: ®g. 7).

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

69

looking in particular at what he calls its ``kingly'' and ``populist'' sides, which effectively collapses the chief/big man distinction used by Sahlins (1963). Marcus suggests ``not only that chiefs who share much in common with Melanesian big men are to be found in Polynesia, but that big men who share much in common with chiefs, and in fact are chiefs, are to be found in Melanesia'' (1989:180). Yet the Polynesian boundary is maintained through a concept of chieftainship rooted in the institution of kingship throughout the region, and if Sahlins has its analysis correct, one that is of ``a distinctive pan-Polynesian form'' (Marcus 1989:181). In short, Polynesian chieftainship has a recurring set of characteristics that contrast with those of the chie¯y institutions of Fiji (Oliver 1989:1,174±76), and with those occurring on occasion in some societies to the west. A wide range of other social institutions exhibiting ethnographically attested patterns held in common have also been identi®ed as characteristically Polynesian. Thus the Fijian method of classifying cognatic kin, and the resulting kin types, are sometimes described as ``Dravidian'' (Oliver 1989:1,167±68), and are quite distinct from those of Polynesia, which are generally classi®ed as ``Hawaiian'' following Morgan (1871; see also Murdock 1949). The Polynesian sibling term pattern is characteristic of what Marshall (1984) called ``Type 10,'' though a few societies in Western Polynesia and some Outliers were of his Types 3 and 4. In contrast, the close kin terminologies of Fiji and most Island Melanesian societies were of Type 6, with a scattering of other types dominated by Type 3 (Figure 3.9). In this respect, Polynesian kinship is largely of generational type (Marck 1996b), organized on two principles ± seniority and gender duality ± the one dominant in Eastern Polynesia and the other in Western Polynesia (Howard and Kirkpatrick 1989:65). This results in kinship groupings and descent units that are more varied than might be expected, and which do not permit of ready generalities. Once regarded as ``almost invariably based on common descent from an ancestor in the male line'' (Howard and Kirkpatrick 1989:52±4), since the 1950s anthropologists have regarded Polynesian social groups as based on a nonunilineal principle.16 Oliver (1989:938, 1,028) indicates that in only three Polynesian societies was descent-unit af®liation normatively unilateral; in all others a person was entitled to af®liate with the descent unit of either parent, or of both. This contrasts with Melanesian societies, in which the principal kinds of descent units were typically unilineal (1989:1,028). Oliver (1989:935, 937) summarizes Polynesian descent groups in terms of three general features: (1) most widely identi®ed with descent units, corporately, was land; (2) the collective activity they engaged in most widely was religious; and, (3) their structure in relation to kin was pyramidal. Thus he sees Polynesian societies as ``all very much alike in some fundamental

70

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

features of social structure, especially those having to do with kinship'' (1989:883). Howard and Kirkpatrick provide an even more sweeping view, following their review of the recent literature on Polynesian descent groups: The cultural perspective argues that Polynesians carried with them a set of principles for interpreting the world and organizing their social lives. From this standpoint Polynesian social formations are expressions, under a variety of historical and ecological conditions, of a basic world view that includes speci®c notions about kinship, relationships between human beings and ancestral gods, and a host of related beliefs. (1989:59)

Shore (1989) explores the maintenance of such a basic world view among Polynesian societies under the widely known concepts of mana and tapu, advancing eleven propositions of systemic patterns holding throughout Polynesia in respect to these categories, and demonstrating how even in concepts more widely shared throughout the Oceanic world, Polynesians are distinguished by their speci®c interpretations in practice. Other kinds of regularities and systemic patterns could be cited, such as Goldman's (1955, 1970) attention to status rivalry and status lineages in Polynesia, or widespread practices in child rearing and adoption (Borofsky and Howard 1989a:288). All of these systemic patterns make it abundantly evident that, from the ethnological perspective, Polynesia quali®es as a ``segment of cultural history'' eminently suited for study as a phylogenetic unit. Cultural differentiation within Polynesia While systemic cultural patterns help to de®ne Polynesia as a discrete and robust phyletic unit, an ethnographic perspective also provides evidence for internal differentiation within the Polynesian ``cultural clade.'' That is to say, ethnographers have long recognized that cultural traits among the various Polynesian societies are not randomly distributed, but show regularities of clustering. Thus the ethnographically attested societies of Western Polynesia (Tonga, Niue, Samoa, Futuna, `Uvea) share a number of cultural patterns ± such as elaborate kava ceremonial, the fahu privilege of the sister's son, or the pasting method of bark cloth joining ± which are not found in Polynesian societies outside of this core region. On the other hand, many of the societies to the east, north, or south of Western Polynesia (collectively referred to as the Eastern Polynesian societies) similarly share traits or patterns not found in Tonga, Niue, Samoa, Futuna, or `Uvea. Examples include the pantheon of ®rst-order anthropomorphic gods (especially Tu, Tane, and Rongo; see Marck 1996a), the architectural elaboration of walled or platform ritual structures (marae), or the method of bark cloth retting.

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

71

These intra-Polynesian geographic associations or clusters of traits began to be formally recognized as one outcome of the systematic ethnographic survey of Polynesia initiated by the Bernice P. Bishop Museum in 1920, through the Bayard Dominick Expeditions and successive ®eld studies (Kirch 2000:20±24). Ralph Linton (1923), for example, used a wide array of material culture traits from six Polynesian cultures (Tonga, Samoa, Society Islands, Marquesas, Hawai`i, and New Zealand) to infer a set of culturehistorical relationships; Handy (1930a, 1930b) did much the same based on an expanded trait list that included social organization and religion. These early attempts, however, suffered from a total lack of archaeological perspective and proper time depth, from a strongly diffusionist theoretical perspective, and from undue in¯uence of the then-current racial classi®cations of the somatologists. (Linton, for example, was convinced that the clustering of material traits would have to be explained as the outcome of three distinct migrations of ``negroid, Caucasic, and Indonesian races'' [1923:465].) Interestingly, however, Linton's data were later used by Driver and Kroeber (1932:220±25) in a pioneering quantitative study to assess statistically the validity of inferred cultural relationships. Their analysis con®rmed that the Western Polynesian cultures (in this case represented by Tonga and Samoa) grouped most closely with each other, while the Eastern Polynesian cultures' similarity displayed the highest statistical af®nities with each other. Burrows (1938a) formally extended and re®ned these early efforts, comparing the distribution of cultural traits within Polynesia as a whole, and leading him to de®ne Western Polynesia as a distinctive subregion, marked by a constellation of cultural traits that set it off from other subregions (which he named Intermediate, Central, and Marginal). Table 3.1 provides a selection of these traits, adapted from Burrows (1938a:88±90). The range of traits includes aspects not only of material culture, but also of kinship, religion, and calendrics. What was particularly path-breaking about Burrows' approach, however, was his rejection of multiple migrations as an explanatory device; rather, Burrows emphasized the role of internal processes of cultural change, not only ``diffusion'' (what we would now call ``horizontal transmission''), but also local development and abandonment or rejection of traits. Burrows' (1938a) delineation of a culturally based major internal division within Polynesia ± the Western Polynesian/Eastern Polynesian distinction ± continues to be well supported (Howard and Kirkpatrick 1989:69; Marcus 1989:179; Shore 1989:165). But since Burrows' pioneering effort we have learned that although systemic patterns with great time depth in Polynesia may be expected to appear in both Western and Eastern Polynesia (and in the Outliers to the west), in the core region of Western Polynesia some

72

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Table 3.1. Cultural traits distinguishing Western and Eastern Polynesian regions (adapted from Burrows 1938a) Cultural trait

Western Polynesia

Eastern Polynesia

One-piece ®shhooks Ruvettus hooks Bonito hooks Stone or wood food pounders Bark cloth retting Bark cloth joining Bark cloth watermarking Bark cloth decoration Right-angle plaiting Coiled basketry Twining in kilts Stone adzes Canoe hulls Canoe planks Outrigger attachment Canoe sail Carved human ®gures Dart Wooden slit-gong Drum Formal kava ceremonial Chief 's ``language'' Brother±sister avoidance Vasu (fahu) privilege of sister's son Tu, Tane, Rongo as major gods Myth of origins of humankind Nights of the moon Name of ancestral homeland or underworld

0 0 proximal projection 0 0 pasting 0 tablet rubbing + + 0 tangless low ends ¯ange lashing indirect Oceanic lanteen 0 composite + 0 + + + + 0 evolutionary 0

+ + distal projection + + felting + stamping 0 0 + tanged upturned ends right-through lashing direct Oceanic spritsail + simple 0 + 0 0 0 0 + procreative +

Pulotu

Hawaiki

ancient patterns may have been lost or obscured; it will require the techniques of historical linguistics and of archaeology to fully recover them. Thus a strictly ethnographically based attempt to determine which systemic patterns are truly homologous as opposed to convergences (analogous), or the mechanical application of the age-area hypothesis, is not suf®cient for a rigorous historical anthropology. This caution is not meant as grounds for dismissing these approaches as of little account in historical work, for they are often useful starting places. Only when cross-checked with the independent evidence of archaeology and historical linguistics, however, can the

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

73

hypotheses generated by comparative ethnography be advanced with con®dence to the status of historical narrative explanation. Polynesia as a biological unit The immediate as well as remote biological origins of the Polynesians have been the subject of much debate (see Howells 1979; Terrell 1986; Green 1989a; Houghton 1996). We aver that paleo-populations associated with the Lapita cultural complex in Near and Remote Oceania gave rise to the founding parental Polynesian and Fijian populations from which all later populations in that region derive (Houghton 1989, 1996; Pietrusewsky 1989; Serjeantson and Hill 1989; Kelly 1996; Clark and Kelly 1993; Martinson 1996; Kirch 1997a; Lum and Cann 1998; Lum et al. 1998). At the time of initial Lapita settlement of Fiji±Western Polynesia, the founding or parental population constituted what could be called (after Howells 1979) a ``prePolynesian'' phenotype. The phenotypic differentiation toward ``Polynesian'' was a slow evolutionary process.17 From morphological evidence of skeletal remains dated to between 2200 and 1700 BP, the Lapita-descended people of Watom (Bismarcks), Natunuku, Sigatoka, Waya (Fiji), and several later populations of Polynesia were still much alike (Visser 1994:195±219, 248±49). Thus the biological separation so evident today was accomplished by a fair degree of secular change in one direction within Fiji during the past 1,500 years, presumably with the input from the west of new genetic material into that archipelago (Visser 1994:249), and change in another direction in Tonga (Van Dijk 1993) and in other Eastern Polynesian islands. As a result of these later changes, Polynesian populations came to be marked off phenotypically from those elsewhere in the Paci®c. We cannot neglect the role of strong genetic bottlenecks, ®rst in coastal Papua New Guinea (Redd et al. 1995:611), and later in Fiji±Western Polynesia (Flint et al. 1989; Martinson et al. 1993; Harding and Clegg 1996:591, 593). Recent genetic evidence strongly indicates that the ancestors of the Polynesians passed through a constricted demographic bottleneck in which a parental group of small size (and one showing the genetic traces of initially having resided in a malarious region [Kelly 1990; Clark and Kelly 1993; Martinson 1996]) served as its founding colony.18 Together with the well-known founder effect (Dobzahnsky 1963), this combined to make Polynesians relatively homogeneous, a biologically more uni®ed set of populations. The bottleneck evidence has a second important implication, that the parental populations were of extremely small size, perhaps less than 100 individuals19 at the onset of established settlements in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region. One result was a largely homogeneous set of late Polynesian populations in a physical and genetic sense, now perhaps best

74

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

typi®ed by the phenotype exhibited by people of Eastern Polynesian descent. Thus major later changes within Polynesia from this small founding parental base follow the general pattern of an east/west split, with three isolates (Easter Island, New Zealand, Hawai`i) attached to the central Eastern Polynesian cluster (Matisoo-Smith 1990), and with Fiji separated off from the Western Polynesian cluster (or on some traits grouping with populations even further to the west). Because these biological processes and outcomes do not directly affect how one reconstructs the Ancestral Polynesian societies and their culture, we will not further consider strictly biological aspects of the phylogenetic approach (as in Vogt's step 6, see Chapter 1). But the small number of people involved as a founding population in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region ± strongly supported by the biological evidence ± does help to condition our views of population size in these societies. Beyond that, we will merely comment that a variety of multivariate studies of Polynesian populations, using anthroposcopic traits as well as metric and non-metric traits of crania, yield dendrograms in which the Western Polynesian populations of Samoa and Tonga cluster together (with Fiji joining them in some analyses), while the Eastern Polynesian populations also tend to cluster in various arrangements (Pietrusewsky 1970, 1971, 1996; see Howells 1979, ®g. 11.3). An especially clear example is the dendrogram of relationships deriving from Pietrusewsky's analysis of thirty-eight non-metric cranial traits (1996: ®g. 1), in which Tonga±Samoa link closely with Fiji, forming one major clade, while the Eastern Polynesian groups of Hawai`i, Marquesas, Easter Island, Chatham Islands, Society Islands, New Zealand, and Tuamotu link together to form a second, distinct clade (Figure 3.10). Summarizing his most recent thinking, Pietrusewsky writes that ``although samples remain small for Western Polynesia, differentiation between Western and Eastern Polynesia is suggested'' (1996:351). Thus whatever continued biological evolution there has been among Polynesian populations over the past 2,500 years, this has been conditioned by the relative isolation between Western and Eastern Polynesian subregions. Archaeological perspectives The key contribution of archaeology, in the process of de®ning a phylogenetic unit, is to offer temporal and spatial (geographic) controls that cannot be provided by either linguistic or ethnographic data. For example, while lexicostatistics and its derivative, glottochronology, offer only the crudest approximations of time depth, archaeology through its use of radiocarbon and other ``absolute'' dating methods can ®x the temporal dimension of a phylogenetic unit fairly precisely. Archaeology also furnishes evidence to

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

Fig. 3.10

75

Relationships among Polynesian biological populations as indicated by distance analysis of thirty-eight non-metric cranial traits (after Pietrusewsky 1996: ®g. 1).

de®ne the spatial boundaries of a phylogenetic unit which have been tentatively sketched from linguistic and ethnographic distributions, and may more accurately de®ne the probable homeland region for the unit. Once a phylogenetic unit has been de®ned, and its branching structure worked out, archaeology also contributes substantially to the history of the individual cultural trajectories represented by those branches. Fixing Ancestral Polynesia in time and space Archaeological evidence de®nes a boundary between Fiji and Polynesia, discernible in material culture, beginning around 2500±2200 BP, which continued to be maintained thereafter (Green 1981). Direct continuity in the archaeological sequences and developmental trajectories within Western and Eastern Polynesian archipelagos and islands convinces most archaeologists that there are strong ties between speci®c foundation cultures and their ethnohistoric endpoints throughout Polynesia (for further details see Kirch 1984a; Kirch and Green 1987). There is no indication of cultural replacements within island groups, and certainly none of major intrusions from outside of the Polynesian phylogenetic unit itself. This is not to deny evidence for occasional, if signi®cant, extra-regional contacts with Fiji, Eastern Micronesia, and even South America;20 nonetheless, there can be little doubt that archaeologically one is dealing with a discrete phylogenetic unit.

Fig. 3.11

A graphic representation of the ``density'' of available archaeological information for major Polynesian cultural sequences (modi®ed after Kirch and Green 1987: ®g. 4).

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

77

The archaeological record of three millennia-long continuous sequences in Western Polynesia, compared with sequences ranging from about 2,000±1,000 years duration in Eastern Polynesia and the Outliers (Figure 3.11), supports the view that the Ancestral Polynesian homeland was situated in Western Polynesia. In reviewing the Polynesian homeland issue, Green (1981) concluded: (1) that this homeland had to encompass a region made up of several island groups including Tonga, Samoa, `Uvea, and Futuna, rather than being centered on a single island or group (e.g., Tonga) as some had argued (Groube 1971; Pawley and K. Green 1971); (2) that a model for the differentiation of cultural (and linguistic) entities throughout the homeland region had to incorporate continuing contact and interaction among the societies involved, rather than proceeding strictly by isolation; and (3) that demarcation between the historical trajectories of the Fijian societies to the west and the Polynesian societies to the east was not well attested in the archaeological record until around the latter part of the ®rst millennium BC. Green (1987) also argued that there was no a priori reason that initial biological, linguistic, and cultural differentiation among Ancestral Polynesian societies had proceeded as strictly contemporaneous events or processes, as long as within a reasonable period of time all three began to cohere. That is, the emergence of a parental population, proto-language, and ancestral culture into what became a foundation phylogenetic unit ± prior to its expansion over the larger region it eventually occupied ethnographically ± need not have been a synchronous event, but rather a process of historical differentiation. Indeed, attempting to get too close a chronological ``®t'' between the different biological, linguistic, and cultural ®elds is probably an unwarranted expectation, and not even a realistic occurrence historically. The small founding biological populations discussed in the previous section were associated with the ®rst cultural (and archaeological) assemblages distributed throughout the Fiji±Western Polynesian region. Referred to as Early Eastern Lapita (Kirch 1997a:73), this regional variant of the larger Lapita cultural complex is marked by ceramic assemblages characterized by particular vessel forms, decorated in a distinctive subset of the dentate-stamped Lapita design system (Mead et al. 1975). Recent evidence from Ha`apai (Burley 1998), combined with data from Fiji, Niuatoputapu, Futuna, and Samoa, now indicates that the period of dentate-stamped ceramics in the Early Eastern Lapita style is con®ned to a narrow time span, beginning not earlier than about 1100±1000 BC and ending by 800±700 BC (Kirch 1997a:66±69; Burley 1998). The archaeological evidence suggests that these colonizers were socially organized into small-scale communities (see Chapter 8). The earliest archaeological assemblages, and their associated radiocarbon ages, give us a ®rm temporal ®x on the initial occupation of the Fiji±Western

78

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Polynesian region. It is precisely this ``horizon-like'' portion of the Eastern Lapita cultural complex21 that we would associate with the founding Proto Central Paci®c (PCP) innovation-linked language subgroup (see above). Linguistically, we visualize this entity to have constituted a kind of rapidly dispersing dialect chain. As the chain lengthened through the rapid and progressive colonization of islands to the east, the main variation in dialects occurred between its western and eastern (Tokalau±Fijian/Polynesian) portions. Some dialect differences seem to have rapidly emerged between speakers of communalects in the northern as opposed to southern zones in the eastern portion of the PCP chain (i.e., along its Tonga±Samoa alignment). Given direct archaeological evidence for such north±south variation in another communication medium ± that of the Lapita decorative design system as expressed on pottery (Kirch 1988:187±88, ®g. 114) ± the possibility of corresponding lexical variation is noteworthy. As Pawley (1996a:401±2) suggests, such pre-Polynesian dialectal differences probably laid the bases for the highest-order internal splitting within the Polynesian subgroup of languages, just as early cultural variation between the ceramic design systems of northern and southern groups re¯ects a parallel process, one which is the basis for the later distinctions drawn between Samoan and Tongan ``cultural provinces.''22 If the eastern portion of the PCP dialect chain became increasingly marked as an innovation-de®ned Polynesian subgroup, how long did this process of differentiation take? Pawley's (1996a:395, 400) best estimate from linguistic information (especially his admittedly shaky use of glottochronological computations) is that 400 years is possible but improbably rapid, whereas a more reasonable estimate is at least 800 years, and conceivably longer. To allow only 400±500 years would in Pawley's view suppose a rate of language innovation accumulation and lexical change ``probably unparalleled in the subsequent history of any of the 30 individual Polynesian languages'' (1996a:400). Pawley's construction ± the most sophisticated presently available ± accommodates the dialect chain concerns adumbrated by Dyen (1981:97±99) and Rensch (1987; see also Pawley 1996a:406, fn. 17, 18). It sees Polynesian (a subgroup of languages already exhibiting dialectal variation at the pre-Polynesian stage) emerging during the mid-®rst millennium BC as it simultaneously split into two ®rst-order subgroupings: Tongic and Nuclear Polynesian (see Figure 3.5). It is likewise in the mid to later ®rst millennium BC that archaeologists are able to demonstrate the development of a distinctive Polynesian adz kit within Western Polynesia, and of a type of pottery termed Polynesian Plainware (for details, see Chapter 7). More importantly, Kirch (1981, 1988) and Sand (1990, 1992), using ceramic assemblages from Futuna and `Uvea, as well as from Tonga and Samoa, demonstrate island-speci®c variation in

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

79

pottery. Thus, archaeologists are able to de®ne a material form of early Polynesian culture which emerged toward the middle of the ®rst millennium BC, ®ve to seven centuries after initial Lapita colonization. The correspondence between linguistic and archaeological evidence here is essential: both occur in the same set of islands and during the same temporal interval. Archaeology and historical linguistics converge on the later part of the ®rst millennium BC as the formative period for Ancestral Polynesian societies and their culture, and on the chain of islands stretching from Tonga to Samoa but also incorporating Futuna and `Uvea as their geographic location. The breakup of Ancestral Polynesia and subsequent dispersals The end of the formative stage in Polynesia was marked by a series of events that portend ± from the linguistic perspective ± the break-up of Proto Nuclear Polynesian (PNP), and thus the endpoint of Proto Polynesian (PPN) as Biggs (1971) employs the term. These events are beginning to be recognized archaeologically through settlement sequences for various island groups lying beyond the boundaries of the core Western Polynesian area. Speci®cally, these were the discovery and colonization of the most northerly atolls in Western Polynesia (the Tuvalu and Tokelau groups), of some of the Polynesian Outliers further west, and of the central islands of Eastern Polynesia. While an ``absolute'' radiocarbon chronology for these events is still in its early stages of development, and the subject of some debate (e.g., Kirch 1986a; Spriggs and Anderson 1993; Kirch and Ellison 1994), we would bracket these events to the period dating from about 2200±1900 BP. This makes them consistent with Pawley's (1996a:399) glottochronological estimate of about 50 BC to AD 100 (with a scatter of median dates from 550 BC to AD 400). While admitting the controversial dating of the initial settlement of central Eastern Polynesia, we are convinced that this process must have started by 1600 BP, the date now minimally attested for early human activity in the Society Islands and Mangaia (Ellison 1994; Kirch and Ellison 1994; Lepofsky et al. 1996).23 Whatever the date of ®rst settlement in central Eastern Polynesia eventually proves to have been (i.e., for the area occupied by the Cook, Austral, Society, Tuamotu, and Marquesas archipelagos), there is ®rm evidence that all of these islands were well populated by AD 800. Moreover, recent advances in the sourcing of basalt adzes and other kinds of artifacts (Weisler 1997, 1998) demonstrate that central Eastern Polynesia constituted a complex network of communities linked by frequent inter-island and interarchipelago exchanges. This archaeological evidence for an early interaction network linking the central Eastern Polynesian islands meshes well with the

80

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

linguistic evidence for an innovation-based Proto Central-Eastern Polynesian (PCE) speech community, in all likelihood a dialect chain or linkage. It was presumably within and across such a linkage that a number of phonological, syntactic, lexical, and semantic innovations arose, as well as various cultural developments (``synapomorphies,'' in cladistic terminology) that are uniquely shared by the modern Eastern Polynesian cultures descended from this interstage in the Polynesian phylogenetic ``tree.'' The farthest-¯ung and most remote of the Eastern Polynesian islands and archipelagos (those termed ``Marginal Polynesia'' by Burrows [1938a]) lie beyond the central Eastern Polynesian core, including Hawai`i to the north, Rapa Nui to the southeast, and New Zealand and the Chathams to the southwest. There is substantial archaeological as well as paleoecological evidence con®rming Hawaiian settlement no later than AD 800, and quite possibly as early as AD 300±500 (Kirch 1985; Athens 1997). The immediate source of the colonizing population in Hawai`i is likely to have been the Southern Marquesas, but continued contact between Hawai`i and islands in the core region is indicated by linguistic evidence (lexical borrowings from the Tahitic subgroup), abundant oral traditions (Cachola-Abad 1993), botanical indications, uniquely shared mtDNA sequences in populations of the Paci®c Rat (Matisoo-Smith et al. 1998), and possibly some archaeological style changes as well. However, long-distance voyaging between Hawai`i and the central Eastern Polynesian core became less frequent after about AD 1200, and was little more than a memory encoded in Hawaiian oral traditions by the time of European contact. Rapa Nui seems to have been settled as early or earlier than Hawai`i, as re¯ected in its conservative language which retains phonological and lexical forms lost in other Eastern Polynesian dialects (Green 1966, 1988, 1998a).24 Archaeologically, the earliest period on Rapa Nui is imperfectly attested, although excavations at Anakena (Steadman et al. 1994) con®rm occupation by AD 900, and indications of human disturbances to the island's vegetation in the lake cores are dated even earlier, c. AD 700±800 (Flenley 1996). It is doubtful that Rapa Nui was ever connected with the central Eastern Polynesian core area by regular two-way voyages, although the possibility of a limited number of post-colonization contacts should not be ruled out (Green 1998a). Finally, current archaeological evidence holds that the vast temperate islands of New Zealand were the last landfalls within Eastern Polynesia to be discovered, explored, and eventually colonized, around AD 1000±1200 (Anderson 1991; Sutton 1994). The degree of continued, two-way voyaging contact between New Zealand and the central Eastern Polynesian core region is uncertain, but seems unlikely to have been extensive. As with Hawai`i, New Zealand Maori societies had become wholly isolated from the rest of Polynesia by the time of European arrival.

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

81

Without belaboring the details of the Eastern Polynesian archaeological record, the overall sequence of island colonizations just summarized provides an independent model of the most recent stages in the differentiation of the Polynesian cultures, a process that involved migration and expansion into previously uninhabited lands and proceeded in a series of stages lasting perhaps a millennium. Isolation by distance became a signi®cant factor in this process of differentiation with respect to the most marginal islands (Hawai`i, Rapa Nui, and New Zealand), but played a lesser role within the central Eastern Polynesian core, where early interaction spheres are being indicated by archaeological evidence (Weisler 1998). In this core area, interaction over complex networks allowed for the spread of numerous lexical as well as cultural innovations which, however, did not spread westwards as far as the Tonga±Samoa region, and thus contributed to the marked differentiation between Western and Eastern Polynesian subgroups. In short, in their general outlines the archaeological and the linguistic models for the ®nal stages of phylogenetic differentiation in Eastern Polynesia are remarkably concordant. Ancestral Polynesian sites and assemblages Having established a temporal and geographic framework, we can nominate speci®c sites and archaeological assemblages relevant to the construction of the cultural content of Ancestral Polynesian societies and their culture. Hence we respond, in part, to the criticism of Sutton (1996:377±78) that in our earlier writings on Ancestral Polynesian Society we had failed to de®ne ``APS'' in discrete archaeological terms. In Table 3.2, we list numerous sites and assemblages dating to the time period de®ned above for the emergence of a distinctive innovation-linked Polynesian language group, and which demonstrate material culture innovations (in ceramics and adzes, particularly) that mark these assemblages off from those of earlier time periods, as well as from later sites (see Figure 3.12 for geographic locations of sites). The selection of sites and assemblages listed in Table 3.2 is conditioned not solely on the radiocarbon evidence, but also on internal evidence of a consistent (if variable) set of artifacts. The most important of these artifacts are the ceramics known as Polynesian Plainware (see Chapter 7). It is from these thirty-odd sites and assemblages that we adduce archaeological evidence for the reconstruction of certain cultural domains within Ancestral Polynesia, in the analytical chapters of Part II. Many of the sites listed in Table 3.2 are known only by their ceramic assemblages; for others, there is additional and useful evidence. In large part, this re¯ects the excavation strategies that archaeologists have used in Western Polynesia, at least for sites of this time period. Many sites have been

82

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

Table 3.2. Selected archaeological sites and assemblages associated with the Ancestral Polynesian period Ceramic phase representedb

References

Open midden 2500±2400 Open midden 2400±2200 Numerous open ceramic scatters

LEL LEL

Groube 1971 Poulsen 1967, 1987

LEL to PPW

Spennemann 1989

Coastal midden 2750±2550

EEL to PPW

Coastal midden 2600±2500

PPW

Dye 1987a; Shutler et al. 1994; Burley 1998 Burley 1998

Coastal midden 2600±2500

EEL (?) to PPW Shutler et al. 1994; Burley 1998 EEL to PPW Shutler et al. 1994; Burley 1998 EEL to PPW Dye 1987a; Shutler et al. 1994; Burley 1998 EEL to PPW Burley 1998

Island and site

Site type

Tongatapu Vuki's Mound To.6 Tongatapu: general Ha`apai Group Tongoleleka (Lifuka Is.) Holopeka (Lifuka Is.) Faleloa (Foa Is.)

Age range (BP)a

Pukotala Coastal midden 2750±2500 (Ha`ano Is.) Vaipuna (`Uiha Is.) Coastal midden 2750±2650 Mele Havea (Ha`afeva Is.)

Coastal midden 2750±2500

Vava`u Group Falevai (Kapa Is.) Open site (TO-Va-19, -20) Pangaimotu Open site (`Utungake Is.)

±

PPW

Davidson 1971; Kirch, ®eldnotes 1976 Davidson 1971; Kirch, ®eldnotes 1976

±

PPW

Niuatoputapu Lolokoka (NT-90) Open midden Lotoa (NT-100) Open midden Pome`e (NT-93) Open midden

3200±1800 2800±2000 2500±2000

EEL to PPW LEL to PPW PPW

Kirch 1988 Kirch 1988 Kirch 1988

Tafahi Fatuloa

Open site

±

PPW

Dye, in Kirch 1988

Futuna and Alo® Tavai (FU-11) Asipani (SI-001) Mamalua (AL-09) Alo®tai (AF-34B)

Buried midden Buried midden Open site Coastal midden

2100 2200±2000 ± 2350

LEL LEL to PPW (?) PPW PPW (?)

Kirch 1981 Sand 1990 Kirch 1975 Sand 1990

`Uvea Utufua Atuvalu Utuleve

Open site Open site Open site

± ± ±

PPW PPW EEL to PPW

Kirch 1975 Kirch 1975 Frimigacci et al. 1984

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit Samoa Sasoa`a (SU-Sa-3) Inland site

1900±1800

83 PPW

Vailele (SU-Va-1) Base level under 1900 mound site Vailele (SU-Va-4) Base level under mound site Potusa (SM17±1) Coastal midden 1800

PPW

Falemoa (SM17±2) Faleasi`u

Coastal midden

PPW

Basal layers of mound Buried midden on now in®lled bay Buried coastal midden Buried coastal midden

PPW

`Aoa Valley (Tutuila) Ofu Is., To`aga (AS-13±1) Ta`u Is., Si`ufaga (AS-11±51)

PPW PPW

2900±?

LEL to PPW

3100±2000

LEL to PPW

2300

PPW

Green and Davidson 1974 Green and Davidson 1969 Green and Davidson 1969 Jennings and Holmer 1980 Jennings and Holmer 1980 Jennings and Holmer 1980 Clark and Michlovic 1996 Kirch and Hunt, eds., 1993 Hunt and Kirch 1988

a

Ranges given are approximations in calibrated years BP, based on available radiocarbon age determinations. b Abbreviations: EEL, Early Eastern Lapita; LEL, Late Eastern Lapita; PPW, Polynesian Plainware.

de®ned only by limited test excavations. Where formal sampling strategies have been applied (e.g., Kirch 1988 on Niuatoputapu; Kirch and Hunt, eds., 1993 at To`aga), these have had geomorphological or other objectives in mind, rather than extensive areal exposure of former living surfaces. We currently lack ± for any site of this critical time period ± extensive horizontal excavation and exposure of deposits, such as have been undertaken for some later sites. Because of these limitations, the archaeological record for Ancestral Polynesia is not as extensive as we would like, or as we imagine might be obtained from future ®eldwork using different excavation strategies. We are cognizant of the problems of sampling error, and of differential survivability of items of material culture, and do not minimize these here (see Chapter 7). Rather, we hope that the current limitations on archaeological evidence will stimulate archaeologists to turn ®ner-grained attention to sites in the age range bearing on Ancestral Polynesian culture. Isolation, interaction, and phylogeny We cannot end our consideration of Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit without discussing the linked issues of isolation and interaction, especially given that

Fig. 3.12

Locations of key archaeological sites dating to the Ancestral Polynesian phase.

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

85

recent critiques have pointed to inter-island and inter-archipelago interaction as posing fundamental or even insurmountable problems for a phylogenetic approach (Terrell et al. 1997; Hunt et al. 1998). We have already shown that sudden and absolute isolation is unlikely to have been the case during the early stages of human colonization in the Fiji±Tonga±Samoa region. Instead of an A ? B ? C sequence of colonization with discrete breaks, the formation of linked communities and dialect chains is more plausible, and a gradual process of network-breaking accounts for the formation of dialectal and cultural differentiation within the Polynesian homeland. But what of later, and continued, contact or interaction among related Polynesian societies? Would such interaction, combined with ``horizontal trait transmission'' such as lexical borrowing, or the diffusion of technological innovations, lead to a total masking of the phylogenetic patterns of shared ancestry and inheritance? This is the position argued by Hunt et al., that phylogenetic ``trees re¯ect an unknown and unknowable mixture of ancestry and later sharing'' (1998:3; their emphasis). Terrell et al. (1997) opine that Paci®c Island societies have never been ``primitive isolates,'' and that some degree of interaction and communication has always been present between island communities. We concur.25 Indeed, a decade earlier, Kirch (1986b) offered a detailed analysis of Tikopia as a case study of ``inter-island contact in the transformation of an island society.'' Arguing that islands were rarely, if ever, ``closed systems,'' Kirch wrote that ``even in the more geographically remote islands of Eastern Polynesia, the notion that island societies developed in vacuo, as it were, deserves on recent evidence to be seriously questioned'' (1986b:33). The issue is not whether such contact or interaction occurred, but more speci®cally what effects it had on island languages, cultures, and gene pools, and whether interaction would inevitably and inexorably lead to the dissolution of patterns of homologous traits, fatally undermining a phylogenetic model. In this regard, we do not share Terrell et al.'s (1997) pessimism. Ethnohistoric and ethnographic evidence for interaction within the Polynesian region demonstrates that degrees of isolation varied signi®cantly. Despite oral narratives of an earlier period of two-way voyages between Hawai`i and an ancestral land called ``Kahiki,'' for example, the Hawaiians had not been in contact with other Polynesian groups for at least several centuries prior to Cook's arrival in 1778 (Cachola-Abad 1993). Similarly, there is no evidence that the Rapa Nui people had maintained regular communication with other islands after the period of initial settlement by their founding ancestor Hotu Matu`a (MeÂtraux 1940). New Zealand, too, had been isolated for some time prior to European voyaging. Thus the marginal sectors of Eastern Polynesia, set off from the core by open-ocean

86

The phylogenetic model: theory and method

distances ranging from 2,000 to 4,000 km, were unquestionably isolated, and had not been in regular contact with the Eastern Polynesian homeland for many centuries at least. The situation was different in the tropical core, where inter-island distances were typically in the range of 200±600 km. Two major spheres of regular inter-island voyaging can be identi®ed in the ethnohistoric record: (1) a formal exchange system linking Tonga with Samoa and other Western Polynesian islands, and with Fiji; and (2) a less formalized system linking the Society Islands, directly or indirectly, with the Tuamotus, Australs, Marquesas, and southern Cooks. The Tongan system is sometimes known as the ``Tongan maritime empire,'' and has been analyzed by Kaeppler (1978a), Kirch (1984a:217±42), and Hage and Harary (1991:16±20). What is crucial, for our purposes, is that the Tongan exchange network was operated by a small number of Tongan elites, and involved the transfer of prestige goods (such as mats and feathers) and the marriage of limited numbers of highranking spouses. The central Eastern Polynesian network, best known perhaps from the famous map dictated by the Tahitian priest-navigator Tupaia to Captain Cook (Dening 1962), is less well documented, but also involved elites and was probably restricted to prestige goods. Neither of these systems involved large numbers of people, or high-frequency movement of goods and materials. We infer that the impacts of such exchange were principally con®ned to the elite sectors of society, where they doubtless did in¯uence political affairs and, at times, religious ideology. That such inter-island contacts did not lead to wholesale horizontal transmission of traits (linguistic or cultural) is patently obvious in that the interacting groups maintained distinctive languages and cultural patterns. Thus, despite limited inter-marriage between high-ranking Tongan males and Samoan chie¯y women, Tongans and Samoans retained their own cultural distinctiveness (as in bark cloth designs, club forms, or monumental architecture, to name just a few). Tongan and Samoan languages, likewise, remained discrete and distinctively separate, even though there was some borrowing between them. Marck (1999a:134) identi®es ninety-nine words in the ``metropolitan Western Polynesian vocabulary which may constitute post Proto Tongic and/or post-Proto Nuclear Polynesian borrowings around Western Polynesia.'' While signi®cant, this hardly constitutes massive linguistic impact. The same can be said for the maintenance of cultural and linguistic differences among the various central Eastern Polynesian cultures. Indeed, various Polynesian groups consciously maintained distinctive cultural and linguistic identities, quite the opposite of willy-nilly borrowing of every new word or thing they heard or saw on voyages to other islands. While the ethnohistoric and ethnographic evidence demonstrates that some degree of isolation did separate various Polynesian groups, and that

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interaction both was restricted to certain (elite) segments of society and did not inexorably lead to cultural homogenization, we can go farther. Contrary to the assertion of Hunt et al. (1998) that the ``mixture of ancestry and later sharing'' is ``unknowable,'' historical linguists and archaeologists alike have developed empirical methods for determining historical contacts between groups. In historical linguistics, ``borrowing'' can be detected through the presence of irregular sound correspondences, and sometimes ``doublets,'' resulting in what Biggs termed ``direct and indirect inheritance'' in his classic study of Rotuman (Biggs 1965).26 Given the ethnohistoric evidence for the Tongan ``maritime empire,'' one would predict the presence of Tongan loan words in the languages of other groups with whom the Tongans interacted; this is precisely the case (Clark 1979:264; Biggs 1980; Dye 1980:352; Marck 1999a:137±43). Indeed, with East `Uvea, which was conquered and politically dominated by the Tongans for some centuries, extensive lexical change did occur, although Pawley (1967) could still determine convincingly that `Uvean was fundamentally a Samoic language with a heavy Tongan overlay. The respective contributions of ancestry or shared inheritance could be unambiguously separated from those of culturecontact. Similarly, for Hawai`i, Green (1966; see also Marck 1999a:146±7) was able to point to a small number of Tahitic borrowings in Hawaiian, a language that otherwise groups with the Marquesic branch of Eastern Polynesian. Again, shared retentions can be distinguished from the effects of later contact. With the recent development of archaeometric techniques for sourcing prehistoric artifacts, and especially the application of x-ray ¯uorescence (XRF) techniques to the sourcing of basalt adzes in Polynesia (Weisler and Woodhead 1995; Weisler and Kirch 1996; Weisler, ed., 1997; Weisler 1998), archaeologists are now able to empirically trace and de®ne ancient spheres of interaction. Weisler (1998) has recently shown that basalt adzes from Eiao Island in the Marquesas moved as far as Mo`orea and Mangareva, in agreement with ethnohistoric predictions of a central Eastern Polynesian exchange network. Likewise, Best et al. (1992) demonstrated that adzes produced at the Tatagamatau quarry on Tutuila in Samoa radiated outwards to Tuvalu and Tokelau, as well as to Tonga, Fiji, and even the eastern Solomons. The archaeological sourcing evidence, still in its early stages of development, will in time provide an invaluable data array for de®ning prehistoric interactions within Polynesia. It is essential to keep in mind, however, that the transport of a handful of stone artifacts from one island or archipelago to another implies exactly the kinds of relatively low-frequency, elite-centered voyaging demonstrated by the ethnohistoric record. Moreover, the emerging archaeological evidence supports a model of initial integration of some

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island populations into an interaction sphere, followed by later isolation. This is the case, for example, with some of the Southern Cook Islands, such as Mangaia and Ma`uke, where importing basalt and pearl shell occurred in the prehistoric sequences, followed by a long period of non-importation and exclusive use of local resources (Kirch et al. 1995; Walter 1998; Sheppard et al. 1997). Indeed, Mangaian oral traditions (Hiroa 1934) speak to several attempts by groups from Rarotonga, Aitutaki, and Atiu to invade Mangaia, and the repulsion of such groups by Mangaian warriors. Yet a third body of independent evidence bearing on the question of interaction versus isolation in prehistoric Polynesia comes from recent studies of biological variation. With regard to mtDNA variation in human populations, Lum and Cann (1998:116) ®nd ``signi®cant correlations between genetic and linguistic distances,'' which they interpret as ``evidence of isolation between populations.'' The one area in the Paci®c where they ®nd evidence of extensive gene ¯ow, central Micronesia, ®ts the ethnographic pattern there of extensive two-way voyaging (see also Lum 1998). Referring to Terrell et al.'s (1997) critique of the so-called ``myth of the primitive isolate,'' Lum and Cann tellingly urge ``caution against the adoption of panmictic alternatives'' (1998:109). Additional biological evidence comes from the recent analysis of variation in the mtDNA of the Paci®c Rat (Rattus exulans), a commensal species transported by Polynesians from island to island (Matisoo-Smith et al. 1998). Mitochondrial DNA phylogenies of R. exulans populations from Polynesian islands provide evidence of both isolation and interaction. For example, ``the close relationships between the R. exulans sequences of the Cook and Society Islands suggest a broad central east Polynesian interaction sphere encompassing the Southern Cook and Society Islands'' (Matisoo-Smith et al. 1998:15,146), agreeing with what we know from ethnohistory, linguistics, and archaeological sourcing studies. On the other hand, the rat mtDNA data also suggest signi®cant isolation for the Chatham Islands and the Marquesas. And for Hawai`i, links with both the Marquesas and the Society±Cook Islands are indicated, again independently con®rming the evidence of historical linguistics. In sum, the attack on the validity of a phylogenetic model ± on the grounds that in the absence of total isolation, massive interaction overwhelmed patterns of shared ancestry ± proves to be thoroughly unconvincing, indeed anthropologically naive. While regular patterns of interaction certainly characterized parts of Polynesia, other more geographically remote sectors were signi®cantly isolated. Where interaction was ongoing and is ethnographically described, it involved small numbers of elites. Furthermore, the claim that the effects of interaction are ``unknowable'' is uninformed, for linguists, archaeologists, and biological anthropologists have an arsenal of

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empirical methods to track interaction. Correspondence between the results of their independent analyses is striking. In the last analysis, we need only point to the kinds of deep divisions within Polynesia, so well analyzed by Burrows (1938a; see Table 3.1), to realize that interaction did not produce a homogenized culture. The major and pervasive distinctions between Western and Eastern Polynesia are suf®cient to differentiate two major clades or branches within the Polynesian phylogeny. Polynesian societies were never ``primitive isolates,'' nor were they a panmictic meÂlange. Their history, as de®ned by shared ancestry, by innovation, and by interaction, is both real and knowable. What is essential is good theory, and rigorous method. Phylogenetic differentiation in Polynesia: a summary We now brie¯y restate the essential points emerging from our analysis of Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit distinct from other such units within Remote Oceania. (1) On linguistic, ethnographic, biological, and archaeological criteria, the Polynesian cultures and societies comprise a distinct phylogenetic unit set apart from the rest of Remote Oceania, a consequence of their shared history. (2) The formative or Ancestral Polynesian stage, at the root or base of the Polynesian phylogenetic tree, can be geographically situated within the region including Tonga, Samoa, and its near neighbors such as Futuna and `Uvea (but excluding Fiji), which constitute its immediate homeland. (3) It was in this homeland region that Ancestral Polynesian culture and societies emerged out of an immediately preceding Early Eastern Lapita precursor, the date of such emergence being the mid to later ®rst millennium BC. (4) Initial dialectal as well as cultural differentiation within the Ancestral Polynesian region occurred not as a series of discrete branches as in a classic dendritic model, but rather as an overlapping series of innovations over a linkage, network, or interaction sphere encompassing many islands and at least several dozen individual social communities. (5) A further stage of linguistic, cultural, and biological differentiation within Polynesia, beginning roughly 2000 BP, was accelerated through the expansion of Polynesian populations into previously uninhabited islands and archipelagos outside of the core Ancestral Polynesian homeland. This included the discovery and eventual colonization of islands both in Eastern Polynesia, and to the west (the Polynesian Outliers). (6) Once the central Eastern Polynesian core archipelagos had been settled, there was considerable isolation between these and the original Ancestral Polynesian homeland region. Much like the Tonga±Samoa interaction sphere, the central Eastern Polynesian islands constituted a second, complex, linked network among which various new innovations spread, leading to marked cultural as well as

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linguistic differentiation between Western and Eastern subgroups of Polynesia. (7) The settlement of the most geographically remote outposts of Eastern Polynesia, which were only infrequently or minimally linked to the central Eastern Polynesian core, led to additional ``branches'' of the Polynesian ``cultural tree,'' which through time and as a consequence of increasing isolation also developed their own distinctive cultural patterns. (8) Finally, within the core of central Eastern Polynesia, regular inter-island communication began to decline after about AD 1400 and, although this did not completely cease, encouraged social isolation and some degree of cultural differentiation. By the time of regular European intrusion into Polynesia beginning in the late eighteenth century, the island groups of central Eastern Polynesia, as well as those of Western Polynesia and the Outliers, were each distinguished from the other by myriad local variations in speech, dress, material culture and architectural styles, details of sociopolitical organization, and so forth. A ®nal note on method We have repeatedly pointed to various lines of evidence ± not just linguistic, but ethnographic, archaeological, and biological ± indicating not only that Polynesia as a whole constitutes a robust phylogenetic unit, but that at least two internal subdivisions are also well marked: the Western and Eastern Polynesian regions. This brings us to one additional methodological detail: the importance of using information from both Western and Eastern Polynesian subgroups when reconstructing the society and culture ancestral to both. Given the traditional family tree for the Polynesian languages (see Figure 3.5), a particular lexeme or word may be considered to have been part of the PPN vocabulary if it is attested by cognates in the two main branches of Polynesian languages: Tongic and Nuclear Polynesian. Or, in the case where such cognates are missing in one of these branches, an external witness from either Fijian or Rotuman (the other members of the Central Paci®c group of languages) is required to demonstrate that the lexeme under question was present at the PPN stage. However, we can see that a potential problem arises in the case of terms that satisfy these requirements, but for which the re¯exes are found exclusively in Western Polynesian languages (e.g., Tongan and Futunan). In such cases, the term may potentially be a later innovation, after the breakup of PPN, which was then borrowed into one or more other Western Polynesian languages, given that the speakers of these languages have been in intermittent contact throughout prehistory. Addressing such problems in the context of a comparative study of Polynesian cosmogonic traditions, Marck proposed two principles of histor-

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ical reconstruction, which we will also follow. These principles, as stated by Marck, are: 1. If a feature . . . is universal or occurs in Tonga and Eastern Polynesia the feature will be suggested to have occurred amongst the beliefs of the PPN speakers. (Agreements between Tongan and Samoan will be considered possible borrowings unless there is agreement from Eastern Polynesia as well.) . . . 2. Similarly, if a feature occurs in two widely separated groups not otherwise known to have borrowed from each other, the feature will be suggested to have occurred in the community of speakers of their common proto-language rather than to be borrowed. (1996a:218±19)

As an example of the ®rst kind of feature, Marck gives the cosmogonic ``belief that the sky was close to the earth at the time of creation . . . and that an early act of the early gods was to raise the sky into its present position'' (1996a:219). Because versions of this belief are attested in Tonga and Samoa, and from Eastern Polynesia, Marck regards it as an aspect of the belief system of the PPN speakers. As an example of the second principle, he gives the naming of the male of the Primordial Pair as Papa-adjective in both Samoa and the Marquesas. We will also apply these principles in our work of cultural reconstruction to the Ancestral Polynesian level. Conclusion Based on the conjunctions of independent sets of evidence ± derived from linguistics, comparative ethnology, and archaeology, with more limited input from biological anthropology ± we have de®ned a phylogenetic unit called Polynesia. Within the vast geographic region now occupied by Polynesian societies and populations, we have moreover identi®ed a homeland region situated in the core islands of Western Polynesia, an inference supported by both linguistics and archaeology. Polynesian culture emerged out of the Early Eastern Lapita cultural complex, representing the founding settlement of the Fiji±Western Polynesian area at the beginning of the ®rst millennium BC. A distinctive Polynesian culture is archaeologically recognizable by the mid-®rst millennium BC, and continued no later than the ®rst centuries of the Christian era. After this time it is no longer reasonable to speak of an Ancestral Polynesian culture or societies, for differentiation within the homeland had proceeded suf®ciently for us to distinguish distinctive Tongan and Samoan cultural provinces. By the close of the ®rst millennium BC, an expansion of Polynesian populations had commenced, out of the homeland into central Eastern Polynesia, as well as into the Outliers. Having thus delimited our units in time and space, including the main branches of the Polynesian phylogeny, we proceed to the challenging task of de®ning the cultural content of Ancestral Polynesian societies.

part ii

Rediscovering Hawaiki

Hawaiki, as one of the names of the homeland, has been carried along and applied to various islands in memory of the past, but the original Hawaiki lies buried under the accretions of time.

hiroa 1945:12

If there is a word that can persist in the memory of Polynesians in their centuries of wandering, it would have to be a word such as Hawaiki: a word of origin that tells of greatness and divine ancestry; a word of identity stamped with a glorious past; a word which, whatever the particular cognate and its language-speci®c associations, may be taken to symbolise the journey of Polynesians taumoefolau 1996:406 through time and space.

Introductory remarks

We have chosen the title for Part II of our book ± Rediscovering Hawaiki ± quite consciously. We might have called it ``reconstructing'' Hawaiki, for one aim of the triangulation method within a phylogenetic model is to determine as fully as possible the ancestral culture which stands at the root of any ``segment of cultural history.'' But every label carries its own intellectual baggage, and the baggage of ``reconstruction'' includes an ubiquitous usage during the heyday of the New Archaeology, thus tending to be associated with an uncritical form of positivism. We recognize that history (or prehistory) is ± to a certain degree ± ``constructed'' by its practitioners, although we would strongly assert that what makes anthropological history a science and not an art is that its constructions of the past are self-consciously and continually constrained by the evidence. What is more, a central goal of triangulation is to assure that this array of evidence is as broad as possible, that it is not con®ned to any single line of inquiry, but draws upon the full spectrum of anthropological insight. Thus we prefer rediscovering Hawaiki, a simple phrase that, in our view, more aptly conveys the essence of our enterprise. Hawaiki was, after all, in the indigenous Polynesian conception of their history the original homeland, a place ± an island or islands ± that their own ancestors had ®rst discovered and populated (see below). Historical anthropology can only hope to ``rediscover'' this ancestral space and time, to recover only partially the material culture, the social and political organization, the calendar and rituals, and other aspects of life in the Ancestral Polynesian homeland some two or more millennia ago. Hawaiki as the ancestral Polynesian homeland Hawaiki is a word deeply ingrained in the annals of Polynesian scholarship. Smith (1921:35 passim) regarded Hawaiki as the name of a place which had been ``occupied by the people in the remote past,'' noting that it ``is known to nearly every branch of the race, though it varies in form from island to island according to the changes that have taken place in the language since the dispersion.'' Williamson (1933, 1:312±13) pondered the matter at 95

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length, concluding that ``we are justi®ed by the evidence . . . in believing that the name Havaiki . . . was in some islands given to one or another ± sometimes to more than one ± place which was regarded as being an ancestral home; and that in some islands certain souls were supposed to pass to an ancestral home, which was sometimes called Havaiki, and was sometimes given another name.'' Burrows (1938a:73±76, diagram 17) pointed to the ``distinct regional distribution'' of the names Hawaiki and Pulotu, the latter being a strictly Western Polynesian concept of an ``island in the west, home of gods and of the elect after death.''1 While the two names thus have similar meanings, they are in complementary distribution in Eastern and Western Polynesia, respectively. As Burrows comments, Pulotu ``is as de®nitely western Polynesian as the concept of Hawaiki as underworld or ancestral home is central-marginal'' (1938a:76). Geraghty (1993) deals at length with Pulotu while Taumoefolau (1996) reconsiders Hawaiki, both invoking detailed linguistic arguments. The fascinating details of their respective arguments need not concern us here, except to note that Geraghty regards Pulotu as the original (pre-)Polynesian homeland, which he speci®cally situates in the Eastern Lau Islands, perhaps on Matuku. Taumoefolau offers an intriguing etymological hypothesis for the origin of Hawaiki, suggesting that it was originally a loan word from PTO into PNP, and that it can be traced back to a compound term in PPN, *sau ariki, meaning `chie¯y/ancestral/traditional ruler.' She believes that ``simultaneous with the modi®cation of the proto-form, there has been a corresponding shift in the proto-meaning from the `title of ancestral rulers' to the `name of the ancestral land' '' (1996:398). These lexical and semantic shifts would have occurred ``some 2,000 years ago, perhaps earlier, after PPN separated into PTO and PNP'' (1996:405). Our position in this continuing discussion over the naming of the Polynesian homeland is as follows. We think the most reasonable explanation for the distribution of the terms Pulotu and Hawaiki, and their varied meanings, is that Pulotu is the more ancient, reconstructable to PCP as *burotu, and which for the PPN speakers probably referred to the Fijian archipelago, their immediate homeland and place of the ancestors. *Sawaiki was a lexical innovation at the PNP interstage, corresponding to the period when the original PPN speech community (or dialect chain) was breaking up as a coherent unit. Its origin at this time is signi®cant: to the immediate descendants of the Ancestral Polynesians who began expanding out of the Samoa±Tonga homeland region, *Sawaiki/Hawaiki indexed that homeland, again the abode of the ancestors. Thus the origin of Hawaiki marks the end of the Ancestral Polynesian period. The name would be carried by Polynesian voyagers throughout virtually the whole of Eastern Polynesia, where it was variously

Introductory remarks

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given to islands or places (e.g., Hawai`i, `Avaiki), and where it would ®gure in local religious ideology as the ancestral homeland, and abode of spirits of the dead. We thus use the word in much the same sense that we infer the PNP speakers to have done, as the name of the ancestral homeland in which a distinctively Polynesian culture arose. Plan of Part II Each of the six chapters to follow addresses a domain of Ancestral Polynesian culture. We begin with the physical world of the archaic homeland, its islands and seas, ¯ora and fauna, and how these were culturally categorized. We next turn to the economic basis of Ancestral Polynesian life, to cultivation practices, and strategies for exploiting the bounty of reef, lagoon, and open sea. This will lead in turn to a quintessentially cultural domain, the culinary complex. From the world of the ancient Polynesian cookhouse, we proceed to other aspects of technology and material culture. Social and political organization are then addressed, and ®nally, the spiritual world-view and ritual practices which structured the seasonal round, year after year. We are aware that these six major domains do not exhaust the possibilities for historical analysis; ``music'' and ``myth,'' for example, are domains we have left for others to pursue. For each of our chosen domains, we endeavor to show how the different strands of evidence ± linguistic, comparative ethnographic, and archaeological ± can be brought to bear through triangulation. In some cases, the direct evidence of archaeology plays a strong role, while in others we must depend almost exclusively on linguistic clues aided by comparative ethnography. In every case, the comparative ethnographic corpus is essential for robust semantic reconstruction. We hope to show, however, that there is no domain for which at least some reasonable hypotheses cannot be put forward. Although the ``rediscovery'' of Ancestral Polynesian culture is an intellectually suf®cient goal in its own right, as a substantive contribution to cultural history it is just as much the means to larger ends. These are the study and explanation of cultural change, ``evolution'' if you will, represented by the diversi®cation and differentiation of the myriad Polynesian cultures that descended from the ancestral ``Hawaiki.'' By de®ning the cultural content of the ancestral node or root, we set the stage for a more comprehensive analysis of subsequent cultural change, through the individual trajectories of daughter cultures and societies. But these larger ends extend far beyond our goal in this book. We will return to these future possibilities in the Epilogue, and offer there some thoughts on where the phylogenetic approach in historical anthropology might lead us in future endeavors.

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A note on orthography and abbreviations In the following chapters, we consider a great many Polynesian (PN) and Proto Polynesian (PPN) words, for which the following conventions apply. Reconstructed lexemes (whether attributable to PPN or other interstages of Austronesian) are designated by an initial asterisk (*). For PPN reconstructions, a glottal stop is indicated by the letter q, following Biggs' practice in POLLEX. For modern Polynesian language words, we use the more familiar symbol (`) to indicate the glottal stop. The velar nasal we have rendered consistently as ng (although in some modern Polynesian orthographies, such as for Samoan, it is indicated with a g; linguists denote it with h). The principal proto-languages or interstages with which we will be concerned are the following, with the abbreviations used for them: Proto Austronesian (PAN); Proto Malayo-Polynesian (PMP); Proto Oceanic (POC); Proto Central-Paci®c (PCP); Proto Polynesian (PPN); Proto Nuclear Polynesian (PNP); Proto Ellicean (PEC); and Proto Central-Eastern Polynesian (PCE). For modern Polynesian or other Oceanic languages, we use the standard three-letter abbreviations widely adopted by Austronesian linguists. A complete listing of these languages and their abbreviations is given in the list of language abbreviations (pp. xvi±xvii).

Chapter 4

The Ancestral Polynesian world

The lexical reconstructions indicate that the PPN speech community were ®shermen-horticulturalists, familiar with a typical tropical IndoPaci®c high island environment and also with certain objects found natively only on certain islands of this category, including the balolo worm, the pearl oyster, such land animals as snakes, pestiferous mosquitoes, bats, owls, rails, pigeons, parrots, and [a] moderately pawley and k. green 1971:23 diverse land ¯ora . . .

The Ancestral Polynesian homeland Linguistics, archaeology, and comparative ethnography converge to situate the Ancestral Polynesian homeland in space and time: the region known today as Western Polynesia. A WoÈrter und Sachen1 approach to locating a proto-homeland, well known to Indo-European specialists (Diebold 1994) is thus unnecessary. Nevertheless, it may be instructive ± from a theoretical perspective ± to ask whether the classic evidence of ``words and things'' independently agrees with the conclusions derived from archaeology and linguistic subgrouping. Some years ago, Pawley and K. Green (1971) queried the evidence of PPN lexical reconstructions, to ask where the homeland of the PPN speakers was most likely to have been located. Drawing on a preliminary version of POLLEX (Biggs et al. 1970), they discussed a range of relevant terms, contextualizing these within a set of postulates. For example, their Postulate 4 stated that ``the presence in any proto-language of a term denoting a category of objects is taken as indicating that the referents were familiar to the speakers of the language, either as part of their own immediate environment or as part of a nearby environment'' (Pawley and K. Green 1971:17). They correctly realized that such ``referents'' might include species introduced to the islands by humans themselves. We will not discuss all of their thirteen postulates, but simply note that the method applied by Pawley and Green was an exemplary instance of circumscribing the assumptions underlying a WoÈrter und Sachen approach. Among the many PPN lexical reconstructions considered by Pawley and K. Green are several words indicating that the Ancestral Polynesian home99

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land was situated ``on or near a high island or island group,'' and which at the same time preclude the possibility of this island(s) being located within Eastern Polynesia (1971:21). One of the most intriguing terms is PPN *palolo, re¯ected by TON, EUV, and SAM cognates, with an outside witness in FIJ balolo (indicating that the word was a PPN retention from the immediately preceding PCP interstage). As Pawley and Green relate, ``this `sea-worm' [Nereis sp.] lives in the crevices of coral reefs in certain regions of the Paci®c. The egg-swollen tail segments of the balolo rise to the surface around dawn on the 8th or 9th day after the ®rst full moon in October or November (sometimes in both months), and are taken in hand-nets as a highly prized food'' (1971:21). The Nereis sea-worm occurs only in Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa, and nowhere in Eastern Polynesia. Cognates of PPN *palolo are found in some Eastern Polynesian languages, but the reference is usually to a lunar month in the calendric system (see Chapter 9), or as in ECE to a small marine insect eaten by birds. The distribution of palolo terms, when compared with the geographical distribution of the sea-worm itself, unambiguously supports a PPN homeland in the Tonga±Samoa region. Similar evidence is provided by PPN *ngata, ``snake.'' The term is retained in TON, SAM, EFU, and EUV, along with TOK and a few Outlier languages, but snakes themselves are distributed only as far eastwards as Samoa (Loveridge 1946). As Pawley and K. Green observe, ``this does not imply that Samoa is the only possible homeland within the Triangle region, for snakes were evidently known by reputation to the inhabitants of some other island groups near to Samoa or Fiji'' where snakes also occur (1971:22). But it precludes the Eastern Polynesian archipelagos, where snakes are entirely absent, as possible candidates for the homeland of PPN speakers. Other lexical evidence delimiting the geographic region in which the PPN speakers resided includes an extensive list of plants and other organisms commonly found ± if not always exclusively distributed ± in Western Polynesia. This lexical evidence converges on the same homeland archipelagos indicated independently by both archaeology and by linguistic subgrouping. Beyond the shadow of a doubt, the Ancestral Polynesian homeland consisted of ``the central area of West Polynesia, i.e. the area bounded by Samoa, Uvea, Futuna, and Tonga'' (Pawley and K. Green 1971:23). We will now examine in greater detail the physical and biotic environments of this homeland, characterizing the opportunities as well as constraints or challenges posed by this environment, and exploring the ways in which Ancestral Polynesians categorized and conceptualized the natural world. We rely heavily on a careful review of the PPN lexicon, but do not neglect archaeological evidence, which provides a critical perspective on dynamic landscape and biotic changes, modi®cations to the Ancestral Polynesian

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environment which often resulted from human actions and land-use practices. The physical environment The Ancestral Polynesians inhabited a geographically diverse island world. The volcanic ``high'' islands included Futuna, `Uvea, Niuatoputapu, and the Samoan group, the makatea or upraised-coral islands were represented by Tongatapu and Vava`u, and the low-lying atoll or atoll-like islands by the Ha`apai group. Each type posed its own environmental challenges, and offered unique resources. The high islands, with their fertile volcanic soils and rainforests, were well suited to shifting cultivation (see Chapter 5). On the smaller coral islands, cultivation must have been more limited, but intensive forms of tree cropping (especially of coconuts and breadfruit) would have been favored. Yet the coral islands had their own advantages, especially their vast reefs and lagoons rich in ®sh and shell®sh. This spectrum of environmental variability, necessitating particular human adaptations, encouraged cultural variation among the Ancestral Polynesian societies. In moving eastwards beyond the large Fijian islands of Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, the immediately pre-Polynesian (Early Eastern Lapita) peoples crossed a fundamental threshold of Paci®c geology and biogeography. The ``Andesite Line'' which runs between Fiji and Western Polynesia (see Figure 4.1) marks the tectonic divide separating the vast Paci®c Plate on the east, from the Fijian Plate on the west. As the Lapita peoples expanded out of the Bismarck Archipelago, down through the Solomon Islands and out to Fiji, they encountered islands that, while different in minor respects, were all of andesitic-arc geological origin (Nunn 1994). Such islands have long and complex geologic histories, composed of a diverse suite of rocks, including both igneous and meta-volcanic types, as well as sedimentary formations. East of the andesite line, the islands are exclusively formed by ``hot spot'' or mid-plate volcanic eruptions, largely of basaltic composition. Erosion and subsidence of these volcanic islands gradually converts some of these to atolls, or when they are elevated, to makatea islands. The consequences of moving over this transition from island-arc to midplate volcanic islands were far-reaching. For one, the islands east of the andesite line are generally much smaller than those to the west. Within the Ancestral Polynesian homeland, the largest island is Savai`i with 1,600 square kilometers, a good-sized land mass but considerably smaller than Viti Levu at 10,388 square kilometers. Most other islands in the Polynesian homeland are much smaller, such as Niuatoputapu at 15 square kilometers, or many of the islets in the Ha`apai group. Second, the lithic resources

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available for stone tool production were limited to dense, relatively hard-towork basalt or hawaiite;2 a low-silica type of obsidian also occurred at a few localities, such as on Tafahi Island. This restricted suite of available rock types inspired changes in the way in which stone tools, especially adzes, were manufactured (see Chapter 7). Third, biotic diversity (both terrestrial and marine) declines as one moves eastwards out of Fiji into Samoa and Tonga. Although the ¯ora and fauna of the Ancestral Polynesian homeland is part of the Indo-Malasian and Indo-Paci®c provinces from which the Lapita peoples had hailed, many of the useful or edible species found in the larger westerly archipelagos were missing in Samoa and Tonga. How did the Ancestral Polynesians conceptualize this new world of properly ``oceanic'' islands? The PPN reconstructions pertaining to the physical world open a window into the Ancestral Polynesian mind, yielding the very semantic categories into which this world was partitioned and classi®ed. Table 4.1 presents the set of PPN words for aspects of the physical world.3 Because this is the ®rst of many such tabular presentations of PPN lexical items we will use, a few brief explanations are offered. The ``probable gloss'' is our best judgment of the meaning of the PPN term. The POC and PPN reconstructions are as given in POLLEX (Biggs 1998), augmented by other sources, especially for POC (e.g., from the chapters in Pawley and Ross [1994], and in Ross et al. [eds., 1998]). If cognate POC and PPN terms are given, the PPN term must obviously be a retention, whereas if only a PPN form is given, it is probably an innovation at the PPN (or in some case PCP) interstage. Table 4.1 and others to follow include columns bearing the codes ``NCOG,'' ``P1,'' ``P2,'' and ``PSA.'' NCOG is the number of cognates within Polynesian languages (excluding extra-Polynesian languages such as FIJ and YAS). If NCOG is high (~20±30), the PPN term has been retained in the majority of Polynesian languages, while if it is small (<10) the term has been lost (or replaced by another innovation) in many languages. P1 and P2 stand for Jeff Marck's ``Principles 1 and 2,'' discussed at the end of Chapter 3. We regard any PPN reconstructions meeting either criteria for P1 or P2 as robust, even though in the case of P2 there may only be a small number of cognates. If neither P1 or P2 is checked, the reconstructed term is represented by modern witnesses found exclusively in Western Polynesia. In such cases, it is possible that the term is a post-PPN innovation which has spread through borrowing within Western Polynesia. Finally, PSA indicates prime semantic agreement, in which case the meanings of modern re¯exes within all major branches or subgroups of the PN language are in essential agreement. If the PSA column is not checked, there are divergences among the meanings of the cognates, and a probable semantic history will in most cases be provided in the text.

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Table 4.1. Selected Proto Polynesian terms for the physical world Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) General Land; placenta Island, islet Earth, land Earthquake Terrestrial environment Mountain Ridge of mountain Point of land, headland Cliff Lake, swamp Swampy area (especially under cultivation) Fernland, degraded lateritic zone Fresh water, stream, river Stream, river Waterfall Spring (of water) Inanimate objects Stone, rock Earth, soil, dirt Mud, dirty Sand (calcareous) Hard, black, volcanic stone Limestone, coral Coral, brain coral Branch coral Marine environment Seashore, coast Sea beyond the reef, open ocean Lagoon Reef Coral head, rock in sea Channel through reef, passage Ocean side of reef Rock or coral head Sea current Ocean wave Rough, of sea Low tide

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*panua *motu

*fanua *motu *nuku *mafuike

28 27 17 13

3 3 3 3

*maqunga *tuqa-siwi *mata *pali *rano *fusi

29 12 11 5 10 8

3 3 3

*toafa *wai *wai-tafe *safu *wai-puna

7 33 10 9 8

3 3 3 3

*fatu *kele *pela *qone *kalaa *lase *punga *feo

27 26 23 31 15 11 27 13

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

*tahi *moana *loto *hakau *toka *awa *tuqa-hakau *toka *qau *ngalu *loka *(tahi)-masa

18 26 11

3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3

3 3 3

3 3

3

Cont . . .

*mata *dano

*waiR

*patu *9kele *lepa/pela *qone *lanje *pu9a

*ta(n)sik

*zagaRu *awa9

*qaRus

18 24

18 16 7

P2

PSA 3 3 3

3 3

3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3

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Table 4.1. (cont. ) Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) Astronomical phenomena Sun Moon (also month) Star (general term) The Milky Way The Pleiades (also a month name) The Morning Star A star name (Venus or Antares) A star name (probably Sirius) Guiding star? Sky Weather Fine weather Storm, hurricane Wind, breeze Westerly quarter and wind and weather associated with it Blow, of wind or breeze Wind, strong wind Dry season of southeast trade winds Cloud Rain Squall, rain Drizzle, light rain Light rain, drizzle Flood Cease raining Rainbow Directionals East (where the sun rises) West (where the sun sets) West, land ``below'' South, south wind Northerly quarter and wind from that quarter

Proto Oceanic

*fetuqu *Mata-liki

*langit

*apaRat

*angini *angin *raki *qaRoq *qusan *timu(R)

*sisi(p)

*tokalau(r)

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*laqaa *maa-sina *fetuqu *kaniwa *mata-liki *fetuqu-qaho *mele (PNP) *takulua *kaweinga *langi

31 23 22 15 25 9 11 14 9

*laqo®e *afaa *sau *laki

8 18 14 14

3

*angi *matangi *laki *qao *quha *timu *afu-afu *moti-moti *lolo *mao *nuanua (PNP)

23 29

3 3

34 10 10 9 6 21 17

3

*sasake *sisifo *lalo *tonga *tokelau

P2

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

PSA 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3

3 3

3 3 3

3

3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3

3 3

3 3 3 3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

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105

Turning to the speci®c items in Table 4.1, a PPN word meaning `land' is *fanua, a retention from POC *panua, `inhabited land or territory, land' (Blust 1987; Green and Pawley 1998:62). Clearly, *fanua had a double meaning to the PPN speakers, `land' in the most general sense, but also `placenta, afterbirth.' This linkage of the two meanings metaphorically suggests the intimate linkage between people and their natal land, a matter we will discuss in Chapter 8 with respect to land-holding social groups. PPN *motu more narrowly indicated an `island' or `islet,' and was probably a retention from POC. A third term, *nuku, is more dif®cult to ascertain; it may have referred to a `settled land.' Given that the tectonically active archipelagos and islands of Ancestral Polynesia straddle the boundary between the Paci®c and Fijian Plates, a robust PPN reconstruction for `earthquake,' *mafuike, is not surprising. In at least ®ve cognates, the term is associated with a deity who either causes earthquakes, or was the discoverer of ®re. To the PPN speakers, *mafuike presumably had a double meaning, signifying both the physical phenomenon of earthquakes, and a supernatural spirit responsible for them. As Pawley and K. Green (1971) recognized, many PPN words show that the Ancestral Polynesians were familiar with high islands. These include PPN *maqunga for `mountain,' and *tuqa-siwi for `mountain ridge.' The latter is metaphoric, formed of separate PPN words for `back' and `bone.' A headland or point was called *mata, one of many meanings of this polysemous term. *Pali, `cliff,' invokes Marck's Principle 2, for the term has only ®ve witnesses, but these include FIJ as well as four Eastern Polynesian words (in HAW, MAO, RAR, and TAH), making it certain the term existed in the PPN vocabulary. PPN *rano indicated a swamp, lake, or inland body of fresh water, and was distinguished from *fusi, a swampy area under cultivation (see Chapter 5). *Toafa referred to deforested or degraded inland areas, which supported a fernland-type of vegetation. The widespread term *wai denoted both `fresh water' as well as `stream' or `river,' while the compound morph *wai-tafe meant `stream' or `¯owing water.' Another compound term, *wai-puna, designated a spring issuing from the ground. Other PPN terms refer to inanimate objects such as rocks, earth, sand, and coral. *Fatu was the general term for `rock,' while *kalaa indicated either dense basalt (suitable for stone adz production), or possibly obsidian (or both). `Earth' or `soil' (*kele) was differentiated from calcareous `sand' (*qone). The many re¯exes of PPN *pela include common references to `dirt' and `mud' but also to `decaying matter' and `pus,' making the precise meaning of this word unclear. The Ancestral Polynesians recognized at least three kinds of coral: *lase for either coral or lime derived from coral, *punga which certainly referred to `brain coral' (such as Porites spp.), and *feo which indicated `branch coral' (such as Acropora spp. and related taxa). That the

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PPN speakers distinguished between branch and brain coral types is noteworthy, as both of these were used for different types of abrading tools (see Chapter 7). The PPN lexicon was rich in terms for the sea and for marine topography. PPN speakers distinguished *tahi, the calm inshore waters of the reef ¯at or lagoon, from *moana, the open sea and realm of the navigator and seamaster. *Loto was polysemous, referring not only to lagoons, but to holes or depressions in the reef, and in some cases also to lakes or pools. *Hakau designated the coral reef, which had its ocean side (*tuqa-hakau), as well as passages or channels (*awa) through which canoes could pass. A separate term *toka referred to coral heads or coral formations, a not surprising distinction since ®sh congregate around such formations, as any experienced tropical ®sherman knows. Finally, there are robust PPN reconstructions for `wave' (*ngalu), `sea current' (*qau), and `rough sea' (*loka). Several terms for astronomical phenomena can be robustly reconstructed (Table 4.1), including `sun' (*laqaa), `moon' (*maa-sina, which also meant a `month' or lunation), and a general term for `star' (*fetuqu). The Milky Way (*kaniwa) was also named, as was the star-cluster Pleiades (*Mata-liki ). But we can reconstruct only three speci®c star names, *fetuqu-qaho (lit. `star-day') for the Morning Star (or Venus as the morning star), *mele, a star/or planet (possibly Venus or Antares), and *takulua, most likely Sirius.4 There is an intriguing PPN lexeme, *kaweinga, which POLLEX glosses as `that which is steered for (usually a star).' Given the widespread Oceanic practice of using ``star paths'' or guiding stars in inter-island or inter-archipelago navigation (Lewis 1972), the existence of such a `steering star' term is not surprising. As farmers, the Ancestral Polynesians must have astutely observed the weather, monitoring rain essential to the growth of their crops, and heeding signs of storms or hurricanes which might devastate their orchards. 5 A subset of PPN terms refers to weather, including those for `®ne weather' (*laqo®e) and for storm or hurricane (*afaa). There are at least four words for `wind or breeze,' with the most general being *matangi. PPN *laki probably indicated both the westerly quarter, and wind and weather which came from that direction. As a directional, *laki may have formed a trio along with *tonga and *tokelau.6 The PPN speakers had at least six terms associated with rain and raining, the cover term being *quha. `Rainbow,' *nuanua, can be reconstructed back as far as PNP but not, on current evidence, to PPN. Finally, there is the matter of what Blust (1997) calls ``macro-orientation,'' the directional systems by which individuals order themselves in relation to the physical world. Such conceptual systems are arguably highly stable or persistent, and Blust suggests that two fundamental contrast sets can be reconstructed to Proto Malayo-Polynesian: a ``land±sea'' axis, and a spatiotemporal distinction between the ``west/north-west monsoon'' and the

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107

``east/south-east monsoon'' (1997:39). He suggests that these Austronesian directional systems were ``adapted to a life on or near the sea, in which the sailing winds were of basic importance and the land-forms encountered were small islands.'' Table 4.1 lists some key PPN directionals. *Sasake and *sisifo, referring respectively to `east' and `west' (where the sun rises and sets) are re¯ected only in Western Polynesian and Outlier languages, but are probably good PPN reconstructions, especially since *sisifo is clearly a retention from POC *sisi(p). These terms were presumably lost in PEP. More important is the *tonga/*tokelau distinction, widespread not only in Western Polynesia but also in Eastern Polynesia and the Outliers. To PPN speakers, this contrast set designated a directional axis with *tonga to the south (where the island of Tongatapu, `sacred Tonga,' lies) and *tokelau to the north (where the Tokelau Islands are situated). This axis may also have been associated with winds from these directions. The term *lalo in general means `down' (and contrasts with *lunga, `up'), but may also have had a directional sense of `west' since such a secondary meaning exists in eight widely dispersed Polynesian languages. The ``land-sea axis'' described by Blust (1997) for Proto Malayo-Polynesian also persisted into the Polynesian consciousness regarding physical environments, as anyone who has spent time in Hawai`i or other contemporary Polynesian islands is aware (the distinction has been adopted into everyday speech in Hawai`i, as the familiar mauka-makai contrast set).7 There can be no doubt that Proto Polynesian speakers also oriented themselves according to this ``toward-the-land'' and ``toward-the-sea'' distinction. Owing to lexical innovations and/or replacements, however, the precise lexical form which this contrast set took in Proto Polynesian is ambiguous, although the existence of the semantic contrast set is not. POLLEX lists the following two Proto Samoic-Outlier terms: *ngaa- as a `locality pre®x'; and, *ngaa-tai as directional meaning `seaward' (opposed, in many Polynesian languages, to ngaa-uta, `landward'). What we can infer for PPN is that this directional contrast set incorporated the words for coastal or inshore waters (PPN *tahi ) and `inland' or `interior' (*quta), with some form of directional pre®x, in the form *pre®x-tahi and *pre®x-quta.8 Biogeographical considerations In crossing the andesite line, the Eastern Lapita peoples moved onto Paci®c Plate islands with more restricted rock resources (Figure 4.1). But these geological differences were hardly the only environmental challenge they faced, for in moving eastwards out of the diverse Fijian archipelago, these early colonists and their Polynesian descendants encountered an increasingly

Fig. 4.1 The central Paci®c region, showing the location of the Andesite Line. Islands to the north and east of this line are situated on the Paci®c Plate (after Green 1974b: ®g. 63).

The Ancestral Polynesian world

109

depauperate biotic world. Fiji is much richer in its diversity of plants and animals than Tonga or Samoa to the east, more similar to the larger Solomons and Vanuatu archipelagos from which the Lapita peoples had migrated. For example, while there are about 230 species of ferns and fernallies in Fiji, there are only about 100 in Tonga, and just 53 in the Manu`a Islands. Similarly, the numbers of vascular plants drops from more than 2,000 in Fiji, to about 750 in Tonga, and only 420 in Manu`a. The same holds for reptiles (lizards, snakes, and frogs), with 29 species in Fiji, as opposed to 13 in the main Samoan group, and none in Manu`a. Marine ¯oras and faunas also display similar declines in generic and species-level diversity from west to east within the Fiji±Western Polynesian region. These biogeographic differences had real consequences for the Ancestral Polynesians. Many of the trees, shrubs, herbs, birds, mollusks, ®sh, and other natural resources they were accustomed to harvest, gather, or exploit ± whether for food, ®bers, wood, thatch, medicines, feathers, shell, or other uses or purposes ± were lacking in their new-found environments. Of course, key economic species such as crop plants and domestic animals could be transported and transplanted into the new island groups. But others were presumably absent, and the Ancestral Polynesians adapted by ®nding new resources, or concentrating on those fewer species still present. Ancestral Polynesian ethnobiological knowledge Cognitive anthropologists have synthesized much ethnographic data regarding ``folk'' biological classi®cations, ®nding that virtually all known systems of ordering the natural world and its creatures adhere to a limited set of general principles (Berlin 1992:13±35). All such systems of classi®cation exhibit a hierarchical or taxonomic structure, comprised of a limited number of ranks or levels. Such a system is schematically illustrated in Figure 4.2. According to Berlin (1992:22), the major taxonomic ranks found in folk classi®cations are those of: (1) kingdom; (2) life-form; (3) intermediate; (4) generic; (5) speci®c; and (6) varietal. The ®rst and third categories are frequently covert (not lexically marked), and must be discovered by careful ethnographic inquiry and experimentation. The life-form rank is usually limited to a few categories (< 10), these ``based on the recognition of the strong correlation of gross morphological structure and ecological adaptation'' (Berlin 1992:24). The generic rank is typically the most numerous in any folk biological system; ethnographic data suggest ``an upper limit at about ®ve hundred to six hundred taxa in systems typical of tropical horticulturalists'' (1992:23). Moreover, the majority of generic-level taxa are monotypic, with no taxa of lesser rank (i.e., species or varietal levels). Species-level taxa, when present, further partition folk generic taxa into two

110

Rediscovering Hawaiki

Fig. 4.2

The hierarchical structure typical of folk biological classi®cations (after Berlin 1992: ®g. 1.1).

or more classes, and folk varietals further partition folk species. As Berlin observes, ``subgeneric taxa are less numerous than folk generics in all systems examined to date'' (1992:24). The lexical evidence for PPN folk biology conforms closely to expectations derived from such world-wide ethnographic comparisons. We can strongly suggest that the PPN speakers categorized and classi®ed their biological world into at least three, and probably four, lexically marked taxonomic ranks, these being life-form, generic, and speci®c, and probably also varietal. The majority of PPN reconstructions for taxa of plants and animals are of generic rank, as would be predicted, although we have some indications of speci®c and even varietal-level taxa as well. Generic level taxa are the most apt to be temporally stable. Subgeneric taxa were susceptible to lexical change, as the descendants of the Ancestral Polynesians expanded out of the Western Polynesian homeland to encounter more biogeographical differences, including both generic-level biotic depauperization and speci®c-level endemism (here using the terms ``generic'' and ``speci®c'' in their scienti®c senses). Life-form terms Cecil Brown (1981) reviewed both ethnographic and linguistic evidence for zoological life-form terms from twenty-four Polynesian languages, drawing upon Biggs et al.'s (1970) initial PPN reconstructions. Brown's interest was primarily ``evolutionary,'' in that he wished to determine at what stage of

The Ancestral Polynesian world

111

Table 4.2. Proto Polynesian life-form terms Probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

Tree, plant in general Grass, herb Bird Insect, wug Earthworm Snake Fish Shell®sh Crab

*daqan

*raqa-kau *mahuku *manu *manumanu *kele-mutu *ngata *ika *®ngota *paka

31 27 33 10 10 10 30 10 19

*manuk

*mwata *ika(n)

P2

3 3 3 3

PSA 3 3

3 3 3

3 3

3 3

3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

development ± along a putative universal sequence of zoological life-form encoding ± the Polynesians were situated. He concluded that the Polynesians were ``at Stage 3 in animal life-form growth, having the initial three lifeforms of the encoding sequence'' (1981:104). These forms, according to Brown, were those for `bird' (PPN *manu), `®sh' (*ika), and `snake' (*ngata), all robust PPN reconstructions. Brown observed that in Eastern Polynesia the term for snake was lost (actually, it was transferred in some cases to other animals, such as worms), not surprising given that snakes were not naturally distributed beyond Samoa. He also regarded the development of life-form terms for `worm' and `wug' (a category usually comprising insects plus spiders, and sometimes other forms such as grubs or worms) as later, postPPN, developments. Table 4.2 lists all of the probable life-form terms reconstructed for PPN. There are nine terms overall, seven of these being zoological, a considerable expansion from Brown's list of three terms. Botanically, the word *raqa-kau designated the class of trees (and wood), but by semantic extension probably also included all vascular plants. PPN *mahuku, on the other hand, referred minimally to grasses, but very likely also included other categories such as low ferns, herbs, and sedges. Zoologically, terms for `bird' (*manu), `®sh' (*ika), and `snake' (*ngata) are well attested, as Brown recognized, but we would add robust reconstructions for `insect' or `wug,' *manumanu; for `shell®sh' (mollusks and sea-urchins, or perhaps all shell®sh gathered by

112

Rediscovering Hawaiki

women on the reef ), *®ngota; for `crab,' *paka; and, for `earthworm' (or `wug'?), *kele-mutu. The category *ngata, `snake,' nicely illustrates changes in Polynesian folk classi®cation necessitated by biogeographical distributions. In the Paci®c, snakes are distributed no farther east than Samoa. Zug (1991) indicates that two species of snake (Ogmodon vitianus and Candoia bibroni ) occur in this region, with the former found only in Fiji, and with C. bibroni in Fiji, Samoa, and Tonga. FIJ gata is cognate with TON and SAM ngata, and in all cases these refer to snakes. In PN languages outside of Western Polynesia, however, cognates of *ngata were transferred to other animals with elongated body shapes. Thus in Hawai`i, for example, naka means a sea-creature of some kind, while in New Zealand ngata refers to a slug or leech. Two additional terms, PPN *moko and *pili, might be considered life-form categories. Both of these referred to lizards, but cognates in Polynesian languages range across taxa in both the gecko and skink families. Fiji has a rich lizard fauna (twenty-®ve species according to Zug [1991]), whereas this drops to twelve species in Samoa and Tonga, and even fewer in Eastern Polynesia. Thus *pili may have been a general (life-form) term for `lizard,' whereas *moko referred to geckos, especially those commensal species which typically reside in human dwellings. Generic and subgeneric taxa Berlin (1992) argues that the most frequent taxa in any folk classi®cation system are of generic rank, and this certainly ®ts the lexical evidence for PPN. There has been no comprehensive attempt to reconstruct the entire system of PPN terms for the biological world, but Biggs' POLLEX ®le includes many generic-level reconstructions, Clark (1982) has reconstructed PPN names for birds, and R. Hooper (1994) deals with PPN ®sh names.9 Hooper's study of ®sh names, along with additional examples for the domain of reef and inshore invertebrates presented in Table 4.3, provides good examples of PPN generic-level folk categories. Table 4.3. Proto Polynesian terms for reef and shoreline invertebrates Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) Crustacea General life-form term for crabs Hermit crab (Paguridae) Spotted crab (Carpilius sp. ?)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*qumwa9

*paka *qunga *tuutuu

18 22 8

3 3 3

P2

PSA

3

The Ancestral Polynesian world Mangrove crab Ghost crab (Ocypode sp. ?) Rock crab (Grapsidae) Crab sp. Coconut robber crab (Birgus latro) Land crab (Cardisoma sp.) Spiny lobster (Palinurus sp.) Slipper lobster Squilla Mollusca: Gastropods Turbo spp. Cowries (Cypraeidae) Limpets (Patellidae) Trochidae spp. Mollusca: Bivalvia Giant clam (Tridacna spp.) Pearl oyster (Pinctada spp.) Asaphidae spp. Mussel (Mytilidae spp. ?) Rock oyster A bivalve mollusk A bivalve mollusk

*kuka

*qayuyu *quda9

*qalili9 *mbule

*(b,p)sua *japi *kasi *kuku *tiRom

Cephalopoda Octopus Squid Echinodermata Kind of sea-urchin Sea-urchin with long, thin spines Kind of sea-urchin Coelenterates Sea anemone Coral, brain coral Branch coral (Uncertain) Venomous sea-worm ?

*(9)kina *saRawaki *dr(o,u)mane(e,i) *pu9a

113 *kuka *kawiki *kamakama *kala-misi *quuquu *tupa *qura *tapatapa *walo

3 12 19 11 15 26 33 14 16

3 3 3 3

*qalili *pule *pisi PNP *kali-kao

22 24 11 11

3 3 3 3

*paasua/faasua *tifa *kasi *kuku *tio *tofe *pipi

15 10 22 17 17 10 24

3 3 3 3 3 3

*feke *nguu-feke

22 14

3 3

3 3

*kina *wana *saawaki

10 23 6

3 3

3

*rumane

6

3

3

*punga *feo

27 13

3 3

3 3

*weli

18

3

3 3

3 3

3

3

3 3 3

3 3

3

3

3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Hooper (1994:187) reconstructed 115 PPN names for ®sh, and slightly more (147 cases) for the later PNP interstage. Of the 115 PPN words, no less than 112 are primary lexemes, corresponding to generic-level status. One of the few examples for which both generic- and speci®c-level taxa can be reconstructed is with the ®sh family Balistidae (trigger®sh). In this case, there is a generic-level term *sumu, and these are speci®c-level terms *sumulenga (probably Balistapus sp.) and *sumukaleva (probably Alutera sp.). While the PPN ®sh names are mostly ``generic-level'' this does not mean that they correspond precisely to Western (scienti®c) notions of genus and species. Indeed, Hooper (1994:189) observes that of the 115 PPN ®sh name reconstructions, ``about a quarter correspond to scienti®c species, about a quarter to genera, and less than ten to higher level groupings.'' The PPN life-form *ika, while including the 115 reconstructed genericlevel terms discussed by Hooper (1994), probably was not limited to `®shes' in the Western, scienti®c sense. Comparative ethnography reveals that virtually all Polynesian cultures also include within the ika category: cetaceans (PPN *tafu-raqa, `whale'), marine turtles (*fonu, Green Sea Turtle, and *kea, the Hawksbill Turtle), and cephalopods (*feke, `octopus,' and *nguufeke, `squid'). Table 4.3 provides further examples of PPN generic-level folk taxa for reef and shoreline invertebrates, with a total of thirty-two PPN reconstructions. There is no general life-form term corresponding to this scienti®c domain, and the taxa listed in Table 4.3 would have cross-cut the PPN life-forms of *ika, *®ngota, and *paka, as well as including several generics that did not fall under either of these two terms. Again, all of these taxa are of the folkgeneric level, with a complete absence of reconstructable speci®c-level terms. While some PPN terms correspond to single scienti®c species (such as *quuquu for the Coconut Robber Crab, Birgus latro), many represent entire groups of higher-level inclusiveness, such as the terms for cowries (*pule) or for branch coral (*feo). In general, PPN folk taxa are heavily biased toward economically useful or environmentally salient species, a point made by Hooper (1994:188) with regard to ®sh names.10 She observes that the diversity of butter¯y ®shes (Chaetodontidae) and damsel®shes (Pomacentridae) were lumped by the PPN speakers under just two taxa, *ti®ti® and *mutu, respectively. This re¯ects their relative insigni®cance as food ®shes, whereas various individual species within such families as jacks (Carangidae), tunas (Scombridae), and groupers (Serranidae) are individually named. This point applies also to the category of insects and spiders, a large and highly diverse part of island biotas from the scienti®c perspective, but one of little interest to Polynesians. There are only about ten PPN reconstructions for insects or spiders, and half of these pertain to noxious or commensal taxa, such as ants (*loo), sand¯ies or gnats

The Ancestral Polynesian world

115

(*nono), mosquitoes (*namu), ¯ies (*lango), and cockroaches (*mongamonga). The diversity of spiders on oceanic islands was reduced in the PPN folk taxonomic system to a single cover term, *kalewelewe. In folk systems of biological classi®cation, subgeneric taxa (the speci®c and varietal levels) are typically most developed for ``cultivated plants that have been highly modi®ed under domestication'' (Berlin 1992:106). This is veri®able with ethnobotanically studied Polynesian folk classi®cations, such as those of Hawai`i (Handy 1940), Tonga (Whistler 1991), and Futuna (Kirch 1994a), and it is likely to have been so for PPN categories of domesticated plants. For example, we can reconstruct at least three PPN varietal-level terms for breadfruit cultivars, these being *aveloa, *puou, and *maopo. A careful comparison of such varietal-level terms across Polynesian folk ethnobotanical classi®cations might yield similar PPN reconstructions for cultivars of key crop plants such as taro, yams, and bananas. We leave the task to others. Pawley (1996b:160) discusses the ``extreme instability'' of POC names for subgeneric taxa of reef and shoreline invertebrates, observing that virtually all POC reconstructions are at the generic rank. He offers several possible explanations, including the variability of local species (biogeographical differences), and the ``wide range of salient characteristics exhibited by many folk generics and folk species.'' Since many subgeneric categories consist of compound terms involving a descriptor, these may have been subject to rapid change: Speakers can be expected from time to time to change the choice of the characteristics used to distinguish one taxon terminologically from its sister taxa. Finally, particular modifying terms may themselves change in meaning and no longer be semantically appropriate. In some cases the old modi®er may be retained as part of the term, leaving an opaque or idiomatic binomial; in other cases the old modi®er will be replaced by a new semantically appropriate one. (1996b:160)

It is beyond our scope to attempt a complete reconstruction of PPN terms pertaining to the biological world, although efforts in progress will doubtless produce such an account in due course. When complete, we estimate that the list of generic-level PPN lexemes for plants and animals will probably run to roughly 500 or so items, consistent with Berlin's (1992) ®ndings for folk taxonomic systems worldwide. ``Paradise lost'': natural and anthropogenic changes in the Polynesian homeland While archaeology is unlikely to ever tell us anything about PPN folk biological systematics, archaeological evidence and that derived from inter-

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

disciplinary studies conducted jointly with paleoecologists (see Kirch and Hunt, eds., 1997) offer signi®cant insights of a different kind, bringing us back to the power of the triangulation method in historical anthropology. Taken on its own, the historical linguistic evidence yields a static portrait, whereas recent archaeological and paleoenvironmental investigations reveal that the physical and biotic world in which the Ancestral Polynesians were enmeshed was highly dynamic. Such dynamism resulted both from natural environmental processes, and from environmental changes induced by the Ancestral Polynesians themselves. One salient natural process of environmental change affecting the world of the Ancestral Polynesians during the mid to late ®rst millennium BC was sea level change.11 When Lapita communities were established throughout the Fiji±Tonga±Samoa region (around 3000±2800 BP), sea level in the central Paci®c stood approximately 1±1.5 m higher than at present. Because of this, islands such as Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988), Tongatapu, and the Ha`apai group (Dickinson et al. 1994; Burley 1998) were more limited in land area than they are today. The earliest Lapita settlements often occupy elevated beach terraces now located some distance inland. Evidence from the To`aga site on Ofu Island (Kirch 1993a) suggests that this mid-Holocene high stand began to fall toward its modern level prior to 2000 BP, when a phase of rapid shoreline progradation set in. Toward the end of the ®rst millennium BC, the Ancestral Polynesians must have experienced dynamic changes in the reefs, lagoons, and shorelines of their islands. As sea level fell, reef ¯ats were tidally exposed, inhibiting coral growth and gradually creating a new source of biogenic sediments, changing local sediment budgets and initiating shoreline progradation. Whether such changes occurred fast enough to be noticeable at a human time scale (i.e., within the lifetime of an individual) is uncertain, but this is likely, at least for certain locales. These environmental changes could have been economically signi®cant, especially on smaller islands, as beach terraces prograded, increasing the area of exposed land and decreasing areas of resource-rich reefs and lagoons. On Niuatoputapu the situation was dramatic, with a net increase in land area of more than 300 percent, and a decrease in the area of reef-lagoon microenvironments of 50 percent (Kirch 1988:248). Other environmental and ecological changes resulting from human actions and land use activities included: (1) the purposive introduction of a wide range of crop plants and domestic animals; (2) inadvertent introduction of commensal species, such as the Paci®c Rat (Rattus exulans), some weeds, garden snails (e.g. Lamellaxis gracilis), and so on; (3) clearance of native vegetation, for hamlets and villages, for tree crop orchards, and for shifting cultivations; (4) hunting, collecting, and gathering of wild terrestrial food and other economic resources, especially birds and certain plant species

The Ancestral Polynesian world

117

(e.g., hardwoods for timber); and, (5) continuous exploitation of reefs and lagoons by the harvesting of their edible invertebrates and by ®shing. These activities commenced with the initial Lapita occupation of the region at the beginning of the ®rst millennium BC, and by the Ancestral Polynesian period were pervasive. The cumulative effects of such human activities are re¯ected in the archaeological and paleoenvironmental records from the Western Polynesian islands, including the direct faunal (and to a lesser extent ¯oral) evidence for introduced species, size reductions in shell®sh species over time, and geomorphological evidence for increased rates of erosion and alluvial/colluvial deposition. Dramatic evidence for human impact on the natural ecosystems of Western Polynesian islands, during the Lapita and Ancestral Polynesian periods, concerns the land and sea bird faunas. Steadman (1989, 1993a, 1995, 1997) discusses zooarchaeological evidence from sites in Tonga for extinction, extirpation, and population reductions in a number of bird species. At least fourteen bird species went extinct within the ®rst two to three centuries after human arrival, and were probably already little more than a memory (possibly encoded in oral traditions) by the Ancestral Polynesian period. Most sensitive to such human impact (either directly through hunting, or indirectly through habitat modi®cations) were the pigeons, megapodes, and rails. But human-induced impacts on terrestrial faunas were not restricted to birds; fruit bats and lizards, including an endemic iguana formerly present in Tonga (Pregill and Dye 1989; Koopman and Steadman 1995), were also extirpated or went extinct. There is also faunal evidence for signi®cant reductions in the numbers of marine sea turtles between earliest Lapita and later Ancestral Polynesian phases. One instance of extinction and extirpation illustrates the power of the triangulation method we advocate. This concerns the megapode (also called the ``incubator bird'' or the ``brush turkey''), a ``curious family of fowl-like birds of the Australian region [which] do not incubate their eggs'' (Mayr 1945:56). Rather, the females deposit their eggs in soil, sand, or hot volcanic ashes, or, most frequently, in substantial mounds of scratched-together forest-¯oor litter. Historically, ®ve species of the genus Megapodius are known from the southwest Paci®c, but only one of these, Megapodius pritchardi (the Niuafo`ou Incubator Bird) occurs within Western Polynesia, where its distribution is con®ned to isolated Niuafo`ou Island (Mayr 1945:127). 12 On Niuafo`ou, the megapode nesting grounds were carefully controlled by the ruling chief, assuring the continued survival of this population. Despite the restriction of megapodes to a single locality within Western Polynesia, a valid PPN reconstruction for this species, *malau, is possible because in addition to the TON re¯ex (malau), there are cognates from three Polynesian Outliers (MFA, malau; OJA, malau; TAK, marau), where a closely

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

related species (Megapodius freycinet) occurs.13 We may ask, however, whether in Ancestral Polynesian times the megapode was restricted to the single locality of Niuafo`ou, and whether the Polynesian term malau was later applied to the closely related species M. freycinet when the Outliers were settled (or resettled) by Polynesian speakers. Neither historical linguistics, nor the distributional evidence of historical biogeography, is helpful; we must turn to zooarchaeology. Recent excavations in Manu`a, Ha`apai (Lifuka), and `Eua islands have all produced Megapode bones (Steadman 1989, 1993b), demonstrating that populations of this genus were widespread throughout Western Polynesia at the time of initial human settlement. The Lifuka and `Eua bones belong to a distinct (now extinct) species, M. alimentum, while the limited sample of bones from the To`aga site on Ofu Island represent either M. freycinet (historically not known east of Vanuatu), or a closely related but now extinct species. The megapode demonstrates in a small but concise manner the power of triangulation. Historical linguistics and comparative ethnography allow us to reconstruct the PPN name for this bird, but cannot tell us about its original distribution within the Polynesian homeland. Archaeological evidence ± mute as to the name given by Polynesians to this curious bird ± proves essential in demonstrating that megapodes were once a ubiquitous part of the Ancestral Polynesian environment, and that their extinction was a consequence of human actions in these vulnerable island ecosystems. Together, linguistics and archaeology minimize the ``polygon of error'' in historical reconstruction, enhancing our understanding of the past. To sum up, when the Early Eastern Lapita ancestors of the Ancestral Polynesians arrived in Tonga and Samoa and nearby islands, they were the ®rst human beings ± indeed, the ®rst large land vertebrates other than birds ± to intrude into this remote and biotically vulnerable oceanic world.14 Cloaked in rainforest and teeming with land- and seabirds, and with reefs and lagoons supporting a lush diversity of edible invertebrates and ®shes, these islands must have seemed a kind of paradise. A millennium later, as the Proto Polynesian dialect chain was breaking up and the Polynesians began to expand beyond their homeland, these islands had seen signi®cant and irreversible transformations, both in their physical landscapes and in their biotas. Rich avifaunas had been decimated, with some species already extinct and most others greatly reduced in numbers. Pristine rainforests had been opened up for gardens, in some places resulting in increased erosion and alluvial progradation of coastal plains, or in®lling of valley bottoms. Extensive lowland areas had been planted in orchard gardens of economically important, adventive tree crops, including coconuts, breadfruit, Tahitian chestnut, and other species. All of this was the inevitable result of permanent settlement by humans, and of the cumulative processes of

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119

resource exploitation and establishment of managed, productive agroecosystems. From the human, cultural perspective, such changes were essential to transform isolated islands into habitats capable of supporting large and dense human populations. Yet from a strictly ecological perspective, it was a matter of ``paradise lost.''

Chapter 5

Subsistence

The immediate plant origins of the most important cultigens, the starch-producing staples . . . demonstrates three major characteristics of Oceanic agricultures: 1. Their derivative natures . . . 2. The importance of vegetative reproduction in the plant roster. 3. Arboriculture as a signi®cant part of subsistence patterns.

yen 1973:70

We have seen that the PPN speakers indexed their biotic world with a rich and complex terminology for plants, birds, shell®sh, ®sh, and other life forms. On these ecologically varied low and high islands extending along the Tonga±Samoa lineament, they created distinctive modes of food production and extraction. How might one reconstruct the subsistence economy of Ancestral Polynesia, applying the triangulation method? In triangulation it is not necessary to always privilege linguistic evidence. A well-developed tradition of ethnobotanical research within Polynesia and Oceania ± one thinks of Merrill (1954), Barrau (1965a, 1965b), and Yen (1971, 1973, 1991) ± has long sought to reconstruct ancient forms of Oceanic cultivation and food production. More recently, historical linguists such as French-Wright (1983), Ross (1996a), and Osmond (1998) have concerned themselves with the reconstruction of Oceanic crop plant and horticultural terminologies, although this has been primarily at the POC rather than PPN level. For ®shing and marine exploitation, a similarly long tradition of comparative ethnography includes the works of Beasley (1928), Anell (1955), Reinman (1967), and others, supplemented by studies of ®shing gear incorporated within many of the museum ethnographies of the 1920s±1940s (e.g., Hiroa 1930, 1944; Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1938). Aside from reconstructing PCP and PPN ®sh names (Geraghty 1994; Hooper 1994), and POC reef and shoreline invertebrate terminology (Pawley 1996b), historical linguists have paid little attention to ®shing strategies and methods, although Walter (1989) used both archaeological and linguistic approaches to adduce evidence for Lapita ®shing. Archaeologists, in contrast, have long been concerned with ancient Polynesian and Lapita ®shing and shell®sh gathering, both from the evidence of material culture and from 120

Subsistence

121

zooarchaeological studies of faunal remains (e.g., Emory et al. 1959; Reinman 1967; Kirch 1979; Butler 1988). Subsistence in the preceding Lapita period Ever since the distinctive Lapita ceramic style began to attract archaeological attention in the 1960s, a debate ensued over whether the Lapita horizon represented an ``oceanic strandlooper,'' non-horticultural mode of subsistence or a more typically oceanic mix of food production and wild resource extraction (Groube 1971; cf. Green 1979a). We will not revisit this debate, but comment on the currently accepted reconstruction of Lapita economy as background to our effort to understand Ancestral Polynesian systems. Archaeobotanical evidence from Far Western Lapita sites in the Mussau and Arawe Islands now backs up POC lexical reconstructions for an extensive range of crop plants (Kirch 1997a:203±12), indicating that, when Lapita populations expanded into Remote Oceania c. 3200 BP, they transported a full roster of oceanic crops, including such staples as taro, yam, bananas, and breadfruit. Indeed, the very ability to transfer such systems of horticultural production was arguably an essential aspect of the successful Lapita colonization strategy. Although the numbers of faunal remains of pig, dog, and chicken are typically low in Lapita sites, this essential triad of domestic animals was also a part of the Lapita colonists' baggage. That Lapita populations extensively exploited the reefs, lagoons, and open sea adjacent to their coastal settlements has never been in doubt, for Lapita sites typically constitute rich deposits of mollusks and ®shbones (Kirch 1997a:195±203). Inshore species such as parrot®sh, wrasses, surgeon®sh, jacks, and trigger®sh dominate these ®shbone assemblages, but deep-water benthic and pelagic taxa are also represented (such as groupers and tunas). The material culture of ®shing from Lapita sites includes varieties of onepiece angling hooks, typically of Trochus or Turbo shell, and one-piece trolling lures (Kirch 1997a: pl. 7.2, ®g. 7.1). Lapita colonists, especially in Remote Oceania, heavily exploited natural resources which were present in abundance prior to the arrival of humans. These included the rich shell®sh and ®sh resources of previously un®shed reefs and seas, but more notably, the diverse populations of resident landbirds and nesting seabirds. Zooarchaeological studies of avifaunal remains from early Lapita sites, including those in Tonga and Samoa (Steadman 1997), indicate that these islands supported large numbers of land- and seabirds, and that Lapita colonists extensively used these resources. However, these bird populations were fragile and subject to rapid depletion ± often leading to local extirpation or extinction ± within a few decades or centuries of human arrival on

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Remote Oceanic islands (Burley 1998). In the network of islands occupied by Ancestral Polynesians, such rich bird resources had been largely depleted by 2500 BP, the time frame of Ancestral Polynesia. While hunting birds continued to be a minor strategy within the Ancestral Polynesian economy (as documented below), it no longer had the quantitative importance of the preceding Early Eastern Lapita phase. Proto Polynesian crops Archaeobotanical evidence for crop plants from sites that we associate with Ancestral Polynesian communities (see Table 5.1) is limited. Carbonized coconut shell (endocarp) has been recovered from several sites, but no other paleoethnobotanical remains have been reported. Indirect archaeological evidence is likewise limited, although signi®cant. Aside from shell scrapers that may have been used to prepare vegetable foods for cooking (see Chapter 6), several sites have yielded hammerstones and/or anvil stones, interpreted on ethnographic analogy as nut-cracking tools (Green 1974a:269, 1974b:150; Kirch 1981; Sand 1993). Two such stones, with deliberately pecked ®nger grips, from the Tavai site (FU-11) on Futuna, are illustrated in Figure 5.1. Such scanty archaeological indications offer an admittedly thin basis on which to reconstruct Ancestral Polynesian horticulture; thus, we turn to the lexical evidence. POLLEX lists reconstructed PPN terms for at least twenty-seven species of cultivated/domesticated plants (Table 5.1). These include three species of aroids (Araceae), ®ve species of yams (Dioscorea spp.), two major kinds of bananas (Eumusa and Australimusa), breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis), and a wide range of other tuber, fruit, nut, ®ber, medicinal, narcotic, and economically useful plants. Two points must be stressed: (1) all of these plants have no wild relatives or ancestors within the Polynesian region, and are thus adventive, having been transported there by humans (Yen 1971, 1973); and, (2) the denotata for the cognates in daughter Polynesian languages agree in virtually all cases with the speci®c botanical identi®cations given in Table 5.1. This set of crop terms is thus an extremely robust case of prime semantic agreement (see Chapter 2); elaborate semantic histories are not required. All of these taxa were transported by humans into the Polynesian homeland, and the robust reconstruction of their etyma to the PPN level leaves no doubt that they were a part of the Ancestral Polynesian plant world. Nonetheless, a few terms in Table 5.1 bear further discussion. One of these is the doublet set *mei/*kulu for breadfruit, a matter that has attracted attention with respect to possible origins of this major Polynesian tree crop (Langdon 1989; Marck n.d.). Both terms are robust PPN reconstructions, but their precise meanings are uncertain. According to Marck (n.d.), it is

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Table 5.1. Proto Polynesian crops Crop type name/gloss Staple starch Taro, Colocasia esculenta Giant taro, Alocasia macrorrhiza Swamp taro, Cyrtosperma chamissonis Greater yam, Dioscorea alata Yam variety (prob. D. alata) Lesser yam, Dioscorea esculenta Banana (Section Eumusa) Breadfruit, Artocarpus altilis Fruits, nuts Coconut, Cocos nucifera Tahitian chestnut, Inocarpus fagiferus Vi apple, Spondias dulcis Malay apple, Syzygium malaccensis Pommetia pinnata Indian almond, Terminalia catappa Minor food crops Sugarcane, Saccharum of®cinarum Cordyline fruticosum Turmeric, Curcuma longa Pueraria lobata Thorned-stem yam, Dioscorea nummularia Five-®ngered yam, Dioscorea pentaphylla Bitter yam, Dioscorea bulbifera Sago, Metroxylon spp. (thatch ?) Banana (Section Australimusa) Polynesian arrowroot, Tacca leontopetaloides Medicinal, narcotic, other uses Kava, piper methysticum Morinda citrifolia Broussonetia papyrifera Pandanus spp.

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*talo(s) *piRaq *(m)bulaka *qupi

*talo *kape *pulaka *qu® *kasokaso *qu®-lei *futi *kulu *mei

28 22 15 29 6 5 21 20 13

3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

*niuR *qipil *quRis *kapika *tawan *talise

*niu *i® *wii *ka®ka *tawa *talie

29 19 16 19 14 16

3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3

*topu *jiRi *laqia

*too *tii *ango *aka *palai

13 23 10 10 10

3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3

*pilita

8

3

3

*soi *qato

15 23

3 3

3

*pudi *kuluR

*Rabia, *qatop *joRaga

*kawa *nonum *padran

*soaka *maasoaqa

*kawa *nonu *siapo *fara

3 3 3 3

4 8

24 25 11 30

P2

3

3 3

3 3 3 3

PSA

3 3

3 3 3

POC reconstructions primarily from Ross (1996a). PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Fig. 5.1

Cobbles with ®nger-grips from site FU-11, Futuna, interpreted as hammers for opening hard-shelled nuts, such as Canarium (after Kirch 1975: ®g. 26).

unlikely that this pair of terms indicated `tree' and `fruit' respectively, or that they referred to particular varieties. We think, however, that *kulu was the generic term.1 Another vexing word is PPN *qato, whose reconstruction depends upon a small set of cognates con®ned to seven Polynesian languages and a number of extra-Polynesian witnesses (Dutton 1994:113±14). POLLEX gives the PPN gloss as `thatch,' and the PNP gloss as `sago palm.' Dutton's larger data set, however, indicates that the various glosses in Oceanic languages, while often referring to thatch, also have `sago (Metroxylon spp.)' as a primary referent. The large leaves of Metroxylon palms are widely used throughout Melanesia for thatching. For Ancestral Polynesia, the issue is complicated because Tonga±Samoa represents the easternmost limits of the natural distribution of Metroxylon palms in the Paci®c (Barrau 1959; Yen 1973:82; Kirch 1994a:90±91). A semantic history hypothesis is required. We propose that the PPN term *qato referred both to thatch and to the sago palm whose leaves had been used as the primary thatching material by the Lapita peoples.2

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125

Further scrutinizing Table 5.1, we can infer some core aspects of Ancestral Polynesian horticulture. First, the major ®eld crops dominating ethnographically attested Polynesian cultivation systems were all present, including the two prime starch-staples, taro (Colocasia esculenta) and the greater yam (Dioscorea alata). The sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) is conspicuously absent, because it almost certainly was introduced from South America into Eastern Polynesia at a later time (Yen 1974; Hather and Kirch 1991). Aside from taro and yam, other important ®eld crops include the giant taro (Alocasia macrorrhiza), and the Eumusa hybrid bananas. Equally notable are the fruitand nut-yielding tree crops. These include breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis) ± later to become a fundamental staple in the subsistence economies of some Eastern Polynesian archipelagos (e.g., Marquesas, Society Islands) ± as well as coconut (Cocos nucifera), Tahitian chestnut (Inocarpus fagiferus), vi apple (Spondias dulcis), Indian almond (Canarium indicum), and others. These tree crops put Ancestral Polynesian horticulture squarely in line with a widespread Oceanic pattern of arboriculture, which both Yen (1990, 1991) and Kirch (1997) have argued was a component of early Lapita (and, in Near Oceania, probably pre-Lapita) subsistence systems. Noteworthy also are the psychoactive plant Piper methysticum, the medicinally important Morinda citrifolia, and the paper mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera) which yielded bark essential for bark cloth (see Chapter 7). Another plant of interest is turmeric, Curcuma longa, which through a complex process of processing and extraction from its tuber yields both an orange-colored foodstuff and a bright orangered dye (*renga). The dye has widespread ritual signi®cance in Polynesian societies; we discuss its possible importance in Ancestral Polynesian societies in Chapter 9. PPN crop plant words include those for several taxa that while adventive ± and therefore doubtless purposefully introduced into the Polynesian homeland ± were rarely if ever cultivated in historic times, according to ethnohistoric and ethnographic sources. These include the vining tuber plant Pueraria lobata (a New Guinea domesticate), and the minor yam species Dioscorea pentaphylla and D. bulbifera. Barrau (1965b) listed these in his enumeration of ``witnesses of the past,'' hypothetical components of former Oceanic cultivation systems. As Kirch observes for Futuna (1994a:100±1), these plants are ubiquitous in second growth, suggesting once more extensive planting by humans. Also occurring with Pueraria and the Dioscorea yams in second-growth vegetation are the Polynesian arrowroot (Tacca leontopetaloides), and the ti or ki (Cordyline fruticosum) (ethnographically these two are also known to have been planted). The reconstruction of the proto-lexemes for these plants certainly does not tell us all there is to know regarding their role in the Ancestral Polynesian cultivation systems of two and one-half millennia ago. In the case of these

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

``witnesses of the past,'' systemic ethnobotanical patterns of distribution provide the basis for a hypothesis that these plants ± even though in historic times con®ned to a peripheral role in Polynesian food production systems (as essentially wild, famine foods) ± once occupied more important positions as minor cultigens. This hypothesis may be directly tested as archaeobotanical methods for studying ancient cropping systems are further developed in the Paci®c. Ancestral Polynesian horticulture The lexical reconstruction of PPN crop plant names provides only a ®rst step, for an agricultural system consists of far more than the biotic basis of cultivation. Table 5.2 presents sixteen PPN terms associated with horticultural practices, and their probable meanings. For some of these terms, semantic reconstruction is unproblematic. Such a case of prime semantic agreement is PPN *maqala, which we gloss as `garden, cultivated ®eld, or swidden.' Every one of the thirteen modern witnesses of this term listed in POLLEX carries a gloss indicating `garden' or `cultivation,' leaving little doubt that this was also the semantic value of the PPN word. The case for PPN *talu is less clear-cut, because glosses for cognates range from `weeds that have been cut and laid on the ground' (RAR) to `land out of cultivation' (NIU). Given that the meaning `weeds' is at the core of most glosses, we suggest that the PPN term referred to `weedy growth' or `fallow land,' and as contrasted with cultivated land (*maqala). This interpretation is bolstered by the higher-level semantic reconstructions of PMP *talun and POC *talu(n) as `fallow land' (Osmond 1998:118). The term *mahuku is widely attested in Polynesian languages, often glossed as `grass' or `sedge.' However, in several Polynesian languages there is also a common reference to grass that either grows in a swidden plot, or is used for mulch. Thus for *mahuku, our hypothesis is that the PPN term had a semantic extension indicating the use of grasses for mulch on ®eld crops such as taro and yam. A ®nal word referring to plantings is *qulu, which indicated a grove of trees. That this term did not simply refer to `forest' is suggested by the contrasting term *wao, referring to `primary or climax forest,' uncleared by humans. Given the presence of several species of tree crops in Ancestral Polynesia (e.g., breadfruit, coconut, Tahitian Chestnut, and others), *qulu presumably referred at least in part to planted stands of economic trees. Table 5.2 also lists words relating to horticultural activities such as planting and weeding. Comparative ethnography reveals that some form of dibble stick (sometimes incorrectly referred to as a ``digging'' stick) was the main agricultural implement throughout Polynesia (e.g., Handy 1940; Kirch 1994a:116, 143±44). Not surprisingly, this wooden artifact is attested by a

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127

Table 5.2. Proto Polynesian terms associated with horticulture Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) Garden/land Garden, cultivated ®eld, swidden Fallow land, weeds Forest, land never cultivated Grove of trees Grass (mulch, overgrown swidden) Gardening activities Propagation material for root crops (seed yam, taro) Mound of earth (for yam, tuber planting) Cultivate soil with a digging stick Dig Digging stick To weed, clear land of weeds To weed Turn over, lever up, as soil with stick when weeding Harvesting Crop, especially of breadfruit To harvest To gather or pick (especially fruit)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*maqala *talun *wawo

*maqala *talu *wao *qulu *mahuku

12 15 26 15 24

3 3 3 3 3

*(m)pula(m)pula *(m)puki

*pulapula

18

3

*puke

19

3

*langa *keli *koso *qau-talu *wele *sua

5 31 19 6 16

*fuata *utu *toli

6 7 15

*koso

*sual

P2

PSA 3 3 3 3

3 3

3 3

3 3 3

3

3

3 3

3 3

3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

robust reconstruction of PPN *koso. A term for `dig' is also known (*keli ), although this may have referred to digging in general, not con®ned solely to agricultural practices.3 Another term, *langa, is more weakly attested with re¯exes in ®ve languages (TON and four NP languages), and seems to have indexed the breaking up of soil for gardening, using a dibble stick. As Yen (1973) observed, a key aspect of Oceanic agricultural systems is vegetative propagation. Thus we have PPN *pulapula, with a robust meaning of `seed yams, seedling propagation material.' Another term, *puke, clearly has a semantic base referent of `small earth mound,' and the speci®c

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

reference to yam planting mounds in several Polynesian cognates makes for a likely semantic history that the PPN term referred to loosened heaps of earth for the insertion of seed yams, *pulapula. This correlates well with the lunar calendar and its articulation with a seasonal sequence of yam planting, and the making of mounds in which to plant yams (*fakaafu), discussed further in Chapter 9. In swidden cultivation systems, weeding is a critical and labor-consuming activity; not surprisingly then, for PPN we have three words referring to such activity. *Qau-talu is an interesting compound term, incorporating *talu, which we earlier noted referred to weeds, and probably to `fallow land' as well; *qau-talu seems to have meant `to weed' or `weeding.' There is also the robustly attested word *wele, which POLLEX glosses as `weed, clear away scrub, weeds.'4 The third term is PPN *sua, with roots in POC. The consistent meaning here is the action of turning over or levering up, but there is a regularly recurring connotation of gardening and weeding action as well (as in TON huo, `clear of weeds,' or TIK suua, `clear away brush wood, weeds'). Finally, a few PPN terms relate to the harvest of crops. A term for the crop itself, which may have referred primarily (or perhaps exclusively) to breadfruit, is *fuata. *Utu likely referred to the action of harvesting root crops, especially taro and yams, as these are the meanings of its cognates. In contrast, *toli has a probable reconstructed gloss of `pick, pluck, or gather,' as in the case of tree crops, and a forked-pole device for plucking fruit is reconstructed as PPN *lohu. The PPN reconstructions given in Tables 5.1 and 5.2 thus greatly extend our picture of Ancestral Polynesian horticulture. What comes through is nothing less than a succinct encapsulation of two of the most prevalent subsystems of Oceanic horticulture: shifting cultivation and arboriculture (Barrau 1965a, 1965b; Yen 1973). Is there any direct archaeological evidence to support (or, to contradict) this interpretation of Ancestral Polynesian horticulture? Unfortunately, neither shifting cultivation nor arboriculture would be expected to leave the sorts of material traces ± such as permanent ®eld boundaries or terraces ± associated with more intensive forms of cultivation. And we have no hint in the lexical reconstructions of any horticultural tools that might survive in normal archaeological contexts. Shifting cultivation, however, may result in alterations to a landscape, especially in steep volcanic terrain where the removal of forest cover accelerates erosion and leads to deposition of colluvium or alluvium in valley bottoms. In Futuna, there is evidence from both the Tavai and Asipani sites for substantial slope erosion and valley deposition (with sediments incorporating charcoal, indicating burning) early in the ®rst millennium AD (Kirch 1994a:219±26). On Tutuila, cultivation of hillslopes in the Aoa Valley led to a similar sequence

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129

of alluvial deposition between about 3000 and 2000 BP (Clark 1996:448±49; Clark and Michlovic 1996). While some prehistorians might consider this weak evidence (e.g., Leach 1999), it is consistent with our interpretation based on the linguistic data. A ®nal aspect of Ancestral Polynesian food production is animal husbandry, intimately integrated with agricultural systems throughout Oceania (Yen 1973). The classic Oceanic triad of domestic animals ± pig, dog, and chicken (jungle fowl) ± are all well attested for PPN with lexical reconstructions of *puaka, *kulii, and *moa, respectively. What linguistics cannot tell us, however, is the relative importance of these animals in Ancestral Polynesian economies, and here archaeology comes to the rescue. Bones of all three animals are present in at least some Ancestral Polynesian sites. Pig bones and teeth have been excavated at such sites as Falemoa and Potusa in Samoa, NT-93 and ±100 on Niuatoputapu, and To.6 on Tongatapu. Dog bones are less well represented, but based on their presence in NT-90 dogs were probably present. Chicken bones were particularly well represented at the To`aga site on Ofu Island (Nagaoka 1993: table 13.20; Steadman 1993b), as well as in the Niuatoputapu and Tongatapu sites. However, the relatively small numbers of pig bones from Ancestral Polynesian sites (in contrast, for example, to their presence in some later Polynesian sites) suggest that pork was not a commonly consumed food at this early time period. Thus, archaeological evidence quali®es and constrains the range of potential interpretations of the lexical evidence: while the Ancestral Polynesians were familiar with pigs, dogs, and chickens, these were all minor aspects of diet, far less important quantitatively than marine foods. What about variability in Ancestral Polynesian horticultural and food production systems? As noted in Chapter 3, there was never a single, uni®ed Ancestral Polynesian society; rather, we envision a network of related communities dispersed over several islands and archipelagos. Given linguistic evidence for dialectical variation within PPN (Pawley 1996a), we anticipate similar variation in other aspects of culture and behavior, including horticulture. But hard evidence for variation can be dif®cult to obtain, and at this time we can only point to some possibilities. On the larger volcanic high islands such as Futuna, `Uvea, and Samoa, we would predict that Ancestral Polynesian horticulture emphasized shifting cultivation, given ample forested land and rich volcanic soils. In contrast, on the small coral islands of the Tongan group (as in Ha`apai) the possibilities for ®eld cultivation were more restricted. There, arboriculture (especially of breadfruit) was more likely to have been essential to the establishment and maintenance of permanent communities. These are only conjectures, but we raise them to make explicit our contention that signi®cant variability must have operated even within the overall systemic economic pattern of

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Ancestral Polynesia. Testing these propositions will challenge future archaeologists. The question of irrigation and intensi®cation Those familiar with Polynesian ethnobotany may wonder why we have made no reference to irrigation, or to water control technology, as part of Ancestral Polynesian food production; certainly, irrigation and/or drainage systems are widespread in contact-period Polynesian societies (see Kirch 1984a:168±76, table 19). Indeed, some scholars have argued that irrigation technology was a part of an ancient set of agricultural practices diffused from Southeast Asia by the Austronesian-speaking peoples (e.g., Spencer and Hale 1961; Spriggs 1982, 1990). If their hypothesis is correct, irrigation should also have been a part of Ancestral Polynesian food production. This question was taken up by Kirch and Lepofsky (1993), who reviewed both archaeological and historical linguistic evidence for irrigation in Polynesia, and to a limited extent elsewhere in tropical Oceania. They found that archaeological evidence for terracing, canals, or other forms of water control in several Polynesian islands and archipelagos (Futuna, Samoa, Hawai`i, Society Islands, Marquesas, and Mangaia) consistently points to the local elaboration of such systems during the later time periods of island sequences. In Futuna, for example, irrigation systems (which now dominate the agricultural landscape in Sigave District) ``did not become a major part of the agricultural landscape until about the middle of the ®rst millennium AD,'' 1,500 years after initial human settlement (Kirch and Lepofsky 1993:187). In the Hawaiian Islands, despite limited (and contested) evidence for some early water control, extensive archaeological evidence con®rms that large-scale canal-fed, pond®eld irrigation began to develop during the Expansion Period (after AD 1100) and continued on into the early historic period (Kirch and Sahlins 1992, vol. 2). Similar scenarios obtain in other island groups. The historical linguistic evidence is also compelling. Unlike the case for shifting cultivation and arboriculture, for which there are many well-attested lexical reconstructions not only in PPN but also extending back at least to POC, there are no such terms for irrigation.5 Rather, we have two discrete geographic sets of irrigation terms, one centered in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region, and one in Eastern Polynesia. To quote Kirch and Lepofsky: Only after the breakup of PPN do we have evidence for the innovation of terms for `pond®eld' or `wet taro ®eld,' a possible Proto-Samoic-Outlier term *fusi in the western Polynesian region, and a Proto-Marquesan term *roki in eastern Polynesia. Such a pattern is consonant with a hypothesis of the independent innovation or

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131

development of complex pond®eld irrigation or raised-bed cultivation in these two regions. (1993:196)6

Thus both archaeological and historical linguistic evidence militates against the hypothesis that the Ancestral Polynesian cultivators practiced intensive forms of water control for taro cultivation, although we strongly suspect that they may well have manipulated swampy environments (by means of drainage) for taro planting. This is consistent with our view that landesque capital 7 intensive forms of agricultural production tend to arise in tandem with the growth of large, dense populations, and in conjunction with various sociopolitical spurs to surplus production, such as competition between chie¯y lines (Kirch 1994a). In the small-scale communities that we infer for Ancestral Polynesia, where sociopolitical structures were heterarchical rather than hierarchical (see Chapter 8), such forms of intensi®cation would be problematic. To aver that the Ancestral Polynesian horticulturalists did not practice landesque capital forms of water control, does not mean that they were ignorant of such basic ethnobiological knowledge as the propensity of Colocasia esculenta to thrive in hydromorphic soils. Yen (1973:70) argued that such basic concepts are ancient, and the Ancestral Polynesians would presumably have made use of natural swampy environments when these were present, and at times even modi®ed these through drainage. But the development of large-scale terracing, canal networks, and the like were technological elaborations that would accompany much later stages in the transformation of Polynesian societies. Fishing and hunting: the archaeological evidence The triangulation method need not privilege any particular line of evidence. In the case of Ancestral Polynesian horticulture, we emphasized the PPN lexical evidence, using comparative ethnobotany to inform our speci®c semantic histories. Turning to marine exploitation (®shing, littoral gathering) and hunting ± that is, food extraction rather than production ± we ®nd substantial archaeological evidence in the form of material culture and faunal remains. We therefore commence with these archaeological data, turning thereafter to relevant ethnoarchaeological and comparative ethnographic evidence for Polynesian ®shing strategies, and only last to the linguistic evidence as an independent means of cross-checking our interpretations. All archaeological sites ascribable to the Ancestral Polynesian phase consist of ``open'' sites (see Table 3.2). The coastal middens typically have calcareous sediments with excellent preservation of stone, bone, and shell, but little preservation of vegetative materials unless these were thoroughly carbonized. However, even a cursory perusal of the Polynesian ethnographic

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

literature reveals that the majority of material culture items associated with ®shing and hunting were manufactured from wood, ®ber, string, rope, and other highly perishable materials (see Chapter 7). Only a few items, such as angling hooks made from shell or bone, or harpoon heads, would be expected to survive for two millennia or more in open sites in tropical Polynesia. In the Ancestral Polynesian archaeological record, we have been dealt a rather poor hand. One-piece ®shhooks made of shell are hardly ubiquitous, but they have been recovered from several Ancestral Polynesian sites, in numbers suf®cient to demonstrate that angling hooks were a regular component of ®shing technology. The largest and best-documented assemblage comes from To`aga, on Ofu Island (American Samoa), with twenty-eight whole or fragmentary hooks (Kirch 1993b:160±62), as well as additional prepared tabs and manufacture debris. Made from Turbo setosus shell, they are largely of the ``rotating'' variety, with some variation in shank and head form (Figure 5.2). More rarely, as at Niuatoputapu (site NT-100; Kirch 1988:204, ®g. 124c), small one-piece hooks were made from pearl shell (Pinctada sp.). Tools for making hooks, including Acropora branch coral ®les, Porites coral abraders, and sea-urchin spine ®les (made from the spines of Heterocentrotus mammillatus) are also known from To`aga and several other Ancestral Polynesian sites (see Chapter 7). Far less conclusive is archaeological evidence for other kinds of ®shing technology, such as trolling or netting. Janetski (1980a: ®g. 43, r) reports a possible trolling-lure preform made of Conus shell from the Potusa site in Samoa. Direct evidence of netting is also elusive, as nets were made of perishable line and wooden ¯oats, with heavy weights as the only materials likely to survive in archaeological contexts. Some double-perforated Cypraea shells illustrated by Janetski (1980a: ®g. 44) from the Potusa site may have functioned as net weights.8 From his Tongatapu sites, Poulsen (1987:190, table 87) reports numerous ``net sinkers'' of Anadara shell, and a single stone net sinker from site To.6 (1987: pl. 77.10).9 From Niuatoputapu, Kirch (1988:204±5) describes large Turbo shells with a perforation in the body whorl, which could have functioned as net weights. A ®nal category of archaeologically attested ®shing gear is the compound octopus lure, which from ethnographic examples combined a stone weight with ``caps'' of Cypraea-shell dorsa, all lashed to a wooden or ®ber shaft, and lowered to the ocean ¯oor with a line (Hiroa 1930). Such prepared Cypraeashell caps have been found at Ancestral Polynesian sites, including those on Tongatapu (Poulsen 1987:188±89, table 87, pl. 67.6), the To`aga site (Kirch 1993b:162), and the Falemoa and Potusa sites ( Janetski 1980a). The ``coffee bean'' shape of stone sinker (lacking a groove) is evidenced at the Va-1 site in Samoa (Green 1969:134±35).

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Fig. 5.2

133

Turbo shell ®shhooks from the To`aga site (after Kirch 1993b: ®g. 11.2).

In sum, direct archaeological evidence con®rms the presence of small, one-piece angling ®shhooks made of Turbo setosus and (more rarely) of pearl shell, but is more tentative for trolling hooks, nets, and the octopus-lure rig. Not only are sample sizes small, but some archaeological objects may have had more than one function. With this in view, we turn to the zooarchaeological evidence. Ancestral Polynesian vertebrate faunal assemblages are dominated by ®shbones.10 At To`aga, for example, ®shbones constitute 94 percent of the total vertebrate fauna. Marine turtle (Chelonia mydas) bones are also well represented, but marine mammals (typically porpoise) are rare. Fishbones typically are dominated by a suite of inshore or reef-dwelling taxa, especially in the families Scaridae, Lethrinidae, Serranidae, Acanthuridae, Lutjanidae,

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Holocentridae, and Diodontidae. Shark teeth and the distinctive vertebrae of elasmobranchs (sharks and rays) occur in small numbers. Pelagic ®sh, usually caught by trolling, are extremely rare in the analyzed assemblages, although Scombridae bones were present at To`aga and Niuatoputapu. These ®shbone assemblages tell us that Ancestral Polynesian ®shermen targeted a range of inshore microhabitats including fringing reefs, lagoons, and the immediate over-reef benthic habitat, but ventured out to the open sea more rarely. These faunal assemblages leave no doubt that Ancestral Polynesians extensively harvested the invertebrate resources of reef and lagoon, independently con®rming a deep knowledge of such marine life suggested by the many lexical reconstructions for shell®sh (Pawley 1997; see Chapter 4). Coastal middens with good preservation are all marked by high densities of gastropod and bivalve mollusks. On Niuatoputapu, molluskan shells in sites NT-93 and 100 averaged 4.76 and 8.32 kilograms of shell per cubic meter of deposit (Kirch 1988: table 45), while at To`aga more than 168 kilograms of shell midden were recovered from thirty 1-meter test units. Among the commonly gathered taxa were trochids, Tridacna clams, cones, cowries, muricids, and nerites. Sea-urchins are also well represented in these Ancestral Polynesian middens. Faunal evidence for gathering or hunting non-marine food resources is more limited. Birds, the principal category of terrestrial vertebrates naturally occurring on Oceanic islands, not surprisingly dominate the non-marine faunal assemblages. However, most island sequences show a major decline in the taking of resident landbirds and nesting seabirds from the earliest Lapita colonization phase to the later Ancestral Polynesian period (Steadman 1989, 1997). Yet wild birds do occur regularly in Ancestral Polynesian sites. At To`aga, some seabirds (e.g., Puf®nus spp., Pterodroma spp.) are represented, along with a few landbirds (Steadman 1993b). A similar picture obtains for Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:221). Other wild food resources include indigenous fruit bats (Pteropus spp.), and an iguanid lizard (Brachylophus sp.), both of which occur rarely in Ancestral Polynesian sites. The lizard, it would appear, had been hunted to extinction by the end of the Ancestral Polynesian period.11 In short, direct archaeological evidence indicates that Ancestral Polynesian communities fully exploited the invertebrate and vertebrate resources of the littoral and inshore zones, including ®shes, marine turtles, sharks and rays, mollusks, and sea-urchins. The rare appearance of mackerel or tuna bones (Scombridae) suggests that while Ancestral Polynesians knew how to capture pelagic ®sh, they rarely did so, preferring to concentrate on the more abundant and readily obtainable inshore ®shes such as parrot®sh, jacks, tangs, squirrel®sh, groupers, and the like. They hunted fruit bats and

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birds (primarily seabirds), but the contribution of these wild, terrestrial foods to their diet was relatively minor (unlike in the immediately preceding Lapita period, prior to the extirpation or extinction of many species). As to the material technology of ®shing and hunting, the archaeological evidence is more restricted, with angling hooks as the only ®rmly documented artifact class. Nets, trolling gear, and the octopus rig are more problematically indicated. Polynesian ®shing and hunting: comparative ethnography and ethnoarchaeology Despite a long tradition of detailed technical studies of Polynesian material culture used for ®shing (e.g., Beasley 1928; Hiroa 1930; Anell 1955), there have been few studies of actual ®shing practices within a traditional ethnographic context, yet such studies are essential for linking material culture with behavioral practices. As a part of their ®eld research on Niuatoputapu in 1976, Kirch and Dye (1979; Dye 1983) carried out an ethnoarchaeological study of ®shing, drawing several important implications for prehistoric Polynesian ®shing: (1) the reef ¯at and reef edge are by far the most intensively exploited microhabitats; (2) a mere thirty ®sh taxa ± all reef ®sh ± dominate the catches; (3) ``the greatest elaboration of ®shing methods occurs in the use of nets and hooks;'' and (4) the two most important methods, in terms of numbers of ®sh taken, are seine-netting and nightspearing with torch (Kirch and Dye 1979:66±68). They noted that of ®sh taxa represented in Niuatoputapu archaeological sites, only two (Caranx and Lutjanus) are regularly taken by angling (Kirch and Dye 1979: table 9). All other taxa are caught using nets or spears, or by poisoning. Kirch and Dye concluded that the range of ®sh represented in the Niuatoputapu middens must have been caught using a range of ®shing strategies as diversi®ed as those of the contemporary Niuan ®shermen, and certainly including some kinds of netting, spearing, and poisoning techniques. Based on this ethnoarchaeological study, they argued that angling ± represented by the onepiece ®shhooks recovered archaeologically ± was a relatively minor ®shing method. This inference would apply equally to other Ancestral Polynesian sites, based on the range of ®sh species indicated by the faunal remains. The comparative ethnography of Polynesian ®shing gear and ®shing strategies reinforces this conclusion. A wide range of angling, trolling, netting, spearing, trapping, and poisoning and other methods and associated equipment are documented for virtually every Polynesian society. We will draw attention to a few examples. In Table 5.3 we plot the distribution of several kinds of ®shing methods across a representative range of societies situated within the tropical core of Polynesia. The widespread distribution of

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 5.3. Distribution of ®shing methods in tropical Polynesia Fishing strategy

Southern Tonga Samoa Futuna Cooks Pukapuka

Groping X Shark noosing Spearing X CoconutX frond sweeps Torch ®shing X Octopus lure Poisoning X Walled weirs Woven traps X Dip nets X Scoop nets X Casting nets ? Seine nets X Flying-®sh ? nets One-piece X angling hooks Trolling lure X hooks

Tahiti Tuamotu Mangareva

X X

X

X

X X

X

?

X X

X

X X

X X

X X

X X

X X

X X X X X X X X X

X

X

X

X X X X X

X

X

X X

X X X

X

X X

X X X

X

X

X X

X X

X X X X

X X X

X X

?

X X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

Ethnographic sources: Tonga (Niuatoputapu, Dye 1983); Samoa (Hiroa 1930); Futuna (Burrows 1936); Southern Cooks (Hiroa 1944); Pukapuka (Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1938); Tahiti (Handy 1932); Tuamotu (Emory 1975); Mangareva (Hiroa 1938).

many of the techniques listed in Table 5.3, such as groping, spearing, poisoning, torch ®shing, the use of coconut-leaf sweeps, stone-walled weirs, seine nets, angling, and trolling, offers compelling evidence that these methods are not independent adaptations, but rather are shared retentions of an ancestral set of ®shing strategies. This conclusion is reinforced by detailed comparisons of the ®shing gear itself (as made for example by Hiroa [1930, 1944] in his classic material culture studies), which display common technical features. A few methods with more spotty distributions may also be shared retentions (such as some form of octopus lure ®shing), although in these cases the possibility of independent invention becomes stronger. Comparative ethnographic evidence for Polynesian hunting indicates that this was focused largely on birds and fruit bats, although Burrows (1936:145) describes the taking of large coconut robber crabs (Birgus latro) on Alo®

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Island. The Beagleholes described a range of methods for catching birds on Pukapuka (1938:73±76), including netting, hand catching, striking, use of a lure (for tropic birds), noosing and snaring, lime catching, and use of a fowling line; similar methods are documented for many other Polynesian societies. Steadman (1997) reviews the Polynesian ethnographic literature pertaining to birds, including hunting methods, and the various uses to which captured birds were put (for food, feathers, bones, as pets). These comparative ethnographic data make it clear that the exploitation of birds is also a basic component of Polynesian subsistence, thus amplifying our archaeological data of birdbones in Ancestral Polynesian sites. Applying our methods of triangulation, comparative ethnography and ethnoarchaeology have allowed us to modify and elaborate the narrow archaeological reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian ®shing and hunting. The wide range of inshore ®sh species represented in the prehistoric middens must have been taken not only by angling, but by a much broader range of ®shing strategies. Despite slim direct archaeological evidence for netting or other techniques, such methods clearly were a part of the Ancestral Polynesian ®shing repertoire. Angling was practiced, and we know that simple one-piece hooks were made primarily from Turbo shell. But nets (seine and other types), traps, sweeps, spears, torches, and other apparatus made from perishable materials must have been familiar sights in Ancestral Polynesian communities, given the broad distributions for these items across the later societies of tropical Polynesia. With such hypotheses and reconstructions independently generated by archaeology and comparative ethnography, we turn lastly to the historical linguistic evidence. Fishing strategies: the lexical evidence Table 5.4 lists twenty-six PPN lexical reconstructions and their probable glosses, all related to ®shing or associated activities and knowledge. The ®rst subset relates to ®shing strategies, as these would have been known to a *tautahi, or `sea master.' The glosses in eight Polynesian languages for re¯exes of this PPN word favor a reconstructed meaning of `master ®sherman,' but expertise in handling canoes is also indicated (Pawley and Pawley 1994). Of course, the two kinds of expertise logically go together. A term re¯ected in almost every Polynesian language, and which can also be reconstructed back to POC, is *faangota, `to gather seafood on the reef ' (see Clark 1991). Semantic agreements for re¯exes of *faangota are close, making this a case of prime semantic agreement. Another is PPN *sii, `to ®sh with a line.' The PPN word *tili requires a semantic history hypothesis, for its modern witnesses carry meanings that, while frequently referring to the throwing or casting of a hand net, also may simply mean `to throw' or `cast.' Eight out of

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Table 5.4. Proto Polynesian terms associated with marine exploitation Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

Fishing strategies Expert in seafaring and associated skills; master ®sherman To obtain seafood by ®shing or *pa9oda hunting on the reef To ®sh with a line To cast, throw, ®sh with a casting net To ®sh at night with torches; torch *damaR To catch ®sh by use of poison To encircle, surround (as in ®shing) Fishing equipment Fishhook (angling) Trolling lure, trolling ®shhook Fishing rod Cord, especially ®shing line Shrub (Pipturus sp.) used to manufacture cord Spear Fish trap Fishing basket Nets and netting Net (generic term) Mesh of net Float of a net Float of a ®shing net Netting needle or shuttle Net gauge Kind of hand net Kind of net made from coconut fronds Fish poison plants Shrub (Tephrosia purpurea) used for ®sh poison Creeper used to poison ®sh Coastal tree (Barringtonia asiatica) yielding ®sh poison

*paya *apon *sao

*kupega *mata *qutong *sika

*putu

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

P2

PSA

3

3

*tau-tahi

8

*faangota

23

3

3

*sii *tili *rama *qau-kawa *liko

22 18 29 4 8

3 3 3

3

3

*mataqu *paa *ma-tila *afo *qolongaa

17 19 10 21 10

3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3

*tao *fanga *qora

24 7 5

3 3 3

3

*kupenga *mata *uto *futa *sika *qafa *tili *rau

25 17 15 2 21 6 5 14

3 3 3

3

*kawa-susu

8

3

3

*kawa-sasa *futu

4 22

3

3 3

3

3

3

3

3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

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the nineteen recorded witnesses have some reference to ®shing, and these are widely dispersed geographically. It seems more parsimonious that the semantic reference to ®shing has been lost in the other cases, rather than to posit an unlikely conversion of a general term `to throw' on the speci®c action of throw-netting. We thus concur with POLLEX in the reconstruction of the PPN meaning of *tili as `cast, throw, ®sh with a casting net.' One of the most remarkable scenes in traditional Polynesia is night-time ®shing on the reef or sea beyond the reef edge with the use of coconut-frond torches. Practiced on moonless nights, these torches attract certain ®sh, especially ¯ying ®sh (Exocoetidae). Comparative ethnographic data suggest that this widespread method is also ancient, con®rmed by the robust reconstruction of the PPN term *rama, `®sh at night with torch (typically of coconut fronds).' The word is re¯ected in no less than twenty-nine Polynesian languages ranging from Tonga east to Easter Island. Also widespread in Polynesia is the practice of poisoning or stupefying ®sh with various plant materials (e.g., Barringtonia fruit or the roots of Tephrosia) and ± we would infer ± this was an ancient method of ®shing. Surprisingly, a PPN term for the generic action of ®sh poisoning (*qau-kawa) is only weakly attested on the basis of witnesses in four languages. However, given that these range from Tonga to Hawai`i in remote Eastern Polynesia, the reconstruction is probably sound (invoking Marck's second principle, see Chapter 3). More widely attested words for ®sh-poison plants (*kawa-susu, referring to Tephrosia purpurea; *kawa-sasa, possibly also Tephrosia) reinforce this interpretation of poisoning as a lexically indexed Ancestral Polynesian ®shing strategy. The PPN term for the coastal Barringtonia asiatica tree (*futu), whose fruit and roots are widely used to produce ®sh poison, is a case of prime semantic agreement. One last possible PPN ®shing term is *liko, which POLLEX glosses as `encircle, surround.' While the generic action of encircling is the dominant meaning in the eight languages in which this term is re¯ected, there are three cases with a speci®c reference to ®shing (TIK, TON, and TUA). We therefore propose a semantic history hypothesis that PPN *liko had at least a secondary meaning of `surround ®shing,' as in certain kinds of netting, or in the use of coconut-leaf sweeps (see further discussion below). Another subset of PPN terms refers to ®shing gear and apparatus. The ®rst of these is *mataqu, `®shhook,' re¯ected in seventeen languages. While glossed everywhere as `®shhook,' the ethnographic literature suggests that the word referred speci®cally to one-piece angling hooks (whether of shell, bone, or wood).12 This is reinforced by the contrasting term *paa, `trolling hook, lure.' Thus the Ancestral Polynesians had distinct terms for two functionally different sorts of ®shhooks: those for angling, and for open-sea trolling.

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

PPN *paa (a retention from POC) deserves further consideration; what kind of trolling lure was used by Ancestral Polynesian ®shermen? Zooarchaeological evidence supports the occasional taking of mackerel and tuna ®sh (Scombridae), but only a single possible lure shank (of Conus shell) has been recovered archaeologically from an Ancestral Polynesian site. However, excavations in older Lapita sites in Mussau, Tikopia, and the Reef/Santa Cruz Islands have yielded a kind of one-piece trolling hook manufactured from Trochus shell (see illustrations in Kirch and Yen 1982: ®g. 97; Kirch 1997: ®g. 7.1). We suggest that POC *paa referred to such a Trochus-shell trolling rig, in which the point was an integral part of the one-piece hook. The complication arises in that trolling hooks from post-Ancestral Polynesian archaeological contexts in Eastern Polynesia, and as known ethnographically from throughout Polynesia, typically have a separate shank of pearl shell, and a point made of bone, turtle shell, pearl shell or other material which is lashed to the shank (e.g., illustrations in Beasley 1928). The question, then, is whether this innovation in trolling hooks arose in Ancestral Polynesian times, or was a later innovation, after the breakup of PPN.13 Lexical evidence provides a signi®cant clue, for while a term for `lure' or `trolling hook,' *paa, is robustly attested in PPN, a term for a separate point is not. Our semantic history hypothesis is therefore that the single-piece, Lapita style of trolling hook continued in use during Ancestral Polynesian times, and was lexically indexed by the term *paa, as it had been in preceding POC speech. Moreover, we would posit that the development of the typical two-piece Polynesian trolling rig (with separate lure and point) was an adaptation required by the eastward movement of Polynesians out of the Ancestral Polynesian homeland into the archipelagos of central Eastern Polynesia. In the latter area, the large Trochus shells needed to manufacture one-piece trolling hooks no longer occur, whereas there is an ample supply of pearl shell (Pinctada sp.). The morphology of pearl shell does not permit a lure and point to be cut out of the same valve, necessitating a technological innovation. We have perhaps dwelt overly long on the case of PPN *paa, but it illustrates the kind of speci®c semantic histories which can be constructed, and which is now over to archaeology to con®rm, modify, or reject. Returning to PPN terms for ®shing gear (Table 5.4), *ma-tila has a robustly reconstructed gloss of `®shing rod.' Rods might have been used either with angling hooks (*mataqu) or with the *paa trolling hook as in bonito ®shing from canoes. Lines are essential to any ®sherman, and PPN *afo can be glossed `cord, especially ®shing line.' Witnesses in the twenty-one languages recorded sometimes refer only generically to `cord,' but in a majority of cases they have a semantic referent to `®shing line' making this a case of prime semantic agreement.14 Such lines were probably most frequently manufactured from the bark of the Pipturus argenteus shrub, PPN *qolongaa.

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141

The spear, PPN *tao, is an ancient implement in Oceania, for it can be reconstructed back to POC (*sao) and beyond, to the Proto MalayoPolynesian interstage (PMP *saet). Of course, spears can be hurled at many different kinds of targets other than ®sh (including other humans!), so the term is not unique to ®shing. Widely distributed throughout Polynesia were walled traps or weirs constructed on reef ¯ats, permanent ®shing facilities used in conjunction with the falling tide. PPN *fota indexes such weirs, a very speci®c term with common semantic agreement across ten languages. Some kind of portable, wicker, or woven ®sh trap is more likely indicated by PPN *fanga, but the semantic reconstruction of this term is less robust than for *fota. Finally, a basket used by ®shermen to carry their catch is indicated by PPN *qora. Ethnoarchaeological and comparative ethnographic evidence supports the notion that nets were integral to Ancestral Polynesian ®shing, backed up by lexical reconstruction of eight different PPN words for nets and netting. The generic term was *kupenga. The term is also ancient, traceable back to POC *kup( w)ena (Osmond 1998:213). The mesh of a net is indicated by PPN *mata, and the ¯oat by *uto. Throughout Polynesia, nets were manufactured with the aid of a needle or shuttle on which line was wrapped (PPN *sika). A net gauge, used to keep the mesh consistent in size, is indicated by PPN *qafa.15 While this word set leaves no doubt about the importance of netting, what we lack for PPN is a series of terms for different kinds of nets. Aside from the generic term *kupenga, there is only PPN *tili, re¯ected in ®ve different languages, and indicating some kind of smaller hand net. 16 PPN *rau is well attested, and probably had a meaning of `net made of coconut fronds,' for use in sweeps or encircling ®sh on the reef (see *liko). This *rau, however, surely was not a woven net. The absence of more speci®c net terms is puzzling, given the wide variety of net types attested ethnographically. Concluding remarks In our reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian subsistence, we have sought to demonstrate how the triangulation method variously draws upon available ``strands and cables'' of evidence, not necessarily privileging any one perspective. While it is true that historical linguistics is perhaps more uniformly capable of providing insights for any given domain of culture ± through the method of ``terminological reconstruction'' ± this does not mean that archaeology or comparative ethnography are inevitably consigned to play a secondary role. Moreover, we stress that there are de®nite limits to what ``terminological reconstruction'' (Ross, Pawley, and Osmond 1998) in and of itself can achieve. Our point is well illustrated through a consideration of Ancestral

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Polynesian diet. Terminological reconstruction tells us that the PPN speakers had words for `pig,' `dog,' and `chicken,' but beyond this indicates nothing about the relative food values of these domesticated animals. Indeed, historical linguists might be tempted to intuit that this triad of adventive animals ± introduced into Remote Oceania by the initial Lapita colonizers ± was a primary source of meat and protein. Certainly, comparative ethnographic evidence suggests that pigs, in particular, were consumed in large quantities in some Polynesian societies, especially for feasts and ritual occasions. Here the material, quantitative evidence of archaeology is critical, demonstrating that the place of pigs, dogs, and chickens in the diet of Ancestral Polynesian peoples was quite minor. Of far greater importance were marine resources, especially inshore ®shes and invertebrates. This is information that can be uniquely supplied by archaeology. On the other hand, were we to restrict our reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian horticultural practices to what can be gleaned exclusively from the archaeological data currently available, we would be left with a distinctly impoverished portrait (as a reading of Leach [1999] indicates). In this instance, terminological reconstruction supplies us with a far more robust picture of the crop plants and agronomic practices that underpinned the Ancestral Polynesian economy. Of course, as archaeologists, we are convinced that future work on this topic ± bringing to bear new advances in archaeobotany ± will in time augment our reconstruction with signi®cant material insights on crop plants and landscape modi®cations. As with the faunal reconstructions, these in time may re®ne the picture adduced from the historical linguistic data. Our point is not to belittle any single evidential approach, but rather to underscore the importance of utilizing all of the available evidence at hand. When we con®ne ourselves to just a single line of evidence ± be this linguistic, archaeological, ethnographic, biological, or otherwise ± we fail to take advantage of the real power of an integrative, holistic, historical anthropology. The arbitrary disciplinary boundaries erected by academic programs and departments too often keep us from reaching out to see what our colleagues' research has to tell us concerning problems of mutual interest. Whenever this happens, history, knowledge, and understanding are the losers.

Chapter 6

Food preparation and cuisine

There is a considerable body of knowledge connected with the art of cooking in Tikopia . . . a considerable vocabulary of words to describe the state of foods, as cooked and raw, thick and thin, hard firth 1936:108 and soft.

The procurement of raw food initiates a chain of activity culminating in a quintessentially human activity: the meal or ± at times ± the feast. As anthropologists have long known, the transformation of the ``raw'' into the ``cooked,'' occurs in culturally speci®c ways. Cooked food is the essence of culture, partitioned into semiotically marked categories rich with social meaning. Archaeologists usually take their reconstructions of prehistoric foodways no farther than the analysis of diet, augmented at times by studies of butchering patterns and more rarely of cooking facilities, falling far short of a true ``archaeogastronomy.''1 Yet when archaeological evidence can be augmented and extended through triangulation within a phylogenetic model, it is possible to go further. How much further we will demonstrate by sketching a broad reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian concepts of food and taste, of cooking techniques, recipes, and storage methods. Again, we must weave back-and-forth among independent lines of evidence: from archaeology, comparative ethnography, and historical linguistics. The comparative ethnography of food is a neglected topic. The classic museum ethnographies of Polynesia cover the material culture of food preparation, but give short shrift to food preparation methods and recipes; a richly nuanced exception is Hiroa's (1930) treatment of Samoan cooking. Perhaps only in Firth's classic, We, The Tikopia (1936:94±116), is the entire process from lighting the earth oven to the consumption of the family meal exquisitely detailed.2 Recently, Di Piazza et al. (1991) produced what may be the ®rst true Polynesian ``cookbook,'' a study of traditional Futunan cuisine (who but the French would pioneer this approach!). A pathbreaking comparative study of the ``Polynesian pudding complex'' by Su`a (1987) also combines ethnographic with archaeological and linguistic evidence. Barrau and Peeters (1972), Yen (1975), and Cox (1980) contribute important perspectives on food processing and food preservation. 143

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While historical linguists have reconstructed the names of crop plants, ®sh, and other foodstuffs (see Chapter 5), cooking per se has not received much scrutiny. The exception is Lichtenberk's (1994) pioneering study of POC terms for food preparation, extended by Lichtenberk and Osmond (1998), which, although dealing with a pre-Polynesian time period, have been of much use to us. The PPN speakers partitioned food into two fundamental categories. Food, as well as the act of eating, was indicated by PPN *kai, an ancient Austronesian term, with cognates in thirty-one Polynesian languages. There were probably marked and unmarked senses of *kai as well, for at one level it stood in opposition to PPN *kina, `food eaten with another food as relish.'3 Thus *kai when opposed to *kina meant something like `starch staple.' This distinction is widely expressed by contemporary Polynesians, such as the Futunans (Kirch 1994a:191). Hocart (1929:137) observed that in Lau the starchy ``basis of diet'' was ``commonly spoken of as `food,' or more precisely `true food' or food `proper.''' Such distinctions ± deeply prevalent throughout Polynesia ± were doubtless salient aspects of Ancestral Polynesian concepts of food. The raw and the cooked: a matter of taste Claude LeÂvi-Strauss proclaimed that the distinction between the ``raw'' and the ``cooked'' was equivalent to the gulf between ``nature'' and ``culture.'' No doubt this is generally true, but some cultures also highly value the consumption of certain exquisitely raw/uncooked foods. Among them are Polynesians, who savor the taste of raw ®sh and shell®sh, marked lexically by PPN *qota (Table 6.1).4 Indeed, this gastronomic proclivity is not con®ned to Polynesia, and Lichtenberk (1994:269) reconstructs the word back as far as POC (*qoda). Anyone who has spent time in traditional Polynesian societies has experienced this aspect of their cuisine, and the ethnographic literature con®rms the widespread practice. But in tropical localities, raw seafood just pulled out of the lagoon can within hours go quite ``off,'' becoming increasingly dangerous. Not surprising, then, to ®nd PPN *mae, meaning `smell of stale seafood or ¯esh,' seafood which has gone off. Not only are certain ¯esh foods good to eat raw, most fruits and certain other plant foods (e.g., sugarcane, PPN *too) are also best consumed without cooking. Thus PPN *leu, `ripe fruit,' which as in most of the PPN taste terms, is a case of prime semantic agreement. Fruits which were green or unripe, not yet ®t for eating, were demarcated by the contrast term *moto.5 A more general term for ``green'' things not ready for cooking, or possibly even under- or inadequately cooked foods, is PPN *mata, best glossed simply as `raw.'6

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Table 6.1. Proto Polynesian terms for raw, cooked, and taste Probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

Be raw, eat raw food; especially of ®sh and shell®sh Ripe, to ripen, of fruit especially Raw, unripe; especially of fruit or plant foods Unripe fruit, green Cooked food Taste, ¯avor Sweet-tasting food Palatable, sweet Salty, acid tasting Bitter tasting (intoxicating, poison) Smell of stale seafood or ¯esh (``off '' or ``high'') Rotten, decayed, especially of fruit or plant foods Over-ripe fruit (on tree) Over-ripe, soft (of breadfruit) Allow breadfruit to become over-ripe and soft

*qoda

*qota

20

3

*mataq

*leu *mata

12 23

3

3

*moto *moho *suqa *suqa-malie *maangalo *maqai *kona *mae

19 12 9 8 18 12 19 8

3 3

3 3

3 3 3 3

*pala

26

3

3

3 20 7

3 3 3

3

*maosak

*mpa(l,d)a

*pala-tuqu *(m)peq(a,e) *peqe *faka-peqe

P2

PSA 3

3

3 3

3 3 3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

As with seafoods, fruit or other plant products can go ``off,'' become rotten, and un®t for eating. Several PPN lexemes cover this semantic domain. Prime among them is *pala, `over-ripe, rotten, decayed,' re¯ected in twenty-six Polynesian languages. If one's subsistence depended upon fruit properly ripening on the tree ± the case especially for Ancestral Polynesian communities dependent upon seasonal breadfruit harvests ± a speci®c term for fruit rotting on the tree might be expected; it is evidenced in PPN *palatuqu. Re¯ected in just three Polynesian languages, we might be cautious about this PPN reconstruction, were it not that the speci®c witnesses are far¯ung TON, TOK, and HAW. We have, moreover, PPN *peqe, `over-ripe' applied primarily if not exclusively to breadfruit.7 This concern with the

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over-ripening of breadfruit comes through in yet another term, *faka-peqe, `allow breadfruit to become over-ripe and soft,' attested in seven languages, spanning Western and marginal Eastern Polynesia. One senses that the Ancestral Polynesians were critically dependent ± at least at certain seasons ± upon the productions of their breadfruit groves and other tree crops. In Chapter 5, we pointed out that on the smaller islands of the Ancestral Polynesian homeland, arboriculture would have been a key component of subsistence. The proliferation of terms relating to rotten and inedible fruit (especially breadfruit) con®rms this. As rich as PPN vocabulary was in terms for raw, uncooked, ripe, or rotten foods, the dominant starch staples which formed the core of the Ancestral Polynesian diet had to be thoroughly cooked. Taro, swamp taro, giant taro, yams of various types, certain varieties of bananas, breadfruit, Pueraria, Cordyline, and other starches are absolutely inedible without cooking. 8 Hence PPN *moho, `cooked,' a pure-and-simple case of prime semantic agreement.9 Proto Polynesian words for taste do not end with the lexical set for `raw/ rotten/cooked.' An intriguing term is PPN *suqa, which POLLEX glosses as `taste, ¯avor.' This word raises the question of whether the Ancestral Polynesians had what we might label a culinary notion of `¯avor.' The term is re¯ected in nine Polynesian languages, as well as in the YAS dialect of Fiji. In all cases except EFU, REN, and YAS, it appears in the form of a compound term, *suqa + malie (`good'). Clearly, there was a root PPN term, *suqa, but one is hard-pressed to provide a robust semantic history. That in most cases a modi®er, *malie (`good'), is added suggests that among Ancestral Polynesian ``gourmands'' the ancient root at least allowed for the possibility of a negative form. This possibility is attested by just a single semantic witness, obtained by Bruce Biggs' indefatigable linguistic ®eldwork, where in Futunan the construction su`a-veli (`bad-tasting') parallels su`a-malie. This, some will demur, offers slim grounds on which to propose an Ancestral Polynesian theory of taste; we prefer to believe otherwise. Indeed, other PPN lexemes have semantic extensions referring to taste (Table 6.1). One is PPN *maangalo, glossed as `palatable, sweet.' In opposition to either *maangalo or the compound term *suqa-malie were such terms as PPN *maqai, `salty or acid.' Particularly well attested is PPN *kona, `bitter tasting or intoxicating.' Reviewing the nineteen re¯ected Polynesian terms of *kona and their meanings, `bitter' is without doubt the core meaning, but there are other references to `acid, sour, poisonous.'10 In the oven-house: cooking facilities and equipment Archaeologists11 may chafe at our reconstruction of the lexemic bases for a Polynesian gastronomy. Let us then turn to the material evidence of

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147

archaeology, which will take us, indeed, to the core of Ancestral Polynesian cuisine, what Oliver (1989:281) calls the ``most distinctive of Island cooking methods,'' the earth oven (PPN *qumu). When it comes to Polynesian ``archaeogastronomy,'' the earth oven lies at the intersection between archaeology and historical linguistics. For, as we shall demonstrate, the lexical domain of the *qumu is rich indeed. Picking up virtually any ethnography of a Polynesian society, one ®nds at least a paragraph devoted to this essential form of Polynesian cooking. But what is more satisfying to the archaeologist is that *qumu is a lexical category which has many times been veri®ed in the ground. Earth ovens have been excavated from many of the sites listed in Table 3.2. For example, at the To.6 site on Tongatapu, Poulsen (1987:39±41) excavated nine ovens, three of them with associated radiocarbon dates falling within our period of interest. These ranged in diameter from about 90 cm up to roughly 200 cm. At the NT-100 and 93 sites on Niuatoputapu, Kirch (1988: tables 9, 10) excavated ovens in the range of 75±80 cm diameter. At Sasoa`a on Upolu, Green (1974b:111±13, ®g. 55) exposed a small earth oven in Layer 5, associated with a set of postmolds indicating a round, or round-ended, structure. In the To`aga site on Ofu, Kirch and Hunt (1993a:73±75, ®g. 5.23) excavated a circular oven, 80 cm in diameter and 38 cm deep, ®lled with ®re-cracked volcanic stones, with the oven ®ll and surrounding deposit thick with the spines of sea-urchins which had been cooked in the oven's last ®ring. These and similar examples share the following common features: the ovens are more-or-less circular in plan, basin-shaped in cross-section, and contain quantities of ®re-cracked or ®realtered stones (Figure 6.1). Charcoal and ash usually line the base of the pit, and the subsoil is frequently discolored a bright orange-red as a result of oxidation from the heat of repeated ®rings. Because most excavations in Ancestral Polynesian sites have been limited to 1-meter test pits or other small horizontal exposures, we do not have a clear idea of the kind of structures which sheltered these earth ovens. The round-ended structure at Sasoa`a, if not interpreted as a dwelling from its pavement and associated stone adzes (see Chapter 8), could easily have been a cookhouse; at To`aga the oven in units 20/23 was directly associated with two large postmolds. A high priority for future archaeological work in Western Polynesia must be extensive horizontal excavations of sites dating to the Ancestral Polynesian time period. Only areal excavations will provide direct evidence of these early households, incorporating both dwelling and cooking structures, as well as storage, and possibly, ritual components. The material culture recovered from Ancestral Polynesian sites includes food preparation equipment. Ubiquitous pottery, with narrow-necked jars, open bowls, and small cups, is described in Chapter 7. Various sites have

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Fig. 6.1

The earth oven, a central feature of Ancestral Polynesian cooking, attested by archaeological examples, such as this oven at the Lolokoka site (NT-90) on Niuatoputapu.

yielded one or more kinds of mollusk shell interpreted as ``scrapers'' or ``peelers'' for food preparation. Of particular interest are the Anadara-shell ``paring knives'' described by Poulsen (1987:184, pl. 73, 12) from Tongatapu (including site To.6); these have a perforation through the body of the shell as well as usewear along the edge. The perforation raises the possibility, as noted by Poulsen, that these may have been coconut grater heads lashed to wooden seats, an interpretation we favor given the PPN lexical evidence. Other shells, such as the bivalve scrapers described by Kirch (1988:208, ®g. 126, c) from Niuatoputapu, were probably hand-held. As noted in Chapter 5, a distinctive kind of stone hammer with pecked ®nger grips occurs at sites of the Ancestral Polynesian period in Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:209, ®g. 127a), Futuna (Kirch 1981:141, ®g. 13; Sand 1993), and Samoa (Green 1969:134; Jennings and Holmer 1980: ®g. 48). These hammerstones may have been ``nut-cracking hammers'' for breaking open hard-shelled nuts such as those of Canarium, Terminalia, and Barringtonia. Many of the amorphous basalt and/or obsidian ¯akes found in Ancestral Polynesian contexts

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149

could have been used in cookhouses, for tasks such as butchering, scaling ®sh, or scraping tubers. The rich comparative ethnography of Polynesian cookhouses and their accouterments aids us in interpreting the archaeological evidence, and in developing semantic history hypotheses for the terms given in Table 6.2. A separate cookhouse in which the earth oven was situated is ubiquitous in Polynesia. In Western Polynesia it is called paito (TON peito), while in Eastern Polynesia it takes some form of the compound term fale umu, literally `house oven' (e.g., RAR, MIA `are umu). Hiroa's description of the southern Cook Islands' cookhouse would stand for many other Polynesian societies: A cook house (`are umu) was a necessary adjunct to the dwelling house for, though cooking was usually done in the open, a roof over the oven was a necessity in wet weather. These houses were small with a framework similar to that of the dwelling house and with a thatch of coconut-leaf sheets. The sides were without walls. (1944:41)12

Hiroa's (1930:98±147) detailed account of cookhouse equipment in Samoa would be accurate, with only minor variations, for most other tropical or subtropical Polynesian societies. Near any cookhouse a sharpened stick is thrust into the ground, used to husk coconuts. Among the cookhouse equipment are tongs for handling hot stones, made from a doubled-over piece of coconut midrib, or of Pandanus root. Wooden bowls of a wide range of shapes and sizes, going under the generic term kumete or one of its variants, are vital for holding liquids (such as expressed coconut cream, or rendered coconut oil), for pounding starchy pastes, and so on. The cup formed by a half-shell of coconut is used as a ladle, a drinking cup, and a container for certain kinds of special cooked puddings.13 Ceramic equivalents of coconut half-shell cups also occur in Ancestral Polynesian sites (see Chapter 7). Other kinds of cooking gear, generally made with wood, ®ber, or other perishable materials, include oven spreaders, breadfruit splitters, strainers or wringers, mincers, food stirrers, breadfruit pickers, and varied woven baskets. Of particular importance is the coconut grater, which varies in exact form in different societies (e.g., Hiroa 1944: ®g. 3), but usually consists of some kind of stool or seat of wood, with an arm or protrusion on which the head was lashed. In post-contact times, the head has typically been of metal, but pre-contact forms used shells, coral, serrated pearl shell, stone, or other abrasive materials. The meat on the inside of opened coconut shells is grated on this head, and collected in a bowl, then squeezed through a strainer often made of Hibiscus bast, to yield coconut cream. The cream can be rendered into coconut oil by stone boiling in a wooden bowl. An important regional difference between Western and Eastern Polynesian societies is in the use of pounders for mashing or pounding starchy

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Table 6.2. Proto Polynesian terms associated with the cookhouse, earth oven, and cooking equipment Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) Cookhouse, oven terms Cookhouse, shelter over oven Earth oven To cook in earth oven Firewood Prepare earth oven for lighting To light a ®re, burn Arrange hot stones on bed of the earth oven Open up, uncover an earth oven Open up by removing a cover (esp. an earth oven) Cookhouse equipment Tongs, pincers Bivalve shell (Asaphidae) used for scraping tubers or breadfruit Husk coconuts on a pointed stake Coconut grater Butt end of coconut frond midrib (used for pounding) Plate, platter, bowl Wooden bowl Earthenware cooking pot Container for liquid/cup Half-coconut shell container

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

P2

*paito *qumu *taqo *fa®e *faka-qafu *tafu *uru

6 31 24 22 6 29 10

3 3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3

*pukes

*fuke *suke

25 14

3 3

3

*kapit *gasi

*hiko-® *kasi

21

3

*hoka *tuahi *palalafa

17 16 7

3 3

*paa *kumete *kulo *ipu *faangongo

6 27 7 26 9

3 3

*qumun *taqon *papie

*kudo(n)

PSA

3 3

3 3 3

3 3 3 3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime Semantic Agreement.

tubers such as taro, and for breadfruit. As discussed by Hiroa (1930:111) and Burrows (1938a:15±16), formal pounders made of stone or coral are con®ned to the central and some marginal Eastern Polynesian societies, and are therefore clearly an innovation within Eastern Polynesia. In certain Eastern Polynesian societies, such pounders became highly elaborated (Garanger 1967). In Western Polynesia, pounding is performed using the

Food preparation and cuisine

151

butt end of a coconut frond midrib, sticks, or simply the clenched ®sts (Hiroa 1930:112); we would infer that this was the case in Ancestral Polynesia. We turn now to the lexical evidence for Ancestral Polynesian cooking, based on the set of reconstructed PPN terms in Table 6.2. Based on re¯exes in both TON and six other languages, the PPN term for cookhouse was *paito.14 What these structures looked like will not be known until more extensive archaeological excavations are conducted, but the comparative ethnographic evidence suggests open-sided sheds with thatched roofs; in any event their central feature was the earth oven, PPN *qumu. This key term is represented in no less than thirty-one Polynesian languages, a classic case of prime semantic agreement. As in the older POC language (Lichtenberk 1994:270±73), the earth oven complex is represented not just by PPN *qumu, but by a number of associated words. Another widely re¯ected term is *taqo, meaning to `bake, cook in earth oven.' Several additional words cover the process of preparing, igniting, and cooking. `Firewood,' essential to the oven process, is the certain gloss for PPN *fa®e, while *faka-qafu indicates the action of `preparing the oven for lighting.'15 *Tafu, a general term for `light a ®re, burn,' probably applied to other kinds of ®re lighting (as in a hearth) as well, but at least four of its witnesses include references to ovens. PPN *uru is another term speci®c to the oven complex, with a probable gloss of `arrange hot stones on the bed of the earth oven,' a critical part of the cooking procedure if food is to be well done yet not singed or burnt. After covering and cooking for a suf®cient time, the oven is opened, an action designated by another broadly re¯ected PPN term, *fuke.16 Other PPN lexemes refer to the implements and cooking utensils that we predict ± on comparative ethnographic as well as direct archaeological evidence ± would have been found in Ancestral Polynesian cookhouses. The pointed husking stick, ubiquitous around Polynesian cookhouses even today, was presumably called by the same word used for the pointed digging stick, *koso (see Table 5.2), while the action of husking coconuts is given by PPN *hoka. Fire tongs, so important for handling the white-hot oven stones not only in oven preparation but in stone boiling of liquids such as coconut cream, are indicated by PPN *hiko-®. Archaeological evidence for shell scrapers is matched linguistically by PPN *kasi. Modern re¯exes typically refer to a bivalve shell, often Asaphis violascens but also other species. Hence POLLEX provides the PPN gloss `bivalve shell (Asaphidae).' However, noting that several cognates include reference to the action of scraping with these shells (e.g., ANU, ROT, SAM, TAK), and given archaeological evidence for shell scrapers, we infer that PPN *kasi referred both in general to bivalve shells, and speci®cally to shells used for scraping tubers and breadfruit. Our hypothesis is reinforced by

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Lichtenberk's reconstruction of POC *(k/g)asi, with a gloss of ``scrape out/ off, strip off, peel off (takes as its direct object a noun phrase to the stuff scraped off, e.g., the skin of tubers)'' (1994:280). Again, the archaeological and lexical evidence are mutually reinforcing. Comparative ethnography underscores the widespread importance of coconut graters in Polynesia, re¯ecting the central role of coconut cream and coconut oil as the primary emollients in Polynesian puddings (see discussion below). The existence of graters in Ancestral Polynesian times is strongly attested by PPN *tuahi, meaning `coconut grater.' But what kind of grater was this? Ethnographic specimens range in form and kind of head (Figure 6.2), but all incorporate the same basic concept of a wooden base or support, sometimes in the form of a three-legged stool, to which a shell grater is lashed. The widespread distribution of this basic object throughout Polynesia provides good evidence that it has been retained since Ancestral Polynesian times. However, since the stool or base would have been made of wood, these are unlikely to be recovered in archaeological contexts, but the head should be. Poulsen (1987) described Anadara shells with perforations enabling them to be lashed to a wooden shaft. Anadara bivalves have a naturally serrated, curved edge which would be effective as a grater on the concave surface of a coconut shell. Another possibility on the basaltic high islands is that such grater heads were made from ¯aked stone. Basalt grater heads are known from surface archaeological contexts in Samoa (Hiroa 1930:367±68, ®gs. 217, 218), and from the MAN-44 rockshelter site on Mangaia Island in Eastern Polynesia (Kirch et al. 1995). Whether the stone grater head had been developed by Ancestral Polynesian times is uncertain, but remains a possibility that should be archaeologically veri®able. Serrated grater heads made from pearl shell, recovered from early archaeological contexts in central Eastern Polynesia (e.g., at the Vaito`otia site, Sinoto 1979), were certainly a later innovation, and did not exist in Ancestral Polynesia. We have already drawn attention to the differential distribution ± in the ethnographic record ± of stone food pounders. That stone pounders were an innovation in central Eastern Polynesia is strongly supported by the absence of a PPN term for such implements. Rather, we have the Proto Tahitic term *penu, meaning `pestle, pounder,' and a second term *reru, `food pounder,' which may be a Cook Islands innovation (re¯ected only in MKI and RAR). What can be reconstructed to PPN is the term *palalafa, meaning `butt end of coconut frond midrib.' This is precisely the ad hoc implement used for pounding starches in the Western Polynesian region and among Polynesian Outlier societies. That the butt of a coconut frond should be lexemically distinguished from other parts of coconut fronds points to some particular signi®cance for PPN speakers; we suggest that this was its suitability for food

Food preparation and cuisine

Fig. 6.2

153

Ethnographic examples of coconut graters, made up of a stool or other wooden base to which a shell grater is lashed: (a) Kapingamarangi; (b) Nukuoro; (c) `Uvea; (d) Ana`a, Tuamotu; (e) Rarotonga; (f ) Mangaia.

pounding, a practice that continued without pause in the western homeland region, but which was replaced later with formal stone food pounders in Eastern Polynesia. Finally, there is lexical evidence for several kinds of food containers or serving implements in Ancestral Polynesian society (further discussed in Chapter 7). One well-attested meaning for the polysemous term *paa is that of `plate, platter, bowl.' Woven serving mats on which food is served were designated by PPN *laulau. In addition, one function of the open ceramic bowls ubiquitous in archaeological assemblages could have been food serving. The presence of wooden bowls is certain, since PPN *kumete is represented in twenty-seven modern re¯exes, every one of which has the

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

meaning of `wooden bowl.' Probably there was a range of sizes, shapes, and particular functions for such *kumete, but we can only guess at these based on the variability attested in ethnographic examples. Another widely evidenced term is *ipu, which POLLEX glosses as `container for liquid,' but which we believe referenced a small cup-shaped container. We base this inference on the frequent semantic references to coconut shell cups in modern Polynesian languages. PPN *ipu probably designated such coconut shell cups, but perhaps also to similar sized cups made of earthenware (see Chapter 7). There is, moreover, another PPN term, *faangongo, with a semantic value of `half-coconut shell.' Such empty coconut shells are used to hold liquid food concoctions for cooking in the earth oven, and this word hints at the practice in Ancestral Polynesian cooking. Earthenware vessels, we know from the archaeological record, were a ubiquitous component of Ancestral Polynesian material culture, and we will discuss them more extensively in Chapter 7. They are lexically marked by the generic term *kulo. Food preparation and cooking methods As we have just seen, triangulation yields a richly textured portrait of the Ancestral Polynesian cookhouse, with its central earth oven and many food preparation implements and containers. But what of actual cooking methods and food preparation processes? Direct archaeological evidence is of little use here.17 Comparative ethnography, for its part, reveals that Polynesian cuisine depends on more than just earth oven cooking, despite its centrality. Kirch (1994a:97±100, table 5), for example, documents the range of cooking methods applied to speci®c crop plants in traditional Futunan cuisine, which include roasting over open ®res or in embers, as well as using different parceling methods for foods placed within the umu; similar methods are described in the standard ethnographies for most Polynesian cultures. Stone boiling in wooden bowls is another widespread cooking method. There is no need, however, to resort to an extensive analysis of the ethnographic literature, for the PPN vocabulary relating to food preparation and cooking methods is extensive, with the majority of terms all instances of prime semantic agreement (Table 6.3). Given abundant evidence for scrapers and graters in Ancestral Polynesian cookhouses, it is encouraging to ®nd several PPN lexemes that refer to scraping or grating. PPN *waru is re¯ected in twenty-nine Polynesian languages plus FIJ, and seems to have been a generic term for `scrape.' The lexeme *sisi, however, had a narrower meaning, `to scoop or gouge out coconut meat,' as virtually all of its re¯exes apply to coconut. PPN *olo has been glossed by POLLEX as `grate, rub something against something.'18 A subset of terms refers to the process of scraping coconut to extract the

Food preparation and cuisine

155

Table 6.3. Proto Polynesian terms for food preparation and cooking methods Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) Food preparation terms To scrape or grate (as with coconut) Scoop out, gouge out (as meat from coconut) Grate (speci®cally taro ?) Scrape (coconut ?) Wring out, express (as with coconut cream) Dregs, material (as coconut scrapings from which the cream has been expressed) Trash, especially grated coconut ¯esh Pound Knead, mix to a pulp Knead, mix with water Mix, mingle Wrap up, covering, parcel (speci®cally of food) Cooking methods Cooked To cook in earth oven Heat over ®re to smoke, grill, toast (food), or render supple (leaves) Cook on open ®re, roast, grill Singe, cooked, burnt Boil food in water Reheat cooked food

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*waru *sisi

29 12

3 3

3

*sisi

*olo *saqalo *tatau

18 20 14

3 3 3

3

*kora

9

3

16 27 8 16 16 15

3 3

*kopu

*penu *tuki *lapu *natu *®ro *kofu

3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3

*maosa *taqon *rarag

*ma-oha *taqo *rara

24

3

3

28

3

3

*tunu *sunu *sakan

*tunu *sunu *saka *faka-fana

28 13 5 9

3 3 3 3

3 3

*tutuk

P2

PSA

3

3

3

*POC terms are generally from Lichtenberk (1994); *PPN terms from POLLEX. PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

¯esh or meat, and to expressing the cream by wringing it with a strainer of shredded coconut husk or Hibiscus bast. In addition to *sisi (see above), there is PPN *saqalo, a PCP innovation re¯ected in FIJ as well as twenty Polynesian languages, meaning `to scrape coconut.' The action of expressing coconut cream is covered by PPN *tatau, although this verb may also have applied to other kinds of wringing out, as in kava preparation (see Chapter 9). After the cream has been wrung from grated coconut meat, the dry shavings generally have little use (although they are frequently fed to chickens by modern Polynesians); two words referring to these dregs were PPN *kora and *penu. In Polynesian cuisine, starchy foods are frequently mixed with each other and with coconut cream or oil, and several terms refer to pounding, kneading, and mixing. PPN *tuki is the verb `to pound,' its witnesses in some cases having a special connotation of food pounding or pounder. PPN *lapu has a reconstructed meaning of `knead to a pulp,' while *natu indicated `knead, mix with water.' A more general term for `mix or mingle' is *®ro, which probably applied to all kinds of materials as well as food. A comparative ethnography not just of Polynesian, but of Oceanic cuisines in general, reveals the importance of parceling or bundling foods in leaf packages. Large, ¯eshy leaves such as those of banana and giant aroids (Alocasia macrorrhiza and Cyrtosperma chamissonis) are widely used to wrap puddings and other food concoctions prior to baking. Breadfruit and Cordyline fruticosum leaves may be used to wrap ®sh or other meat for open ®re roasting. The PPN term for wrapping up or parceling of food was *kofu, a word Lichtenberk (1994:276±77) traces back to POC (*kopu). The generic term for `cooked' in PPN was *ma-oha. This would include food cooked in the earth oven (*taqo) or in several other ways. Aside from earth oven cooking, heating of foods over a ®re is attested by PPN *rara.19 PPN *tunu reconstructs as `cook on open ®re, roast, grill.' Associated with *tunu is *sunu, `to singe or be seared.' Boiling is attested by *saka, which is re¯ected only in six languages (including TON and FIJ), all in the Western Polynesian±Fijian region. 20 The absence of witnesses of *saka in Eastern Polynesia is signi®cant, suggesting that in PPN the term referred to boiling in earthenware pots (see Chapter 7). As pottery was lost in the colonization of central Eastern Polynesia, the term *saka would have been dropped from the vocabulary of the early central Eastern peoples. Finally, there is PPN *faka-fana, `to warm, reheat, or recook food.' In the tropics, where food quickly starts to spoil, such recooking is a common and necessary practice. Pounded foods and the ``pudding complex'' In his insightful discussion of Oceanic food processing, Yen (1975:149) observed that the ``main method'' of preparing food was simple cooking by

Food preparation and cuisine

157

roasting, steaming, or boiling, but drew particular attention to pounded or ``pudding-like'' foods. The greater elaboration and complexity of preparation of such foods (``a sequence after harvest of cooking, dividing and pounding, and recooking for consumption'') captured Yen's attention. Su`a (1987) labeled this core of Polynesian cuisine the ``pudding complex,'' drawing attention to a range of foodstuffs that combine one or more kinds of precooked starchy staples with an emollient, particularly coconut cream or coconut oil. Firth (1936:103±10) describes this culinary principle as ``the use of two elements, a base or bulk food, and an emollient or bond which softens its harshness and at the same time serves to bind its particles together.'' Di Piazza et al. (1991:73) offer a similar characterization for Futunan cooking, as does Hiroa (1930) for Samoa. In Eastern Polynesian societies, the pudding complex was transformed with the development of stone pounders, emphasizing starch staples (usually breadfruit or taro) combined with water as an emollient. The importance of coconut in the pudding complex (in Western Polynesia and presumably also in the Ancestral Polynesian homeland) is evident in the elaboration of terms for the grating and extraction of coconut meat, cream, and oil (see above), and in the comparative ethnographic evidence for its use in a range of recipes. Hiroa's remarks on the role of coconut in Samoan cuisine could be applied throughout most of the tropical Polynesian core: The outstanding value of the coconut in cooking is evident. In some form or other it enters into combination with every vegetable food and most marine ¯esh food except the larger ®sh . . . But it is the expressed coconut cream that is invaluable in so many preparations. Cooked with them as fai`ai [PPN *fai-kai ], it enters into 17 different dishes. As the oily niu tolo, it is indispensable to the most important made up dish, fa`ausi. It provides the only sauce for meat, vegetables, and puddings. Without the coconut, Samoan cooking would be resolved into its primary elements. (1930:136)

The signi®cance of coconut cream or oil in Ancestral Polynesian cooking is strongly indicated by three PPN lexemes (Table 6.4). The ®rst of these is *lolo, re¯ected in twenty-®ve Polynesian languages, with a core meaning of `coconut milk/cream or oil.'21 Related to this is the compound lexeme *loloqi, meaning `prepare food with coconut cream or oil.' This second term is not as broadly represented in modern Polynesian languages (although there is little doubt of its reconstruction to PPN), and was lost in many of the languages of Eastern Polynesia, where the pudding complex shifted to an emphasis on pounded taro or breadfruit pastes. The third coconut-related term is PPN *pekepeke, `coconut cream sauce.' This is represented by only ®ve words in Polynesian languages, but with a range from TON to HAW the PPN reconstruction is sound. Presumably, *pekepeke sauce of expressed cream

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 6.4. Proto Polynesian terms associated with the pudding complex Probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

Coconut milk or oil Prepare food with coconut cream Coconut cream sauce Pounded starchy food together with a sauce or gravy Taro pounded up for food Food cooked with coconut cream Grate, mash (type of food mixed with coconut cream ?) A kind of pudding made from Polynesian arrowroot

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*lolo *lolo-qi *pekepeke *poqoi

25 15 5 12

3 3 3 3

*mafu *fai-kai *roqi

9 8 7

3 3 3

*waatia

4

P2

PSA 3 3 3

3

3

3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

was used as a `dip' for cooked breadfruit, taro, and other starches, as it is today in Futuna, Samoa, and elsewhere. Several PPN words refer to the ``pudding complex.'' PPN *mafu is glossed by POLLEX as `taro pounded up for food.' Of particular note is *fai-kai, glossed as `food cooked with coconut cream.' Modern witnesses of *faikai occur mainly in Western Polynesia, but a critical witness is HAW (*hai`ai ) indicating that it is a valid PPN reconstruction, and that its absence throughout most of Eastern Polynesia was due to loss.22 The etymology of *fai-kai is notable, a compound term based on PPN *fai, `make, do' and *kai, the fundamental word for `food.' Perhaps a better gloss, then, is `made food,' which captures the Polynesian essence of the pudding complex; foods are `made' through a more complex process of ®rst cooking the starchy base, then adding the coconut emollient, and often a secondary recooking as well.23 PPN *roqi is another term that relates to the pudding complex, although it is dif®cult to provide a precise gloss. POLLEX gives its meaning as `grate, mash,' but the meanings associated with the eight known witnesses suggest it might have referenced a kind of *fai-kai. PPN *waatia also refers to such a category of `made food,' a `pudding made from Polynesian arrowroot (Tacca leontopetaloides).'

Food preparation and cuisine

159

Formal stone or coral food pounders (PCE *penu) were a technological innovation in the central Eastern Polynesian region after the breakup of PPN. Comparative ethnographic evidence supports the notion that pounded starchy foods (especially breadfruit and taro) supplanted the earlier importance of the pudding complex in this region. Lexical evidence reinforces this hypothesis, for although *poqoi, meaning `pounded starchy food together with a sauce or gravy' is a valid PPN reconstruction, it is represented primarily by re¯exes in Eastern Polynesia (e.g., TAH poi, MQA popo`i, HAW poi ). Here, the term signi®es cooked breadfruit or taro mixed with a small quantity of water and pounded with a stone pestle. Such popo`i or poi was the most frequently consumed starch food in Eastern Polynesia. Food storage and preservation In the humid tropics, including both the Polynesian homeland and the Near Oceanic region from which their Lapita ancestors hailed, storing or preserving foodstuffs for any duration poses a real challenge. Some crops, especially yams, can be stored uncooked for a period of months under proper conditions. Others such as taro, breadfruit, and bananas cannot be kept for more than a few days without decay setting in. Yet given seasonal variability in harvests, as well as periodic effects of environmental hazards such as droughts and cyclones (see Kirch 1984a:127±35), a reserve supply of stored food is essential. One method for securing a surplus, widely evidenced throughout Oceania, involves sun-drying or drying/smoking over a ®re (Barrau and Peeters 1972; Yen 1975). This technique is more appropriate for certain foods (e.g., ®sh) than others. That the Ancestral Polynesians used sun-drying is suggested by at least one term, PPN *tau-raki, `dry in air or sun.'24 Of far greater interest is both lexical and archaeological evidence indicating that the Ancestral Polynesians were familiar with semi-subterranean fermentation and pit storage of breadfruit, and possibly other starchy foods as well. Ethnographically, the practice of ensiling breadfruit, taro, bananas, and sometimes other starches or fruit in leaf-lined pits is well documented across the tropical core of Polynesia in both its Western and Eastern sectors (Cox 1980; Kirch 1984a: table 18). In certain islands, this method took on considerable importance. As Yen (1975:150) observes, the practice is also known in the Marshall and Caroline Islands of Micronesia, which indicates that its origins pre-date Ancestral Polynesian times, and are probably associated with the early Lapita expansion into Remote Oceania (Kirch 1997a:216). Lexical evidence for pit fermentation and ensilage consists of three PPN terms: *mara, *maa, and *masi. *Mara is widely re¯ected throughout Poly-

160

Rediscovering Hawaiki

nesian languages, and from external witnesses can be reconstructed to POC (*ma[n]da). POLLEX gives the PPN gloss as `food fermented to preserve it, or to enhance the taste.'25 Although there is some variation in the range of meanings for the modern re¯exes of *mara throughout Polynesia, consistent reference to fermentation makes the POLLEX gloss plausible. The second word, *maa, also meaning `fermented food,' is represented by a smaller cognate set, and there is some question whether this was merely a dialectical variant of *mara (see Marck n.d.). A separate PPN term is *masi, glossed by POLLEX as `sour, acid, fermented (of vegetable food).' Closely examining the range of cognate meanings in fourteen languages (including FIJ), there is a recurrent reference to breadfruit, and we would re®ne the gloss with a semantic history that PPN *masi referred to `fermented breadfruit.' Given the separate terms *mara and *masi, one might speculate that the ®rst meant the general method of food fermentation, while the second referred to pitensiled breadfruit. Direct archaeological evidence backs up the linguistic hypothesis for fermentation and pit ensilage. Green (1969:121) suggested that ``shallow rounded pits'' sealed in by later deposits at the Vailele site in Samoa might have been used for breadfruit fermentation. At Pome`e-Nahau (NT-93) on Niuatoputapu, Kirch (1988:109, ®g. 64) exposed two large, straight-sided and ¯at-bottomed pits which showed no evidence of having been used for cooking, and for which a function of pit fermentation seemed most likely (Figure 6.3). Numerous other pits which could have served this function were exposed in Poulsen's excavations in Tongatapu (1987). In short, the archaeological testimony of appropriately sized and shaped pits in many Ancestral Polynesian sites, combined with strong linguistic evidence, leaves little doubt that the fermentation and storage of breadfruit and possibly other starchy crops was a practice well known to the early Polynesians. Their descendants in certain islands ± especially the Marquesas ± would later make *mara/masi a vital component of their subsistence and cuisine. Food in society By applying the triangulation method we have reconstructed, in perhaps unanticipated detail, an ``archaeogastronomy'' of Ancestral Polynesian food: concepts of taste, cooking methods and techniques, kinds of recipes, and storage methods. While the immediate goal of cooking is to eat, more than eating for the sake of survival is involved: to partake of a ``meal,'' a ``repast,'' is a fundamentally social act. Again, the comparative ethnography of Polynesia and Oceania is rich with regard to the social dimensions of food (e.g., Bell 1931). It is disappointing, then, that only a handful of PPN lexemes refer to the place of food in Ancestral Polynesian societies.

Food preparation and cuisine

Fig. 6.3

161

Straight-sided pits, lacking evidence of burning, may have been used as silos for the fermentation and storage of breadfruit paste; this example was excavated at the NT-93 site on Niuatoputapu (after Kirch 1988).

One such term is PPN *qinati, which POLLEX glosses as `share' or `portion.' We will revisit this term later in Chapter 9, noting here only that the term likely referred to a `food share in a communal feast.' A word whose original meaning is clear is PPN *maa-kona, `satis®ed or satiated after eating.' Not only did the Ancestral Polynesians probably use this term to express their satisfaction at the end of a meal, but they used another term, *mahu, to refer to `abundant, plentiful food.' Contrasting with *mahu is *samu, `to eat scraps, or eat only one kind of food.' The semantic essence of *samu was probably a meal lacking in *kina, or unsatisfying for other reasons, not resulting in the desirable state of being *maa-kona. The ultimate contrast with *mahu, however, is *songe, `famine.' Finally, we can also note that when

162

Rediscovering Hawaiki

Ancestral Polynesians went traveling, as on a canoe voyage, they had a speci®c term for the foodstuffs taken as provisions: *qoho. Concluding remarks On the face of things, ``cuisine'' might seem an intractable topic for historical reconstruction when written texts are lacking. Yet an ``archaeogastronomy'' of Ancestral Polynesia is certainly within our purview, given the methodology of triangulation. Limited to its own internal evidence, archaeology alone could not produce an especially detailed reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian foodways. Nonetheless, archaeology does provide signi®cant quantitative evidence for aspects of diet, as well as direct material evidence for food preparation technology. Comparative ethnography, for its part, advances many useful hypotheses ± such as the key role of the pudding complex and the importance of grated coconut as an ingredient and emollient ± but, lacking support from historical linguistics and archaeology, it would also fail on its own to produce a clear image of ancestral cooking practices. Historical linguistics outlines the terminological contours of the domain of cuisine, the emically marked concepts whereby Proto Polynesian speakers indexed their foods. Yet only when archaeology and comparative ethnography are consulted in tandem with lexical evidence, augmented by detailed semantic-history hypotheses ± that is, through the triangulation method of historical anthropology ± does our reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian foodways truly come into sharp focus.

Chapter 7

Material culture

Although we can look to archaeology to con®rm the hypothesis that durable artefacts will be found in sites associated with Oceanicspeaking communities, there is little hope of archaeological recovery of the perishable artefacts in question. Here linguistics adds an extra dimension to research on the prehistory of Oceania.

osmond 1996:130

Material culture and technology are cultural domains central to archaeology. Indeed, until the expansion of archaeological interests to incorporate ``ecofacts'' and other non-artifactual evidence, largely associated with the New Archaeology, the classi®cation and analysis of material culture occupied the vast majority of archaeologists' time (Lyman et al. 1997:121±205). In Polynesia, where ceramics were absent in the ethnohistoric record, archaeologists focused their efforts on studying and classifying stone tools, especially adzes but also a range of other types including pounders (e.g., Brigham 1902; Duff 1959; Garanger 1967; see Cleghorn 1984 for a review of Polynesian adz studies). Later, when stratigraphic excavations began in Eastern Polynesia, much attention was paid to stylistic variation in ®shhooks made of bone and shell, for these offered potential as chronological indicators (e.g., Emory et al. 1959; Suggs 1961). Only when excavations commenced in the Western Polynesian homeland was it discovered that ceramics, too, had once been part of the original Polynesian material culture, providing a critical linkage connecting early stages of Polynesian culture with the antecedent Lapita cultural complex (Golson 1961; Green 1974a). Given this long and rich tradition of Polynesian archaeological studies of portable artifacts, one might suppose that archaeological evidence would occupy pride of place when applying a triangulation approach to recover the material basis of Ancestral Polynesian culture. Archaeology does indeed yield much evidence for some categories of Ancestral Polynesian artifacts, especially adzes and ceramics, as well as ®shhooks, abrading tools, scrapers, and a few other types. For these artifact classes, archaeology provides 163

164

Rediscovering Hawaiki

important data on variability within and between Ancestral Polynesian communities, as well as on technological processes of manufacture and use. Where archaeology fails ± and this is a point we think insuf®ciently appreciated by some of our colleagues ± is in providing anything like a thorough or complete inventory of the material culture of Ancestral Polynesia. The problem stems from the natural-resource base upon which Polynesian material cultures were founded, utilizing a wide array of perishable materials: wood, bamboo, bark, ®ber, leaves, cordage, feathers, and so forth. A perusal of any of the material-culture monographs for Polynesia, such as Te Rangi Hiroa's masterly Samoan Material Culture (1930), or his Arts and Crafts of the Cook Islands (1944), reveals the extent to which indigenous Polynesian technology depended upon the plant world. In any traditional Polynesian village, one would discover a remarkable variety of objects and impedimenta made of perishable substances, including: the superstructures of dwellings and cookhouses; wooden bowls of all shapes; platters and baskets of coconut leaves, and other baskets made of sennit or Pandanus; a diversity of mats plaited from coconut, Pandanus, and other leaves; garments of bark cloth and matting, along with combs, headdresses, ¯y whisks, and fans; woven sandals; staffs, spears, and other insignia; wooden canoes with mat sails, and sennit lashing and lines, wooden paddles, and bailers; ®shing gear such as snares, nooses, torches, sweeps, spears, bow and arrow, traps, nets, poles, and so on, all of wood and cordage; digging sticks, harvesting poles, coconut husking sticks, and carrying poles; musical instruments including gongs and drums; toys and amusements such as tops, kites, darts, pitching discs, and string ®gures; instruments of war such as clubs, slings, and spears; and ®nally, objects of religious veneration including wooden and woven images. In Table 7.1, we offer a simple tabulation of the total numbers of object types ethnographically documented in four representative Polynesian societies, and estimates of the percentages of perishable versus durable materials.1 On average, about 82 percent of the range of material objects used in a traditional Polynesian culture would not be expected to survive in a normal open-site archaeological context. True that in exceptional circumstances archaeologists do occasionally recover a wider range of perishable material culture. The speci®c taphonomic circumstances are either extreme desiccation (such as the lava tubes of Kalahuipua`a on Hawai`i Island; Kirch 1979), or the anaerobic conditions of waterlogging (such as the Vaito`otia-Fa`ahia site on Huahine Island; Sinoto and McCoy 1975). Unfortunately, such site conditions are exceedingly rare in tropical Polynesia, and are not currently known for sites of the Ancestral Polynesian time period.2 It is questionable whether either a ``wet'' site or an extreme ``dry'' site with conditions favorable to preservation of a wide range of perishable objects may ever be discovered, given the geoarch-

Material culture

165

Table 7.1. Perishable and durable components of Polynesian material culture inventories Ethnographic culture Samoa (Hiroa 1930) Cook Islands (Hiroa 1944) Pukapuka (Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1938) Tuamotus (Emory 1975)

Total no. object types

No. of perishable No. of durable object types1 object types2

Percent durable

284 147 130

245 120 107

39 27 23

14 18 18

97

74

23

23

1 Objects made from wood, ®ber, bark, leaves, string, cordage, or feathers. 2 Objects made from stone, shell, bone, or coral.

aeological context of most Ancestral Polynesian sites. Not impossible, to be sure, but in our view unlikely. The message is clear: while archaeology contributes much valuable and highly detailed information about certain categories of material culture and technology, only in exceptional circumstances of preservation will the archaeological record mirror the diversity revealed in ethnographic collections. But if robust historical reconstruction is our goal, the triangulation method can aid us. In this chapter, we explore what the complementary evidence of archaeology, historical linguistics, and comparative ethnography reveals about Ancestral Polynesian material culture. Archaeology will be given its due, with respect to pottery, adzes, and some other categories. But we will show that, even for these materially attested types, archaeology does not tell us everything there is to know. Proto Polynesian `things' Every culture has some general terms to designate `things' in the abstract; the Proto Polynesian speakers were no exception. There are PPN words (Table 7.2) both for a general class of items, *meqa, `thing,' and for a category which included portable objects, PPN *alanga meaning `tool' or `weapon.' Treasured possessions or material wealth, especially ®ne garments and perhaps also ®ne mats, were referred to by two PPN words, *ta(a)qonga and *koloa; we discuss these further in Chapter 8 under the topic of ``exchange.'' We can also reconstruct an extensive descriptive vocabulary for items of portable material culture. PPN *faqa-si, `part, side, or half,' had other correlates: PPN *tumutumu, `top,' qaro, `front,' and *tuqa, `back.' Some portable items had `tips' or `points,' PNP *ti®. If they were sharp pointed objects, PPN *tala is the appropriate word, and PPN *keo(h,s)o would have referred to the sharp point. If the objects had holes or perforations in them,

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 7.2. Proto Polynesian terms for `things' Probable gloss (PPN interstage) Thing Limb; tool, weapon Treasured possession, especially a garment (or mat?) Part, side or half of something Measured part or portion (extended armspan) Span, fathom (Hand)span (measurement)

Proto Oceanic

*dopa *zanga

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

P2

*meqa *alanga *ta(a)qonga

25 10 11

3

*faqa-si *ngafa

23 6

3

*rofa *hanga

12 13

3 3

3

PSA 3

3 3 3 3 3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

they would have been called *putu; piercing, drilling, or making a hole in them employed the verb *fohu. Pieces, parts, or fragments from most objects seem to be covered by *konga. Parts or portions of some things were measured in *ngafa, something approximating an arm-span. Ethnographically, re¯exes of PPN *rofa imply a span or fathom, and are sometimes associated with measuring lengths of bark cloth, or the size of sailing canoes and their parts.3 It is probably related to the customary measurement by hand-spans (POC *zanga and PPN *hanga). Although the *ngafa re¯ex is not represented in Eastern Polynesian languages, measurements in arm-span units are known in Maori, for example (Leach 1976:185±86, 215±17). 4 For things like tools and weapons, PPN *mata denoted a point, blade, or cutting edge, and *lipi its sharp or cutting edge. For tools like adzes, the butt end was called *reke in PNP, a term also likely to have been used by PPN speakers. Pottery and other containers Containers in Ancestral Polynesian culture (Table 7.3) may be divided into durable (pottery) and perishable (plant material) types. PPN *ngaqati apparently referred to an empty container, such as a mollusk shell, coconut endocarp, or pod of a plant. With a suitable suf®x as modi®er, it also had the meaning of `skull.' Whether *ngaqati could apply to pottery vessels we do not know. However, it almost certainly did cover containers made of coconut, and probably those of wood and basketry as well.

Material culture

167

Table 7.3. Proto Polynesian terms for containers Probable gloss (PPN interstage) Empty container, such as a gourd, shell, husk, pod, skull Large wooden bowl Bowl for kava Half-coconut shell used as a drinking cup; container for liquid Cup-like container Basket Bag, basket (also belly) Small bag or basket, used for personal effects Box Food-serving mat, shallow platter Earthenware pot; cooking pot Water jar Hole at base of tree to hold water (TON, EUV) Plate, dish, bowl, basin Stopper, bung Mould (clay, etc.) (EFU, REN) Cook on open ®re (and probably to ®re a pot) Earth, dirt, soil (and probably also clay) To strike or beat (as with paddle and anvil?)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

P2

PSA

*nagqati

8

PCP *kumete *kumete PCP *tanoxa *taanoqa *ubi/*ibu *ipu

27 9 26

3 3 3

3 3 3

*kabu *katu PEOC *kete *tanga

*kapu *kato *kete *tanga

14 8 25 14

3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3

12 9 6

3 3

*kuron

*pusa *laulau *kulo FIJ saqaa haka

3

3 3 3

*paa *qumoti *puli-puli (?) *tunu

6 8 2 28

3 3 3

3

27

3

3

*buli *tunu

3

3 3 3

PCP g(w)ele *kele *taa

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

Ceramics in Ancestral Polynesia For years, Polynesians were regarded as a people who had either completely lost, or never engaged in, the art of pottery making (Brown 1919; Skinner 1951:43; Urban 1964). However, post-World War II archaeology soon documented that pottery manufacture had been a common cultural practice

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throughout the ®rst millennium BC in Tonga, Samoa, `Uvea, and Futuna, before its manufacture ceased in the initial centuries of the ®rst millennium AD. Potsherds from imperishable ± but easily broken ± ceramic vessels dominate in the excavation records from sites assigned to Ancestral Polynesian culture. Despite various explanations as to why Polynesians ceased making pottery (Leach 1982; Marshall 1985; Le Moine 1987; Green 1989b), there is no fully accepted scenario. Environmental reasons, such as the dif®culty of ®nding suitable clays for making pottery, are not a viable explanation. After all, early Polynesians, as well as their Eastern Lapita ancestors, made pottery within their Western Polynesian homeland quite successfully for more than a thousand years. Most important may have been functional shifts in the methods of food preparation and cooking, plus changes in the social value of pottery (manufactured by women?) which became a largely utilitarian plainware, leading to its eventual replacement by containers made in wood (manufactured by men?). Pottery manufacture in Polynesia thus ceased shortly after the break-up of Ancestral Polynesian culture and the movement of populations into the northern atoll islands of Western Polynesia, the Outliers, and central Eastern Polynesia. In these areas, despite a few handfuls of sherds on some islands (Tuvalu, Tokelau, Southern Cooks, Marquesas), no good evidence for sustained pottery manufacture has ever been found. The long-term use of pottery vessels in Polynesia is thus con®ned to the ancestral homeland. Ancestral Polynesian ceramics represent a continuing pottery tradition from the preceding Eastern Lapita phase, between c. 2900 and 2600 BP (Burley 1998). The highly decorated ceramics of the Early Eastern Lapita cultural complex include a whole range of shouldered jars and a number of dish-like bowls not found in the later plainwares associated with Ancestral Polynesian culture (Sand 1992:214) (Fig. 7.1). With the loss of the decorated vessels around 600 to 700 BC, what remained was a utilitarian plainware, which continued to be manufactured for some 800 to 900 years, or perhaps longer. Archaeology informs us not only of the ubiquitous nature of pottery in Ancestral Polynesian communities, but of the range of vessel forms and sizes, and of variability in their distribution within the Ancestral Polynesian region. There have been three principal attempts to classify the pottery vessels of the Ancestral Polynesian homeland: (1) Green (1974a:250±53 and ®g. 90) proposed thirteen vessel types for the largely plainware bowl forms of Samoa; (2) Kirch (1988:156±66) de®ned ten types for Niuatoputapu in northern Tonga; and (3) Poulsen (1987:86±103, ®gs. 42±53) applied a more complicated scheme to Tongatapu. Sand (1992) reduced this variation to nine undecorated vessel forms that commonly occur in both Early Eastern

Material culture

Fig. 7.1

169

Pottery vessel shapes in Ancestral Polynesia (modi®ed after Sand 1992).

Lapita and later Polynesian Plainware contexts, plus nine other decorated vessel forms, only three of which also occur in the undecorated category (Figure 7.1). These vessel forms display important distributional differences. Admittedly, plainware assemblages exhibiting varying numbers of vessel types may re¯ect no more than functional differences between the areas of the sites excavated (i.e., sampling error). However, the occurrence of cooking pot and

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

water jar forms in sites on `Uvea, Futuna, and Tonga ± but not Samoa ± is signi®cant, as is the dominance of open-bowl forms in Samoa, but not in `Uvea, Futuna, or Tonga. The key point is that regional differentiation in pot forms (as in adzes, see below) was already established in Ancestral Polynesian culture, and can be traced back to the Early Eastern Lapita period (Kirch 1988:186±88 and table 29). Technological studies of these ceramic assemblages also reveal that most pottery was made locally and was not extensively traded or exchanged between communities (e.g., Kirch 1988; Dickinson et al. 1996). We now turn to linguistic and ethnographic evidence to expand on this archaeological picture. Reviewing POC pottery terms, Ross (1996b:69) observed that it is not evident either from material catalogs of Lapita pottery forms, or from modern Oceanic speakers' pot forms (May and Tuckson 1982; Green 1990), how these types might have been emically classi®ed by Proto Oceanic speakers. However, the modern pot-users' terminologies do offer clues. Indeed, ``most Oceanic languages have a quite simple [pot] terminology'' (Ross 1996b:69), restricted to three or four main meanings. There is typically one generic taxon for `pot,' and four speci®c categories: `cooking pot,' `water jar,' `bowl/dish,' and `frying pan,' with lexical reconstructions for the last being the least secure. A ®fth category of both imperishable and perishable vessels may have been overlooked: `ladle, dipper, or cup,' POC *kabu (Lichtenberk 1994:284). Certainly all ®ve categories are represented in either FIJ or Polynesian, and all are attested archaeologically as functional pot forms in Ancestral Polynesian assemblages. The generic taxon for `pot' is PPN *kulo, derived from POC *kuron, which also carried the speci®c meaning of `earthenware or cooking pot' (Osmond and Ross 1998:68).5 The FIJ term for a pottery water jar or drinking vessel is saqaa; it has one known Polynesian cognate in a nominal form in TON6 and is represented both archaeologically and in the PPN verbal form *saka, meaning `to boil' (see below). A plate, platter, or bowl/dish form is PPN *paa, which in FIJ is designated by love or tabula (Geraghty 1996b:428), and in Eastern FIJ by vulu-vulu (Ross 1996b:69). The FIJ term for a pottery ``fry pan'' form is i-tavu teke which literally means `roast on embers' as well as `potsherd put under a pot to support it' preceded by an ``instrument-deriving morpheme'' (Ross 1996b:79, fn. 3). What is indicated is a broken potsherd set on a ®re or embers, and used to roast or cook food; this meaning is also found in some of the extra-Polynesian languages supporting a POC reconstruction, *palanga for ``frying pan'' (Ross 1996b:70).7 There is no PPN re¯ex for POC *palanga, but both a shallow dish-like form (Ross 1996b:1d) and large individual potsherds with ®re marks on one side are present in Ancestral Polynesian ceramic assemblages, and might have functioned in this way.

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171

A category not suggested by Ross, but reconstructed as a ``miscellaneous'' form by Lichtenberk (1994:285) is POC *kabu, `ladle, dipper, cup?,' which Blust (1972) also indicates was a PAN lexeme for `ladle or dipper.' No equivalent archaeological pottery forms are known to us from early Southeast Asian, Far Western Lapita, or Western Lapita sites, so initially such objects may have been made in perishable materials. However, cup-like forms (similar or larger than coconut half-shell, PPN *ipu) have been recovered as decorated ceramic forms from Early Eastern Lapita sites on Futuna and Niuatoputapu (Sand 1992: ®g. 3; Kirch 1988:157), and as plainware versions from sites on several islands in Western Polynesia (Kirch 1988: table 23; Sand 1992: ®g. 3). These ceramic cups continue into the Polynesian Plainware assemblages of Ancestral Polynesia. We posit that they were marked by the PPN linguistic category *kapu, for which POLLEX provides the gloss `cup-like container made from a shell or leaf '; in our view, they were once also made of pottery. One function for such *kapu seems to have been as a scoop or ladle. Linguistic reconstructions tell us little about the actual forms of objects, and the functions of pottery vessels may have been multiple (Ross 1996b:77). However, drawing on the known range of plainware vessel shapes for Western Polynesia as assembled by Kirch (1988:156±67, table 28) and Sand (1992: ®gs. 3 and 4), we can use ethnography to make some inferences about likely functions. There are PPN *kapu cup-like containers, sometimes in pottery, in Tonga, Samoa, and `Uvea, and PPN *ipu perishable containers, most often in coconut shell. In Samoa, these served as drinking cups for water and for serving liquid foods, for kava drinking, and for holding dyes used in bark cloth manufacture (Hiroa 1930:104, 139, 150±51, 306). Given the potential for interchanging terms and functions between vessels made of pottery or of wood, one can go further. The two large plainware restricted-neck globular pot or jar forms known from Tongatapu, `Uvea, and Futuna (illustrated by Sand 1992: ®g. 3; see our Figure 7.1) can be identi®ed as the probable material referent for PPN *kulo. These presumably functioned as such pots do today in Fiji, for boiling or steaming foods like taro. The squat or more globular pot shapes, such as Niuatoputapu types 8A and 8B, were de®nitely present in northern Tonga at this time (Kirch 1988: table 23). POC etyma for boiling and steaming are not easy to distinguish, but were probably *nasu and *napu; in PPN `to boil food in water' was *saka, as it is in FIJ and in PCP.8 Plainware pottery jars with handles, known archaeologically from Tonga, `Uvea, and Futuna (Sand 1992: ®g. 3; Kirch 1988: table 23), were lost from Polynesian material culture over the last two millennia. They, and perhaps the PPN *kulo form with a restricted mouth, may have had stoppers or bungs, often of leaves, suggested by PPN *qumoti.9 Morphological variation in unrestricted-mouth bowls of plainware pottery

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is attested in Western Samoa (Green 1974b: ®gs. 57, 59, 60), `Uvea (Sand 1992: ®gs. 3, 4), and to some extent in northern Tonga (Kirch 1988:156, 160, table 23). These forms were likely referred to as *paa, whether made from wood or pottery. Green (1974b:129) drew on Hiroa's ethnography (1930) for comparable wooden forms, noting that small and medium-sized vessels of this form were used to hold arrowroot paste, and dyes for decorating bark cloth, and for preparing various foods. The wooden forms could also be used to pound cooked breadfruit in, or to cook food by dropping heated stones into their interiors. Moreover, where heating was required for paste, dye, or food preparation, the pottery vessels could have been placed directly on the ®re without resorting to heated stones. Another possible function noted by Green (1974b) for the medium and large pottery bowls ± particularly the shallow ones ± was as kava containers, referenced by PPN *taanoqa (see above; see also Kirch [1988:162] regarding slightly earlier decorated Lapita bowl forms suggested as serving this purpose). The last pottery category, a shallow unrestricted earthenware cooking pot, is rather unsatisfactorily referred to by Ross (1996b:70±71, ®g. 1d) as a ``frying pan.'' This pot shape is known from a single example in Western Samoa (Green 1974b: ®g. 60d), but is also present among the Eastern Lapita vessel forms of Tonga (Burley 1998: ®g. 4). However, large broken potsherds may frequently have been used to roast, grill, or cook over an open ®re, as suggested by the PPN term *tunu (see Chapter 6). Such cooking on sherds is a likely but as yet inadequately documented practice, perhaps because archaeologists have not looked for speci®c evidence pertaining to it. We are reminded of large body sherds we have seen, in assemblages of this period, with one or both sides blackened by ®re, that might have served as such cooking sherds. Fijian dialects for potting centers provide a rich set of terms for materials, tools, and processes used in pot production (Geraghty 1996b:425±28). This is not the case in Polynesia, where, owing to the later loss of ceramics, no matching ethnography is possible. For example, FIJ qwela, qele, `clay,' has a much wider meaning in both POC and FIJ as `earth, or dirt.' Similarly, PPN *kele, with a primary meaning of `earth, dirt or soil' likely had a semantic extension indexing `potting clay.'10 The PPN verb *keli, `to dig,' may have extended to `digging clay,' as it does in some places in Fiji (Geraghty 1996b:426). FIJ tara, with the generic meaning `to do or make' is in one dialect applied to making or shaping pottery, hinting that the PPN verb *taa, `to strike or beat,' may have also applied to shaping or beating pottery, using the archaeologically documented paddle-and-anvil process which followed initial slab construction (Green 1974b:129; Kirch 1988:154±55). One term with a POC antiquity, *buli, `mold or shape' as of clay, etc. (Ross 1996b:75), means `to make or shape pottery' in some FIJ dialects (Geraghty 1996b:426).

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173

We ®nd modern re¯exes of this term in the Polynesian Outlier languages of EFU and REN as pulipuli, meaning `to fold together or mold' (as of puddings). On that basis *puli, `to mold or shape clay, etc. as in potting,' might be attributed to PPN as well. The PMP and POC term for the paddle used to beat clay into shape, *tapik (Ross 1996b:79) has not been encountered by us as a Polynesian nominal re¯ex, although it occurs in FIJ.11 Another PMP and POC lexical form, *tunu, meaning both `to roast in the ®re' and `to ®re a pot' (Ross 1996b:76), has a speci®c Fijian association with pottery in a ®ring hearth, dunua, tunua for baking the pots (Geraghty 1996b:426). Thus it is likely the PPN meaning for *tunu extended from `cook on open ®re, roast, grill,' to baking pots in an open ®re, the usual and widespread Oceanic method for pottery ®ring (Kirch 1988:155±56). In sum, starting with archaeologically recovered ceramics from Ancestral Polynesian sites, we have searched the linguistic and ethnographic evidence to seek the probable emic, lexical categories by which the PPN speakers indexed these ubiquitous objects (Figure 7.2). Despite the later loss of ceramics in all Polynesian cultures, a surprising number of reconstructable terms exist. These often have transformed meanings in their Polynesian re¯exes, applying for example to wooden vessels with equivalent shapes. Nonetheless, drawing upon the range of meanings that have persisted in the extra-Polynesian witnesses of these terms (which in PPN usually were retentions from POC), we have made a case for reconstructing a reasonably extensive PPN pottery vocabulary. Non-ceramic containers As Ross (1996b:71) observes, pottery terms may also come to be applied to non-ceramic vessels of similar shape, and the opposite is probably true as well. Certain shapes of Ancestral Polynesian pottery containers exhibit temporal continuity in Samoan wooden vessel counterparts (Green 1974b:129±30). In general, wooden bowls were known in POC as *tabiRa, a lexical form with this meaning attested only as far east as Eastern Fiji (Ross 1996b:72). The POC lexeme was replaced in PPN by *kumete (wooden bowl), a term that in FIJ sometimes refers to a wooden kava bowl, as opposed to a Fijian pottery kava bowl, dare or dari (Geraghty 1996b:428). A specialized wooden bowl for kava is reconstructible as PPN *taanoqa. This word was later borrowed into FIJ and ROT, along with the actual wooden bowl form, as tanoa (Geraghty 1983:374, 382), although the PPN etymon has been irregularly derived from PCP *tanoxa, taxona12 for `a kind of bowl' (cf. PFJ *takona), presumably in wood. In addition there was a word for a `box' or `case' of wood, PPN *pusa. A carrying cord or handle for these items was designated by PPN *ka(a)wei. No systematic study of Polynesian wooden

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Fig. 7.2

Conceptual terms for Proto Polynesian containers, and their realization in plainware pottery vessels of the Ancestral Polynesian culture.

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175

food bowls is known to us, and Hiroa (1944:415) merely remarks they were ``used throughout Polynesia [and] vary in shape and in special features such as legs, handles, lids and carving.'' Other common perishable containers in Polynesia are those made from coconut shells, or from gourds, as vessels for small quantities of liquids (PPN *ipu, derived from POC *ubi/i*ibu). This word is one of three POC terms with similar meanings that Ross (1996b:73) is able to reconstruct, but is the only one that continues into PN. Ross observes that all three re¯exes never seem to refer to ceramic vessels, in contrast to frequent references to coconut shells. Rather, we think that another PPN term, *kapu, referred to a small ceramic cup shaped like a coconut half-shell. Utilitarian bamboo containers used as bottles to transport and store ¯uids or other liquid-based foods, usually with a plug of green leaves for the open end, are a widespread feature in Polynesian societies except New Zealand (Linton 1923:355; Hiroa 1930:105). Thus, the perishable bamboo ¯uid container was likely a common artifact in Ancestral Polynesia. No special name seems to have attached to them, and the term for bamboo plant, PPN *kohe (also applied to a bamboo knife), was appropriated for that item. A third class of perishable containers were manufactured of woven and wooden materials. These included PPN *kato, `basket,' and *kete, `bag' or `basket,' both continuations of POC forms, as well as PPN *tanga, `bag.' For bags and basketry a recent Polynesian-wide survey (Connor 1983) allows one to infer a number of aspects of the kinds of kit bags and basketry that probably existed at the Ancestral Polynesian stage. The two main plant materials from which these perishable containers were made are parts of the coconut tree, PPN *niu, and the leaves of various species of pandanus, PPN *fara, especially Pandanus tectorius. Another member of the pandanus family (Freycinetia sp.), PNP *kiekie,13 stands as the third major plant ®ber used in basketry and plaited containers (Connor 1983:12±39). From these materials two kinds of temporary containers, simple rough plaited platters, PPN *laulau, and kit bags, PPN *kete, were also manufactured (Connor 1983:71±76). While plaiting is nearly ubiquitous in Polynesia, certain other techniques of weaving, twining, coiling, and netting are restricted to Western Polynesia, with only Tonga exhibiting all ®ve, raising the question of whether these represent innovations, or loss. Twining, a widespread technique in Polynesian ®sh traps and clothing, and which occurs in basketry in Hawaii, Tahiti, and New Zealand, was almost certainly an Ancestral Polynesian technique (Connor 1983:93±94). In addition, Connor argues that the highly decorated, non-utilitarian Tongan kato alu coiled basket, as well as the twined kato mosi kaka, have their ancestry in the Lapita cultural complex of Western Polynesia (Connor 1983:162±64), based on the technological evidence, the forms and

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 7.4. Proto Polynesian terms for industrial tools Probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

Adz, axe Adz, axe (PNP tattooing chisel) Adz, axe handle or haft (of wood) Fragment File, rasp, saw Whetstone, grindstone Abrasive stone, grindstone

*toki *toki *matau *matau *p(w)aRara *tuukau *konga *kiri[-] *kili *fuqanga PNP *fo(q,o)anga PEOC *sele *sele *wiri(t) *wili *qola

Knife, cut with a knife Drill Wedge

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1 30 6 7 7 6 20 13 19 8 7

P2

3

PSA 3

3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3

3 3 3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

motifs in their decoration, and other comparisons with artifacts in bark cloth, tattooing, and wood. If so, their presence at the Ancestral Polynesian level may be inferred. Industrial tools Historical linguistic reconstructions and archaeological evidence also intersect in the domain of tools ± largely of stone ± for chopping, cutting, drilling, and shaping things (Table 7.4), which included adzes or axes, chisels, gouges, ®les, whetstones and grindstones, drills, wedges, and simple basalt, obsidian, and chert ¯ake tools. Chief among these is the Ancestral Polynesian adz kit (Green 1971, 1974a) from which the later adz types of both Eastern and Western Polynesia were derived. The Ancestral Polynesian adz kit Starting with nineteenth-century steel adzes in Great Britain, for which there are extensive listings and illustrations of named adz types and their illustrations, Leach (1996) derived some principles to assist in the classi®cation of Polynesian stone-headed adzes. Nonetheless, she adopted a negative

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177

stance that, for prehistoric Polynesia, ``we can never know the indigenous type concepts (let alone their names)'' (Leach 1996:419). Our view is less pessimistic, for reasons we hope to demonstrate after reviewing archaeological stone adz head classi®cations. Leach (1996:416) concludes her discussion of improved Polynesian adz head classi®cations by observing that functional taxonomies (types of adzes used for speci®c purposes) are the most useful to archaeologists. Such taxonomies might focus on: shape or morphology; technology of production; level of skill in production; stage of use in life cycle of tool; and style or fashion. She also comments that, in Polynesian-wide classi®cations, morphology ± especially of adz cross-sections ± has proven most effective (Leach 1996:417). This approach has produced thirteen cross-section shape categories (Green 1971: ®g. 2; 1974a: ®g. 92). In Samoa, Green and Davidson (1969) used shape to reduce the number of types to ten, a large number of which occur in Ancestral Polynesian contexts (Green 1974a: table 28). We take the ``early Samoan adz assemblage'' as most representative of the Ancestral Polynesian kit (Green 1974a:265), because for the Tongan group (Kirch 1988:192±204), `Uvea, or Futuna (Kirch 1981), data on adzes are more limited, especially for archaeologically excavated specimens from plainware ceramic contexts. How might we reduce this variety of archaeologically recovered adz head types to its functional essentials at the period of Ancestral Polynesian culture? Leach (MS)14 does this by revising the Green/Davidson adz typology based on morphological shape, according to technological principles involved in adz production. Leach's revisions are based on technological studies of the Tatagamatau adz quarry materials from Tutuila Island (American Samoa), especially the preform blanks and the ways these were reduced and ®nished to produce the variety of morphological shapes identi®ed by Green and Davidson. As Leach (MS) states, ``we have reached the stage now where Samoan adze classi®cation must explicitly incorporate technological variables as well as those relating to ®nish, function, or shape.'' This yields a concise ®ve-category description of the early Samoan adz kit (c. 2600±1800 BP), which also best serves as a basis to characterize that for Ancestral Polynesia. To quote Leach: In summary, at the end of the ceramic era, the Samoan adze kit was created from a variety of blank types ranging in size from small thin ¯akes to pieces a little over 65 mm thick and 172 mm long. The adze makers were suf®ciently skilled to produce blanks amenable to trilateral ¯aking as well as the more common bilateral, bifacial shaping techniques. At this time they deliberately manufactured: (1) robust, heavy, bilaterally ¯aked plano-convex adzes with curved cutting edges (Type Va); (2) triangular and high plano-convex sectioned adzes with narrow cutting edges,

178

(3) (4) (5)

Rediscovering Hawaiki made from trilaterally ¯aked platforms (Types Vb, VI, VII, and possibly IX), usually of large size; small, light rectangular adzes and chisels, usually ¯at-ground (Type III); light reverse sub-triangular or reverse trapezoidal-sectioned adzes with sharp, straight cutting edges (Type IV); a variety of light ¯ake adzes of variable thickness and cross-section, in general of quadrangular form, with most showing a tendency to have the bevel formed on the widest face of the adze (Type I/II and possibly Type IX/X). (Leach MS: 36)

Leach's (MS) collapsing of the Samoan Types Vb, VI, and VII into a single category ± based on a similar trilateral preform technology ± with variation being limited to the ®nished shapes of their cross-sections, puts the emphasis on the Samoan technological innovation. By the ®rst millennium AD, triangular (or triangular, then rounded-by-grinding) cross-section adzes were no longer just small or experimental forms. This suggests that they had a longer history of successful manufacture, extending back into the ®rst millennium BC.15 Within the Ancestral Polynesian homeland, there is marked regional variation in the distribution of adz types (Figure 7.3). Heavy curved cuttingedge adzes (Type Va) were widely distributed from Manu`a in American Samoa (Kirch 1993b:158) to Futuna and Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:192, 203), and Tongatapu (Green 1974a: ®g. 92). In contrast, light ¯ake adzes of quadrangular section (Samoa types I/II) occurred only minimally in Tongatapu (Green 1974a: ®g. 91), and not at all in Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:192). The larger Samoa types IX/X (dominant later in Niuatoputapu [Kirch 1988:192±98]) are rare in both regions, and are only indirectly attributable to the ceramic period in Niuatoputapu. They have not been found at all in plainware contexts in Tongatapu (Poulsen 1987:164±79). The small light rectangular-sectioned adzes and chisels (Samoa Type III) are again uncertainly attributed to ceramic contexts in Niuatoputapu, although found in Tongatapu. However, only one among the triangular and high plano-convex category of Samoan adzes ± which constitute a Polynesian technological innovation ± has been found in plainware contexts in Tonga, and in Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:192; Green 1974a: ®g. 92), where even in later periods triangular adzes are rare, and often imports. Finally, the light reverse-subtriangular or trapezoidal adzes are absent from anywhere in Tonga at this period. Greater regional differences are found in adz heads manufactured from shell, only a single example in Cassis sp. shell having been found with plainware pottery in Samoa, where shell adzes at any time period are extremely rare (Kirch 1993b:158). In contrast, in both Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:198) and Tongatapu (Green 1974a: ®g. 91) ovoid-to-quadrangular cross-section adzes made from the hinge portion of Tridacna shell are

Material culture

Fig. 7.3

Industrial tools: adzes in Ancestral Polynesian culture (top half, Samoan types; bottom half, Tongan types).

179

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

common, and there are also a Terebra shell chisel, and a Conus shell adz, from Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:198). Poulsen (1987:182±83) found a late plainware-period Terebra shell chisel, and some of his Conus shell gouges may date from this period. Another category of adz heads absent in Samoa, but known from plainware contexts in Tongatapu (Green 1974a: ®g. 91), are the planilateral and circular-to-elliptical sectioned forms made in stone. These re¯ect a continuity from shell adzes, continuing forms from the preceding Lapita period. In Samoa, where adz makers had access only to dense oceanic basalt rocks, and where large Tridacna shells are rare, the new triangular-sectioned forms were therefore an adaptation. Thus ``when people crossed the andesite line to settle Samoa and the rest of Polynesia, they found it necessary to manufacture their entire adze kit from a restricted range of ®ne grained basalts whose ¯aking properties and strengths differed from those previously used'' (Green 1974b:144). It is not currently possible to provide lexical categories that may have been used by PPN speakers in classifying their adzes. Several factors are at play. Firsthand information on adz manufacture and use in most Polynesian societies disappeared early after European contact (see Green 1974a:254). Because of this, folk taxonomies showing how Polynesians classi®ed adzes and other stone tools are limited to a few cases. Likewise, indigenous names for adz types seldom occur in dictionaries or ethnographies, severely limiting the evidence for reconstruction at any proto-language level within PN. The POLLEX database provides only the CEP term *koma, for some as yet undetermined kind of adz. There is, of course, the PPN etymon *toki, the generic cover term for tools we call adzes, axes, and chisels (each in English having a different technological de®nition and name). Re¯exes of *toki display stable prime semantic agreement, meaning `adz' through all stages from PPN down through lowerorder interstages and daughter languages (Table 7.4). Occasionally the referent is to `axe,' as opposed to `adz,' but often both meanings occur, hence these are what POLLEX provides for its PPN gloss. As Green (1994:179) explains, archaeologists would expand the usual meaning of adz ± as this is technically de®ned in English ± to cover axes and chisels within the generic PPN *toki taxon. This is justi®ed on the grounds that there are no contrasting reconstructable PPN lexemes with the meaning axe or chisel, although on occasion other words in some Polynesian languages do mean chisel or axe. Moreover, we question the meaning `axe' as entirely appropriate for PPN *mata(q)u, although that was its POC meaning (see below). Also, on archaeological evidence, stone adz heads, while functionally hafted and employed predominately as adzes in Polynesia, also functioned at times as axes and chisels (Hiroa 1930:362±64).16

Material culture

Fig. 7.4

181

Industrial tools: saw, ®les, whetstones, grinding stones, stone and coral abraders, drill points and bow drill.

The POC etymon *toki carried the verbal meaning of `to cut, chop, and peck,' but not that of an adz, axe or chisel (Ross, Clark, and Osmond 1998:235, 256). Rather, the generic name for `adz or axe' in POC was *kiRam, while in PCP they were referred to as *kia (Geraghty 1990:62). A semantic change in the meaning of *toki therefore occurred at PPN level, as other words took on the meanings of `to cut, chop, and peck'; for instance, PPN *tongi, *talai, or perhaps even *to®, where an association with the concept of `adzing' occurs intermittently among the daughter language re¯exes. Finally, because both the Lapita and Ancestral Polynesian adz kits included adz heads in shell, as well as stone, and because some Oceanic re¯exes including one Polynesian witness still mean `shell adz,' ``it is probable the meaning of *kia (and then *toki ) always covered axe/adzes with heads in shell as well as those in stone'' (Green 1994:179). POLLEX lists PPN *mata(q)u with the meaning `axe,' as in the Eastern FIJ

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dialects (Geraghty 1996b:425±26). We do not accept this semantic reconstruction, (a) because its re¯exes mean `tattooing chisel' in ®ve of the Polynesian Outlier dialects critical to the PPN reconstruction; (b) because the Western FIJ witnesses refer to various tools including a digging stick and paddle for shaping pottery (Geraghty 1996b), and in Bauan FIJ also `adz' (Osmond and Ross 1998:89); and (c) because Hiroa (1930:330±31) interpreted its meaning in the name of the important Tutuila adz quarry of Tataga-matau as the `preform stage of adz manufacture' (see also Leach and Witter 1987:33), rather than `axe.' We would like to suppose that PPN *mata(q)u might have indexed a `preform,' but on the available evidence that is sheer speculation. More likely is the PNP meaning of `tattooing comb' (see below), or a miniature form of bone or shell comb-like adz for tattooing. The Polynesian literature often speaks of adz heads simply as ``adzes,'' but we believe from our experience that the PPN term *toki applied both to the whole tool with its haft, and to the stone or shell adz/axe/chisel head. The haft and handle, however, were clearly distinguished from the adz head by the PNP term *tuukau, which likely also applied at the level of Ancestral Polynesian culture, even if we cannot reconstruct the etymon to PPN itself. Wooden adz hafts have been recovered from the Vaito`otia-Fa`ahia wet site of early Eastern Polynesian age (Sinoto 1982), but not yet from any Ancestral Polynesian site. On comparative ethnographic evidence, they probably consisted largely of the toe, or on occasion medium type of haft (Hiroa 1944:443, ®g. 269). In addition, if Leach (MS) is correct, the groove or slot in the foot of a heel-type haft ± allowing Type IVb Samoan adz heads to be mortised into it ± would also have been present. Mead (1968, 1971) applied in-depth comparative ethnological studies to Polynesian adz hafts and their decorative lashing patterns (by which the adz heads were attached to the handles). He identi®ed some nine out of thirty-four decorative design units occurring on adz handles as extending back to the Ancestral Polynesian level (Mead 1971: table 2). Other implements and tools Items for shaping stone, shell, bone, or wood, including saws or ®les, whetstones and grinding stones, and stone abraders are all archaeologically evidenced at various Ancestral Polynesian sites (Green 1974a:269, 1974b:149; Poulsen 1987:209±13; Kirch 1988:211±12, 1993b:162), and a few examples are shown in Figure 7.4. Two categories have corresponding PPN lexical reconstructions: *kili, for `saw or ®le,' and *fuqanga, for `whetstone or grindstone' (PNP *foanga referred to abrasive stone or grindstones). Whetstones or grindstones are associated with the shaping and ®nishing of adzes, as well as sharpening or resharpening their bevels.

Material culture

183

Poulsen's (1987:209±13) list of stone cutters or saws, branch coral ®les, seaurchin ®les, coral grinders, pumice grinders, and stone grinders covers the principal industrial tools encountered in sites associated with Ancestral Polynesian culture. Some were certainly used in ®shhook manufacture, but the remainder served as more general tools for making other objects. The concept of cutting things ± in the sense of slicing or incising them with a knife ± is carried by PPN *sele, with a nominal meaning of `knife' that goes back to PCP. It probably applied to obsidian and chert ¯ake tools recovered from Ancestral Polynesian contexts in Samoa and Tonga (Green 1974a:146±49, 1974b:268±69; Poulsen 1987:214; Kirch 1988:213±16, 1993b:165; Clark et al. 1997:80). However, obsidian was not abundant in Tonga or Samoa, with the exception of Niuatoputapu, and in one site in `Aoa Valley on Tutuila (Clark and Michlovic 1996). Imported chert was abundant only in early Niuatoputapu sites, and is rare elsewhere. The main obsidian sources in the core region of Western Polynesia were on Tafahi Island and adjacent Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:215), and somewhere on the island of Tutuila (Clark et al. 1997:80). The cherts were presumably imports, but have proved dif®cult to source, although Fiji and Futuna are likely possibilities (Kirch 1981). One might suppose that the PPN speakers had a speci®c term for obsidian or chert, beyond the generic *maka, `stone or rock.' Yet Osmond and Ross (1998:92±93, 113±14; see also Osmond 1996) could not reconstruct with certainty such a term for POC, the most likely contender being POC *nad(r)i, for `¯int or obsidian.' In PPN the same problem applies, with only PEP *mata-a, based on EAS and MAO re¯exes, plus a probable cognate for a `kind of stone' in Hawaiian, and a possible re¯ex and cognate for the `point of a spear' in TOK. Again the suggested meaning covers both obsidian and other isotropic stones that yield ¯akes with a sharp edge. Given the related PPN term *mata, `point, blade or cutting edge,' a PNP or even PPN lexeme may also have taken the form *mata-a. It bears further investigation. Many Ancestral Polynesian shell artifacts (especially ®shing gear and ornaments), as well as compound wooden artifacts such as canoe hulls, had holes drilled in them. The Polynesian ethnographic literature describes drill points of slate-pencil sea-urchin spines, worked pieces of coral, basalt and chert rocks, the tips of long spired shells, sting-ray spines, shark's teeth, and rat's teeth. One sea-urchin-spine abrader, distally worn to a circularsectioned point, was found in the plainware layers of the To`aga site in American Samoa, and was interpreted as a drill used to manufacture associated Turbo-shell ®shhooks (Kirch 1993b:162) (Figure 7.4). A tip of another such specimen was also found close by. Hiroa (1930:496) records Samoan ethnographic examples of pump drills with sea-urchin or stone drill

184

Rediscovering Hawaiki

points attached, and a later prehistoric drill point in stone was found in the Western Samoan site of Lotofaga (Davidson 1969:247). Stone drill points are one of the formal tool types recognized in ¯ake tool assemblages from Tutuila (Clark 1998:294). Thus both kinds of drill points recorded for Samoan pump drills are attested archaeologically. A probable coral example of a drill point (rather than a ``®le'' under which it is listed) is pictured by Poulsen (1987: pl. 73/3) and comes from Tongatapu. Two Polynesian words carry the meaning `to make a hole,' PPN *fohu, `to enter into, pierce,' and PPN *wili, `to twist or bore.' In some re¯exes, the same lexeme also covers indigenous types of drills, gimlets, and augers. The most usual form of a complete drilling rig employing such drill points is described as a ``pump drill.''17 In TUV and TIK these are referred to not as vili/viri but as mili and miri respectively.18 In just two cases a bow rather than a pump drill is mentioned as the rig, and only the Maori possessed a preEuropean type of cord wrapped shaft as their main drilling device (Best 1974:84±91; Hiroa 1962:194±96). On the combined evidence of archaeology, ethnology, and historical linguistics, therefore, the Ancestral Polynesians most likely used a pump drill termed *wili, employing sea-urchin, coral, and probably stone points (Figure 7.4). Finally among the list of perishable industrial tools is a wedge in wood, PNP *qola, for which we have no archaeological examples. Material culture domains with limited archaeological support In contrast with containers or industrial tools, for which both linguistics and archaeology provide mutually supporting evidence at the Ancestral Polynesian stage, other material culture domains lack strong archaeological witnesses. The domains in question are: (1) the bark cloth complex; (2) clothing and decoration for the human body, including tattooing; (3) weapons; (4) sports and games; (5) musical instruments; (6) houses; (7) canoes; and (8) cordage. Most of these domains have a few examples of durable items to which we can point for archaeological support, but in none is that list extensive. We treat these domains in summary fashion, although additional ethnological distributional and descriptive evidence might be adduced to support their reconstruction for the Ancestral Polynesian period. Bark cloth Despite the dearth of direct archaeological evidence for the Ancestral Polynesian bark cloth complex, one can hardly doubt its existence. The prime evidence is comparative ethnographic, supported by a robust set of

Material culture

185

PPN terms (Table 7.5). Based on this information, combined with the widespread Paci®c and Southeast Asian occurrence of the bark cloth complex (and an even greater archaeological antiquity in Southeast Asia), Green (1979b:16±17) argued that the manufacture and use of bark cloth was brought into the Fiji±Western Polynesian region by the ®rst Lapita settlers. He relied on the distributional and ethnographic evidence assembled by Kooijman (1972:430±32), augmented by linguistic evidence, and demonstrated that many designs on ethnographic bark cloth have close parallels with those on Eastern Lapita-style pottery, dating to 2900±2600 BP. Matthews (1996:119) has focused on the ethnobotany of the paper mulberry plant (Broussonetia papyrifera), the major source of ®ber for Polynesian bark cloth.19 Again, the historical distribution of Broussonetia, ranging from mainland through Island Southeast Asia and into Melanesia, supports a Southeast Asian origin of the plant (Matthews 1996: ®g. 2). However, as Matthews (1996:128) notes: There is no reason to doubt that tapa was made during the Lapita period, but paper mulberry was not necessarily used by the makers of Lapita pottery. The plant could have reached the Paci®c Islands after the Lapita period. Lapita artistic traditions could have been transmitted indirectly to tapa made from B. papyrifera ± via tapa made from other plants, or by other media.

Thus the PPN reconstruction of *siapo, meaning both `bark cloth' and the `paper mulberry plant,' furnishes the most secure linguistic evidence of its antiquity, although this takes it back only to the plainware stage of Ancestral Polynesian culture, and not to that of the decorated Eastern Lapita pottery horizon. Our view is that many of the pottery designs of the Early Eastern Lapita horizon continued to be applied in Ancestral Polynesian culture to items of bark cloth. They may also have occurred as `design patterns' (PPN *kanu) on adz handles (see above) and other wooden objects, in tattooing (Green 1979b; Gell 1993:95±96, 190), and in mats and basketry (Taylor 1960; Conner 1983:162±64). Kaeppler (1978b, 1989:234) extends the underlying design principles to other artistic forms including music, dance, poetry, and sculpture. They thus constitute what DeBoer (1991:147±48) perceptively labeled a pervasive mode of decorative organization or art style, i.e., one that occurs across many kinds of media and on many different materials, as in his Shipibo case example.20 Archaeological items probably relating to bark cloth decoration, which occur in a number of sites, include pieces of red ochre carrying ®ne striations and other signs of modi®cation (Green 1974b:151±52; Poulsen 1987:214; Kirch 1988:218). Fine particles from rubbing this ochre were used to enhance the reddish-brown dye made from the bark of the Bischo®a javanica

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 7.5. The Proto Polynesian bark cloth complex, clothing, ornaments, and tattooing Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage) Bark cloth complex Paper mulberry plant (Broussonetia papyrifera); bark cloth Bark cloth (not printed or stained) Used bark cloth Old mat or bark cloth (Old) bark cloth or waist garment of bark cloth Tree (Bischo®a javanica) from bark of which a reddish dye for printing bark cloth is made Bark cloth beater or mallet To beat out bark cloth into felt Board or log on which bark cloth is beaten Pattern, design (e.g., on pottery, tapa, tattooing) Clothing in general Clothing or covering for the body Clothing (n); wrap food in leaves (v) Item of clothing, loin cloth, skirt Fine woven garment Loin cloth garment Fasten loin cloth or skirt Skirt or kilt worn for dancing Head accessories Head-dress Garland for head; headband Eyeshade Ear-pendant Ear-pendant Comb (n); to comb (v) Fly whisk, fan Body accessories and decoration Necklace Whale tooth; whale ivory Flower worn as decoration Ring (for the ®nger) Sew, thread, pierced objects on a string (as of beads, etc.)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*m(w)ase

*siapo

11

3

PEOC *taba *tapa PCP *ngatu *ngatu *nga®-nga® *leu-leu

8 7 7 11

3 3 3

PEOC *koka *koka

11

?

*ike *tutuk

*ike *tutu *tutu-a

15 13 11

3 3 3

PCP *kanu

*kanu

7

*kaput *kopu PCP *kie *kiRe *malo PCP *sulu

*kafu *kofu *kie *kiekie *malo *sulu *titi

25 5 10 9 23 6 14

*pale *faqu PNP taumata *sau PNP *faka-kai *selu *fue

15 16 7 3 5 22 10

*kasoa *rei *sei *mama *tui

11 16 19 6 27

PCP *sau

*tuRi

P2

PSA 3

3

3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3

3

3

3

3 3

3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

Material culture Paint, smear, rub oil on body or hair *vani Needle, tattooing needle (typically *saRum made from wing bone of ¯ying fox) Tattoo (of face or body) Foot accessory Sandal

187 *pani *hau

15 12

3 3

3 3

*tatau

13

3

3

*taka

8

3

3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

tree, PPN *koka. This was applied when printing designs on bark cloth in the Western Polynesian region (Kooijman 1972: table E), but was only one of the possible functions for red ochre powder. It supplied a basic ingredient for the red slip which sometimes occurs on pottery, and could be sprinkled over a corpse, perhaps wrapped in bark cloth, for burial (Green 1974b:152). Thus the presence of worked pieces of red ochre furnishes only equivocal support for inferring decorated bark cloth in Ancestral Polynesian culture. Unfortunately, a PPN term for ochre as robust as that for CEP *karaea has yet to be reconstructed, although it may have been covered by a semantic extension of the term for `red clay,' PPN *kele. Our view is that it is more likely to have had a separate term as it does in TON (`umea) today, and in Eastern Polynesia, but we cannot reconstruct it at present. Bodily decoration and tattooing An extensive set of PPN terms for clothing and decoration of the human body has been reconstructed (Table 7.5). On ethnographic and distributional grounds, these occurred as part of Ancestral Polynesian culture (Linton 1923:454). Insightfully, an early commentator on the subject of native clothing remarked, Polynesians ``have a high notion of decorating the head and shoulders. The tatoo [sic] is considered the chief adornment for the body'' (Ella 1899:170). That pattern of dress, it seems, was an ancient one given the PPN reconstructions we have assembled. Regrettably, except for tattooing (Gell 1993), we lack modern comparative studies for these domains. Archaeologically, items of bodily adornment dating to the Ancestral Polynesian period (Figure 7.5) are limited to narrow shell bracelets, bangles, or armbands of various kinds, small shell rings, small beads of shell and bone, stone beads, and long ``circular units'' of shell ( Janetski 1980b; Poulsen 1987:215±17; Kirch 1988:206±207, 1993b:162±63). A number of shell

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Fig. 7.5

Ornaments from archaeological sites of the Ancestral Polynesian phase.

species were used, primarily Conus, Trochus, and Tridacna. While these objects could have been used for various kinds of necklaces, ear rings, arm rings, and ®nger rings (all ethnographically attested functions), it is certainly the case that some of the so-called bracelet or armband pieces would never have ®tted on arms, and some of the rings are of insuf®cient size for adult ®ngers. As Poulsen (1987:198, 202, 204, 205) observes, rings of various sizes and beads often occur ethnographically in composite items such as necklaces, or sewn onto pieces of clothing such as belts. Moreover, to sew them on, or even easily string them into necklaces, would have required needles. Appropriate ®ne birdbone needles have been recovered from a few plainware assemblages in Tonga (Poulsen 1987:191). A `needle' for a variety of

Material culture

189

purposes comes under the category of PPN *sau, a form and meaning which derives from POC *saRum, while `to thread pierced objects on a string' (such as beads) or `to sew' is PPN *tui, derived from POC *tuRi with the meaning of `stringing things together' such as beads or ®sh, or `to skewer' (e.g., candlenuts). Although many of the items of clothing and body ornamentation reconstructed linguistically for PPN (Table 7.5) have no direct archaeological correlates, a few of those in shell do. This might apply to beads which could have been used in `necklaces,' PPN *kasoa, and PPN *mama, `ring for ®nger.' The main surprise is ®nding no PPN lexeme for a shell bracelet or armband, nor for a bead. Archaeologically, the existence of tattooing during the Eastern Lapita horizon is certain, on the basis of comb-like tattooing chisels found in sites in Tongatapu (Poulsen 1987:207). An associated pottery cup has been plausibly interpreted as having held the tattooing pigment.21 A fourth tattooing chisel came from an early but post-ceramic period pit. Poulsen (1987:107) notes that an identical set of tattooing chisels was collected in Tonga on the Cook voyages. This is suf®cient evidence to infer the continuity of these tattooing instruments ± and therefore tattooing ± throughout the Tongan sequence, and hence to attribute the practice to Ancestral Polynesian culture. One therefore expects to discover one or more lexemes for tattooing instruments at the PPN level, an expectation not entirely met. A reconstruction *usi, for tattooing instruments, exists only at the PEP level, and their antiquity at the early Eastern Polynesian stage is con®rmed archaeologically (e.g., Kirch et al. 1995). In Western Polynesia and the Outliers, two reconstructions are also possible. One, *mataqu, would see the Outlier instrument as a kind of miniature adz (cf. Linton 1923:417), for which the ®ve re¯exes of matau from ANU, NUK, ONJ, TAK, and TIK carry the meaning `tattooing instrument,' along with a Samoan form meaning `adz preform,' and a BAU and Eastern FIJ dialect form designated in the ethnographic sources as an `adz' or `axe.' The lexeme is therefore of undoubted PPN, and indeed POC, antiquity (Osmond and Ross 1998:89). POC in fact probably had two terms, *kiRam and *matau for `adz/axe.' A more plausible semantic history hypothesis in Polynesia might be that at the PNP stage *matau came to mean a comb-like tattooing ``adz'' of miniature size, with a later-stage development in meaning being an adz preform in Samoa, and a much later to modern one being an axe in some Eastern Fijian dialects. If so, then the competing form, PPN *hau, based on seven re¯exes, would have referred to a needle or pen-like form of tattooing instrument (often made from the wing bone of a ¯ying fox), as might be expected from the word's prime meaning of `needle' extending back to PMP *zaRum (Osmond and Ross 1998:87).

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Weapons The domain of war, warfare, and weapons has little archaeologically to support its existence at the Ancestral Polynesian stage. Even unequivocal sling stones have not been identi®ed for this period, although they may well occur among items identi®ed as probable ``hammerstones'' or among other rounded pebble manuports of appropriate size. Pointed-ended sling stones occur in Western Lapita sites and there is a POC term (*maga) for them (Osmond 1996:126, 130). Thus the occurrence of sling stones (and by inference, the sling) is to be expected at the Ancestral Polynesian stage. Some support is found in PPN *maka, a continuation of its POC form, for both a `sling' and `to hurl or to sling.' As for the spear or lance, it is dif®cult, as Osmond (1996:121) notes, to distinguish between spears for ®shing, fowling, and ®ghting. Everything we know ethnographically suggests the bow and arrow complex belongs not under weapons of warfare, but in the domain of sports and games, with ®shing and hunting birds being other functions which it also served (see below). At present, therefore, indications of the practice of warfare at the Ancestral Polynesian stage are limited to a small set of linguistic reconstructions (Table 7.6). Because these are not anywhere near as extensive as the wide range of clubs and weapons attested ethnographically, this suggests perhaps that war and warfare among these small-scale societies was limited.22 Forti®ed places, too, are probably a later phenomenon in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region (Best 1993), the PPN term *koro most likely referring to a fenced settlement, or similarly enclosed place. Games and sports One Polynesian game, widely documented archaeologically (Skinner 1946), is that in which shaped discs are bowled between two stakes positioned at some remove from the bowler. Archaeologists have recognized either probable or de®nite bowling stones, from plainware contexts in Samoa (Green 1974a:269) and Tongatapu (Poulsen 1987:208). Hiroa (1930:663) discusses the game's wide ethnographic distribution including Samoa, the Cook Islands, Hawai`i, and probably Tonga, where bowling disks were made of perishable materials in addition to stone. Poulsen (1987:208) con®rms the name teka for a disc made of Alocasia root in Tonga, while Koch (1984:176±77) describes bowling stones in Tuvalu, where they go under the names tika and teka on different islands. Linguistically (Table 7.6), the domain of games comes under the PNP category *ta(a)-kalo with the meaning of `to play' or a `game.' PPN *teka in verb form means `to roll, rotate, or spin,' and the leaf-wrapped spinning disc

Material culture

191

Table 7.6. Proto Polynesian terms for warfare, sports and games, and musical instruments Category/probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

War, warfare, weapons War, ®ght, make war War, war party Courageous, warrior Strike with a blow Weapon Spear, lance Shaft of a spear Stone, sling, slingshot; to sling, hurl Enclosed, fenced, or forti®ed settlement

*tau *tauqa *toqa *patuk *patu *masafu *sao(t) *tao *fuata *maga *maka PEOC *ko(d,r)o *kolo

Sports and games Cat's cradle, string ®gure games Whipping or spinning top Dart, to throw a dart

*tibwa(ng)

Name of game in which a spinning disc is used; to roll, rotate, spin Tossing game (like quoits) played with asymmetrical discs Disc used in *lafo game To shoot (with a bow) *p( w)anaq Reed, arrow Bowstring, taut *lolo(s) Musical instruments Drum, to drum, thump Wooden drum Bamboo nose ¯ute Trumpet

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1 23 23 21 18 3 23 8 20 17

*fai *moa *tika PCE *teka *teka

6 6 9

*lafo

5

7

P2

3 3 3

PSA 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3

3 3

3 3 3

3 3 3

3 3

*tupe *fana *ngasau *kalolo

10 25 8 6

3 3

3

*pasu *nafa *fangufangu *pu(q)u

9 10 8 22

3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

192

Rediscovering Hawaiki

or bowling stone as well as the game in which it was used were called *teka. However, later in CEP, a soundshift occurred in the vowel from *i to *e, giving CEP *tika, an ancestral word also meaning a dart throwing game. This meant that in Eastern Polynesian and probably in places at the PEC stage, *tika became *teka, leading to some confusion over the name of these games given in various sources. PPN *tika, however, was the original name for a quite different game. Its practice is described by Hiroa (1930:664) under the rubric ``throwing cord,'' and more fully by Moyle (1970). The characteristically shaped wooden dart points attached to a reed shaft used in this game have not been recovered archaeologically in tropical Polynesia, but in New Zealand bone points of identical shape have been found in early Archaic contexts (Davidson 1984: ®g. 56). Perhaps similar bone examples will one day also be found in appropriately aged sites of the core area of Western Polynesia. For now, the game's Ancestral Polynesian status rests on its ethnographic distribution including Fiji and Rotuma, and the linguistic evidence which extends back to POC (Osmond and Ross 1998:225±26). Another Polynesian pastime likely at the PPN stage is *lafo, a pitching game played with asymmetrically sided discs (*tupe), usually in wood, and with mats (or other features) as bounded spaces, on which the discs must stay to score. Other pastimes at the PNP level included *moa, a spinning top which could easily be found in a suitably shaped coral form, and *fai, string ®gure games.23 Both can be inferred to have been part of Ancestral Polynesian culture, but only the spinning top is ever likely to be con®rmed archaeologically. Although Linton (1923:452) placed the bow (and arrow) as an important weapon in contact-period Tonga, and stated that it was traditionally believed to have had such a role in New Zealand, in Tonga, Niue, and Hawai`i it served for hunting rats, in Tahiti and Tikopia for hunting birds, and in the Marquesas, Tikopia, and Samoa for some kinds of ®shing. It was also used in chie¯y sport in the Society Islands, and as a toy in the Marquesas, Hawai`i, and Samoa. Consequently, we do not believe the bow and arrow ever played an important role as a weapon in ancient Polynesian society, though it was certainly present. Musical instruments Words for four musical instruments are reconstructed linguistically at the PPN and PNP levels and are likely to have existed at the Ancestral Polynesian stage (Table 7.6). Triton shell examples of PNP *puu, `trumpet,' might in the future be recovered in archaeological excavations in Western Polynesian sites.24 The trumpet is certainly an item of Polynesian-wide

Material culture

193

distribution, occurs elsewhere archaeologically, and has a ®rm although different POC lexical reconstruction (Osmond and Ross 1998: 106±7). We have reconstructed PPN *fangufangu for the bamboo nose ¯ute. It is a reduplication of PPN *fang(o,u) meaning `to blow the nose,' or `through the nose.' Archaeologically, supposed nose ¯utes have been found only in New Zealand (Davidson 1984:93), where they occur in materials other than bamboo. Different lexical forms attest to ¯utes in POC (Osmond and Ross 1998:107±108), and Blust (1995a:496) reconstructs PAN *tulali, `nose ¯ute.' All this suggests these instruments are pre-Polynesian in their antiquity, and of course they are widely attested ethnographically in Polynesia (Moyle 1990). Houses and community structures Archaeologists have yet to identify structural elements of Ancestral Polynesian households and settlements, due to the lack of extensive horizontal excavations. Green (1986:53) summarized the evidence for components of Ancestral Polynesian households, and while his discussion of the lexical evidence can now be expanded (Table 7.7), the archaeological evidence is little changed. The best documentation is for sites dating to around 2100 BP, especially in Western Samoa, although important data also come from Tongatapu, Niuatoputapu, Futuna, and American Samoa. In this review, we use the list of lexical items in Table 7.7 as a guide. Ethnographic distribution of house forms throughout Polynesia, as well as archaeological evidence for later prehistoric time periods, suggests that both straight-sided and rounded-ended dwellings were ancient types. However, the linguistically indicated change from a rectangular, stilt, or pole-house dwelling (POC *Rumaq) occupied by Lapita peoples, to the open-sided dwellings of Polynesia (PPN *fale), reveals that much about the early form and features of Ancestral Polynesian buildings remains unclear (Green 1998b; Green and Pawley 1998). Holes in which to implant posts of various sizes (PPN *pou, *tulu, *tia) would have been key structural elements of the round-ended PPN *fale dwelling form, and are archaeologically evidenced in Samoa (Green 1974b:111±13; Davidson 1974:232; Kirch and Hunt, eds., 1993), Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988), and Tongatapu (Poulsen 1987). One example where areal exposure revealed more than a single postmold is Layer 5 in the SU-Sa-3 site at Sasoa`a. In the plan reproduced here as Figure 7.6, the post holes are clearly adjacent to an exterior stone pavement (PPN *paepae) on which (and in the area beyond) an adz maker or lithic specialist (PPN *tufunga) refashioned adzes (Green 1974b:112±13, 137). Just beyond the pavement another alignment of post holes suggests a wooden fence (PPN *loto-qaa, or less likely in this case, *paa) possibly demarcating an

194

Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 7.7. Proto Polynesian terms relating to household units and their architectural features Category

Probable gloss

PPN term

Buildings

Primary dwelling, house Cookhouse, shed, containing earth oven Canoe shed God-house, ritual building Fenced enclosure, compound

*fale *paito *(a)folau *fale-(qatua) *loto-qaa

Wall, fence, enclosure Wall, fence Earth oven Storage pit, hole Wood, timber

*paa *qaa *qumu *lua *kau

Sennit ®ber, rope, coir Gravel for paving Doorway, entrance

*kafa *kili-kili *faqi-totoka

Pavement, platform Peg used for fastening, wooden nail Storage shelf, platform Rafter, beam Rafter, or possibly purlins Enclosed area or inner room Thatch Posts Ridge pole Stake, post Post, staff Wooden pillow To cover ¯oor with mats or grass Mat

*pae-pae *faqo *fata *fatunga *kaso *loki *qato *pou *taq(o,u)fufu *tia *tulu *kali *faaliki *tapakau, *takapau

Household unit features

Construction materials

Parts of buildings

Furnishings

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX).

Archaeological evidence X

X X

X

X

X X X

Material culture

Fig. 7.6

195

Excavation plan of the Sasoa`a site in the Falefa Valley, Samoa, showing the postmolds, house pavement, and earth oven.

area to one end of the house. In this same vicinity (although not with complete certainty associated with the period of the house) are a small earth oven (*qumu) and subterranean storage pits (*lua). Several Ancestral Polynesian sites evidence sorted gravel spreads of house ¯oors (PPN *kili-kili ), a widespread feature common in later time periods (Davidson 1974:232). In addition, the earth oven using heated stones (*qumu), and the informally stone-outlined or simple scoop-basin hearth have

196

Rediscovering Hawaiki

been identi®ed in sites of Ancestral Polynesian age, as have storage pits for food (see Chapter 6).25 Other PPN lexical reconstructions for parts of the Ancestral Polynesian *fale are not as yet attested archaeologically (see Table 7.7). The linguistic evidence, reinforced by the comparative ethnography of Polynesian household units, strongly suggests that dwellings (*fale) were differentiated from cookhouses (*paito) in Ancestral Polynesian settlements.26 Boundaries or divisions within a settlement, such as might delineate separate household units, are suggested by the PPN term *tuqa-(a)-koi, `boundary marker.' There was most likely a religious or ritual component to at least some households, even if this cannot be identi®ed archaeologically. These ritual spaces are discussed in Chapter 9. Linguistically, a communal concept is tied in semantically with the gloss for PPN *fono, or `deliberative assembly of persons,' which might have used a building with a stone foundation as its base. Another term offering some hope of eventual archaeological identi®cation is PPN *qafu, a raised foundation or platform supporting a structure (domestic or communal), and in the latter case perhaps having some kind of religious function (see Chapter 9). Canoes Polynesian seafaring falls within the broader complex which allowed Austronesian-speaking peoples to settle the Paci®c island world (Irwin 1992; Pawley and Pawley 1998). Evidence for this canoe complex in antiquity, and the stages through which voyaging with these vessels developed in the Paci®c, however, is largely indirect and inferential. An occasional exception is a wet site like Vaito`otia-Fa`ahia on Huahine in the Society Islands, where the early East Polynesian assemblage includes several canoe parts, and accessories such as steering paddles (Sinoto and McCoy 1975; Sinoto 1979). Yet, to explore this ocean-dominated world, to ®sh its waters, and to transport goods and people among its myriad islands, all required seaworthy vessels. The evidence, especially that involving exchanges of several kinds of items, often over great ocean distances in the Lapita and post-Lapita periods (Green and Kirch 1997; Kirch 1997a:228±39), persuades us that such craft not only existed, but were sophisticated. Haddon and Hornell (Hornell 1936; Haddon 1937; Haddon and Hornell 1938) provided a comprehensive ethnographic corpus of canoes for the entire Paci®c, from which the kinds of ancestral water-craft likely in particular regions may be inferred through comparative typology. More recently, Pawley and Pawley (1994, 1998) have provided historical linguistic backup to Haddon and Hornell's survey, allowing one to assign to the PPN stage a rich canoe and seafaring complex, an essential component of

Material culture

197

Ancestral Polynesian culture. Pawley and Pawley (1998:208) show that upwards of twenty words having to do with water-craft and seafaring can be reconstructed for Proto Malayo-Polynesian (PMP), and virtually all were continued into POC and PCP. ``In addition, around ten terms can be attributed to POC and PCP that have not so far been reconstructed for PMP.'' A selection among some thirty of these items from POLLEX is set out in Table 7.8, as they would appear in PPN. Important among them is a ®rm reconstruction for a `double-hulled canoe,' something which remains a matter of debate for the earlier POC stage.27 In addition, there is support for the large ocean-going sailing canoe, and the small outrigger or dugout canoe for inshore use, along with a number of accessory items such as paddles, bailers, and anchors.28 Cordage The canoe complex raises the issue of cordage, a key perishable material whose existence again relies solely on strong inference and indirect arguments, rather than archaeology. Certainly, cordage must have been vital for joining together canoe parts, as well as for rigging associated with the mast and sails, and for tethering and anchor ropes. Cordage was also essential in house construction, and for lashing adz/axe heads to their handles. In all these cases a set of characteristic Polynesia-wide lashing patterns are encountered ethnographically, although their descriptions are scattered through the literature. Other lashing techniques attach ®shhooks to ®shing lines, and again in the realm of ®shing gear, the use of ®ner-weight cordage and thread was common, especially in connection with nets and seines. Inferentially, ®ne cordage or thread of various kinds is implied by the needles found in sites of this period, as it is by the holes drilled in the range of shell artifacts. Indeed, a whole range of objects which make up Ancestral Polynesian culture implies the existence of cordage in a wide variety of forms, even if its archaeological presence in Ancestral Polynesian culture is not directly attested. The historical linguistic evidence reveals some of the common categories of cordage known to people in Ancestral Polynesian societies. POLLEX lists at least seventeen PPN verbal reconstructions having to do with various actions involving the use of cordage and rope. Among the set of reconstructed nominal terms are two for rope (PPN *maea and *taura), one for a type of cordage or lashing (PPN *lufa), and one for sennit (PPN *kafa), as well as two for cords. One kind of cord, PPN *uka, probably initially referred primarily to a bowstring, but then took on the general meaning of cord, especially for some kind of ®shing line in PNP, while PPN *afo referred to a kind of ®shing line right from the PPN stage on. Without further ethno-

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Table 7.8. The Proto Polynesian canoe complex a and cordage Probable gloss (PPN interstage)

Proto Oceanic

Proto Polynesian

Canoe complex Sailing canoe *waqa *waka Sea-going craft, especially a *f(a,o)ulua double-hulled canoe Small outrigger or dugout canoe *paopao for inshore use Plank *baban *papa Strake, probably topstrake of a *(q)oRa *oqa canoe Base, bottom, keel (or dugout PCP *takele *takele underbody to which planking is added) Projecting headboard or prow (often *ijung *isu with ornately carved decoration) Outrigger ¯oat *saman *hama Outrigger boom *kiajo *kiato Sail (n) *layaR *laa Mast PEOC *pana*fanaa Bailer *limas *asu *tataa Paddle *ponse *fohe Cordage Rope Rope Sennit (made of coconut ®ber) Type of cordage or lashing of coconut ®ber Bowstring Cord, ®shing line Cord, especially ®shing line Carrying cord, handle Strand of rope or cord (PPN); single element in plaiting or weaving (PNP) Make a cord by rolling ®bers on the thigh Braid (i.e., interlace three or more ¯exible elements), sometimes called plaiting

NCOG P1 31 6

P2

3 3

8

PSA 3 3

3

3

17 14

3 3

3 3

19

3

3

6 23 28 24 12 18 6 31

3

3

3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3

3

3 3 3 3

*maea *taura *kafa *lufa

12 17 27 4

3 3 3

*apon

*uka PNP *uka *afo *ka(a)wei *fequnu

15 20 8 14

3 3 3 3

3 3 3

*pilo(s)

*®lo

23

3

3

*piri

*®ri

20

3

3

*kapa

*uka

3

Material culture Prepare ®bers for making string; prepared ®ber Rope, cord, plaiting

199

*tali

*amo

9

3

*tali

6

3

3

a

Note that this table provides only a selection of thirteen out of some thirty lexical items in the Polynesian and Oceanic canoe complex. NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

graphic study, or the recovery of direct archaeological evidence, it is not possible to distinguish between them. The nominal terms given in Table 7.7 outline the main set of cordage and rope items strongly indicated by the PPN lexical evidence. In addition, some common means for making cordage are lexically indicated along lines expected ethnographically: PPN *amo for preparing the ®bers for string making; PPN *®lo for twisting the ®bers into cord by rolling on the thigh; and PPN *®ri for braiding or plaiting into stronger forms of cordage and rope. Conclusions Ethnographically, between 100 and 300 types of objects can be expected in any comprehensive account of material culture on a Polynesian island, with larger numbers for those societies residing on high islands, and a lesser number among those inhabiting atolls (Table 7.1). Yet only between about twenty-®ve and forty such types were suf®ciently durable to be routinely discovered through archaeological excavation. In Polynesia the perishable component makes up roughly 80 percent of material culture, archaeologically recoverable only under exceptional taphonomic conditions. Judging which ethnographically attested objects might be inherited from Ancestral Polynesian culture therefore poses a vexing methodological problem, if one relies solely on archaeological data. Historical linguistics offers a partial solution by yielding extensive terminological sets for various material culture domains at the PPN stage. For some domains, archaeology con®rms and extends the linguistic evidence, enabling us to address variability and form within and between the categories and the communities involved, and details of the technological processes of manufacture and use. Archaeology occasionally identi®es items for which no corresponding lexemes have been reconstructed, or for which ethnography offers little or no justi®cation (pottery, for example).

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Ross Clark's 1991 systematically arranged English to PPN Thesaurus incorporates names for over 100 material objects, most of them portable, a small part of the approximately 2,300+ PPN words. Still, and without trying to be exhaustive, we have identi®ed in this chapter seventy-eight such objects (Tables 7.3 to 7.8), and another ®fteen or so are covered in the chapters on ®shing and food preparation (Chapters 5 and 6). Thus, in the number of material objects evidenced by historical linguistic reconstructions at the PPN level, we are coming close to the numbers suggested by ethnographic studies of atoll societies (Table 7.1). Archaeologically, the record is perhaps better than many might have anticipated, and in line with what was expected based on our analysis of four sample ethnographies. In the domain of containers, for example, where eight kinds of objects are discussed, only pottery (PPN *kulo) is archaeologically represented, and we were unable to identify a term referring speci®cally to bamboo tube containers. On the other hand, at least nine kinds of industrial tools are indicated lexically in PPN, and eight of them (or parts of them) have been recovered archaeologically. Adzes/axes (PPN *toki ) occur archaeologically in suf®cient numbers, and the technology of their manufacture is well enough understood, that both variability and methods of production can be described, as we were able to do for pottery. In all, a total of twenty durable items archaeologically represented out of just over 100 indicated through PPN lexical reconstruction closely approaches the 14 to 23 percent of durable items predicted from our ethnographic case studies. When durable objects such as ®shing gear and food preparation items discussed in other chapters are added to the archaeologically recovered corpus, we are comfortably within the ethnographically anticipated range of object types both numerically and in percentage terms for atoll societies (Table 7.1). Our triangulation strategy has alerted us to the full range of portable material culture to be anticipated for Ancestral Polynesian culture. It has produced more emic (i.e., lexically marked) categories than archaeology alone would allow, even in the cases of pottery and adzes where the archaeological evidence itself is extensive and informative with respect to variability, technology of production, and aspects of use, not dependent solely on ethnographic parallels. The lesson is clear: to recover even the material worlds of ancient peoples requires the holistic evidence of triangulation.

Chapter 8

Social and political organization

Probably the term ariki was used as a chie¯y title throughout Polynesia from the earliest times. The character of the oldest form of the Polynesian ariki chieftainship was perhaps more clearly sacerdotal. When the same term was later applied to a chief in the sense of a ruler, it marked a change. In time, a new type of arikiship koskinen 1960:148 evolved.

Thus far in our program of applying a triangulation method to the ``rediscovery'' of Ancestral Polynesia within the framework of a phylogenetic model we have dealt with domains all having a material basis: the environment, subsistence, cuisine, and technology. We now move, however, largely out of this materialist realm, as we attempt to interpret fundamental social structures by which the Ancestral Polynesians organized themselves, as well as the belief systems ± the mentaliteÂs ± that regulated their daily lives. Archaeology will have only minimal input to these investigations, even though its contribution could potentially be much greater.1 To return to our surveying analogy, we are now restricted to ®xing, by triangulation, the domain of interest from only two independent ``lines of sight.'' We must consequently depend more heavily on linguistic evidence for cultural (emic) categories, and will need to be as rigorous as possible in constructing semantic history hypotheses, informed by intensive ethnographic comparison. Such rugged terrain is not for the faint-hearted among culture historians. Yet we do not hesitate, for the landscape now within the scope of our surveying instruments ± hazy though its topography may be ± reveals the essential contours of ancient Polynesian societies. House societies Austronesian scholars have recently found much value in Claude Le viStrauss' notion of socieÂteÂs aÁ maison, ``house societies'' (LeÂvi-Strauss 1982:172±87), rendering the concept more ¯exible than he initially proposed, and extending it ethnographically beyond his initial criteria (e.g., Fox 1993; Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:21±22, 25, 37; Fox and Sather 1996). 201

202

Rediscovering Hawaiki

We ourselves have applied the ``house society'' construct in Oceanic archaeological reconstructions (Green and Pawley 1999; Green 1998b; Kirch 1996, 1997a:183±91, in press), and are convinced of its integrative value in collaborative research in social anthropology, historical linguistics, and archaeology. In contrast, older models of Austronesian social organization based on ``descent groups'' and rules of af®liation have proven less analytically revealing than was once hoped. Moreover, such lineage-based models are nearly impossible to interpret from the archaeological record. Kinship and social organization are notoriously dif®cult to reconstruct for past societies, except perhaps through the application of the triangulation method within a comparative or phylogenetic model, and even then the arguments are complex.2 A ``house-based'' approach to society, in contrast, permits and even encourages, a focus on the architectonic correlates of social organization ± on the physical dwelling, its spatial structure, and associated buildings and spaces. Paradoxically, as Carsten and Hugh-Jones observe (1995:12), Le viStrauss' own writings on this topic omitted the most obvious feature of the House3 concept, its architecture. This they attribute to a general neglect of architectural signi®cance in anthropological analysis (1995:2). The dif®culty arises from a failure to join detailed studies of the material aspects of dwellings and other buildings and spaces, with the social organization of the people who ± often over long periods ± occupy these structures and spaces, and act out much of their domestic life within them (1995:4, 37). Pierre Bourdieu's concept (1977) of the ``habitus,'' the daily exercise of repeated minutiae through which people's lives are socially and meaningfully renegotiated and recreated, is relevant. In Austronesian societies, the House is surely the most fundamental structure of the habitus. Archaeologists have much to contribute to an architecturally informed analysis of social structure, when this is embedded within a more global category of the Housebased society, and speci®cally within a sophisticated notion of House. From this perspective, the House is seen ``in the round,'' as a multifaceted social unit in which all of its different aspects are brought together along the lines initially envisioned by LeÂvi-Strauss (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:18, 20, 45). House societies in the Austronesian world LeÂvi-Strauss (1982:172±87) suggested that House societies were characteristic of many ethnographic regions including native North America, medieval Europe, ancient Greece, feudal Japan, Indonesia, Melanesia, tropical Polynesia, New Zealand, Madagascar, and Africa. Since 1983, the applicability of the concept has been tested for some of these regions, and for new

Social and political organization

203

areas such as lowland South America. Yet nowhere has the idea of House society enjoyed more intensive ethnographic use, than among the Austronesian societies of Island Southeast Asia (e.g., Fox 1993; Fox and Sather 1996; Grinker 1996:856). As Roxana Waterson, a major contributor to a sophisticated theory of House societies, writes: In island Southeast Asia, a number of common themes are prominent both in architectural styles, and in ways of talking about houses and relating to them. The wide distribution of these features, and the vocabularies used for discussing them, are strongly suggestive of shared Austronesian origins. (1995:54)

Waterson's seminal book (1990; see also 1995), along with the essays in Fox (ed., 1993), and six of the chapters in Carsten and Hugh-Jones (eds., 1995), elaborates this perspective. These works draw, in part, on semantic reconstructions of Austronesian house terms to suggest that the concept has real antiquity among Austronesian-speaking peoples (Blust 1987; see also Blust 1995a). Moreover, ethnographies or ethnographic analyses written from a House-society perspective are being extended to many societies in the Austronesian world.4 Collectively, these studies demonstrate the cogency of a House-society perspective for the analysis of Austronesian social organization, lending con®dence in its applicability to Ancestral Polynesia, just as it has proven useful for understanding their Lapita predecessors (Kirch 1997a; Green 1998b). Criterial features of House societies The youthful concept of House society is still under theoretical development, requiring us to outline key features that contribute to its analytical power. We have isolated eight characteristics, but have not tried to determine which among these might be irreducible features, since we agree with Waterson (1995:48) that not every principle need be at work in every ethnographic (or archaeological) instance. 1. Throughout the Austronesian world, the House is a salient organizing category for the people themselves (Waterson 1995:48), an emic category. A paradigmatic example from Oceania is Tikopia, where the elemental social group (the kano a paito) takes its name from the term for the house itself ( paito).5 Moreover, such groups aggregate under a larger ``umbrella'' category, called the kainanga, which invariably traces its origins back to the House of a founding ancestor; we shall encounter these kainanga groups in detail later. Fundamentally, the House-society concept forwards an indigenous perspective, as it employs emic terms and concepts (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:22). As such the House-society perspective can draw upon Oceanic and Polynesian lexical reconstructions, and allows for the development of speci®c semantic-history hypotheses.

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

2. Several Island Southeast Asian ethnographies ``focus on the importance of the House as a kin group as well as a politico-religious entity'' (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:24, 255 fn. 23), while Blust (1980:211) argued on linguistic evidence that PAN *Rumaq and its many modern re¯exes in Austronesian languages referred not only to a physical `house,' but to the low-level genealogical unit de®ned by descent from an apical ancestor. Kirch argues the importance of the House for Tikopia society (1996:259), and generally in his analysis of Polynesian temples as ``holy houses'' (in press). Further, LeÂvi-Strauss stressed that the House as a social unit endures over time, outlasting any single generation. This it does by various mechanisms that ensure its continuity beyond that of a continual replacement of its human resources (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:7). These special mechanisms include: 3. The House comprises a ®xed-property holding unit, something akin to a landed estate with its residential architecture. This feature appears to be a prominent, perhaps essential, aspect of House-societies in the Austronesian region, including Polynesia. We ®nd substantial evidence to support the reconstruction of an Ancestral Polynesian category that corresponds nearly precisely with such a landed estate and its social group, the PPN *kaainga. 4. In addition to land, the House group holds signi®cant movable property, including major capital items like canoes or seine nets, as well as intangibles such as rights to resources, privileges, and titles, and this extends even to the ownership of myths, or rights of access to supernatural entities, especially where these are ancestors linked to House origins (Waterson 1995:50). Throughout Polynesia, the ethnographic literature asserts the extra-individual nature of such property, not in general, but in terms of speci®c kinds of corporate groups, which we will argue also ®ts the House model. 5. The House is a vehicle for the transmission of proper names, both of physical dwellings (as, for example, in the ethnographically documented cases of Tikopia, Tokelau, Futuna, Mangareva, or Maori) and of social groups (as in East Polynesian ngati or `ati names).6 6. Waterson (1995:48±49, 51) questions the pervasiveness of social hierarchy in House societies, and concludes that a looser de®nition and more ¯exible approach are desirable. Thus ``societies without marked strati®cation'' (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:10) still meet the continuity criteria discussed above (points 3±5). Our own view is that some aspects of ranking are nearly always present in House societies, but range from weakly developed and unaligned (i.e., heterarchy), to elaborated and aligned (i.e., hierarchy). These considerations are germane to the social transformations that occurred between the earlier Lapita stage, and that of Ancestral Polynesia.

Social and political organization

205

7. Waterson (1995:48) also asks whether the House society concept helps to advance the analysis of kinship systems. One goal of LeÂvi-Strauss' formulation was to understand kinship systems which had been classi®ed under such rubrics as ``non-unilineal,'' ``ambilineal,'' or ``cognatic'' descent groups. Here the House-society concept has indeed been liberating, freeing ethnographers from older lineage models, and allowing a clearer understanding of House recruitment, whether by marriage, by the application of ®ctive kinship rules, or by adoption. Thus the concept of House allows us to consider, under a single rubric, ``houses and their inhabitants as part of one process of living'' (Carsten and Hugh-Jones 1995:37). 8. The ¯exible approach advocated by Carsten and Hugh-Jones (1995:21) pays close attention to the architectonic aspects of the House, seeing these as an integral part of the social processes they help to pattern, an essential component of the habitus. For the Austronesian world, two studies that have integrated social and architectural perspectives are Waterson's The Living House (1990), and Inside Austronesian Houses (Fox, ed., 1993). In Austronesian societies, ``the literal dominance of the house, as a physical structure and a grouping of kin, is inescapably obvious'' (Waterson 1995:68). This has a methodological consequence: whereas historical linguistics provides the key evidence for emic House categories (see point 1), archaeology offers empirical evidence of ancient house forms. Grinker (1996) observes that descent models, concepts of the lineage, and types of kinship systems have long co-existed and competed with another set of studies that initially focused on models of houses as residences, their physical layouts, and their meanings. Now these latter can be extended to include the House as a social formation. Moreover, in Grinker's view social organization has proven ``simply too complex to be captured by any single model'' (1996:858). Arguably, the House-society concept in contrast constitutes a powerful tool for inquiry into the social organization and structure of the Ancestral Polynesian societies, one that can integrate both kinds of models of social organization. Situating Ancestral Polynesian societies Arguments for the antiquity of House societies in Island Southeast Asia, largely backed by historical linguistic claims (Blust 1995a:485±87), currently lack much direct support from archaeology. In Oceania the situation is different, and Green and Pawley (1998, 1999) reconstructed a full linguistic set for POC architectural forms and settlement patterns, combining this with relevant ethnographic and archaeological evidence. The POC reconstructions (dating to 3000±3500 BP) include thirty proto-lexical forms and their inferred meanings for the dwelling house and its main structural

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 8.1. Proto Austronesian (PAN), Proto Malayo-Polynesian (PMP), and Proto Oceanic (POC) words for settlements and architecture Category

Probable gloss

PAN

PMP

POC

Buildings

Dwelling house Open-sided building Men's house (Blust 1987); granary shed (Tryon 1995) Area underneath a raised house

*Rumaq

*Rumaq *balay *kamaliR

*Rumaq *pale *kamali(R)

Architectural features

Settlement patterns

Mound for house site; platform of earth on which a house is built Entrance to house; doorway Thatch of sago palm leaves *qatep (Dutton 1994); roof, thatch (Blust n.d.) Leaf, thatch Rafter (Dempwolff 1938) Inhabited territory, including a community's gardens, houses, and other possessions (Blust 1987); land (not sea) Settlement; open space associated with a house or settlement Open space in a settlement (used for ceremonial or ritual purposes?) Cleared land, land free of encumbrances, i.e., cleared of vegetation but not built on or planted Fallow land, now reverted to wilderness *quCan (Blust 1989); scrubland, bush (Blust n.d.)

*gabwari *apu *kataman *qatop

*kasaw *banua

*raun *kaso *panua

*pera *malaqai *mwalala

*qutan

components and other structures associated with these buildings, and with settlements (Table 8.1). Green and Pawley conclude that the main architectural components of the Island Southeast Asian House societies were retained in the dwellings, building components, and settlement patterns of early Oceania, although often expressed in a distinctive but related set of physical forms. In the transition from Lapita to the societies of Ancestral Polynesia, a signi®cant reorganization of social organization took place, speci®cally in the Fiji±Western Polynesian region (Green 1998b). Most signi®cant was the loss of the original Austronesian type of dwelling (POC *Rumaq),7 and of the men's house (POC *kamaliR ), to be replaced by the newly innovated Polynesian dwelling taking on a different structural form under the PPN

Social and political organization

207

Table 8.2. Linguistically indicated changes in architectural forms from Proto Oceanic to Proto Polynesian interstages POC term POC gloss

PPN term

PPN gloss

*Rumaq

House, primary dwelling

±

*pale

Open-sided building (often with *fale specialized function) Entrance to house, open doorway *faqi-totoka (probably with wooden framework)

Not present as PPN word or building type House, primary dwelling

*kataman

*turu(s)

*bou

Post, most often the main weight- *tulu bearing post, supporting plate or ridgepole Main beams supporting raised *pou ¯oor or roof structure

Entrance to house (with PPN *paepae or pavement adjacent to house on exterior) Any post, or a staff

House posts, often the main supporting posts

term *fale. The PPN lexical form *fale, however, derived from the older PMP term *balay (transformed in POC to *pale), originally meaning an `opensided shed or building' (Blust 1987; Green and Pawley 1998:49). Thus while the PPN lexeme for dwelling house was a retention from a much earlier stage of Austronesian, it underwent a signi®cant semantic transformation between the POC and PPN interstages. These changes also affected speci®c architectural components of these structures (Table 8.2). For social organization, we also have evidence for the development of new terms, such as PPN *kainanga and *kaainga, which we argue embody the House concept for Ancestral Polynesian societies, and a shift in meanings for a term for an elite Polynesian leader (*qariki ) different from that found in Fiji, or in other societies further to the west. In short, while there were strong continuities from older Austronesian structural forms, in key aspects Ancestral Polynesian societies represented a distinctly new form of social organization from that which went before. Social groups in Ancestral Polynesia Strong biological indications of a genetic bottleneck combined with archaeological evidence for a rapid colonization of the Fiji±Western Polynesian region lead us to infer that the founding Early Eastern Lapita populations were small (see Chapter 3). That populations in the Ancestral Polynesian homeland remained small throughout the ®rst half of the ®rst millennium BC is suggested by surface pottery distributions on Eastern Lapita and

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Polynesian Plainware sites, indicating that settlements averaged only 3,000±4,500 square meters in size (Kirch 1990:1230; 1997a:166±67; Burley 1998:350, 363, table 1). Only in the later Polynesian Plainware period is there evidence of sites beginning to exceed that average (e.g., Kirch and Hunt, eds., 1993:232). What did change for the Ancestral Polynesian period is that settlement on the larger islands began to expand inland as well as along the coasts,8 as attested for Tongatapu (Spennemann 1987:81, ®g. 1; Burley 1998:363), and for the Falefa Valley of `Upolu, Western Samoa (Green 1974b). Thus it is likely that overall populations had increased, but probably not the sizes of individual communities. Instead these had become more widely distributed over island landscapes (Green 1993:223), as social groups ®ssioned and established new daughter communities. As the PPN speakers might have expressed it, the `people of a place,' *kai/*kakai, had now fully occupied their land, their *fanua.9 Reconstructing POC and PPN social groups Williamson (1924) devoted many pages of his classic compendium to the distinctions between ``social and local grouping'' in Polynesia, hinting at the complexities involved. Burrows (1939), informed by signi®cantly improved ethnographic data than were available to Williamson, recognized that much variation in Polynesian social groups could be encapsulated by the terms ``breed and border,'' the ®rst referring to kinship or descent, the latter to land rights. Burrows observed that ``types of alignment of breed and border in Polynesia had fairly distinct distributions,'' and from this he hypothesized that ``coincidence of breed and border was the earlier alignment'' (1939:17±18). That is to say, Burrows inferred that the early form of Polynesian social grouping consisted of descent groups which occupied and controlled speci®c territories. He regarded the later dissociation of land tenure from kinship as a pattern arising independently in various Polynesian societies as a result of parallel processes, a case of cultural convergence: Progressive encroachment of border over breed seems to have been the rule in Polynesia. As territorial units grew larger and stronger, kinship grouping became simpler or vaguer; for in both areas of intermingled breed and border, complex rami®ed kinship grouping was either absent, or the larger groups were vague in conception and limited in function. (1939:20±21)

In short, Burrows saw an ancient system of land-holding kinship groups as having been transformed ± repeatedly and in various ways ± in many descendent Polynesian societies.10 In the 1950s and 1960s, ethnographers actively debated kinship and social groupings in both Polynesian and Micronesian (i.e., Remote Oceanic)

Social and political organization

209

societies, struggling to reconcile advances in unilineal descent-group theory with the largely non-unilinear or ``cognatic'' nature of Oceanic systems (e.g., Goodenough 1955; Firth 1957; Davenport 1959; Howard 1963; see also Howard and Kirkpatrick 1989:51±60). Goodenough's in¯uential paper on ``a problem in Malayo-Polynesian social organization'' is highly relevant to our task of reconstructing Ancestral Polynesian social groups. Surveying evidence from the broad region we now call Remote Oceania, Goodenough concluded that in ``early Malayo-Polynesian society, there were two types of group associated with land. One was an unrestricted descent group, while membership in the other was determined by parental residence'' (1955:82). Goodenough also invoked linguistic evidence, pointing out that ``the term kainga, together with its variant kainanga, has a wide distribution in Micronesia and Polynesia'' (1955:77).11 Goodenough knew that the distribution of these related words ± not to mention the social concepts they indexed ± had to be shared retentions of an ancient social order, because their ``various forms show the proper historical sound shifts as loan-words do not'' (1955:78). And while he acknowledged that ``the meaning of the [kainga/kainanga] term is not always clear,'' Goodenough recognized that ``it invariably has to do with land and/or some kind of social group.'' Indeed, Goodenough posed a set of historical hypotheses that bear repeating: Clearly there was some kind of descent group associated with land in the society from which both Polynesian and Micronesian peoples are jointly descended. But how in the course of history could this ancestral descent group come to be nonunilinear in some places and unilinear in others? And where it is unilinear, how could it become patrilineal here and matrilineal there? If we start with the assumption that this group was originally . . . one in which continuity of membership derived from parental residence where the residence rule was bilocal, then the answer becomes clear. In those societies shifting to regular patrilocal residence, the group automatically becomes patrilineal. Where matrilocal residence became the rule, as in the Carolines, the group became equally automatically matrilineal. And in each case no one need even be aware that a change had in fact occurred. Where bilocal residence continued or tendencies to unilocality did not go too far, the kin group remained nonunilinear. (1955:78)

Goldman's study of Polynesian ``status rivalry'' picked up where Goodenough left off, arguing that ``the earliest Polynesian descent groups may have been small and localized and concerned primarily with land'' (1970:437). He noted that while the term kainga was ``common to all but three Polynesian societies,'' only in four cases (Samoa, `Uvea, Futuna, Tokelau) was this the ``common term for a descent group'' (1970:438). Admitting his ``frankly speculative reconstruction,'' Goldman interpreted the kainga as ``an early Polynesian bilateral descent group,'' but went on to suggest that:

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the organization of Polynesian kin groups evolved from two different sources, from the small and utility-minded land-holding group of bilaterally related persons, the kainga, and from the comprehensive genealogical networks organized around chie¯y lines.12 Both systems meshed, and since they were not fully incompatible, the kainga could retain for long its own character and its relative autonomy. (1970:438)

In this, as in other aspects of his sometimes undervalued work, 13 Goldman demonstrated his uncanny ability to cut to the quick of Polynesian social issues. Koskinen (1960:157±58), although more concerned with leadership, also commented on ancient Polynesian social groups, and most importantly may have been among the ®rst to recognize that kaainga and kainanga are separate terms, with discrete etymologies. Noting its variant meanings in several Polynesian societies, Koskinen proposed that the original meaning of kaainga might have been ``applied as a social term to the people who live on the landed estate of the group, and gain their livelihood from its soil'' (1960:157). Kainanga, in contrast, he thought referred to the ``populace of a place,'' perhaps with speci®c reference to ``plain people,'' those without rank.14 In a working paper, only an abridged version of which was later published, Pawley (1979; see also 1982, 1985) began to explore the deep etymological roots of the kaainga/kainanga terminology in Proto Oceanic and Proto Polynesian. He wrote that: *kai was probably the base for a cluster of complex terms in Proto-Polynesian, at least some of which may go back to Proto-Oceanic. One of these is *kakai `people of a place' . . . *kakai was probably in use also as a verb `inhabit' . . . PPN *kaainga may also contain the same root. *kaainga can be reconstructed with two senses: (1) home, place where one lives, (2) kin, be related to, from cognates in all major Polynesian subgroups. An association with *(ka)kai `inhabit' and *-nga `noun derivative suf®x' is possible, though not free of problems. (1979:6)

Pawley cited several Micronesian as well as Polynesian cognates that would allow the reconstruction of ``an early Oceanic form *kainanga,'' such as Trukese kainang, Puluwat yayingang, Woleai gailang, Tikopian kainanga, Tongan kainanga, and Hawaiian maka`ainana. Without making the basis for his semantic reconstruction explicit, Pawley claimed that the clearly ancient term *kainanga was ``evidently a land-holding descent group, under the authority of a chief '' (1979:6). He further commented that ``in several Polynesian languages *kainanga normally occurs following the type PPN *mata, a noun or nominal classi®er denoting a social group, which goes back to a POC form of similar shape and function'' (1979:7). Kirch (1984a), in his pioneering effort to delineate the contours of Ancestral Polynesian society, drew upon the insights of Goodenough (1955) and Pawley (1979) to propose two main kinds of social grouping, the PPN

Social and political organization

211

*kainanga and *kaainga. The former he regarded as having been a landholding descent group, and the latter ``a minimal descent group or extended household, together with the lands occupied and cultivated by that group'' (Kirch 1984a:65±66). Kirch further suggested that residence (as opposed to genealogical descent) would have been a criterion for *kaainga membership. He also pointed to a third PPN reconstruction, *fono, meaning a `political assembly of people,' who were responsible for major decision making, and who may also have invoked ancestral deities, under the guidance of their priest-chief, the *qariki. These interpretations were brie¯y restated by Kirch and Green (1987). Pawley's initial linguistic efforts (Pawley 1979, 1982, 1985) to discuss meanings for PPN *kainanga and *kaainga have been followed up by Marck (1996b, 1999a), who observed that *kainanga was an older form, ``because it retains the Proto Oceanic ®nal consonant and was derived by *-anga rather than *-nga'' (1999:246). *Kaainga, in contrast, ``developed later, after the loss of the ®nal consonant, possibly in Proto Polynesian itself.'' After reviewing the linguistic evidence, but only ethnographically restricted glosses for the modern re¯exes of these terms, Marck (1999a:241) concluded that *kaainga had to do with ``agricultural and especially residential land of people belonging to a social group and dwellings thereon, whereas PPn *kainanga seems to have had the `social group' meaning for that language'' (1999a:244±45, table 8.4). With regard to a more precise semantic value for *kainanga, Marck concluded that ``the ravages of time have worn down the agreements to a point where we cannot offer a more speci®c reconstruction than Pawley's (1985:96) Proto Polynesian semantic reconstruction of `lineage or clan''' (1999a:247). To do more, he believes, requires going ``beyond the linguistic evidence which remains at this time, and must be argued by the social anthropologists on other grounds'' (1999a:247). This is a challenge we happily take up through our triangulation method. PPN *kainanga As we have seen, at least two PPN terms for social groups have roots in the more ancient POC idea of `the people,' *kai(n). The ®rst etymon incorporating the older POC root *kai(n) is *kainanga, a word whose extra-Polynesian witnesses in ROT and several Nuclear Micronesian languages indicate that it was an innovation at an Eastern Oceanic interstage pre-dating PCP.15 In order to develop the most robust semantic history hypothesis for *kainanga, we list all of its known re¯exes in Table 8.3, along with ethnographically extended glosses. With sixteen re¯exes represented in all major subgroups of Polynesian, the lexical reconstruction of PPN *kainanga is secure, while the presence of several extra-Polynesian witnesses indicates that the word was a

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Table 8.3. Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *kainanga, including extra-Polynesian witnesses Geographic region/ language

Cognate term

Nuclear Micronesia Trukese eyinang Puluwat Woleai Lamotrek

yayinang gailang(a) hailang

Rotuman

kainaga

Gloss

Sourcea

A clan, matrilineal descent group

Goodenough and Sugita 1980 Clan Pawley 1979 Clan, tribe, tribal division Pawley 1979 A named, exogamous matriclan, the largest Alkire 1965 land-holding unit on an island Persons related by consanguinity; a personal Howard 1963 or bilateral kindred; those who share descent from a common ancestor and therefore have usufruct rights to land

Western Polynesia TON kainanga SAM NIU EUV

An alternate word designating commoners, Gifford 1929 people of non-chie¯y rank ainaga Attendants and ministers of the aitu; a child given to the gods or a chief mata/kainaanga A man's elder brother; male child of a man's Loeb 1926 father's brother, or of his father's sister kainanga People not of chie¯y rank

Polynesian Outliers ANU kainanga

TIK

kainanga

REN (Bellona) kakai`anga

MAE

na/kainaga

Eastern Polynesia PUK keinanga

MRA

mata/keinanga

A patrilineal descent group tracing its Feinberg 1981 origin back to a named male ancestor; made up of several patrilateral extended families (patongia) Major division of Tikopia society, primarily Firth 1985 on patrilineal descent basis, conventionally termed `clan' A subclan, whose members all trace Monberg 1991 patrilineal ascent to an ancestor of a later generation than that of the ®rst immigrants Titled person subordinate to a given person An exogamous matrilineal sublineage, having an important economic function in the control of land, especially taro beds A large number of people who occupy a territory de®ned by boundaries, speak a common dialect, and are governed by one head

Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1938 Hiroa 1932

Social and political organization RAR

mata/keinanga

TAH

mata/eina`a

TUA

keina`a

MQA

mata/`eina`a

MVA HAW

mata/kainanga maka/`ainana

213

A settlement, the inhabitants of a district or neighborhood Subjects of a chief; a certain tribe, clan, or Oliver 1974 subdivision of the inhabitants A group, band, body of followers, servants, people who are united by the same services or duties; the division of an army; the female attendants of a chiefess A `tribe,' the largest social grouping, usually Thomas1990 coterminous with a valley geographic unit Assembly, a congregation of persons Commoners, people not of chie¯y rank

a

Ethnographic sources consulted by us for glosses are indicated with citations; all other glosses are from POLLEX.

shared retention from a pre-Polynesian stage, not an innovation. By the same token, a perusal of the diversity of glosses given in Table 8.3 leaves no doubt that there have been major semantic shifts in the meanings of kainanga and its variants. Can we hope to reconstruct a plausible PPN semantic value from this data set? The basic principles of a phylogenetic method ± whether in linguistics, biology, or culture ± tell us that if a feature is present in all of the main branches of a phylogeny or cladogram, that feature is likely to be a shared retention, a homology. This is especially the case for cultural features when there is no evidence for regular contact or borrowing (horizontal transmission) between two or more such primary branches. Examining the ethnographically informed glosses for *kainanga terms given in Table 8.3, it is apparent that, in spite of semantic diversity, a common set of denotata are shared by at least one case in all three primary subgroups. These core denotata are: (1) a descent, or perhaps more appropriately in Oceanic cultural terms, ascent group, tracing back to a founding ancestor; (2) unilineality; (3) exogamy; and (4) control over land. Cases which re¯ect this constellation of associated meanings include Truk and Lamotrek in Micronesia, Rotuma, the Polynesian Outliers of Anuta, Tikopia, and Bellona, and Pukapuka and Manihiki-Rakahanga in Eastern Polynesia. Since there is virtually no evidence for borrowing between any of these main branches, we infer that these cases represent conservative societies in which something reasonably close to the ancient meaning of kainanga has been retained. We can thus go beyond Marck's (1999a) narrow de®nition, and offer the semantic history hypothesis that, at the Ancestral Polynesian stage, PPN *kainanga indexed a `land-holding or controlling group tracing ascent from a

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

common ancestor.' We also infer that these groups were exogamous, and that they were likely to have been unilineal, although we cannot say with certainty whether the principle of ``ascent'' was matrilineal (as in Pukapuka) or patrilineal (as in Tikopia).16 As we shall argue below, *kainanga were larger than minimal residential groups and, in fact, incorporated several such smaller groups (the *kaainga). We will also argue that the leader or titular head of the *kainanga was the *qariki, the priest-chief. Our semantic history hypothesis further suggests that while a few Polynesian societies such as Tikopia, Anuta, Pukapuka, and Manihiki-Rakahanga retain something close to the ancestral de®nition of *kainanga, the term and its associated meanings underwent signi®cant changes in both Western and Eastern Polynesia after the breakup of the PPN speech community. In most cases, re¯exes of the word came to refer to a generalized grouping of people (a ``community''), sometimes with territorial associations (as in the Society Islands and the Marquesas), at other times signifying commoners as opposed to people of rank (as in Tonga and Hawai`i). 17 Burrows (1939) was, in our view, correct in tracing such changes to major con¯icts over land and territory, and to the rise of social strati®cation. By reconstructing the ancestral *kainanga as precisely as possible, we are able to throw the degree of subsequent social change in descendent Polynesian groups into higher relief. PPN *kaainga We turn now to the second social group term derived from the POC root *kai(n), PPN *kaainga. Again, we strive for robust semantic reconstruction, and so list in Table 8.4 all of the Polynesian cognates of the word, with ethnographically extended glosses where these are available. With twenty-six Polynesian re¯exes, but no external witnesses, *kaainga is a particularly robust PPN lexical reconstruction, presumably an innovation at that stage (although it may possibly date to the slightly earlier Tokalau±Fijian± Polynesian interstage).18 The glosses of *kaainga assembled in Table 8.4 exhibit quite a different range of meanings from those associated with *kainanga. POLLEX assigns to *kaainga the meaning of `place of residence, home, people of the place,' while Marck (1999a:243±44, table 8.3) in his revised formal semantic hypothesis says it would have referred to ``place, premises, house and homestead such as of a family and the dwellings thereon.''19 However, on the basis of the data in Table 8.4, and on our close reading of the ethnographic evidence, we dispute his claim that *kaainga had to do exclusively with land, and not people.20 As Oliver (1989) indicates, corporate descent groups in Polynesia (and even more broadly in Oceania) nearly always had to do with land. We

Social and political organization

215

believe that PPN *kaainga referred primarily to people, as much as to their holdings of both ®xed and moveable property ± speci®cally land and structures thereon, in particular the primary residence ± over extended periods of time. Western Polynesian re¯exes of *kaainga exhibit a kinship meaning in the sense of `relatives' or `close kin' (i.e., in TON, SAM, and EUV), but in NIU, SAM, EFU, and TOK there is also the meaning of a social group, often coresidential, occupying and holding rights to an ancestral estate. This meaning of `social group occupying an estate' is also re¯ected in several Eastern Polynesian societies, including EAS and PUK, and possibly also in MIA, MQA, and MVA. Polynesian Outlier re¯exes listed in Table 8.4 seem to display meanings associated only with land or residences. However, the concept of a minimal descent group with its associated estate and dwelling is indisputably present in several Outliers, where it goes under other names, such as TIK paito, or ANU patongia (Firth 1936; Feinberg 1981). We would argue that in these cases the basic structure of a co-residential social group with its landed estate was retained, but the cover term *kaainga was replaced with lexical innovations. Just as for the *kainanga ± the PPN term for a more inclusive descent group ± we can now de®ne for *kaainga a core set of denotata shared by all of the principal branches of the Polynesian phylogeny. These include a primary reference to land, and more speci®cally to an estate, but also to a social group that controlled rights to the estate. Moreover, it seems certain that the estate included a principal dwelling or house site. This original semantic reference in PPN was later transformed in various Polynesian societies, to become sometimes a more generalized term for `kin' or `relation,' in other cases a generalized term for `land' or `property.' In short, a careful reconstruction of the PPN meaning of *kaainga tells us a great deal about the nature of subsequent social transformations in the daughter societies that descended from Ancestral Polynesia. *Kainanga, *kaainga, and House societies Returning to the expanded LeÂvi-Straussian concept of the House (socieÂte aÁ maison), we may bring some heightened understanding to the data just reviewed. Of the two kinds of social group present in Ancestral Polynesian societies, the *kainanga was a larger or more extensive grouping, consisting of the descendants of a common ancestor (or ancestral pair), probably having a unilinear basis, most likely exogamous, and controlling rights to land. The second, the *kaainga, was more restricted in scale, consisting of a coresidential group together with a speci®c house site and associated estate. As

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Table 8.4. Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *kaainga Geographic region/ language

Cognate term

Western Polynesia TON kaainga NIU kaina SAM

`aainga

EFU

kainga

EUV ECE TOK

kaainga kaainga kaainga

Polynesian Outliers KAP keina MAE kainga MFA kainga NKO gaainga PIL kaena REN kaainga SIK kaaina TIK kaainga Eastern Polynesia EAS kainga

HAW MAO MIA MQA MVA

`aina kaainga kainga aika kainga

Gloss

Sourcea

Relation, relative A named property unit, belonging to a Loeb 1926 ``family'' Relative, kin; more inclusively, a corporate O'Meara 1990; family group that owns land in the name see also of a matai title, and traces descent to a Meleisea common ancestor 1995:23 A kin group resident on the same land of Burrows 1936; which they have common use; a dominantly Kirch 1994a agnatic group occupying a named house site and having rights to an accompanying estate Parent, ami, allie Family, also a land-holding unit Kennedy 1931 A cognatic descent unit or ``stock,'' Huntsman and comprising all the descendants of an Hooper 1996 ancestral couple, with exclusive rights to an estate, which is jointly exploited by its members Property, division, section of land Yard, home Village, home Temporary dwelling Village Sleeping place, bed Place Village; an uncommon word in 1928 known only to some elders An estate of land jointly worked by a group of ``brothers'' and their families; a strip of land extending from the coast inland Land, in the general sense Place of abode, country, home Home, residence, house and garden Terre, proprieÂteÂ, domicile, manoir Lands belonging to the family

Firth 1985

MeÂtraux 1940

Christian 1924 Hiroa 1938

Social and political organization PEN PUK

kaainga kainga

RAR TAH

kaainga `ai`a

TUA

kaainga

Home A paternal lineage, with its own burial ground; each lineage formerly had constituted priests who worshiped the gods of the lineage in religious structures on lands of the group Home land which one owns, place Place where one makes one's abode; inheritance, portion of land Homeland, inherited land

217 Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1938

a

Ethnographic sources consulted by us for glosses are indicated with citations; all other glosses are from POLLEX.

Goodenough (1955:81±82) pointed out long ago, two such ``types of kin group associated with land'' are characteristic of many Oceanic societies, because they are adaptive with regards to ¯uctuations in group size relative to limited land resources. ``One was an unrestricted descent group, while membership in the other was determined by parental residence'' (1955:82). We suggest that this was precisely the case in Ancestral Polynesian societies, with the *kainanga being the larger (unrestricted) descent (or ascent) group, and the *kaainga the local residential unit with its linked (and named) estate. Thus a *kainanga would include several local *kaainga.21 Both kinds of group re¯ect criterial components of House societies. A House (*kainanga) has trans-generational continuity, and was typically founded by an eponymous ancestor. However, as a House group expands over several generations and grows in numbers, it typically ®ssions, resulting in several subgroups, often dividing the original estate among them. These were the individual *kaainga groups, in which membership was determined not only by ascent from the founding ancestor, but also by parental residence. Moreover, the ``cognatic'' basis for *kaainga af®liation facilitated recruitment to the House through ®ctive kin ties, adoption, and marriage. This social group was an enduring unit which also held ®xed property, especially land (both residential and gardens), dwellings, and associated residential features. The highest ranked among several *kaainga would have been that of the senior descent line tracing its origins directly back to the eponymous ancestor, and it was likely from that ranking *kaainga that leaders (*qariki ) of the larger *kainanga were recruited; we will discuss this matter further below. Note also that, if our model is correct, this structure has inherent in it the basis for differential ranking or heterarchy among several *kaainga, but not social strati®cation or hierarchy per se.22 In sum, we propose (1) that Ancestral Polynesian societies were House societies in a similar manner to those evidenced throughout the Austrone-

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

sian-speaking world, and (2) that the House in Ancestral Polynesian societies was organizationally structured through two basic social groups, called in PPN the *kainanga and the *kaainga. These terms embraced the senses both of kinship (ascent from founding ancestors) and of certain lands, and the dwellings or other buildings on them, probably including public spaces and even religious features, along with some moveable property. Other social groups: *mata and saqa While the evidence supporting our reconstructions of PPN *kainanga and *kaainga is quite strong, giving us con®dence that these were the two most important kinds of social groups in Ancestral Polynesia, there are two other terms for groups that we cannot ignore. The ®rst of these, PPN *mata, goes back to POC as well, but is of less help in understanding the social organization of the Ancestral Polynesian societies because it is polysemous, with an uncertain number of different meanings (Chowning 1996).23 Moreover, in its reference to associations of people, or social grouping, the semantic value of *mata is ``somewhat unclear, partly because it usually, if not always, seems to appear in compounds'' (Chowning 1996:49). 24 In Proto Central Eastern Polynesian *mata became pre®xed to *kainanga, to form the compound term *mata-kainanga. Our suspicion is that PPN *mata was a rather vague or ¯exible term, perhaps one that denoted any collectivity of persons. Alternatively, it might have indexed the largest social unit, what Oliver (1989) calls a ``society.'' The other term is PPN *saqa, for which POLLEX provides two different entries. The more widely re¯ected semantic reconstruction (``saqa.1'' in POLLEX) is `forbidden, taboo, wrong, bad,' represented by at least sixteen Polynesian witnesses, plus a number of extra-Polynesian cognates (BGO, FIJ, SAA). The second meaning given in POLLEX (saqa.2), is `family, clan.' This semantic variant is re¯ected by eight Polynesian witnesses, from both Western Polynesia and the Outliers (but without any Eastern Polynesian re¯exes), as documented in Table 8.5. The extended ethnographic glosses we provide in Table 8.5 allow for a more precise semantic reconstruction. Speci®cally, two kinds of denotata seem to us to be central to the ``social group'' meaning of *saqa: (1) reference to a collectivity of persons, related to each other in some way or sense (in ECE, EFU, WUV, REN, SAM, TIK, and TON); and (2) as a pre®x attached to the name of an individual, speci®cally a leader of those persons (in ECE, EFU, EUV, WUV, REN, and SAM). Since both of these meanings are so widely shared, we propose the following semantic reconstruction for PPN *saqa: `a collectivity of people who were in some way related to, or under the control/in¯uence of, a person to whose proper name the pre®x *saqa was preposed.'

Social and political organization

219

Table 8.5. Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *saqa, `social group' Geographic region/ language

Cognate term

Western Polynesia TON ha`a

SAM

saa

EFU

sa`a sa`angongo Sa`akafu

EUV

ha`a

ECE

haa, saa

Polynesian Outliers REN sa`a TIK sa

WUV

sa

Gloss

Sourcea

Descendants of kings, people, etc.; race, Kaeppler 1971 tribe; ``societal divisions that have political functions''; ``ranking of groups associated with a title that originated by collateral segmentation'' A particle used before names of persons Freeman 1964 signifying `the family.' Collective name of kin group. ``Samoans often use the pre®x sa and a personal or title name.'' Group of (e.g., sa`a `a ta`ine liki) Biggs (POLLEX) Title of the chief who used to preside GreÂzel in over the district of Pouma POLLEX Chie¯y title, in charge of food distributions Burrows 1936 at feasts Participle preceding the names of traditional leaders Family; pre®x added to indicate the family or associates of a person Clan. Sa`akaitu`u, the clan of Kaitu`u Group; collectivity of persons; population; people, followed by a descriptive term or proper name Pre®x marking collective participation

Firth 1985

a

Ethnographic sources consulted by us for glosses are indicated with citations; all other glosses are from POLLEX.

Exchange in Ancestral Polynesian societies In his masterful synthesis of Oceanic ethnography, Oliver (1989:501) distinguishes between external and internal exchange. The former consists of transactions between two or more communities or societies, and includes both tangible goods (such as ornaments, pottery, mats, and so forth) and intangibles (such as labor, ®ghting assistance, or magical formulae). In contrast, internal exchange takes place within a community or society, most

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

commonly as transactions associated with marriage and alignments between particular social groups. Ethnographically, various forms of internal exchange were ubiquitous throughout Polynesia, whereas external exchange varied considerably from one region to another. Indeed, recent archaeological studies of material evidence for long-distance exchange in Polynesia suggest that there have been signi®cant changes over time in the extent and con®guration of interaction networks (Weisler 1997). That both external and internal exchanges were important aspects of Ancestral Polynesian societies seems certain, but is it possible to infer anything more speci®c regarding such exchange systems? A substantial corpus of archaeological evidence has accumulated since the 1970s documenting the importance of long-distance transfer of material goods between Lapita communities (Green and Kirch 1997; Kirch 1997a:227±55). Thus in Early Eastern Lapita sites in Tonga, Samoa, Futuna, and Niuatoputapu there is evidence for inter-island transfer of materials such as chert, obsidian, and stone adzes (although little evidence for movement of pottery), and probably also shell ``exchange valuables.'' Continuing on into the Polynesian Plainware assemblages of direct relevance to Ancestral Polynesian societies, there is evidence for movement of stone adzes, but the chert, obsidian, and shell valuables appear to drop out of the inventory of external exchange. It seems entirely possible, however, that new items were added to the inventory of materials transferred between communities, especially woven mats and decorated bark cloth. These two categories played signi®cant roles in external exchange in the Western Polynesian region at the time of European contact (Kirch 1984b:232±42). Some linguistic evidence supports this interpretation, with several PPN terms relating to valued goods or possessions, terms whose modern re¯exes designate categories of ``exchange valuables'' in ethnographically documented exchange systems. In Table 8.6 we list these terms along with a number of other words related to trade or exchange. PPN *koloa is a widely re¯ected term that everywhere has a sense of `valued goods' or possessions; in several cases, however, it also refers to `®ne bark cloth,' and this may have been a marked sub-category of *koloa for the PPN speakers. Also notable are the related words *toqonga and *taonga, both of which again refer to `valued property' or `alienable property.' For many speci®c re¯exes, however, there is again a speci®c meaning of ®ne mats, or bark cloth, in addition to the broader semantic value of valued object. Our hypothesis is that in Ancestral Polynesia these terms indexed a range of valued materials, but applied especially to ®nely woven mats and to decorated bark cloth, categories of material culture that were beginning to play signi®cant roles in exchanges, both internal and external. Table 8.6 also lists a number of words referring to the act of exchange, or

Social and political organization

221

Table 8.6. Proto Polynesian terms relating to exchange or trade Proto Oceanic

Probable gloss Valuable possessions, objects of exchange Valuable, alienable property Treasured possession, especially ®ne mat or garment Return gift or services Exchange, buy, or sell Give or trade Exchange, change, replace Pay, compensate, exchange Price, payment, cost

*soli

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*koloa

14

3

*toqonga *ta(a)qonga

11 11

3 3

*sau PNP *soko *soli *sui *tauqi *totongi

4 9 9 14 11 5

3

P2

PSA

3

3

3 3 3 3

NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

of making a gift, as well as for trade or other `commercial'' transactions. Of particular interest is PPN *sau, which POLLEX glosses as `return for services or to a gift.' The MAO re¯ex for this word is of course the hau made famous in Marcel Mauss' essay on ``the gift.'' Although there are only four Polynesian re¯exes, *sau is also re¯ected in FIJ, and, given the distribution of cognates from TON to MAO, is a valid PPN reconstruction. PPN *soko may have implied more of a sense of `barter' or `trade' than a formalized exchange, whereas *soli probably referred to outright `gifting' without expectation of a return. PPN *tauqi is best glossed as `pay' or `compensate.' Kinship, status, and role in Ancestral Polynesia We have already encountered PPN words for `people,' *kai/*kakai, and for `person,' *tangata (see Chapter 3). Here we turn to linguistically marked distinctions among such persons in Ancestral Polynesian societies, including distinctions along kinship lines and those involving status or role. There are four groups of terms: those for persons in general, those for specialists, those that deal with kinfolk, and a few terms pertaining to elites. Close study of the lexical items given in Table 8.7, supported by the kinship terms of reference in Table 8.8, reveals: (1) a generational structuring of such distinctions;

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Table 8.7. Proto Polynesian terms for persons Category/probable gloss Status categories Ancestor (grandparent)

Commoner, person without rank Priest-chief, probably the ranking head of *kainanga Man of rank Ruler, high-ranking elite, to have command or rule over a group of people Specialists Expert, craftsperson, ritual specialist (?) Warrior Sea expert, navigator General terms for persons Young person, unmarried, virgin of marriageable age Unmarried person (male or female) Primiparae, woman who is parturent for ®rst time or who has borne one child and no more Child or classi®catory child, especially male (son) First-born child Young man Girl Child (boy or girl) Children Grandchild and collaterals of that generation

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

*tupuna *tupunga *taaua? *tuqa *taulekaleka *qariki

7

3

15 28

3 3

*mata-a-pule *sau

4 11

3

*tufunga *toa *tautahi

17 22 10

P2

PSA 3

3 3

3 3 3

*poqou *tau-poqou *qalopoqou *tama *qulu-matuqa PNP *taamaloa *taqahine *tamaqiti *tamariki *m(a,o)kupuna

7 9 15 9 13 6 12 21 23

3 3

3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

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Table 8.8. Proto Polynesian kinship terms Generation

Probable gloss

PPN term

Second ascending

Grandparent (ancestor ?)

*tupuna

First ascending

Parent Parents Father, father's brother Mother Mother's brother Father's sister Parent in-law Younger sibling, same sex Older sibling, same sex Woman's brother Man's sister Sibling, cross-sex Sibling, same-sex Spouse Sibling in-law, same sex

*matuqa *maatuqa *tama(na) *tina(na) *tuqa-tina *masaki-tanga *fungawai *tahina *tuaka(na) *tuangaqane *tuafa®ne *kawe, *weka *taqo-kete *qahawana *maqa

Man's son Woman's child, esp. son Woman's daughter

*fosa *tama *qo-fa®ne *(q)a-fa®ne *qilamutu *qulu-matuqa *fungaona *makupuna

Ego's generation

First descending

Second descending

Man's sister's child First-born child Child in-law Grandchild

Source: Marck 1996b. PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX).

(2) an emphasis on ranking older over younger siblings, where these are of the same sex; (3) a concern with gender; and (4) marked interest in ®rst-born children, particularly the ®rst-born male child. Overall, a concept of statusmarking is inherent in this terminological system. To quote Howard and Kirkpatrick, ``Polynesians carried with them a set of principles for interpreting the world, and organizing their social lives,'' including ``speci®c notions about kinship, relationships between human beings and ancestral gods, and a host of related beliefs'' (1989:59).

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In this Polynesian world view one begins with ancestors, the base, trunk, or root from which society ascends (rather than descends as in the social anthropological concept of ``descent'' and ``descent groups''). One works up, either to be assigned a place among the less differentiated mass of common people, or to be singled out as belonging to some special branch of demarcated rank in society, some of whom are ultimately elevated to the status of venerated ancestors. Most of the evidence presented in Table 8.6 is straightforward and its implications have already been summarized. However, the word for `ancestor' requires additional comment (see also Chapter 9). A concern with ancestors, and especially with apical founders of ascent groups, seems to go back to the PMP stage (Fox 1994, 1995; Blust 1995a:497±98). In Polynesia, the kin-term *tupuna for grandparent also carries with it nearly everywhere a second meaning of `ancestor.' The question is, were the two meanings kept distinct at the PPN level, as they are today in such societies as Tonga, Samoa, `Uvea, Futuna, and Tokelau? In Western Polynesia, two other terms are typically given, re¯exes of PPN *tupunga or its doublet *tupuqanga, meaning `source' or `ancestor,' and of *tupulanga meaning `age set' or `generational group.' Possible explanations for this diversity of terms include confusion in sources, borrowing among the core Western Polynesian languages (Marck's preferred solution), or our own view that the terminological distinction is indeed ancient. Most scholars agree that there was a Polynesian transformation of an older Austronesian root (POC *tubuq) ± which meant `to grow' (according to a tree-and-branch ideological structure; see Fox 1995c; Marck 1996b) ± into words for `ancestor,' PPN *tupunga or *tupuqanga.25 This transformation was accomplished by the addition of the suf®xes *-qanga or *-nga, and *-langa to the root *tupu (`to grow'), perhaps literally ``raising up'' grandparents into ancestors. We propose a semantic history in which PPN had discrete words for ancestors, for grandparents, and less certainly (only at the PNP interstage) for age set or generational group. Additional study by linguists might specify which reconstructed morph applies in each case, and how some irregular mergers of ng with n have given us the present situation with four tupuwords. For us, the comparative ethnographic evidence strongly establishes both `ancestors' and `a generational principle' as typical of Ancestral Polynesian societies. Thus, while Marck (1996b) thinks there may not have been a distinct word for `ancestor' in PPN (as separate from the same term for `grandparent'), we suspect for a variety of reasons that there almost certainly was, despite the lack of clear re¯exes in Outlier or Eastern Polynesian languages. Our hypothesis is that in these latter languages the two meanings were merged under the term *tupuna at some early point in

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their history, with the distinctions retained only in the core Western Polynesian homeland. More about ancestors will be said in Chapter 9, when we take up the topic of Ancestral Polynesian religious beliefs. Specialists in Ancestral Polynesian societies are embraced by PPN *tufunga. Only two certain categories of such experts are indicated by discrete lexemes: warrior (*toa), and sea expert or navigator (*tautahi ). If similar terms existed for carpenters who constructed buildings, canoe makers, adz makers or lithic specialists, tattooers of people, basket or mat weavers, bark cloth experts, or even potters (to name a few of the ethnographically attested Polynesian specializations), they are not encoded by labels at the PPN level, or indeed even at later interstages. The one probable exception is PPN *maatai which, following TcherkeÂzoff (2000), would have referred to specialists involved in constructing things (such as houses or canoes), in other words an expert craftsperson or builder.26 Turning to kin terms, we have noted the generational structure of the PPN system of classifying people, and it comes as no surprise that the system of kin-terms is so organized. The PPN terms of reference (Table 8.8) exhibit distinctions between elder and younger same-sex siblings, and special terms for the cross-sex siblings of a female and of a male. The kinship terminologies of later interstages of Polynesian languages evolved from this early model largely through simpli®cation. Thus the history of kinship terms in Polynesian initially stems from one of so-called ``Hawaiian'' type, recalling Murdock's (1960) conclusions on the topic. In regard to our suggestion that the *kainanga was a unilineal group, it is signi®cant that PPN lexically distinguished `father and father's brother' (*tama[na]) from `mother's brother' (*tuaqa-tina), because cross-culturally such ``bifurcate merging'' terminologies are associated with either patrilineal or matrilineal descent (Hage 1998b). Other kin-terms that deserve further highlighting are the elder/younger distinction among same-sex siblings, on which the conical clan concept and the ranking of descent lines ± and in later societies the ranking of chiefs ± are founded (Kirch 1984a:31±37). The relevant PPN terms here are *tahina and *tuaka(na), for older and younger same-sex siblings, as reconstructed by Marck (1999a:262±72; see also Marshall 1984).27 Cross-sex siblings, in contrast, were distinguished on the basis of sex, as *tuafa®ne (`man's sister') and *tuangaqane (`woman's brother'). Kirch (1984a:63) pointed out that this sibling terminology with its senior/junior distinction ``was fundamental to the Polynesian ideology of rank,'' and observed that while the older pattern was later simpli®ed in some Polynesian societies, it was ``retained by all of the more highly strati®ed chiefdoms.'' Recently, Bellwood (1996b) has drawn attention to the pervasive ``founder ideology'' in Austronesian societies, and

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we suggest that the PPN kinship system re¯ected this overriding concern with rank based on birth order. Rank and leadership If one goal of reconstructing Ancestral Polynesian societies is to provide a ®rm basis for understanding sociopolitical transformations in descendent cultural traditions, then, along with the nature of early social groups, nothing could be more critical than the forms of ranking and leadership that prevailed in ``Hawaiki.'' The founder of the modern comparative ethnographic genre in Polynesia, Williamson, devoted the atypically short concluding chapter of his three-volume opus to ``the head of the social group,'' remarking that ``this of®ce was one of the fundamental features of the social and political systems of Polynesia'' (1924, 3:396). Among what we might call pervasive ``systemic cultural patterns'' with respect to chiefship, Williamson noted that this social group head was ``the holder of . . . the recognized title or name of the group''; that he was ``invested with a degree of sanctity''; that he ``was the natural high priest of the group''; that he was elected by members of his own social group; that he ``occupied the place of honour'' at group assemblies; that ``the land of the group was regarded as being vested in him''; that he had some role in relation to harvests and food supply; and that he had a certain right to ®rst-fruits (1924, 3:396±400). Williamson modestly concluded by stating that he hoped ``to show hereafter that the chiefs also took the leading part or the position of importance, in feasts, kava parties, and other social functions and ceremonies,'' but deferred this to another work. We think that he correctly distilled the essence of Polynesian chiefship, and will argue that the above list would comprise an excellent extended gloss for the PPN term *qariki. Koskinen (1960), picking up where Williamson left off and having the advantage of a vastly improved ethnographic corpus, devoted a pathbreaking monograph to a comparative study of Polynesian chiefship, and while historical reconstruction was not foremost among his aims, he advanced a few propositions regarding the ancient form of chiefship. In particular, Koskinen drew attention to the ``magico-religious role of the ariki chiefs,'' and speculated that ``the oldest form of the Polynesian ariki chieftainship was perhaps more clearly sacerdotal'' (1960:140, 148). Again, we concur. Kirch (1984a:63±64) drew not only on Williamson (1924) and Koskinen (1960), but on Pawley's (1979) linguistic reconstructions of the POC terms *qa-lapas, `chief,' and *qa-diki, `®rst-born son of chief,' and PPN *qariki, `chief,' advancing the proposition that ``Ancestral Polynesian Society had already developed the institution of hereditary chieftainship.'' In a strict

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sense, Kirch was correct in this interpretation, but his argument was insuf®ciently documented through a full application of the triangulation method; the simple gloss ``hereditary chieftainship'' was too ambiguous, subject to multiple interpretations, and thus open to subsequent critiques (e.g., Sutton 1990, 1996; cf. Green 1994). Pawley (1982) and Lichtenberk (1986) have tackled the linguistic problems of reconstructing words for social group leaders at the POC level. Pawley adduced evidence for two terms, POC *qalapa(s) and *qadiki, for which he provided glosses of `chief,' and `®rst-born son of chief,' respectively (1982:41). The PPN term *qariki was, of course, derived from POC *qadiki. Pawley went on to propose the hypothesis that, at an early stage of Oceanic, the *kainanga ``denoted a higher-order descent group whose formal leader was its *qalapa(s) `chief,' a term which has been lost in most Polynesian [languages], where it was replaced by *qariki, and in the Nuclear Micronesian languages, where various noncognate words for categories of chief or leader have developed'' (1982:44). Lichtenberk marshaled a greater array of linguistic evidence, requiring some revision of Pawley's reconstructions. Instead of *qalapa(s), Lichtenberk proposed POC *tala(m)pat, with a literal meaning of `big, great person,' and *adiki, which ``took the personal/proper article *qa,'' and had a meaning of `oldest child' (1986:344). These POC reconstructions are signi®cant in being consistent with the principles of ranking discussed above, and with the notion that in early Oceanic societies leaders were drawn from the senior branches of a lineage, an aspect of what Bellwood (1996b) calls ``founder ideology.'' That the `oldest child' should be lexically marked hints at the origins of the later Polynesian practice of patrilineal descent for chiefs. PPN *qariki, head of the *kainanga The institution of chiefship is pervasive among Polynesian societies (Sahlins 1963; Marcus 1989), marked nearly everywhere by cognates of PPN *qariki, such as TIK ariki, TON `eiki, or HAW ali`i. POLLEX lists twenty-nine Polynesian witnesses, glossing virtually all of them as `chief ' (although in NKO and KAP there is also the meaning of `priest'). At ®rst glance this is an undisputed case of prime semantic agreement. One might think that there is little to argue about, and con®dently aver ± as did Kirch ± that ``Ancestral Polynesian Society had already developed the institution of hereditary chieftainship'' (1984a:64). This interpretation, however, was strongly critiqued by Sutton (1990:668), who maintained that one could not ``assume that the status or kin categories identi®ed in lexical reconstructions have operationally speci®c meanings.'' Sutton (1990:669) argued that `chief ' ``will mean different things in different social and cultural contexts,'' rendering

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any precise semantic reconstruction impossible. Dye (1987b:445±46) similarly noted that the ``semantic value assigned [*qariki ] is modeled on the rights, duties, and modes of succession associated with chiefs of contact-era societies in full land situations,'' and questioned whether these ``could have been the rights and duties of an *`ariki in a `propagule' of fewer than 100 persons on an island covered with virgin forest.'' Sutton's and Dye's points are well taken; we certainly agree that a naive projection of the ``ethnographic present'' onto the distant past hardly constitutes a valid methodology (see Green 1994). Indeed, we have been at pains to develop speci®c semantic history hypotheses that take account of shifts in the meanings of terms over time, in different branches of a cultural phylogeny. With this in mind, let us closely examine the lexical and ethnographically extended semantic values for PPN *qariki. Table 8.9 lists thirty-two re¯exes of PPN *qariki, organized by major geographic regions of Polynesia, and includes extended glosses where available. These latter we have obtained through a close reading of the relevant ethnographic sources indicated in the last column of the table, paying attention to such matters as the mode of inheritance of a chie¯y title, the functions of a chief, and the nature of the social group headed by that chief. Since the lexical reconstruction of *qariki itself is not in dispute, it is these glosses that command our attention in an effort to develop a rigorous semantic history hypothesis for what, to some, has been an enigmatic concept. Perusing Table 8.9, we can extract (as we did for the social group terms), a bundled set of denotata that go beyond a simplistic gloss of `chief,' and which are represented in all of the major branches of the Polynesian phylogeny. (1) These include not only the pervasive secular leadership role, but in numerous cases a primary sacred role, as the principal priest or religious leader (e.g., EFU and TOK in Western Polynesia, ANU, TIK, KAP, and REN in the Outliers, and at least MIA and TUA in Eastern Polynesia). (2) Another widespread association is between ariki and (``descent'') ascent groups (e.g., EFU, SAM, TOK, ANU, TIK, EAS, MAO, MQA, MRA, PUK, TUA). In at least four cases, ariki were the leaders of a kainanga-type group (ANU, TIK, MQA, and MRA), and in three cases of a kaainga-type group (SAM, TOK, PUK). (3) Another pervasive pattern is hereditary succession to ariki titles, usually through primogeniture in the patrilineal line. (4) Holders of ariki titles were typically male, and if female, often lexically marked as such (e.g., ali`i wahine in HAW). (5) Finally our reading of the literature convinces us that ariki were everywhere regarded in some degree as `sacred' (tapu), the conveyors or possessors of `supernatural power' (mana). The features enumerated above, while not necessarily present in all cases (and we lack good ethnographic sources for many of these), are widespread

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Table 8.9. Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *qariki Geographic region/ language

Cognate term

Western Polynesia ECE aliki EFU `aliki

EUV

`aliki

NIU SAM

(patu)-iki ali`i

TON

`eiki

TOK

aliki

Polynesian Outliers ANU ariki

KAP

ariki

MAE MFA NKO NKR OJA REN

ariki ariki aligi ariki `ali`i `angiki

SIK TAK TIK

aliki ariki ariki

WFU WEV

ariki aliki

Gloss

Sourcea

Hereditary chiefs, including the paramount chief (aliki sau) and village chiefs (aliki fenua) Inheritance is patrilineal within kutunga descent groups. In pre-Christian times, the aliki were also the main priests. Hereditary chiefs, particularly of certain high-ranking family lines `King' or paramount chief Chief, one of two main kinds of leader (matai) of lineage or family groups (`ainga) Members of a hereditary class of chiefs, often titled, who were the leaders of speci®c territorial units. A sacred leader, priest of the supreme god Tui Tokelau; descendant of the founding lineage; membership in the kaainga aliki was exclusively through agnatic links

Burrows 1936; Kirch 1994a, 1994b

Hereditary chiefs, of which there are two, each associated with a particular kainanga group. In pre-Christian times, the ariki were also the principal priests Hereditary chief-priests, principal religious leaders in the pre-Christian religion Chief Chief Priest of cult Chief Chief A particular kind of priest-chief, associated with harvest rituals Chief Chief, chie¯y Chief, clan head. The ariki is the head of the kainanga (clan), functioning as both secular (political) and religious leader. Succession to the title is patrilineal. Chief Chief

Burrows 1937 Loeb 1926

Gifford 1929

Huntsman and Hooper 1996

Feinberg 1981

Emory 1965

Monberg 1991

Firth 1936, 1985

Cont . . .

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Table 8.9. (cont. ) Geographic region/ language

Cognate term

Eastern Polynesia EAS ariki

HAW

ali`i

MAO

ariki

MIA

ariki

MQA

haka`iki

MRA

ariki

MVA

akariki

PEN PUK

ariki aliki

RAR TAH

ariki ariki

TUA

ariki

Gloss

Sourcea

Chief, king, lord, headman in general. The Churchill 1912; paramount chief or `king' was termed the MeÂtraux 1940 ariki-mau. The ariki-mau was `divine,' and descended from the founding ancestor Hotu Matu`a. Member of the chie¯y class, which included at least nine ranked grades. Succession was typically by primogeniture, but usurpation was not infrequent. High-born chief, descendant of ®rst-born Firth 1959 children in a continuous elder line; the hereditary leaders of hapu social groups Hereditary titles, speci®cally the Inland Hiroa 1934 High Priest (ariki-pa-uta), Shore High Priest (ariki-pa-tai), and the Ruler of Food (te ariki i te ua i te tapora kai), each of®ciating at particular temples (marae) Hereditary chiefs, the genealogically senior Handy 1923; and sacred leaders of the `tribe' or mata`eina`a Thomas 1990 The senior male member (matahiapo) of a Hiroa 1932 number of family groups which have branched out from the original family (the matakeinanga). The term ariki is regarded as a title. Nobles who ruled over the separate islands Hiroa 1938 or large districts. Heirs had to be born on a particular temple (marae), and were tapu. Succession was by primogeniture. Chief Chief, hereditary leader of a paternal lineage Beaglehole and (kainga). All the major chiefs were priests by Beaglehole 1938 virtue of rank. Chief A term of address and reference for the Oliver 1974 sovereign ruler of each tribal unit; persons holding high-grade of®ces in certain kin-congregations Hereditary leaders of a descent group (ngati), Emory 1947 who in pre-Christian times were also usually the priests who of®ciated at the group's temple (marae)

a Ethnographic sources consulted by us for glosses are indicated with citations; all other glosses are from POLLEX.

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and represented in all of the main branches of the Polynesian phylogeny. Thus they are unlikely to be the result of borrowing or diffusion (horizontal transmission); neither is independent invention (convergence) a parsimonious explanation. Rather, we have isolated a set of features pertaining to chiefship which must be shared retentions of the Ancestral Polynesian pattern. Thus we would now offer an extended ethnographic gloss on the meaning of PPN *qariki: `the senior, male, titled leader of a social group, probably the *kainanga, who typically inherited his position patrilineally within the senior ranked line of this group, and who acted as the group's secular as well as ritual leader.' (The role of the *qariki as priest will be explored in greater detail in Chapter 9.) This enhanced semantic de®nition of an Ancestral Polynesian priest-chief once again allows the possibility of tracing, in some detail, transformations that have occurred in particular societies after the breakup of the PPN speech community. In more conservative societies, ariki retained both their secular and sacred roles, and continued to be closely associated with ascent groups such as the kainanga and kainga; examples are Tikopia, Pukapuka, and Tokelau. In many societies, however, a functional separation between secular and sacred roles developed. This was particularly so in Eastern Polynesia, corresponding to the widespread importance of a priestly class (tahunga), and of oracles and inspirational priests (taura, tau`a). Yet another kind of transformation accompanied the breakdown of the ancient *kainangatype social groups, and their replacement with strictly territorial groupings, in which ariki became the leaders of such land units; Hawai`i and Tonga both exemplify this kind of change. In short, we hope to have now answered our critics such as Sutton (1990) and Dye (1987b), by demonstrating that it is possible to reconstruct, with some precision, the nature of Ancestral Polynesian chiefship. Rather than a naive projection of the ethnographic present back into the past, this requires a closely argued, ethnographically based semantic history, taking into account widespread features of chieftainship that can only be shared retentions. Essential to such a semantic history hypothesis is a body of ethnographically informed semantic extensions for the relevant lexical witnesses. Such is the advantage of the triangulation method, working within an explicitly phylogenetic model. PPN *fatu, leader of the *kaainga Some of the most challenging problems in semantic reconstruction involve polysemous words, such as PPN *mata. Another word with a diversity of meanings is *fatu, for which POLLEX provides reconstructed glosses ranging from `weave,' `stone,' `kidney,' `to fold,' and `viscous, clotted.' But

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

POLLEX also offers a compound lexical reconstruction involving *qariki, which should alert us to the possibility that here we have another kind of leadership category: PPN *fatu-qariki. The POLLEX entry gives just four witnesses (MFA, NIU, NKO, and WFU), with a dubious semantic reconstruction of `high chief.' Pursuing the lead to a wider array of ethnographic sources, however, we can amplify not just the compound construction *fatuqariki, but another primary meaning for *fatu itself. The data are provided in Table 8.10. At ®rst glance, the various glosses for cognates of *fatu having something to do with leadership or social position seem wildly varied; closer study, however, reveals that the sense of an informal, mature leader of some kind is represented in all of the primary branches of Polynesian (e.g., in TO, NP, EC, EP, MQ , and TA subgroups). This suggests that at the PPN stage, *fatu had a semantic value centered around the notion of an `elder' of some kind. But of what kind of social group? We know it cannot have been the *kainanga, because the evidence that *kainanga leaders were called *qariki is very sound. Could it have been that *fatu were the heads of individual *kaainga? While not conclusive, some evidence supports this interpretation. Speci®cally, we note the following shared denotata, evidence for constructing such a semantic history hypothesis: (1) a shared meaning of `ancestor' or `®rst parent' in several Eastern Polynesian languages (MAO, EAS, MVA); (2) a widespread meaning of `master, lord' or the proprietor of resources, especially those that would pertain to a kaainga group and its estate (EAS, HAW, MQA, NIU, RAR, TAH, TUA); (3) an explicit lexical link to kaainga resources and issues (ECE, HAW, RAR, and TOK); and (4) reference to a mature individual who possesses *qariki rank (NIU, NKO, WFU, MFA). While the data are admittedly messy, our overall deduction is that PPN *fatu is the most likely candidate for the category of `*kaainga leader,' one who oversaw the use and allocation of the *kaainga's land and resources. When that particular *kaainga happened to be highly ranked, its *fatu may also have been the *qariki of the larger *kainanga. This might explain the origin of the compound term *fatu-qariki. Our interpretation of PPN *fatu is bolstered by a consideration of systematic patterns revealed by many Polynesian ethnographies, for a linguistically marked category of men who served as leaders of family-based kin groupings, and thus held standing in the community at large. Structurally, such leadership roles are exempli®ed by the patu of Niue (Ryan 1977:127±32), the tuupele of Pukapuka (Hecht 1977:197), the pule kainga of Futuna (Burrows 1936; Kirch 1994a), the matai of Samoa (Meleisea 1995; TcherkeÂzoff 2000), the ra`atira of the Society Islands (Oliver 1974:769±71), and the rangatira of New Zealand (Salmond 1997:473; Ballara 1998:203±6, 269). In all of these cases, the society recognized a more formal and

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Table 8.10. Re¯exes of Proto Polynesian *fatu, leader of the *kaainga Geographic region/ language

Cognate term

Western Polynesia ECE fatu kainga EFU fatu tangata SAM latu NIU

patu

TON TOK(1)

fatu tangata fatu fa®ne fatu paepae

TOK(2)

fatukaainga

Polynesian Outliers MFA ®tooriki NKO hodooligi WFU faturaki/nga Eastern Polynesia EAS(1) hatu EAS(2)

Hotu Matu`a

HAW(1) HAW(2) HAW(3) MAO MQA MVA

haku tu`u haku haku-`aina whaatua fatu `atu motua

RAR TAH TUA

`atuu fatu fatu

a

Gloss

Sourcea

To be a married person Man who has arrived at mature age Person in charge of an undertaking (e.g., a head house builder) Chief, head of family, elder; a lowly ranked Loeb 1926 chief (not an iki) and a head of a family Ryan 1977 group called mangafaoa, or at times fangai Middle-aged man Middle-aged woman (n. paving stone), but also a senior woman who lives in a family (kaainga) house and who is relied upon to share out the food gathered from the family members The obligation of caring for one's family (kaainga) in the traditional way, said of both men and women Chiefs (collective) Chief of island Game of king of the mountain Lord (in certain oral traditions about past S. Fischer ancestors) (pers. comm.) The primary founding ancestor of the Me traux 1940 island Lord, master, overseer, possessor, proprietor Chief addressed as ``my master'' A land owner, land overseer Ancestor, ®rst parent Master, owner of an animal A founding ancestor in Mangarevan traditional history Lord, master, owner, landlord Lord, master, owner Lord, master, proprietor

Ethnographic sources consulted by us for glosses are indicated by citations; other glosses are from POLLEX or the Tokelau dictionary.

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hereditary category of ariki, who occupied a higher level of chie¯y rank. For the Eastern Polynesian societies, this structural position ± head of the family group ± came to be lexically indicated by the term rangatira or its variants, an innovation that can be linguistically traced to the PCE interstage. For Western Polynesia, in contrast, the linguistic evidence permits a claim for the *fatu term marking this leadership category, back to the PPN level. The case of Niue, in Western Polynesia, offers an ethnographic example which, we would argue, preserved to a large degree the original nature of the *fatu category (Ryan 1977, and pers. comm., 1998), and perhaps deserves closer scrutiny. PPN *sau, secular ruler The formulation of detailed semantic glosses for PPN *qariki and *fatu does not exhaust our analysis of political leadership in Ancestral Polynesian societies, for there is yet another term, *sau, to be considered.28 Ethnographically, the word is best known from Western Polynesia, where it appears in such forms as TON hau, `secular paramount leader,' EFU sau, `paramount chief,' EUV hau, `rule or ruler,' and also in FIJ as sau, `high chief.' In addition, however, there are at least seven Eastern Polynesian witnesses, including MQA hau, `rule, ruler,' MIA `au, `alternate term for the paramount war chief,' TAH hau, `government, peace,' and TUA hau, `government.' We are aware of one Outlier witness, REN sau, `abundance of gifts from the gods.' In all, the fourteen available cognates are suf®cient to lexically reconstruct PCP *sau, and the term may even have an older origin in POC. Taumoefolau (1996:387), in her fascinating article on the origins of the name Hawaiki, suggests that this was derived from a compound term in PPN, *sau qariki, which she glosses as `chie¯y/ancestral/traditional ruler(s).' This compound form is re¯ected in several later Polynesian languages as TON (hou `eiki, `title for aristocracy'), SAM (sauali`i, `honori®c for aitu' ), TOK (haualiki, `demi-god'), TAH (hauari`i, `kingly government'), and HAW (auali`i, `royal, chie¯y'), making the PPN reconstruction of the compound term solid. Its meaning, however, is dif®cult to determine, and Taumoefolau does not offer a robust semantic history hypothesis, being more concerned with the transformation of PPN *sau qariki to PNP *Hawaiki as a name for the `ancestral homeland.' The considerable disparity in ethnographic glosses for sau/hau terms makes development of a semantic history hypothesis far more dif®cult than for *qariki. As a paramount chief, particularly a secular leader, this usage of sau/hau is largely con®ned to the Fiji±Western Polynesian region, raising the possibility of a parallel semantic transformation due to continued interaction.29 We also know that PPN *sau cannot have been the head of the

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*kainanga group, for this surely was the role of the *qariki. We suggest, but cannot strongly con®rm, the following hypothesis: that at the PCP interstage *sau had emerged as the common word for a leader or person of rank, replacing POC *tala(m)pat, apparently a term for leader (or big man?; Lichtenberk 1986). At the time of the Lapita colonization of Remote Oceania, it is likely that the PCP re¯ex of POC *adiki still meant `son of the leader' whether called *tala(m)pat or *sau. However, by the later interstages of PPN and Proto Fijian, semantic shifts in old words provided terms for new forms of leaders, under the lexemes *qariki and *tuquranga.30 Over time (well after the PPN stage), these leadership positions came to the fore, slowly displacing the authority of the *sau, leaving the latter to secular affairs as in the Lau/Tongan examples. One possibility ± and it is nothing more than a hunch at this time ± is that the *sau position may have corresponded to the broader term *mata, which we suspect indexed the larger ``society'' in Oliver's (1989) sense. This would make the *sau something like the ranking or most senior of a set of *qariki (each presiding over a *kainanga), and could explain the lexical marking of such an individual by the compound term *sau qariki as reconstructed by Taumoefolau (1996). This is our current semantic history hypothesis for a topic that has proven puzzling. It introduces a strong role in Ancestral Polynesian times for the persons occupying the title of *sau, a matter largely ignored in earlier discussions. Since the Ancestral Polynesian societies represent a critical formative stage for the many varieties of chiefship that developed later throughout Polynesia, further analysis of this matter may prove rewarding. Conclusion Prior constructions of Ancestral Polynesian social organization may have had their ``unreal'' aspects, as Sutton (1996) avers. Yet Goldman (1970), drawing largely on synchronic ethnography, recognized that from the beginning Polynesian societies incorporated concepts of rank, and possessed leaders who engaged in status rivalry. Our analysis supports many of Goldman's deductions, but it goes much further. Drawing upon LeÂvi-Strauss' concept of House, elaborated in recent years by Austronesian scholars, we identify three kinds of PPN social groups: an encompassing one, the *mata, and three speci®c forms (Figure 8.1). The ®rst speci®c unit, PPN *kainanga, was a unilineal ascent group led by an elite (the *qariki ), while the second was a residentially oriented social group, the *kaainga. These groups ®t well with the concept of the House as developed in recent years by Austronesian ethnographers.31 Within *kainanga as we reconstruct these for Ancestral Polynesian societies, there were several *kaainga, each corresponding to a household unit, with a range of PPN words for its dwellings and architec-

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Fig. 8.1

Social groups and leadership roles in Ancestral Polynesian societies.

tonic features (Table 8.2). Chief among these were the principal dwelling, *fale, and separate cookhouse, *paito. The third speci®c unit, PPN *saqa, seems to have designated a collectivity of persons related to (or under the leadership of ) some individual, possibly the *sau. PPN words for people (*kai/*kakai ) of different kinds display a similarly wide range. We need not repeat all of these, but note only that they distinguished commoners from one another along lines of different generations, as well as separating off a few experts or specialists, generally known as *tufunga, and two kinds of people of rank, *sau and *qariki, the latter being the leaders of the *kainanga. We also have another term, *fatu, which most likely referred to the heads of individual *kaainga groups. In distinguishing between elder and younger same-sex siblings, the *tuaka(na)-*tahina contrast lays a vital basis for subsequent ideas about how hierarchy might be constructed historically in Polynesia, while the cross-sex sibling distinctions played a similar role in gender relations.

Chapter 9

Gods, ancestors, seasons, and rituals The ®rst process involved in building up Polynesian religion was the dei®cation of ancestors . . . The souls of the Polynesian ancestors lived on in the spirit land of Hawaiki. Their descendants called upon them for assistance in the problems of this life. They wished for a continuity of help and so dei®ed speci®c ancestors as gods who could be consulted when occasion demanded. Thus man created his gods.

hiroa 1939:9, 31

In this, our ®nal analytical chapter, we turn to a domain that prehistorians have always approached with caution, as in Hawkes' famous ``ladder of inference'' (Hawkes 1954). Cosmogony, religious beliefs, and the ritual practices of ancient societies may be inferred by archaeologists on the basis of textual or visual materials where these are available (usually only fully in the case of ``state'' level societies, and minimally in visual terms for the upper Palaeolithic), or from the remains of ceremonial or ritual facilities and precincts (temples, shrines, funerary remains, and so forth). For Ancestral Polynesia we have no such witnesses; the evidence of archaeology is for the present entirely mute. There are no extant Ancestral Polynesian temples or shrines, nor do we have funerary remains that might yield clues to ritual practice. No transparently sacred or ritual paraphernalia have been excavated from sites of this period. If asked to attempt a reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian religion strictly on the basis of archaeological indications, we should have to reply that the task is currently impossible, and likely to remain intractable. However, triangulation allows us to apply the evidence of lexical reconstruction conjoined with semantic histories derived from comparative ethnology, even when archaeological data are wholly absent. It is this tack we shall take in constructing an outline ± however skeletalized ± of the spiritual world of the Ancestral Polynesians, and of how these people organized their seasonal round, lunar calendar, and ritual cycle in relation to that spirit world.

237

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

Polynesian religions: ethnographic sources One of the problems of studying Polynesian religions is that virtually all of the indigenous ritual systems were replaced by various Christian sects through the proselytizations of missionaries in the early to mid-nineteenth century. Thus primary information on Polynesian belief systems and ritual practices depends largely on accounts obtained by Westerners after the demise of the ritual systems themselves. Such accounts vary widely in their comprehensiveness and accuracy, and in some cases they incorporate changes made as a result of the conversion to Christianity (e.g., BarreÁ re 1967; see also Marck 1996a:222±23, 231). The standard museum ethnographies of the 1920s and 1930s used these early sources ± sometimes uncritically ± along with such memories and recollections of ancient practice (and the occasional persistence of certain rituals or beliefs) held by their informants, to reconstruct the ``ethnographic present'' of religion in their respective societies. There is much that remains useful in these accounts, but one must exercise caution. What are sorely needed are more critically informed historical ethnographies of traditional Polynesian religions, such as that of Valeri (1985) for Hawai`i, and Oliver (1974) and Babadzan (1993) for Tahiti. Even long-neglected missionary documents, when subjected to critical analysis, can yield signi®cant information on ritual systems at the time of initial proselytization, as Kirch (1994b) has shown in the case of Futuna. One marvelous exception to the demise of traditional religions prior to modern ethnographic study is Tikopia, whose ritual cycle and religious belief system Raymond Firth was able to document using classic ``participant-observation'' methods during 1928±29, and which he elucidated in a unique series of monographs (Firth 1967a, 1967b, 1970). Gordon MacGregor (1943) was likewise privileged to spend two weeks on Rennell Island in 1933, while the traditional religious system was still in force, and he witnessed the annual harvest/®rst fruits ceremony, as well as other rites. And for Bellona Island, Monberg (1991) offers an exquisitely detailed ethnography of belief and ritual among a Polynesian Outlier people who had been Christianized only two decades before his study commenced. Monberg's study is similar in that respect to Emory's earlier work in the Tuamotus (1947), and on Kapingamarangi (1965), where informants had participated directly in the traditional religion. The comparative study of Polynesian religions ± with and without efforts at deep historical reconstruction ± has a long scholarly tradition. Handy's Polynesian Religion (1927) initiated the modern genre, but its historical hypotheses were ¯awed due to reliance on early twentieth-century Kulturkriese methodology. R. W. Williamson was less concerned with historical issues, and his massive compendium, Religious and Cosmic Beliefs of Central Polynesia

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(1933), followed by Religion and Social Organization in Central Polynesia (1937), still provides essential starting points for comparative analyses. Burrows (1938a) only brie¯y considered religion in his study of cultural differentiation within Polynesia. Hiroa (1939) drew upon his vast personal knowledge of Polynesian ethnography in a slim but insightful volume, Anthropology and Religion, a synthesis of what had been learned from the museum ethnographic studies of the 1920s and 1930s. Interest in such comparative syntheses waned after World War II, but recently Jeff Marck (1996a, 1996d, 1999a) has reopened the ®eld with a brilliant analysis of the ``®rst order anthropomorphic gods of Polynesia,'' and his study of early Polynesian concepts of a ``sky father,'' using an approach essentially identical to ours. In this chapter we build from fundamental Polynesian concepts of spiritual power and sacredness, to the evidence for kinds of spiritual beings: ancestors, spirits, gods. We then turn to the kinds of ritual practitioners who of®ciated in Ancestral Polynesian societies, and the ritual spaces and objects they used, including the psychoactive plant kava. From this we move to the seasonal cycle and lunar calendar, recognizing that all Polynesian ritual systems were intimately linked with the annual calendric round. This allows us to discuss the outlines of an Ancestral Polynesian ritual cycle. We conclude with a few remarks on some fundamental transformations in ritual practice that developed in central Eastern Polynesia, after the breakup of the PPN speech community. Mana, tapu, and noa Nothing could be more fundamental to an understanding of Polynesian conceptualizations of the sacred than mana and tapu.1 We drew upon Shore's (1989) comprehensive and thoughtful review to summarize a few salient aspects of mana and tapu. One must ®rst ask whether these words existed in the vocabulary of the PPN speakers, and whether their meanings were within the range understood for ethnographically documented Polynesian societies. This poses little dif®culty, for both *mana and *tapu, along with the related term *noa, are instances of prime semantic agreement, robustly attested across many languages (Table 9.1). PPN *tapu has re¯exes in thirtyone Polynesian languages (thirty-four including extra-Polynesian FIJ, ROT, and YAS witnesses), and in all of these has a core meaning of `prohibited, sacred, or under ritual restriction.' Moreover, the word has a deep antiquity in Oceania, for it can be reconstructed to POC (*tabu, `sacred, forbidden') and even farther back to Proto Eastern Malayo Polynesian (*tabus, `sacred') (see Blust 1995a). PPN *mana is also well attested, with re¯exes in twenty-one Polynesian languages (as well as FIJ, ROT, and YAS), and its core meaning is just as ®rmly centered around a gloss of `power, supernatural force.'2 Like

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Table 9.1. Proto Polynesian terms relating to gods, spirits, and ancestors Category/probable gloss

Proto Polynesian NCOG P1

P2

PSA

Sacredness Prohibited, under ritual restriction, taboo *tapu Supernatural power, effectiveness, prestige, thunder *mana Common, ordinary, free from taboo *noa

31 23 19

3 3 3

3 3 3

Spirit world Sky, heavens Abode of the gods

*langi *pulotu

32 3

3

3 3

*qatua *Taangaloa *Maaui

23 19 15

3 3 3

3

*qaitu *tupuqa *tupuna *tupunga

14 26

3 3 3

Gods, spirits, ancestors Deity Name of a ®rst-order anthropomorphic god Name of a culture hero or ®rst-order anthropomorphic god Ghost, spirit of dead person Supernatural being, demon, spirit Ancestor, grandparent

3 3 3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

*tapu, *mana has a deep history, and can be reconstructed to POC (*mana) although there its meaning may have been more focused on `thunder' (Blust, pers. comm. 1999). Finally, there is PPN *noa, less well reported in the anthropological literature, but well understood by Polynesian specialists as paired with ± and standing in opposition to ± *tapu. PPN *noa is re¯ected in nineteen Polynesian languages, although not in FIJ or ROT, and thus is probably a PPN innovation. It can be glossed as `ordinary,' or `worthless,' but also more precisely as `that which is unrestricted, free from *tapu.' The historical linguistic evidence leaves no doubt that all three terms ± *mana, *tapu, and *noa ± were a part of the PPN vocabulary pertaining to the sacerdotal. As cases of prime semantic agreement, their core meanings have not undergone major shifts over the past two and a half millennia. To brie¯y summarize the signi®cance of these concepts as core foundations of Polynesian cosmology and theology, we will therefore paraphrase Shore's excellent synthesis (1989).

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241

According to Shore (1989:164), ``mana manifests the power of the gods in the human world,'' yet because the relationship between humans and the spirit world is always ambiguous, it is necessary to attempt to control these relations through ritual activity. Mana is intimately ``linked to organic generativity and thus to all forces of growth and vitality,'' but as ``life-giving and death-dealing powers are transformations of each other,'' mana occurs at both poles. Polynesian religious practices and beliefs are thus focused on ``ritual transformations of mana.'' ``The arc through which power can be ritually transformed'' is represented by the polar states of tapu and noa. A state of contact between the divine and the secular is that of tapu, whereas noa ``represents an unbounded state of separation from the divine.'' In Polynesian ritual activity, people or objects are rendered tapu through speci®c rites of ``binding, tying, and containing.'' ``Such rites channeled divine potency for human ends and rendered phenomena intelligible by providing an encompassing and transcendent form, but also were acts of human submission to the divine.'' Shore (1989:165) goes on to observe that because mana is linked with ``generative potency,'' the concept has speci®c and special relationships to the primary sources of human life: food and sex. However, the speci®c ways in which the bipolar qualities of power were mapped onto social structure differed between Western and Eastern Polynesian societies. In Western Polynesia, these were ``mapped onto the brother-sister relationship, or a diarchic kingship, and thereby desexualized,'' whereas in Eastern Polynesia these were ``mapped onto the sexualized relationship of husband and wife rather than brother and sister.'' These differences thus pose a problem in historical reconstruction with regard to the relationship between tapu/noa polarity and sexual relations in Ancestral Polynesian societies. That some complex relationship existed seems certain; we are inclined to think that the Western Polynesian structures have retained the original Ancestral Polynesian model, because the gendered kin-relationships seem to have been fundamental (see Chapter 8). This problem, however, is a challenge we would urge the comparative ethnographers to tackle anew. Gods, spirits, and ancestors If mana and tapu were well-established concepts in Ancestral Polynesian culture, there must also have been a conceptualization of the `divine,' the supernatural sources of power. Indeed, PPN *qatua, widely re¯ected throughout Polynesian languages, can be con®dently glossed as `deity.' A second PPN word, *qaitu, is not so well evidenced, although it occurs in many Polynesian languages in Outlier, Western Polynesian, and Eastern Polynesian branches.3 Re¯exes of *qaitu generally convey some reference to

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`spirit' or `ghost' (sometimes malevolent) rather than to a deity per se. POLLEX glosses *qaitu as `ghost, spirit of dead person,' with which we concur. Yet a third term, PPN *tupuqa, is widely spread throughout Polynesia, and has a semantic range that overlaps with *qaitu but is even broader. Re¯exes of *tupuqa all refer to supernatural beings, but have frequent connotations of `demon,' `monster,' or `bogey-man.' 4 While *qaitu and *tupuqa may have been accorded supernatural powers, it was probably *qatua that were the sources of mana ± generative power ± and hence the normal foci of ritual activity.5 For the supernatural realm, there are two terms of possible signi®cance. The ®rst, widely attested and a case of prime semantic agreement, is PPN *langi, which referred to the `sky' or `heavens.' This may have been more of a physical referent than an indication of a spirit world. The second term is *pulotu, which POLLEX glosses as `abode of the gods,' and which Geraghty (1993) suggests was the PCP term (*burotu) for a `homeland' to which the spirits of the dead returned. However, while *pulotu satis®es the minimal linguistic requirements for reconstruction to PPN, it is re¯ected only in TON, SAM, and EFU, in Western Polynesia, along with FIJ. Hence it may be a loan word, and suggests that the concept of Pulotu as the `underworld and abode of the gods' developed in this region (possibly in Fiji?) after the breakup of PPN. We urge caution in its reconstruction as a part of the theology of Ancestral Polynesian culture. Given a well-attested term for `deity,' *qatua, what evidence is there for the nature of such supernatural beings? Polynesian ethnography is rich in the names and attributes of a great many major and lesser gods, and in Eastern Polynesia these include the familiar Tu, Tane, Tiki, Rongo, and Tangaloa, or their local variants. However, only Tangaloa can be con®dently reconstructed to the PPN interstage. PPN *Taangaloa is attested in nineteen Polynesian languages as well as FIJ, and while there is a considerable range in semantic values, there is a core meaning focused on the notion of a principal god. In a brilliant example of comparative ethnology paired with historical linguistics, Marck (1996a) examines the complex of ``®rst-order anthropomorphic gods'' of Polynesia, and ®nds that the group of siblings including *Taane, *Tuu, and *Rongo are largely PCE innovations. *Taangaloa, however, is the one ®rst-order sibling whose name clearly was in existence in Ancestral Polynesian times (Marck 1996a:247).6 In Tonga and Samoa, *Taangaloa is the senior anthropomorphic god, possibly, though not certainly, a retention of his original status. Marck draws attention to the persistent cosmological theme of a ``Primordial Pair,'' involving complementary male and female elements. The names for the Primordial Pair vary throughout Polynesia, and although it is not

Gods, ancestors, seasons, and rituals

243

possible to reconstruct secure PPN names for them, such a concept must have existed in Ancestral Polynesian societies. In most Polynesian societies, the Primordial Pair represent female (earth) and male (sky) elements. As Marck writes, ``the primordial condition involved a sky that was hugging close to the earth and one of the early acts of the early gods was to raise the sky to create space for standing upright, the brightness of day and other modern conveniences'' (1996a:225). The PNP terms for the Primordial Pair were *Papa-adjective and *Papa-adjective (as in SAM Papa-Tuu and Papa`Ele), and it seems plausible that these may also have been the PPN forms, although the rules of lexical reconstruction do not permit us to state this formally.7 One other robust PPN reconstruction is *Maaui, which, rather than being a god or deity in the strict sense, is probably more properly glossed as the name of a `legendary hero' or `culture hero' (Loumala 1940, 1949, 1955). *Maaui is re¯ected in ®fteen Polynesian languages, a case of prime semantic agreement with respect to the gloss just given.8 For many Polynesians, Maui was an ancestor, ``the ®rst man, the father of the ®rst human being in an island'' (Loumala 1949:106). He is widely credited with being the originator of much that de®nes culture as opposed to nature, such as ®re. In some accounts, *Maaui ®shed up the islands from the sea with his magic ®shhook, or snared the sun and forced it to slow its progression through the sky so that humans could farm. While all of these attributes impart a supernatural quality to *Maaui, he was not a deity in the same way as *Taangaloa. As Luomala remarks, ``To Maui, Polynesians give proper credit ± but no worship, priests, or temples ± for many blessings'' (1955:89). Thus, the Ancestral Polynesians had a speci®c term for deity (*qatua), and at least one such named deity, *Taangaloa, who may have been the ®rst or senior anthropomorphic god born of the Primordial Pair. They also had terms for two other kinds of supernatural beings, *qaitu and *tupuqa, which were not deities, but rather ghosts, spirits, or demons. The second term may be closely related, etymologically, to other PPN words, *tupuna and *tupunga. Re¯exes of *tupuna appear widely throughout Polynesian societies as terms for `ancestor' or `grandparent.'9 Witnesses of *tupunga (or the doublet tupu`anga) are restricted to Western Polynesia (TON, SAM, EUV, EFU, TOK) and refer speci®cally to `ancestor.' As Marck (1996b:18) observes, this leaves unresolved the question of whether PPN actually had two separate terms (*tupuna and *tupunga), one meaning `grandparent' and one meaning `ancestor,' or whether *tupuna was the single term for both (see our discussion of kin-terms in Chapter 8). For our purposes, it makes no substantial difference, because it is certain that there was a term for `ancestor.'10 All three PPN words ± *tupuqa, *tupuna, and *tupunga ± are arguably part of a deeper complex involving ancestors that goes back at least to POC and

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Rediscovering Hawaiki

probably to the PMP interstage (Blust 1980). 11 Moreover, all three words are bimorphemic, with a common root in PPN *tupu, `to grow, sprout, originate.' PPN *tupu is re¯ected in more than thirty languages, including FIJ and YAS, and has been further reconstructed as PMP *tu(m)buq and POC *tupuq. As Marck (1996b:18) writes, ``since at least POC times, *tupu has been polysemous, meaning both `grandparent' and `grow,' and there seems a tendency in Polynesian languages to develop new forms around one or the other sense and apply them to growth, generations, ancestry, and the like.'' To understand why terms for `ancestor' and for `spirit' should be based on the root *tupu, it is necessary to consider what James Fox (1995, 1996) calls ``origin structures'' in Austronesian societies, including those of Polynesia. Contrary to anthropological notions of ``descent,'' most Austronesian societies view the origins of their social groups the other way around, in terms of growth from a source or origin point.12 Very frequently among Austronesian-speakers, origin structures are metaphorically described in botanical terms, as in a tree with its ``base'' and ``trunk'' and later ``branches.'' 13 Fox suggests that this is an ancient and fundamental aspect of Austronesian social organization: It is possible also to identify re¯exes of other origin categories that can be traced back to and reconstructed as proto-Malayo-Polynesian. Besides [PMP] *puqun [`tree, trunk, base, source'], re¯exes of *t-u(m)pu (or *epu), `ancestor, master, second generation relative,' and *tu(m)buq, `growth,' ®gure prominently in metaphoric statements about origins. Together these re¯exes interrelate the notions of origin as `trunk,' as `ancestor' and as `growth' . . . In the Paci®c, re¯exes of *tu(m)buq and *tu(m)pu combine, in various forms, to create a semantics of origins. (1996:6±7)

This, indeed, is precisely what we are suggesting for the PPN word set including *tupuna, *tupunga, *tupuqa, and *tupu, that these were etymologically and semantically linked. To the Ancestral Polynesians, their grandparents (*tupuna) and ancestors (*tupunga) were the source of growth (*tupu) of their social groups, and also in a more direct sense the supernatural transmitters of *mana, the generative power essential for life itself. The exact meaning of *tupuqa is less clear, but may have indicated the spirits of ancestors when these were ritually marked in worship.14 Fox (1995:45±47) draws upon the ethnographic cases of Tikopia and Anuta to illustrate further this model of origin structures, noting that Firth (1985:555±56) also documents the lexical connection between tupu and tupuna in Tikopian language. Feinberg makes these relationships even more explicit for Anuta: Ultimately, manuu [the Anutan re¯ex of *mana] is inherited through a line of males from the line's founding ancestor, a person known as the tapito `source,' `base,' `cause,' `basis,' or `reason.' This individual, as is true of all ancestors from the grandparental generation back, is also known as his descendant's tupuna which is,

Gods, ancestors, seasons, and rituals

245

itself, a modi®cation of the word tupu `grow,' and implies that the founding ancestor is the source of `growing' or `growth.' In our terms, ``power'' and ``intelligence'' and their corollary, ``knowledge,'' are passed down from the ancestors. (Feinberg 1978:134)

A comparative review of Polynesian religions reveals that the dei®cation and ritual supplication of ancestors was virtually universal. Hiroa recognized this when he wrote that ``the ®rst process involved in building up Polynesian religion was the dei®cation of ancestors'' (1939:9). Handy observes that ``the souls of the departed who had been of some consequence in life, after they had reached their ultimate abode usually became what may be called ancestral spirit-gods'' (1927:89). In religions for which we have ®rst-hand or close to ®rst-hand ethnographic accounts (e.g., Tikopia, Bellona, Rennell, Kapingamarangi, Tuamotus), it is clear that rituals directed to ancestors made up a large part of religious practice.15 In Bellona, for example, Monberg (1991:125) includes the following among a list of ``types of relationships to worshipped ancestors'': rituals and presentation of offerings at graves; offerings during homestead rituals; prayers for giving birth; requests for protection to one's house; ``assumption of the role of an ancestor as assistant to a priest-chief during the cycle of harvest ± or other ± rituals''; consecration of gardens, canoes, nets, and other property to ancestors; invocation of the ancestral name during sudden danger; and communication via dreams and through possession by mediums. Firth's monographs on Tikopia religion reveal a similar range of direct involvement of ancestors in the ``Work of the Gods'' (Firth 1967a, 1967b, 1970).16 Even in those Polynesian societies which had elaborated a pantheon of ``state-level'' deities, such as Hawai`i (Valeri 1985), commoners continued to direct most of their daily ritual practice to the collective ancestors (in Hawai`i, to the `aumakua).17 Given the pervasive and hence presumably ancient emphasis on ancestors and origin structures among Austronesian-speaking peoples, combined with the comparative ethnographic evidence for ancestor-worship as a focal aspect of speci®cally Polynesian ritual practice, we suggest that in Ancestral Polynesia, named *tupunga, and perhaps also *tupuna, as well as *atua (such as *Taangaloa), were at the core of the ritual system. The elaborate pantheon of major gods that has often captured the attention of ethnographers was, as Marck (1996a) demonstrates, a later development in central Eastern Polynesia, and cannot have been a part of Ancestral Polynesian religion. Rather, we envision a theology in which dei®ed ancestors ± the ``base'' or ``origin'' from whom the living had ``ascended'' and which continued to be the source of ``growth'' (tupu) through the transference of mana ± were the most signi®cant supernatural entities. Our hypothesis doubtless could be elaborated further, through the kind of careful comparative work pioneered by Marck (1996a).

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Table 9.2. Proto Polynesian terms relating to ritual practitioners and spaces Category/probable gloss

Proto Polynesian

Ritual practitioners Expert (priest?) Priest, medium, shaman Medium or bodily abode of a god

*tufunga *taaula *waka

16 17 6

3 3 3

*malaqe

25

3

*pou 27 *tapakau, takapau 19 *qafu 20

3 3 3

Ritual spaces Open, cleared space used as a ceremonial place or meeting place Post Coconut-leaf mat, used at times in rituals Raised space, house foundation

NCOG P1

P2

PSA

3

3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

Ritual practitioners Leaving the domain of theology and cosmology, and turning our historical gaze toward ritual practice, we ®rst ask who it was, speci®cally, within Ancestral Polynesian societies that directed and led ritual activity. We ®nd three PPN words that might apply to such individuals (Table 9.2). The ®rst candidate is PPN *tufunga, a strong lexical reconstruction, though certainly not a case of prime semantic agreement. POLLEX offers a PPN gloss of `expert, priest,' but careful examination of the geographical distribution of cognates shows that all referents to `priest' are con®ned to Eastern Polynesia.18 Other semantic values for re¯exes of this term, both in Eastern and Western Polynesia, include `skilled person,' `craftsman,' and `expert' in general. We are thus persuaded not to attribute to PPN *tufunga any particular meaning with regard to religion or ritual practice, although that possibility is not entirely excluded by the evidence. Our interpretation is that PPN *tufunga marked a broad status category demarcating any individual with particular knowledge, expertise, or skills, as we suggested in Chapter 8. The second term, PPN *taaula, unlike *tufunga, is restricted to the ritual realm. Cognates are found in seventeen Polynesian languages, in all cases meaning some form of `priest, spirit medium, shaman, sorcerer, or prophet,'

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someone whose role is to mediate between the supernatural and the secular. POLLEX gives a PPN gloss of `priest, medium, shaman,' which is a reasonable summation of the evidence available. Handy (1927:159±66) interpreted the *taaula as `prophet,' distinct from the role of priest, but he sensed the critical Western/Eastern Polynesian distinction here when he noted that ``in Samoa and Tonga, the inspired diviners [*taaula] formed a de®nite class that played a prominent part in the cult'' (1927:159). (For Handy, of course, the `priest' was the tahunga, but here he revealed the strong Eastern Polynesian bias in his personal ethnographic experience.) One further PPN term might apply to the role of ritual practitioner: *waka, a polysemous word, of which the primary meaning is `canoe,' or `vessel.' In six Polynesian languages, this word also refers to the `medium or embodiment of a god,' prompting the POLLEX reconstruction of `medium or bodily abode of a god' as original PPN semantic extensions.19 We agree with this semantic reconstruction, since it includes not only TON and ®ve NP languages, but also MAO in Eastern Polynesia (invoking Marck's Principle 2). However, the term likely applied in special circumstances to individuals who were possessed by gods or spirits, and not necessarily to ritual leaders in the normal sense. *Qariki: the Ancestral Polynesian chief-priest We now revisit a word that we have already discussed in Chapter 8, under the topic of social organization. The lexeme in question is PPN *qariki, which POLLEX glosses simply as `chief,' but which we have argued may be better described as the ranking or senior member of a ``House'' or lineage segment (PPN *kainanga) by virtue of hereditary descent (or in properly Polynesian cognitive terms, ascent) from an eponymous ancestor. But even this extended gloss does not adequately cover the range of responsibilities, duties, and privileges of an Ancestral Polynesian *qariki, as we shall argue. In further examining this important PPN lexeme, we underscore a critical methodological point: that anthropologically informed semantic or terminological reconstruction (as opposed to strictly lexical reconstruction) must ceaselessly explore the subtle and frequently nuanced extensions of core semantic values, or prime agreements in meaning. PPN *qariki is robustly attested by re¯exes in thirty-two Polynesian languages. For twenty-four of these, POLLEX gives the gloss as `chief,' making the term appear to be a simple case of prime semantic agreement. Yet in three cases (KAP, NKR, and WFU) POLLEX indicates an alternative meaning of `priest,' `priest of cult,' or `god, spirits.' This information alone should make the investigator suspicious that PPN *qariki may have had a broader meaning than simply that of a wholly secular `chief.' When one

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pursues in depth the ethnographic literature on the roles of chiefs as priests or cult leaders, it becomes clear that many more of the cognates listed in POLLEX should have their glosses amended to include ritual duties (see Table 8.8). The case of Tikopia is especially informative, and Firth tells us that ``the Tikopia head priests were not simply the representatives of the people in the religious sphere, they were also the leaders in economic and political affairs ± they were the chiefs [ariki ] as well '' (1970:34, emphasis added). So also in Bellona, where Monberg (1991:187) informs us that the ``priestchief '' was the ``highest religious of®cial, and the leader of rituals.''20 In Kapingamarangi, ariki were both secular leaders and priests, the ``high priest'' and keeper of the central cult house denoted by the term ti ariki (Emory 1965:223). In Rennell, MacGregor (1943) describes the key rituals that were performed by the chief-priests. For Tokelau, A. Hooper (1994:307) likewise indicates that the aliki was the ``prime worshipper and voice of the god Tui Tokelau.'' Huntsman and Hooper (1996:155) report that in Tokelau, the aliki title referred to ``the priest of the supreme god.'' Evidence for chiefs as priests is not limited to the Polynesian Outliers. In Futuna, chiefs (aliki ) served as the main ritual leaders, and the paramount chief was at times regarded as the embodiment of the great deity Faka-velikeli (Kirch 1994b:262). Emory (1947:56±58) describes how in the Tuamotu Archipelago the priests who of®ciated at marae ceremonies were of ariki class. In Mangaia, the dual high priests of the god Rongo and a third hereditary title called the ``Ruler of Food'' were all called ariki (Hiroa 1934:112±19).21 Although the pre-contact religion of Rapa Nui is only scantily known, there also ritual was primarily in the hands of chief-priests: ``the sacredness of kingship and nobility linked the ariki very closely with ceremonial life'' (MeÂtraux 1940:324). Geisler (Ayres 1995:67) elaborates: ``Earlier when the kings [ariki ] still had signi®cant powers and commanded respect, they functioned as priests who conducted and led religious celebrations.'' Thus, the dual role of priest-chief is well attested in ethnographic accounts in all the major phylogenetic branches of Polynesia: in the Outliers, in Western Polynesia, and in Eastern Polynesia. Where a separate functional class of priests developed, this was largely in hierarchically elaborated societies, with marked strati®cation. In Hawai`i, for example, there were hereditary ranks of priests (kahuna, cf. PPN *tufunga) who specialized in the rituals associated with particular deities (Valeri 1985). Nonetheless, these kahuna were frequently junior siblings of ruling chiefs, or were drawn from the ranks of chie¯y (ali`i ) families. In Tonga, another society that had undergone substantial sociopolitical evolution prior to European contact, a chie¯y diarchy had evolved with the senior line (the Tu`i Tonga lineage) reserving for itself control over the key rituals of the chiefdom (Gifford 1929; Kirch 1984a:224±25). Thus even in those Polynesian societies where there

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was functional differentiation between secular and sacred power, the linkages between chiefship and priesthood were still evident. Koskinen (1960) was also convinced that major changes had occurred over time with the role of ariki. While he did not attempt a full reconstruction of the original Polynesian ariki-ship, Koskinen clearly regards this as having been ``more clearly sacerdotal'' than secular (1960:148). He writes that ``the magico-religious role of the ariki chiefs as a link with the clan gods was especially characteristic of the societies where kin groups had not lost their importance,'' that is, in the more sociopolitically conservative societies (1960:140). In contrast, where there had been evolution toward social and political strati®cation, ``the priestly role of the ariki was less prominent'' (1960:159). The evidence is compelling that in Ancestral Polynesian societies, the principal ritual leaders were simultaneously the main secular leaders, the *qariki. They were not the only ritual of®ciants, however, for the separate category of *taaula indicates the existence of other individuals who probably were spirit mediums, persons who by individual charisma or ``gift'' (rather than by hereditary rank) were able to effect contact or communication with the supernatural realm. Extending the reconstructed gloss for PPN *qariki to include that of `priest or ritual leader' is critical to a proper understanding of Ancestral Polynesian religion and ritual practice. It illustrates how triangulation draws upon the full range of comparative ethnographic evidence available when developing a particular semantic history. Ritual spaces Polynesian religious facilities are notable for their variability and diversity, and evidence from archaeological surveys has many times been adduced in arguments regarding cultural relationships between Polynesian cultures (e.g., Emory 1943, 1970; Heyerdahl and Ferdon 1965). Such diversity might make the task of reconstructing Ancestral Polynesian ritual architecture appear intractable, but upon careful comparison and examination of both archaeological and ethnographic materials, a probable reconstruction emerges. We begin with a brief survey of regional variability in Polynesian ritual architecture. The Outliers, and especially Tikopia, because it has been so well documented by Firth (1967a, 1967b, 1970) provide an ideal starting place. Tikopian rituals were carried out primarily in two settings: (1) in thatched houses called fare that resemble ordinary dwellings ( paito), and may indeed have originated as such, but became sacred in part through the burial of generations of ancestors under their ¯oors; and (2) in open spaces called marae, often attached to fare on their seaward sides, and usually de®ned on three sides by alignments of upright stones, each stone marking the ``seating

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Fig. 9.1

Plan of a Tikopia fare house with attached marae (adapted from Firth 1970: ®g. 2). This particular example is the Marae Matautu, which adjoins the house of the Ariki Tafua (Motuapi).

place'' (noforanga) of a particular deity. Figure 9.1 illustrates the layout of such a fare-marae ritual space, based on the plan of Marae Matautu (Firth 1970: ®g. 2). The situation on Kapingamarangi, described by Emory (1965:206±11) does not differ much, with thatched cult houses (some of which had proper names incorporating hare, as in Hare Roro) attached to open assembly spaces called marae, where rituals were performed. Upright stones representing deities are likewise present in Kapingamarangi (Emory 1965: ®g. 39). In Bellona, the architectural layout of temples (nganguenga) and adjacent open spaces was again similar, although the cognate terms marae and fare are lacking (Monberg 1991:166±71). On Rennell, the ngoto mangae (cf. PPN *loto marae) is ``a cleared space before the house'' of the chief (MacGregor 1943:34).22 In Western Polynesia, there is greater architectural elaboration of ritual facilities, although the fundamental architectonic concept of an open assembly space (marae) attached to a cult house ( fare) remains consistent. The least elaborated examples are in Futuna (Burrows 1936; Kirch 1994b:262±64), and include ethnographic descriptions as well as archaeological remains of ritual complexes at Lalolalo, and at Loka (on Alo® Is.).

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Here rituals were performed on a plaza (malae) sometimes marked on the inland side by a row of upright stones, fronting the residence of the priestchief (aliki ). Within his house, the main post was known as the pou tapu (`sacred post') or pou atua (`god post'). At Loka (Kirch 1994a:239±41, ®gs. 99, 100) this house was positioned inland of the malae plaza and elevated above it, with the tomb of a chie¯y ancestor adjacent. In Tonga, the most elaborated ritual center was at Mu`a on Tongatapu (McKern 1929; Kirch 1984a:227±30, ®g. 73). The central feature was again a malae, or open space used for ritual, this fronting a series of great burial mounds, langi, each topped with a small thatched god house, as seen in the wonderful etching from Cook's third voyage (Figure 9.2). The mounds, many of which were faced with cut-and-dressed slabs of reef limestone, contained the interments of chie¯y ancestors, particularly those of the Tu`i Tonga line. Other ritual complexes throughout Tonga were less elaborated than those at Mu`a, but followed the same basic architectural pattern. Finally, in Samoa we also ®nd the main structural components of an open meeting/ceremonial ground (malae), and a god house ( fale aitu). God houses, not much distinguished from ordinary houses physically, occurred among dwellings in some aggregated settlements (Davidson 1974), but may also have been situated upon elevated stone or earthen mounds, such as the massive Pulemelei mound site on Savai`i Island (Scott 1969; Green 1970:25). In Eastern Polynesia, the situation is more complex and architecturally diverse, ranging from the marae as meeting house in New Zealand, to the megalithic ahu temples of Rapa Nui with their imposing statues, to the stone platform and terraced heiau of Hawai`i. But for our purposes of reconstructing the nature of Ancestral Polynesian ritual spaces, it is not necessary to trace every transformation among these Eastern Polynesian forms, and we will restrict our survey to selected examples from central Eastern Polynesia. The Mangaian case (Hiroa 1934:172±77; Bellwood 1978b) is particularly interesting, as it is relatively simple and probably culturally conservative, retaining older features. Mangaian marae consist of rectangular courts paved with gravel and sometimes de®ned on their perimeters with stone edgings or curbings. Upright stones, representing deities, are sometimes present at one end of a marae, as at Marae Akaoro in Keia District. When in use, marae had a miniature thatched house on them, called `are ei `au, in which the deities were presumed to take up spiritual residence. The Tuamotuan marae has been thoroughly described by Emory (1947), and consisted of a court (only rarely de®ned by stone edging) with an elevated platform (ahu) at one end (Figure 9.3). This ahu was the most sacred part of the marae, and supported a series of upright stone slabs ( po[u]fatu) which marked ``the position of ancestral gods attending the service'' (Emory 1947:13). Other uprights on the court marked seating positions of chiefs and

Fig. 9.2

Annual tributary presentation of the ®rst yams on the ceremonial plaza (malae) at Mu`a, Tongatapu, as drawn by John Webber, artist on Captain Cook's third voyage in 1777. (Collection of P. V. Kirch)

Gods, ancestors, seasons, and rituals

Fig. 9.3

253

Perspective renderings of three variants of Tuamotuan marae (after Emory 1934): (a) Marae Mahina-i-te-ata, on Takaroa Atoll; (b) the western Tuamotu form; (c) a marae of Reao. While the nature of the court varies, all Tuamotu marae are characterized by the ahu platform with its upright slabs.

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ritual of®ciants. In Tuamotuan marae, there was no actual house, but the functional equivalent consisted of a miniaturized wooden box containing sacred objects, and called ± signi®cantly ± fare tini atua (`house of the gods'). Extending this survey of central Eastern Polynesian marae to Mangareva (Emory 1939), the Society Islands (Emory 1933), or other localities illustrates a range of localized variation upon the same basic architectonic principles of (1) a court (variously de®ned, but usually paved, and sometimes further demarcated), and (2) a raised or elevated platform, ahu, with representations of deities (stone slabs, upright wooden planks, etc.). Even the Rapa Nui temple has fundamentally this same form, the entire structure now called ahu, and with the platform supporting megalithic statues, themselves elaborations of the simple stone uprights of the Tuamotus (in functional terms, as representations of ancestral deities). In sum, the essential components of ritual architecture consistently present throughout all three main subregions of Polynesia (the Outliers, Western Polynesia, and Central Eastern Polynesia) are: (1) an open space, variously elaborated into a formal courtyard, and almost everywhere designated by the term malae or marae; (2) some form of god house ( fale or fale-adjective) attached or adjacent to the court, sometimes associated with ancestral burials, and in central Eastern Polynesian miniaturized (even to the extreme of a symbolic box);23 (3) posts or upright stones (often under the term pou), or in Eastern Polynesia statues, serving as symbolic representations and/or manifestations of deities or ancestors, situated either around the perimeter or at one end of the court, or at times within the god house itself; and (4) present only in central Eastern Polynesia, a raised platform or altar, called the ahu, situated at one end of the court. As we shall argue, this Eastern Polynesian ahu was a transformation of the original foundation of the god or cult house, as retained in Outlier and Western Polynesia. These fundamental architectonic components have corresponding Polynesian terms, all of which can be robustly reconstructed to PPN (Table 9.2). Most important is PPN *malaqe, which POLLEX glosses as `open, cleared space used as meeting-place or ceremonial place.' Second, we have some form of compound term, *fale-adjective, with the adjective denoting `sacred,' `spirit,' or `god.'24 We believe that the most likely PPN form of this term for the sacred house attached to a *malaqe was *fale-qatua, based on re¯exes in EFU, RAR, and TUA. Third, we have PPN *pou, a general term for `post,' but arguably also applying to house posts and/or upright stones which were regarded as representations (or temporary receptacles) for deities. Finally, there is PPN *qafu, a term requiring closer examination. The word is represented by re¯exes in twenty languages (including FIJ and YAS), but its meanings vary considerably. In Eastern Polynesia, ahu typically refers to the raised platform or altar at one end of the temple court. In other instances

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it means a mound, or `to heap' or `pile up.' In both FIJ and YAS, critical extra-PN witnesses to the reconstruction of PPN, it means `foundation mound of a house,' including mounds that supported god houses. And in Vaitupu (ECE), the cognate afu refers to a `shrine' (Kennedy 1931:314±15). From this evidence, we would construct the following semantic history hypothesis: in PPN, *qafu referred to the foundation of a house, probably a slightly elevated mound of earth, or possibly at times a stone platform. In central Eastern Polynesia, as the god house (*fale-adjective) itself became miniaturized or abandoned within temple architecture, the *qafu foundation nonetheless remained, in time to become elaborated as a raised altar, the most sacred part of the temple. We can only speculate as to the semantic innovation behind this shift from PPN *qafu `house foundation,' to PCE *ahu, `temple altar,' but it may well have had to do with the practice of interring deceased ancestors under the ¯oor of the *fale dwelling, until this became suf®ciently sacred that it became a god house (*fale-adjective). We can now summarize what the comparative ethnographic, archaeological, and lexical evidence yields by way of a reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian ritual spaces. We infer these to have been architecturally simple affairs, consisting of an open, cleared space (*malaqe) lying seaward of a sacred house (*fale-{qatua}), the latter constructed upon a base foundation (*qafu). The sacred house may sometimes have been the actual dwelling of the priest-chief (*qariki ), and may at times have contained the burials of ancestors (*tupunga or *tupuna). But we are con®dent that one or more posts (*pou) within the sacred house were ritually signi®cant. Such a ritual emphasis on posts was probably a continuance of an older Austronesian practice of designating posts or other key architectural elements of a house as ``ritual attractors,'' as Fox (1993) and others have argued.25 There is one ®nal detail of ritual space that can be argued for Ancestral Polynesia: the use of plaited mats as ritual paraphernalia either within the god house or on the *malaqe. Two PPN terms, doubtless related as they represent metathesis, can be reconstructed for plaited coconut-leaf mats: *takapau and *tapakau. Today such mats are widely used in a strictly secular manner, to cover house ¯oors, and presumably they also had such function in Ancestral Polynesian houses (see Chapter 7). But in at least four cases, widely separated in space (and thus subject to Marck's Principle 2 [1996a:219]), the meanings of the cognates refer to ritual use. In TIK, tapakau are necessary accouterments of religious ceremonies, laid out to represent ancestors and to place offerings on (Firth 1967a); grave sites are also covered with such mats. In TAH, tapau were `plaited pieces of coconut leaves used by the priests to direct their prayers.' In TUA, Emory says that tapakau were ``leaf decorations . . . tied to the turtle and to the altar of Ruahatu'' (1947:38). And in HAW, the cognate term kapa`au does not refer

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to a mat at all, but to a `raised place in the heiau [temple] where offerings were placed.'26 These witnesses provide reasonable evidence for a semantic extension of *tapakau/*takapau, at least at the PNP level, including ritual use of woven coconut-leaf mats; probably, it was so in Ancestral Polynesian times as well.27 Kava A psychoactive plant, kava (Piper methysticum) was with few exceptions grown and used in all Polynesian societies.28 While the use of kava has medicinal, social, and political functions and connotations throughout Polynesia, it also had a strongly ritual or religious association, possibly stemming from a ``symbolic equation with poison'' (Lebot et al. 1992:131, 152±55). As Lebot et al. opine, ``kava inebriation brings one into a communion with the gods and ancestors. In so doing, it also provides access to potentially valuable and powerful knowledge'' (1992:152). It is not necessary to recount at length the varied ritual uses of kava in traditional Polynesian societies, ranging from libations of the prepared drink poured to gods, to prayers offered up while holding a dried root, to pieces of the plant kept in sacred containers. The association between kava and ritual is so pervasive that these varied practices are certainly retentions from such an association in Ancestral Polynesian times. The plant itself was domesticated in eastern Melanesia, most probably in Vanuatu or the Banks Islands, from a wild ancestor Piper wichmannii (Lebot and LeÂvesque 1989). The wild form is not naturally distributed within Polynesia, so we can be certain it was introduced from the west. Most probably, this occurred with or just after the initial Lapita settlement of the Fiji±Tonga±Samoa region, the doubts raised by Crowley (1994:94) notwithstanding.29 PPN *kawa is attested by re¯exes in twenty-three Polynesian languages, in virtually all cases referring to Piper methysticum, thus making it a case of prime semantic agreement. More importantly, there are two other PPN terms associated with the use of kava, strengthening the argument that kava drinking or use was ritually marked in Ancestral Polynesian societies. The ®rst is *taa-noqa, glossed as `bowl for serving/mixing kava.'30 Although this word is present in only ten Polynesian languages (and also in FIJ and ROT), these range widely from the Outliers, through Western Polynesia, to Hawai`i, making the PPN reconstruction secure; a semantic history is not required. Among the ceramic assemblages known for Eastern Lapita and later Polynesian Plainware phases, are small cups appropriate for kava serving, as well as possible bowls for mixing the infusion (see Chapter 7). Finally, we have PPN *fono, a polysemous word one of whose meanings was

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`food served with kava.' This particular meaning is attested by eight Polynesian re¯exes, with FIJ and ROT as external witnesses. Given that another meaning of *fono was `deliberate assembly' of people, one might speculate that the two senses of the word were related, with *fono assemblies involving the ceremonial or ritual use of *kawa. This certainly would be in keeping with ethnographic practice in Western Polynesia and the Outliers. In any event, we will not push the evidence too hard; the key point is that the use of kava, as prepared in special bowls and served in small cups, and accompanied by food prepared for this purpose, was a part of Ancestral Polynesian ritual practice. Rituals of life, growth, and death All Polynesian ritual systems incorporate an array of speci®c rites, ranging from ceremonies held to mark the birth of a child, through various life cycle changes, to death, as well as annual rites performed to offer ®rst fruits to gods, and to assure fertility and rains, and success in ®shing. The words for such rituals are mostly unique to particular societies, and therefore cannot be reconstructed to PPN. However, there are a number of basic PPN terms relating to ritual practice, which we enumerate in Table 9.3, and will brie¯y discuss. PPN *pule, although attested by numerous witnesses, is not a case of prime semantic agreement, as the meanings associated with its cognates range from `authority over food' (ECE) to `worship, pray to god' (TAH). The POLLEX gloss of `have authority, exert authority' may be essentially correct. Indeed, virtually all of the cognates which have meanings associated with `prayer' are from Eastern Polynesia, while the Western Polynesian and Outlier terms are associated with various indications of `authority' or `rule.' This strongly suggests that the PPN term *pule meant something like `authority,' quite conceivably the authority exercised by a *kainanga leader such as the *qariki. Thus we would posit a signi®cant semantic innovation at the PCE interstage, from `authority' to `pray, prayer,' a shift directly linked to the rise of a specialist class of priests (PCE *tafunga, tahuna). An older term may be *talo, a lexeme whose primary meaning is the taro plant, but which also had an alternative meaning of `invoke supernatural assistance, pray, incantation.' This second meaning is re¯ected in eighteen languages plus FIJ and ROT, indicating it can be semantically reconstructed to PCP. A term which probably does not apply strictly to ritual contexts is PPN *taku, `to recite' or `utter.' In both PUK and REN, however, taku takes the meaning `pray' or `request in prayer,' so some association with ritual recitation may have been part of its PPN connotation. PPN *lotu is a word widely adopted throughout Polynesia to mean `Christian religion or church,'

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Table 9.3. Proto Polynesian terms associated with ritual Category/probable gloss

Proto Polynesian

NCOG P1

Kava ceremonial Kava plant, Piper methysticum Bowl for serving kava Food served with kava

*kawa *taanoqa *fono

23 10 8

3 3 3

3 3 3

*pule *talo

22 18

3 3

3

*lotu *mori *taku *faqi *putu *qinati *taumafa *tangi *renga

17 16 10 12 7 8 16 28 25

3 3 3 3

Ritual terms Authority (`pray' as a PEP innovation?) Invoke supernatural assistance, pray; incantation, spell Prayer Offering Utter, recite, as a prayer Rite; perform a ritual Funeral feast, offering to the gods Share, portion, of a feast Ceremonial food, offering to the gods Cry, wail, weep Turmeric dye

P2

PSA

3 3 3 3 3

3 3

PPN reconstructions from Biggs (POLLEX). NCOG: Number of cognate re¯exes in Polynesian languages (after POLLEX). P1: Found in both Western (TON) and Eastern Polynesia. P2: Found in at least two widely separated groups not known to have borrowed from each other. PSA: Prime semantic agreement.

but seems to be a valid older term with some connotation of religion, as it appears in a few languages devoid of Christian context (e.g., TAH, rotu, `expression used in a certain idolatrous prayer'). Given the historic transformation of its meaning in most languages, the PPN semantic value for *lotu may prove impossible to de®ne with precision. PPN *mori, with re¯exes in seventeen Polynesian languages and FIJ, has a range of meanings, but a common semantic core focused on the `making of offerings to the gods,' and we would give its PPN gloss as `offering.' As far as speci®c rites or rituals are concerned, we have a general term, *faqi, which seems to have meant `rite' or `to perform a rite or ritual.' POLLEX reconstructs *faqi only to PNP, but if we take the TON terms fai (`perform') and fa`itoka (`cemetery, burial ground') into consideration, a PPN reconstruction seems likely. The only speci®c rite for which there is a PPN

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lexical reconstruction is *putu, which Biggs glosses as `funeral feast, offering to the gods.' However, the term is found only in Western Polynesia (EFU, SAM, TON) and in several Outliers (NKR, REN, TIK, WFU), which raises the possibility that it could be a post-PPN innovation. PPN *qinati, while only reconstructed on the basis of eight re¯exes, is certainly valid since its witnesses range from Western Polynesia (TON, SAM, TOK, NIU, EFU, EUV) to Eastern Polynesia (MAO), and the Outliers (REN), and it generally indicates a `share' or `portion' of food presented at a feast. In proto-historic Tonga, `inasi referred to the great annual ®rst yams ceremony performed at Mu`a (Kirch 1984a:237; see Figure 9.2), and this raises the possibility that the PPN *qinati was a share associated with a ®rst fruits feast or ceremony. SAM inati also refers to `®rst fruits,' strengthening that hypothesis. TIK inaki refers to an offering to the gods, as in tapakau a inaki o mua, `¯oor mats which are foremost offerings' in a temple (Firth 1985:146). Other glosses are `share of pork at feast' (EFU), `share of food at feast' (MAO), and `food share' (REN). Given the common associations between `share,' `feast,' and more than one reference to ®rst fruits, we suggest that, in PPN, *qinati was a share or portion accompanying a ®rst fruits feast. Moreover, if our reconstruction of the PPN lunar calendar is correct (see below), then such a ®rst fruits ceremonial probably centered on the yam harvest. PPN *taumafa poses a more dif®cult problem of semantic reconstruction. The lexical reconstruction is robust, with sixteen Polynesian re¯exes plus ROT, but the meanings range from `offering, sacri®ce' (HAW), to `royal food' (TON), to `curse' (PEN). Nonetheless, there is a common semantic core which includes references to food, and to offerings to the gods, which leads us to concur with the POLLEX gloss of `ceremonial food, offering to the gods.' It may be that both PPN *qinati and *taumafa referred to foodstuffs, but the former indicated food shares meant to be consumed by the mortal participants in the ceremonial feast, whereas *taumafa marked foods reserved for the gods. Two other words listed in Table 9.3 have ritual associations. PPN *tangi is a ®rm reconstruction lexically, and a case of prime semantic agreement, meaning to `weep, wail, or cry.' It is not a ritual term as such, but the practice of wailing is closely associated in most Polynesian cultures with certain kinds of ``rites of passage,'' and we therefore mention it here.31 PPN *renga is also well attested and a case of prime semantic agreement, being the term for the distinctive yellow-orange pigment extracted from the rhizomes of the Curcuma longa plant (PPN *ango). Virtually everywhere in Polynesia this pigment has ceremonial uses, such as anointing ritual participants and sacred objects or paraphernalia, and we infer that this was the case in Ancestral Polynesia.

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A more elaborate reconstruction of Ancestral Polynesian rituals would require an exhaustive comparative examination of the ethnographic literature on Polynesian religious practice, a task beyond our scope. However, in addition to our hypothesis that ®rst fruits or harvest ceremonials were important in Ancestral Polynesian societies (based on the PPN term *qinati, on the widespread existence of such rituals throughout Polynesia, and on our reconstruction of the PPN lunar calendar), we will point to one other kind of ceremony which we believe was practiced in these societies. This was an annual ritual coinciding with the seasonal reproductive behavior of the Green Sea Turtle (PPN *fonu, Chelonia mydas), which lays its eggs in the sandy beaches of Polynesian islands between June to September, a time when the star-cluster Pleiades (PPN *Mata-liki ) becomes visible in the early morning sky before sunrise. Kirch (1994b:283±85) reviewed ethnographic evidence from the Lau Islands, Futuna, Pukapuka, Mangareva, Tuamotus, Marquesas, Rapa Nui, and Hawai`i regarding the sacred status of turtles, their association with chiefs and deities, and various ceremonies in which turtles were ritual offerings. In both Pukapuka and the Tuamotus there was a symbolic association between the Pleiades and turtles, and in Futuna turtle feasts were celebrated during the lunar month named Mataliki (the Pleiades). These widespread, similar practices strongly suggest some kind of ritual turtle feast, or ceremony, having its origins in Ancestral Polynesian societies. Archaeology offers an additional clue, for both Lapita and Polynesian Plainware middens in the Tonga±Samoa region are notable for their relatively high concentrations of turtle bones (e.g., the To`aga site, NT-90 on Niuatoputapu, and several others). Given that the arrival of the Chelonia mydas turtles was markedly seasonal, it is not surprising that the early Polynesians might have accorded ritual status to this important resource. The reckoning of time and the ritual cycle Although we can but dimly ascertain the kinds of ceremonies that Ancestral Polynesians conducted in their *malaqe and *fale-qatua ritual spaces ± whether rites of passage (e.g., *putu), celebrations of harvest (*qinati ), or seasonal turtle feasts ± we can be certain that these were not conducted at random. Aside from such life crisis rituals as cannot be scheduled (such as those occurring at death), all ethnographically attested Polynesian ritual systems were ordered by a formal temporal cycle. The reconstruction of the Ancestral Polynesian system(s) of time-reckoning poses a number of challenges, although it is by no means refractory to the triangulation method. The greatest problems stem from the unevenness of the ethnographic data on Polynesian time reckoning, largely owing to the replacement of indigenous temporal systems with the Gregorian calendar soon after European

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contact. Many ethnographic reports dating to the early twentieth century lament the inability of informants to give a coherent account of lunar calendars, or of sidereal or solar methods of time reckoning (e.g., Collocott 1922:164; Handy 1923:347; MeÂtraux 1940:49; Thompson 1940:126).32 Nonetheless, early nineteenth-century explorers and missionaries, as well as indigenous Polynesian writers, did record aspects of these calendrical systems.33 Drawing on all available sources, we have compiled in Table 9.4 data pertaining to a number of key aspects of Polynesian calendrical systems. In virtually all cases, the `year' was partitioned into two periods, as in Tikopia where there is the `work of the trade wind,' and the `work of the monsoon,' or in Hawai`i where the year was divided into the makahiki34 period dedicated to the god Lono, and the remainder of the year (called kau) in which Ku was the reigning deity. The PPN term *taqu seems to have indicated such dual seasons, and is re¯ected in virtually every Polynesian language, often taking on the meaning ``year'' in the Western sense, after the adoption of the Gregorian calendar. There are two PPN words for `moon' and/or `month,' *maasina and *malama, the latter a semantic extension from an older POC term (*marama) for `light' or `bright.' While the Western Polynesian languages use re¯exes of *masina to index the moon and lunar months, re¯exes of both *masina and *malama occur across the Outliers and Eastern Polynesia. Table 9.4 also lists the numbers of lunar months (synodic months, lunations) recorded for particular Polynesian societies, which most frequently are given as thirteen, but range from twelve to fourteen. We discuss the reconstruction of the thirteen-month PPN lunar calendar below. Precisely when a `year,' or a calendric cycle, was initiated in speci®c Polynesian societies is often a matter of uncertainty, as the data in Table 9.4 indicate. In at least three cases (including Western and Eastern Polynesia), the year was said to have begun around late November or early December, while in the cases of Tokelau and Rakahanga, a June commencement is indicated. As we shall argue shortly, it is likely that both of these times were important in the Ancestral Polynesian system, correlated with the acronitic and heliacal risings of the Pleiades, and marked the transition from one *taqu (`season') to the next. *Mata-liki: the Pleiades cycle One of the most beautiful star clusters in the heavens, the Pleiades or ``Seven Sisters'' (designated by astronomers as cluster M45 in the Messier Catalog) comprise a young, open cluster some 120 parsecs distant, in the constellation Taurus. Six stars are visible to the naked eye. At the present time, the

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Table 9.4. Key aspects of Polynesian calendrical systems Pleiades observed at: Island/ group

Term for No. of Name for No. of `season' seasons/ lunar lunations/ `Year' or `year' year period year begins in

Western Polynesia Tonga Niue Samoa Futuna Tokelau

tau tau tau ta`u tau

Vaitupu

tau/nanga 2

Polynesian Outliers Tikopia tau Kapingamarangi tau Eastern Polynesia Rakahanga Tongareva Pukapuka Society Is. Mangaia Marquesas Mangareva Tuamotu Hawai`i New Zealand Rapa Nui

tau mataiti vaia tau, matahiti tau tau tau kau, makahiki tau ta`u, matahiti

2? 2 2

mahina mahina maasina maasina maahina

12 14 12

maalama

13

2

marama marama, mahina

2 or 3

marama

2 or 3 2

maina marama

2

marama mahina marama

2 2 2

mahina, malama marama mahina

12± 13

Acronitic Acronitic Heliacal rising setting rising

Dec.±Jan. ? February

?

October ? December, June Nov.±Dec.

? X X

X

X X

13 12 12 13

13 12 12± 13 12 ?

June February ? May December

X

December

X

July December

X

X X

X

X

X X X X

Pleiades lie at a declination of +248 above the celestial equator. As Makemson (1941:75) writes: ``They rise soon after sunset on November 20, are on the meridian at sunset about February 20, and set in the rays of the setting Sun toward the end of April. Thirty or forty days later they are visible on the eastern horizon just before dawn.'' The ®rst two events are known as the acronitic (or acronical) rising and setting, while that at dawn is the heliacal rising. As Makemson also noted, due to the precession of the equinoxes the star-cluster ``is now 308 farther east of the vernal equinox than it was 2,000 years ago, when it was also 78 closer to the celestial equator'' (1941:76).35 As we shall discuss further below, this also means that the

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timings of the various risings and settings of the Pleiades were also somewhat earlier in the mid-®rst millennium BC than they are today. A PPN name for the Pleiades, *Mata-liki, can be robustly reconstructed based on twenty-four re¯exes; it is a retention from POC.36 As Table 9.4 indicates, the risings and settings of the Pleiades were widely observed in many Polynesian societies, where they were used to mark the change in seasons (*taqu periods), and/or to mark the commencement of the `year.' The acronitic rising (when Pleiades ®rst becomes visible just after sunset) was critical in many societies, such as the Society Islands and Hawai`i, but also in Tokelau and Vaitupu in Western Polynesia. In an equal number of cases, the heliacal rising (just before dawn) seems to have been key. The acronitic setting (when the Pleiades are last visible just after sunset) is less commonly noted as having been important, but does ®gure in at least three accounts. Makemson devoted considerable attention in her monograph on ancient Polynesian astronomy to the importance of the ``Pleiades year'': With but few exceptions they continued to date the annual cycle from the rising of these stars until modern times. In the Hawaiian, Samoan, Tongan, Society, Marquesan, and some other islands the new year began in late November or early December with the ®rst new Moon after the ®rst appearance of the Pleiades in the eastern sky in the evening twilight. Notable exceptions to the general rule are found in Pukapuka and among certain tribes of New Zealand where the new year was inaugurated by the ®rst new Moon after the Pleiades appeared on the eastern horizon just before sunrise in June. Traces of an ancient year beginning in May have been noted in the Society Islands, but there is some uncertainty about the beginning of the year in native annals generally, at least as reported by missionaries and others, due perhaps to the desire to make the Polynesian months coincide with stated months of the modern calendar. (1941:76±77)

A few ethnographic examples will provide some ¯avor of the signi®cance of the Pleiades for Polynesian calendrics. One of the earliest and most coherent accounts was recorded from the Tahitian King Pomare in 1818:37 These are the kingly periods observed by Tahitians. They are Matari'i-i-ni'a (Pleiades above) and Matari'i-i-raro (Pleiades below). When the Pleiades ®rst sparkles in the horizon toward the constellation of Orion's belt in the twilight of the evening [acronitic rising], in the month of Tema (The clearing), on November 20th, they are the forerunners of the season for plenty. Matari'i-i-ni'a is then the season, until these little stars descend below the horizon in the twilight of the evening, in the month of Au-unuunu (Suspension), on the 20th of May. That is the ending of the season of plenty. Matari'i-i-raro is the season beginning in the month of Au'unuunu (Suspension) in May, when those little stars disappear below the horizon in the twilight of evening [acronitic setting], until they sparkle again above the horizon, in the twilight of the month of Tema in November. This is the season of scarcity. One year has two seasons according to this reckoning. (Henry 1928:332)

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For Rakahanga in the northern Cook Islands, Hiroa (1932a) likewise obtained a detailed account in which both the acronitic setting and the heliacal rising of the Pleiades were critical: It is clear that the whakaauanga or morning rising of the Pleiades in June [heliacal rising] was the guide to the commencement of the year, in the month of Whakaau. The morning rising of the Pleiades is the only de®nite sign given by which the annual cycle of months could be inaugurated. Other stars are mentioned with each month, but they were merely seen in those months and there are no details concerning their appearance or disappearance as with the Pleiades. No mention is made of the Pleiades in the November-December period, so that the evening rising of that constellation [sic] was of no signi®cance in the Rakahangan calendar. After Whakaau was inaugurated by the morning rising of the Pleiades on approximately June 5, the tau marama or sequence of months followed automatically with the rising of each new moon . . . In May the Pleiades disappear and cannot be seen at any time of the night. Their reappearance in June in the eastern sky before sunrise is thus the reappearance of that which has been lost and is hailed with singing and dancing. According to the chant, the Pleiades represent the woman who descended into the pit of the setting sun in the west and who, after traveling around the tuanuku (back of the earth), emerges again in the east scatheless after her great adventure and with her six eyes sparkling on the face of the dawn. (Hiroa 1932a:226±27)

Gill, who observed the Mangaian system prior to its replacement with the Gregorian calendar, gives the following brief account, in which the acronitic rising of the Pleiades was the key event: This beautiful constellation [sic] was of extreme importance in heathenism, as its appearance at sunset on the eastern horizon determined the commencement of the new year, which is about the middle of December. The year was divided into two seasons, or tau: the ®rst, when in the evening these stars appeared on or near the horizon; the second, when at sunset the stars were invisible. The re-appearance of Pleiades above the horizon at sunset, i.e., the beginning of a new year, was in many islands a time of extravagant rejoicing. (Gill 1876:43±44)

These and other accounts leave no doubt that a cycle of two *taqu periods, in which each period is initiated by a rising or setting of the Pleiades, PPN *Mata-liki, was a critical element of Polynesian calendrical systems that had been retained from Ancestral Polynesian times.38 All the evidence points to the acronitic and the heliacal risings as the two sidereal events that marked the breaks between *taqu periods; the acronitic setting would also have been observed, of course, offering advance indication that the heliacal rising would soon follow. Due to the precession of the equinoxes, the Pleiades today rise somewhat later in the year than they did in the mid-®rst millennium BC. As a rule of thumb, this precession amounts to a change of one day of rising point for

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any star every seventy-one years.39 Thus in 500 BC, the Pleiades would have risen some thirty-®ve days earlier than they do at present. On this basis, we can calculate the approximate dates for the various key risings and settings of Pleiades in 500 BC as follows: (1) acronitic rising, October 24; (2) acronitic setting, March 15; and (3) heliacal rising, May 16. In Figure 9.4, we show a computer-generated celestial map for May 16, 500 BC, from about the geographic position of Niuatoputapu, looking toward the eastern horizon (808 azimuth) at 5:10 am, about an hour before sunrise, with *Mata-liki at 158 in the sky. This is the heliacal rising which, in our reconstruction, would have signaled the beginning of a new *taqu period, and which ± as in many later Polynesian societies ± was likely to have been joyously celebrated by the Ancestral Polynesians. When, then, did the Ancestral Polynesian ``year'' begin? The answer must be quali®ed by ®rst reiterating that we have no PPN term corresponding precisely to the Western concept of ``year''; rather, we have PPN *taqu, seasons that alternated in an endless cycle. The cusp points between each of these *taqu ± marked alternately by the acronitic and heliacal rising of Pleiades ± must have been equally signi®cant. Associated with the heliacal rising were the appearance of sea turtles to deposit their eggs in island beaches, and the time for harvesting of ritually important turmeric (PPN *ango), not to ignore the critically important commencement of yamgardening work (see below). Some months later, the acronitic rising of *Mata-liki signaled the onset of harvests, and the ``season of plenty'' as several descendent Polynesian societies would term the period when the Pleiades were visible in the night sky. This surely would have been the season for celebration of the harvest, for the offering of ®rst fruits. *Taqu seasons and the yam cycle That the Ancestral Polynesians chose the risings and settings of the Pleiades as the key sidereal events by which they calibrated their dual seasons, their *taqu, was a matter neither of coincidence, nor simply of ``celestial aesthetics.'' Rather, the Ancestral Polynesian ritual cycle and calendar were inseparably linked to the horticultural year, and especially to the seasonal yam crop, whose scheduling depended on climatic seasonality within the Polynesian homeland. In the Tonga±Samoa region, there are marked wet and dry seasons, the former beginning around September±October and continuing to about May±June (Kirch 1978, 1994a). The acronitic rising of the Pleiades thus coincides with the beginning of the wet season, while its heliacal rising signals the onset of the dry season. In short, the risings and settings of Pleiades provided an ideal sidereal timekeeper for the major ecological rhythms of the Polynesian homeland.

Fig. 9.4 The southern sky as it would have appeared an hour before sunrise on May 16, 500 BC, from an island in Western Polynesia, showing the heliacal rising of the Pleiades (*Mata-liki ), at about 15 degrees above the horizon.

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Yams (Dioscorea alata, D. esculenta, and other species) are today a dominant crop in Western Polynesia, and are likely to have been so in Ancestral Polynesian times (see Chapter 5). Yams are tropophytic plants, having a growth period of seven to nine months, and an intervening dormant period when the vines wither and the tubers are stored. Polynesian horticulturalists in this region begin yam ®eld preparation and planting during the dry season, so that the later phases of the growth period and harvest correlate with the wet season (see Kirch 1994a:123±26, ®g. 47; and, Kirch 1978 for ethnographic examples from Futuna and `Uvea). Thus the ®rst yam harvests commence around November, and the last harvests are as late as May or June. Moreover, in Western Polynesian languages, re¯exes of PPN *taqu (e.g., EFU ta`u) refer not just to `season,' but more speci®cally to `yam season.' We believe that this was the original meaning of *taqu, and that in Eastern Polynesia where the cultivation of yams became inconsequential or even absent, the term took on other locally speci®c meanings of `season' or `year.' We can see that in 500 BC, the acronitic rising of the Pleiades in late October would have marked not just the onset of each new wet season, but also the impending harvest of the yams, and the ritual necessity of offering ®rst fruits to ancestors and gods. Likewise, the heliacal rising around May 16 in 500 BC would have signaled the time to begin preparations for clearing and planting new yam gardens. Indigenous calendars based on such horticultural rhythms are arguably ancient in Oceania, and we ®nd them evidenced in other parts of the Paci®c. Malinowski (1935:52±55, ®g. 3) described the complex relationships between seasons, lunar months, and agricultural activities (especially yam gardening) in the Trobriands. As he says, ``the cultivation of gardens gives the full rhythm and measure of the seasonal sequence in the year,'' that is, ``the real measure of time'' (1935:52, 53).40 We know this also to have been the case in protohistoric Fiji (Perks 1980). Thompson (1940:126±27) describes how in Southern Lau the year was divided into two seasons, based on the yam crop: a ``harvest season'' of roughly ®ve months (December±April), and a dry season of seven months. Hocart (1929:108) remarks that, in Lau, ``yam planting determines the names of most months.'' Given the signi®cance of yams in the traditional seasonal cycles of Futuna, `Uvea, and Tonga in Western Polynesia (Kirch 1978, 1994b; Collocott 1922:166), we have every reason to infer that such was the case in the societies of Ancestral Polynesia. The lunar calendar As Table 9.4 indicates, in addition to a sidereal year based on the acronitic and heliacal risings of Pleiades, and with two *taqu seasons, the Ancestral

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Table 9.5. Selected Fijian and Polynesian lunar calendrical lists* FIJ

TON

Gasau (April) Doi (May)

Fakaafumoui Fakaafumate Hiligakelekele Hiligamea`a Vaimua

ECE

SAM

Mulifa Utu-va-mua (Nov.±Dec.) ( Jan.) Takaoga Toe-utu-va (Feb.) Werewere Kelekele Faaafu ( June±July) (March) Cukicuki Siliga Lo (August) (April) Vavakadi Utuaemua Aununu (Sept.) (May) Balolo lailai Vaimui Toeutua Oloamanu (Oct.) ( June) Balolo levu Lihamua Fakaafu Palolo-mua (Nov.) ( July) Nungga lailai Lihamuli Kaunuunu Palolo-muli (Dec.) (Aug.) Nungga levu Ao`ao Luamanu Mulifa ( Jan). (Sept.) Sevu (Feb.) Fu`ufu`uGataitokia Lotuaga nekinaga (Oct.) Kelikeli Tanu-maga Palolomua Taumafamua (March) (Nov.) Uluega Toepalolo Toetaumafa (Dec.)

EFU

TAH

Ualoa (April) Tulalupe (May) Mataliki ( June) Tolu ( July) Palolo-mua (Aug.) Palolo-muli (Sept.) Munifa (Oct.) Tauafu (Nov.) Vai-mua

O Rehu `Ikuwa Napea (Dec.±Jan.) (Oct.±Nov.) (May) Fa`ahu-nui Welehu Matai`i (Nov.±Dec.) ( June) Pipiri Makali`i Tuhua (Feb.±Mar.) (Dec.±Jan.) ( July) Ta`a-`oa Ka`elo Takuua ( Jan.±Feb.) (Aug.) Au-unuunu Kaulua Ehuo (April±May) (Feb.±Mar.) (Sept.) `Apa`apa Nana Mahina i hea (May±June) (March±April)(Oct.) Paroro-mua Welo Oaoa manu ( June±July) (April±May) (Nov.) Paroro-muri Ikiiki Avea ( July±Aug.) (May±June) (Dec.) Muri-`aha Ka`aona Ehua (Aug.±Sept.) ( June±July) ( Jan.) Hia`ia Hinaia-`ele`ele Veo (Sept.±Oct) ( July±Aug.) (Feb.) Te-ma Mahoe-mua Uaoa (Oct.±Nov.) (Aug.±Sept.) (March) Te-`eri Mahoe-hope Uahameau (Nov.) (Sept.±Oct.) (April) Te-ta`i Pohe (Dec.)

Vai-muli (Dec.) Lisa-mua Lisa-muli ( Jan.) Fakaafuola (Feb.) Fakaafumate (March)

HAW

MQA

*Month names are listed in the order given by sources cited below. No attempt has been made to correlate these temporally or lexically. Sources: TON, Burrows (1938a: table 5); ECE (Tuvalu), Kennedy (1931:10± 11); SAM, Turner (1884:204 ±8); EFU, Kirch (1994:296, table 1); TAH, Oliver (1974:265 ±66); HAW, Handy and Handy (1972); MAQ , Handy (1923:350), after Dordillon.

Polynesians also possessed a lunar calendar, for such calendars based on synodic months are ubiquitous throughout Polynesia. In most societies, the year was divided into thirteen lunations, although in some cases only twelve are recorded (there are fourteen names recorded for Futuna). Table 9.5 provides examples of lunar month lists for FIJ and selected Polynesian examples, giving some of the ¯avor of the raw data; additional information may be found in Williamson (1933:154±81), Burrows (1938a:82±83, table 5), Makemson (1941), Emory (1946), and other sources. As we shall see, the Ancestral Polynesian lunar calendar was primarily a horticultural calendar,

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closely linked with the main phases of the yam crop, and with the wet±dry seasonality of the Polynesian homeland region. A perusal of Table 9.5 reveals that reconstructing a full set of thirteen PPN lunar month names is not a straightforward task. Part of the problem stems from the absence of a list for NIU, leaving the TON list as the sole witness for the Tongic branch of Polynesian; furthermore, the available TON list itself has only twelve names. Some assistance is provided by the FIJ list as an external witness, but only three names are cognate with the Polynesian sets, and in any event the FIJ list has just eleven names. In Table 9.6 we have reduced the entire corpus of available lists to a set of twenty-one reconstructions at various Polynesian language interstages, ranging from PCP (two lexemes), through PPN (the two PCP lexemes plus eight or possibly nine PPN innovations), to PNP (two additional innovations), PEC (ten innovations), PEP (one innovation), and ®nally PCE (three innovations).41 Table 9.7 is our best effort at reconstructing a thirteen-month PPN lunar calendar, based on the data summarized in Table 9.6, even though we must leave the names of two months unreconstructed, and one is problematic. Table 9.7 also indicates the successive transformations of this PPN calendar at various later interstages of Polynesian. We now make a few comments on the reconstructed PPN calendar. *Mata-liki, as we know, is the proper name for the star cluster Pleiades. Our reconstruction of *Mata-liki as a lunation name to the PPN stage is putative, because it is absent in the TON and FIJ lists, but given that the name of the star cluster is a secure PPN reconstruction, we argue that it was a PPN lunar month name as well.42 Moreover, the appearance of these stars also signaled the time to plant yams in Rotuma, another outside witness for reconstruction to the PCP stage (Hocart MS [1913]).43 In any event, *Mataliki is securely reconstructed, in both semantic senses, to PNP. Its position in the cycle was unquestionably linked to the heliacal rising of Pleiades on the eastern horizon just before sunrise, which in 500 BC would have occurred around May 16 (Figure 9.4). The ®rst visibility of *Mata-liki before dawn would thus have marked the onset of the dry season, and commencement of much horticultural work. This would also have been the time in which fecund sea turtles appeared on Western Polynesian beaches to lay their eggs, establishing a ritual linkage between the Pleiades and turtles that would be carried on into later time periods in other archipelagos.44 Moreover, the leaves of the *ango plant (Curcuma longa) wither at this season, and the rhizomes must be pulled to extract the ritually marked *renga pigment. If there was any ceremonial associated with the preparation of *renga in Ancestral Polynesia (as we suspect based on its prevalence in later Polynesian societies), it would have occurred at this time.

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Table 9.6. Reconstructed lunar month names for various Polynesian proto-languages Reconstructed Highest-level month name proto-language

Re¯ected in

*Mata-liki

EFU, HAW, MRA, MQA, NUK, ROTa

*Li(h,s)a-mua *Li(h,s)a-muli *Kaununu *Oroamanu *Palolo-mua

PNP (poss. PPN or even PCP) PPN PPN PEC PEC PCP

*Palolo-muli

PCP

*Munifa

PNP

*Siringa kelekele PPN *Siringa maqa

PPN

*Wai-mua *Wai-muli *Vai-(mo-vai) *Takaonga *(F,s)ingaia *Utua-mua *Utua-muli *Pipiri *Serefu *Faka-qafu-ola *Faka-qafu-mate

PPN PPN PNP PEC PCE PEC PEC PCE PCE PPN PPN

TON, EUV, EFU TON, EUV, EFU TAH, TUA, MKI, MIA, MVA MKI, MAO, MIA, TUA FIJ, EFU, SAM, ECE, TOK, PEN, MRA, TUA, MVA, TAH FIJ, EFU, SAM, TOK, PEN, MRA, TUA, MVA, TAH, ECE SAM, TOK, ECE, MRA, PEN, TUA, TAH, RAR, MVA TON, EUV, TOK, ECE, MRA, TUA, RAR, MAO TON, EUV, TOK, ECE, PEN, RAR, MRA, MVA, MAO, HAW TON, EUV, EFU TON, EUV, EFU EUV, TOK, EAS, TUA TOK, ECE, PEN, MRA TAH, TUA, MVA, HAW TOK, SAM, MRA, ECE, MVA, RAR SAM, ECE, TOK, MRA MAO, MVA, RAR, TAH, TUA, MRA TUA, MVA, PEN, MRA, HAW TON, EUV, EFU TON, EUV, EFU, SAM, ECE, TOK, PEN, TUA, MAN, TAH, MRA, RAR

P1

P2 3

3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

3 3

a

As the name of the star-cluster, Pleiades (*Mata-liki) is re¯ected in twenty-three languages, and is a robust PPN reconstruction.

The *Li(h,s)a-mua and *Li(h,s)a-muli month names are based on the witnesses of TON, EUV, and EFU, admittedly weak reconstructions, especially since EUV borrowed heavily from TON in late prehistory. PPN *li(h,s)a is a widely re¯ected term everywhere meaning `nit, or egg or louse,' and the metaphoric or other meaning conveyed to PPN speakers by naming these months `®rst-louse' and `last-louse' might seem to be lost on us today. Reference to Tongan ethnography, however, clari®es the issues, and suggests

Gods, ancestors, seasons, and rituals

271

Table 9.7. Probable reconstruction of the Proto Polynesian lunar calendar, and its transformations in subsequent Polynesian proto-languages Period

PPN

PNP

PEC

June±July July August September±October October±November December December±January January

{*Mataliki ?} *Li(h,s)a mua *Li(h,s)a muli *Palolo mua *Palolo muli {?} {?} *Siringa kelekele

February February±March March±April (March±April) April±May May

*Siringa maqa *Wai mua *Wai muli ± *Faka-qafu muli *Faka-qafu mate

) ) ) *Kaununu ) *Oroamanu ) ) ) ) *Munifa *Murifa ) *Takaonga *Silinga ) kelekele *Silinga ma ) ) *Utua mua ± *Utua muli *Wai (muli, mo) *Wai (noa) ) ± ) *Fakaafu

PEP

PCE

) ) ) ) ) ) ) )

*Pipiri ) ) ) ) ) *(F/S)ingaia )

) ) ) *Wai (tu) ± )

) ) ) *Serefu ± )

Note: ) denotes term carries through from previous level; ± denotes absent.

that these months occupy this position in the calendar, something not clear from the con¯icting list orders. The key reference is Collocott (1922:167), who notes that in Tonga Liha mua and Liha mui are the months when the ®rst yams are forming roots, and that it is at this stage of growth that the little protuberances or roughnesses, like nits, appear on the seed yams; the implications are clear. The *Palolo mua and *Palolo muli months refer to the seasonal rising of the reproductive segments of the Neiris sea-worm (PPN *palolo), a prized delicacy.45 (As with the liha/lisa months, the terms *mua and *muli mean `front, ®rst' and `back, last' respectively.) Moreover, these months must have been a part of the pre-Polynesian calendar, for they are present in FIJ as well.46 Probably, they were a PCP innovation to the lunar calendric cycle used by the ®rst Lapita settlers of the Fiji±Tonga±Samoa region. The *Palolo months would have correlated closely with the ecological transition from the dry to the wet seasons, and with the shift in the horticultural cycle from the end of the yam planting period to the yam growing period. Indeed, fast maturing yam varieties planted at the beginning of the dry season (in the *Faka-qafu lunar period) might be ready for harvesting. This would make the *Palolo months of some signi®cance in the ritual year, because they would have signaled the approach of the wet season *taqu, the ®rst yam harvests,

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and the time for ®rst fruits ceremonial. Such was the case in protohistoric Futuna, where the main ritual season commenced at the end of Palolo-muli with a major feast called fakaangiangi, and with the offering of ®rst yams to the gods (Kirch 1994b:275±79, ®g. 3). Although the Futunan ritual cycle as we know it ethnohistorically is separated in time from its Ancestral Polynesian predecessor by some two millennia, both were linked to the same geographical spaces and the same ecological-horticultural rhythms, so it is perhaps not an unreasonable proposition that the Futunan cycle has conservatively retained much of the ancestral pattern. The palolo worms rise to the ocean surface during the months of October to November,47 so it is also noteworthy that this coincides with the acronitic rising of Pleiades in mid-October, in 500 BC. Very likely, the two events were closely linked, and as was the case in some later Polynesian societies, the new *taqu period of the wet-season probably commenced with the ®rst new moon following the acronitic rising. For the two lunations that must have followed upon the *Palolo months we have no ®rm PPN lexical reconstructions, although it is possible that PNP *Munifa was present in PPN, but lost later in TON, rendering it unreconstructable by formal linguistic rules.48 The placement of the *Hiringa months here is supported by several lines of evidence. First, this is the position suggested by the PEC, PEP, and PCE lists. Second, kelekele may have been a FIJ month in which the yams, with earth adhering to them, are dug up (Perks 1980:66, Wilkes 1845, 3:341).49 Thus the kelekele part of this month has a PCP antiquity. Finally, as Collocott (1922:167) reports for the Tongan calendar, it is the `laying' (hilinga) `earth' (kelekele) month in which to start digging yams. The names of the next two lunations are more readily comprehended, for PPN *wai means `fresh water' or `rainwater.' Thus *Wai-mua and *Wai-muli are ®rst and last rains, and indeed, these months correspond with the end of the wet season in the Ancestral Polynesian region. Finally, the wet season *taqu ± season of yam harvests and plenty ± would have come to an end as Pleiades approached its acronitic setting around mid-March. The lunar names *Faka-qafu muli and *Faka-qafu mate presumably indicate the preparation of ®elds for yam planting at the transition from the wet to the dry season, as PPN *faka is the causative pre®x, and *qafu means `to heap up,' as in a mound (or house foundation). The presumed reference, then, is to the action of preparing yam planting mounds. This lunar calendar would have required a system of intercalation in order to keep the lunar year from becoming progressively out-of-sync with the solar year, and with the seasons so clearly tracked by the lunar month names. The problem, of course, is that each lunar or synodic month has a period of 29.53 days, with twelve lunar months totaling a year of 354 days

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with a leap year of 355 days, eleven days short of the tropical solar year of 365.24 days.50 As both Hiroa (1932a:230±31) and Makemson (1941:94±8) recognized, the Polynesians resolved this problem through the periodic intercalation of a thirteenth lunar month. Precisely when this thirteenth month was intercalated is not known, but the Rakahangan system described by Hiroa gives some indication of how this intercalation system operates: The Rakahangan information establishes a hitherto unrecorded method of correlating the lunar cycle with the Pleiades year . . . The intercalation of a 13th month was decided not by mathematical calculations but by the simple rule that the new year could not start until the ®rst new moon after the morning rising of the Pleiades. The rule of not commencing the new year until the ®rst new moon after the astronomical sign applies equally well if the evening appearance of the Pleiades is taken as the sign. The strict observation of the rule would automatically lead to the intercalation of a 13th month in some cycles. Under this system, the usual year of 12 lunar months would consist of 354 days and at intervals a 13-month year of 383 or 384 days would prevent the disassociation of the lunar month names with the seasons. The range of variation in the year was one lunar month. (Hiroa 1932a:230±31)

Valeri (1985:197), in discussing the Hawaiian calendar, hypothesizes that ``the intercalations were made ad hoc, when the difference between the ®rst rising of the Pleiades after sunset and the phase of the lunar month theoretically associated with it was noticeable.'' It seems most likely that such ad hoc intercalation, calibrated by the sidereal clock of the Pleiades, was the system used by the Ancestral Polynesians to keep their lunar, horticultural calendar in sync with the seasons.51 Summary of Ancestral Polynesian calendrics To sum up, time reckoning in Ancestral Polynesian societies was a complex matter, involving not just one system, but an interlocked set of systems including: (1) an annual cycle of alternating wet and dry seasons (*taqu); (2) a sidereal cycle based on observations of the acronitic and heliacal risings of Pleiades, which marked the transitions between seasons; (3) an annual lunar calendar of twelve to thirteen months; and (4) a system of intercalation that kept the lunar calendar in sync with the tropical year.52 In Figure 9.5, we diagrammatically summarize this set of Ancestral Polynesian annual cycles, correlating the Pleiades cycle, the thirteen lunations, the *taqu seasons, the horticultural yam cycle, and several kinds of inferred ritual activities. Early central Eastern Polynesian ritual transformations In closing, we comment brie¯y on a few of the many transformations that occurred following the breakup of PPN and after the initial movement of

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Fig. 9.5

Diagrammatic summary of the reconstructed Ancestral Polynesian ritual cycle, in relation to the Pleiades year, the horticultural seasons, and the reconstructed Proto Polynesian lunar calendar.

Polynesian peoples into central Eastern Polynesia. In general, we have not addressed such transformations in this book, but here we ®nd them noteworthy, as they led to critical changes in ritual architecture with major implications for Polynesian archaeology. In Table 9.8 we list a number of lexical and/or semantic innovations that occurred at various stages after the breakup of the PPN speech community. The Proto Ellicean stage (PEC) re¯ects an initial expansion out of the geographic region of the PPN homeland. The Proto Eastern Polynesian (PEP) and Proto Central Eastern Polynesian (PCE) stages are correlated with the expansion of Polynesian speakers into the Cook, Society, Austral, Tuamotu, Mangareva and Marquesas archipelagos and to remote Rapa Nui. As can be seen in Table 9.8, six innovations occurred at the PNP and PEC stages, re¯ecting an elaboration of the set of named, ®rst-order anthropo-

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Table 9.8. Some post-Proto Polynesian lexical and semantic innovations in ritual terminology Category

Probable gloss

Gods and spirits

Space dei®ed; space between the sky and the earth First-order anthropomorphic god First-order anthropomorphic god First-order anthropomorphic god First-order anthropomorphic god Primary god of war Ritual expert, priest Ceremonial meal Ritual feast ? A kind of chant or prayer Raised stone platform or altar on one side of marae Upright stone, representation of a deity or ancestor Carved human image, sculpture Year/season

Rituals

Ritual spaces

Calendar

PNP

PEC

PEP

PCE

*Aatea *Mauri *Rongo *Taane *Tonga-Fiti *Tu(q)u *tahunga *anga *fakaala *oli-oli *ahu *kefo *tiki *mata-®ti

morphic gods. First to be added to the single PPN god, *Taangaloa, was a `primary god of war,' *Tu(q)u. This was followed at the PEC stage with the addition of the anthropomorphic sibling set including *Rongo, *Mauri, *Taane, and *Tonga-Fiti, all of whom, in Eastern Polynesian cosmology, emerged from the dei®ed space (*Aatea) between the Primordial Pair. Marck (1996a) discusses these innovations in detail. We would merely point out that the elaboration of the pantheon at the PEC stage marked a fundamental change in Polynesian theology, one that would be especially important in the later development of Eastern Polynesian societies. We can also trace several innovations in ritual practice. At the PCE stage there was a lexical and semantic innovation involving the older PPN term *tufunga, originally meaning `expert' of any sort, but which now developed a narrower meaning of `ritual expert' or `priest.' This innovation suggests that the early communities of central Eastern Polynesia were experimenting with a functional separation of secular and sacred elites, which in some societies led to separate ranks of chiefs and priests. There are a few innovations at the PNP level suggesting development or elaboration of ritual, although none of these is especially well attested. PNP *anga is known only from three witnesses in ECE, ANU, and TIK, and may

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have designated a ceremonial meal, possibly associated with childbirth or puberty. PNP *fakaala is re¯ected in ECE, REN, TIK, and TUA, but the discordance in meanings makes semantic reconstruction problematic. Possibly it, too, was a kind of ritual feast. Finally, there is PNP *oli-oli, a kind of chant with seeming ritual connections, more strongly evidenced by re¯exes in eleven Polynesian languages. In our discussion of Ancestral Polynesian ritual spaces, we brie¯y reviewed the innovations in central Eastern Polynesian marae, which formalized the original court by means of stone construction or paving, and eliminated or miniaturized the attached god-house, while at the same time raising and elaborating a former house foundation as a stone altar. This altar is marked by semantic innovation of the PEP term *ahu (derived from PPN *qafu); that the innovation occurred at the earlier PEP stage (rather than PCE) is indicated by the witness of EAS, where ahu came to replace the older term marae entirely. At the PEP stage we also have *kefo, which probably referred to upright stones set up on the marae court or ahu, and which served as representations of deities. But the most intriguing innovation of all may be PCE *tiki, `carved human image.' It was in the societies of Eastern Polynesia that images of gods became highly developed, carved either in stone or wood, and the appearance of *tiki at this stage suggests that initial experiments in the carving of such ®gures were underway among the speakers of Proto Central Eastern Polynesian. There were, as well, modi®cations and elaborations to the Polynesian lunar calendar after the breakup of the PPN speech community. In Table 9.7 we traced various transformations and innovations in the lunar month names; most of these occurred in the PEC stage, as groups began to expand out of the geographic core of the old Polynesian homeland. This is wholly expectable, for they were now moving into islands with different seasonal rhythms and distinctive ecological conditions (e.g., the absence of the palolo sea-worm), necessitating adaptation of their horticultural cycles. In central Eastern Polynesia, especially, the older emphasis on yam cultivation declined, replaced in part by an intensi®cation of tree cropping based on breadfruit, and in some islands on pond®eld irrigation of taro. These horticultural changes inspired additional modi®cations to their ritual calendars. Aside from changes in the lunar month names, the central Eastern Polynesians developed a comprehensive set of names for the ``nights-of-themoon.'' A further lexical innovation in PCE is *mata-®ti, which supplanted the older PPN *taqu as a term for denoting `season' or `year.' Thus did the varied ritual and calendric systems of the Eastern branch of the Polynesian phylogenetic ``tree'' develop their distinctive characteristics.

Epilogue: on history, phylogeny, and evolution In place of the events that are dust, Braudel urged us to focus our attention on two . . . kinds of time he considered more real. There are the enduring structures . . . that determine over the longue dureÂe . . . our social ecology, our civilizational patterns, our modes of production. And there are the cyclical rhythms of . . . these structures ± the expansions and contractions of the economy, the alternation of emphasis in political and cultural phenomena . . . Underneath the ephemeral happenings of the immediate public arenas lie the enduring continuities of patterns . . . that change slowly.

wallerstein 1991:137 ± 38

Anthropology and history are inseparably linked. We do not refer just to the scholarship derived from written documents, but to the primacy of chronological perspective, whatever ``texts'' must be consulted. In the narrow, documentary sense, there is a growing history of anthropology, which productively decodes the discipline's own archives. But increasingly one ®nds robust endeavors in anthropological history (incorporating traditional ``ethnohistory''), and in historical archaeology (which consciously integrates the study of documents and material culture). In some parts of the world, ancient texts even extend such enterprises well back into antiquity. For the Maya of prehistory, the recent ability of scholars to read the Classic Period glyphs has opened the door to a political history of named actors, places, and dates. As we observed in our Prologue, some scholars would extend historical anthropology to encompass an entire range of evidence well beyond written texts, and have labeled such an approach ``holistic archaeology.'' Yet they have not attempted to push the temporality of this approach much beyond the period of the written word. Nor have archaeologists or prehistorians often incorporated the evidence of historical linguistics into their enterprise, although here too there are signs of a renewed interdisciplinary engagement. In such a context, our own efforts have aimed to further the development of an integrated and deep-time anthropology of history; a holistic and historically grounded anthropology of peoples for whom there is no ± or only limited ± written documentation of their past.1 277

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A ®ne objective, this; but what of that pivotal word, integrated? How does one marry the varied testimony of the past ± derived from such disparate sources as comparative ethnology, oral history, scant and largely recent historical texts, paleobiological anthropology, historical linguistics, and archaeology ± and extend it back one, two, three, or more millennia into the past? This is precisely the task we have set ourselves in this ``essay'' on anthropology's history. Our view is that Polynesia offers an ideal case, precisely because it has long been identi®ed ± for good reasons ± as a clear example of a phylogenetic unit, and because the unusual conditions it entails lend themselves to exploring the theoretical and methodological issues in detail. Our conviction is that if we can tease out even some of the key methods and the practicalities of their application in Polynesia, then modi®cations and enhancements to the phylogenetic approach ± and its application to regions where the contingencies of cultural history make things more complex ± may open up possibilities for historical anthropology. Our own procedure involves two stages in what we envision as ultimately a three-stage process. Step one required the demonstration that Polynesia constitutes a valid phylogenetic unit, a true ``segment of cultural history,'' including the de®nition of its main branches or clades. The second phase, represented by Part II of this book, required a detailed and rounded reconstruction of the Ancestral Polynesian node at the base of this well-de®ned phylogenetic unit. The third step, not undertaken here, will require that many scholars trace out the particular trajectories of continuity and change that resulted in the varied societies and cultures of the islands and archipelagos which are their special concerns (and in the process, modify and enhance our own reconstructions). Essential to our endeavor is the triangulation method, which we foreground in Part I and apply assiduously in Part II. Drawing upon the principal sub®elds of anthropology for the independent lines of evidence they offer, we have tried not to privilege unduly any one of them. Comparative ethnography has perhaps the longest tradition of scholarship in Polynesia, and we have drawn upon the accumulated researches of several generations of ®eldworkers. Naturally, a careful appraisal of such sources is essential, both in terms of the evolving history and theory of anthropology, and in their use of written historical texts to augment twentieth-century ®eld ethnography. However, far from constituting an outmoded ethnographic archive of little relevance to contemporary theory ± as some postmodern scholars contend ± we have found the Polynesian ethnographic record of immense value for a reinvigorated anthropological history. What is essential to make productive use of this corpus for historical purposes, nonetheless, is a rigorous theoretical framework, one we contend is inherent in a phylogenetic approach.

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279

The second sub®eld contributing substantially to our triangulation method is historical linguistics, especially the genre practiced by those linguists active in the Oceanic ®eld who view themselves as ``culture historians.'' For Polynesia in particular, an unparalleled resource has been assembled under the aegis of Bruce Biggs, joined more recently by Ross Clark, in the form of POLLEX. The POLLEX ®les have been essential to our work, and we hope that we have drawn upon them not too naively. Largely accepting the POLLEX lexical reconstructions as given, our own contribution has been in the realm of semantic or terminological reconstruction, enhancing our understanding of key words through carefully constructed semantic history hypotheses. Such semantic history hypotheses join linguistics with comparative ethnography, for one must go beyond simple dictionary glosses for cognates. One must mine the ethnographies themselves, extracting richer and more nuanced sets of denotata, yielding the basis for a sophisticated gloss on any particular term. We are encouraged by the recent tendency, in Oceanic linguistics and ``culture history'' studies, to develop such methodologically rigorous reconstructions of ancient terminologies (of which the latest example is the Oceanic lexicon project, Ross et al., eds., 1998), as well as the equally necessary re®nement of subgrouping models, moving from family tree to dialect chain interpretations of proto-language dissolution. Thirdly, we draw upon the evidence of our own sub®eld, archaeology, viewing ourselves in the broadest sense as ``prehistorians.'' Our methods are not those of traditional ``culture history'' (in the North Americanist sense of the term), nor are they closely aligned with ``processual archaeology'' in that we are concerned here primarily with the disentangling of homologies from analogies and synologies. And while we clearly favor bringing in the symbolic and emic domains of ethnography and linguistics to create a rounded picture of the past ± indeed, a true ``cognitive archaeology'' ± our approach hardly matches much of ``post-processual'' archaeology. Rather, we insist that our enterprise is an integral part of a historical anthropology of the longue dureÂe.2 As archaeologists ®rst and foremost, our foray into historical anthropology has afforded us an opportunity to critically examine our own sub®eld, especially with regard to its strengths and limitations for historical reconstruction. Our Ancestral Polynesian case study allows us to pose the question: just how constrained would a reconstruction of the past be, if it were strictly limited to the archaeological record of durable material culture, as recovered in Western Polynesian sites of the mid-®rst millennium BC? As detailed in Chapter 7, our careful estimate is that such durable items constitute at most 20 percent of the material culture inventory revealed through comparative ethnography and lexical reconstruction. (Not surprising, then, that Goldman [1970:xxiv] referred to the archaeological

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record of early Polynesia as largely one of ``pottery and adzes.'') More importantly, the richness of this durable archaeological record varies tremendously from domain to domain. For domains such as subsistence or cooking, archaeology contributes signi®cantly to our understanding of Ancestral Polynesian culture; for social organization, ritual, or the calendar, it is to all intents and purposes mute. This variable aspect of the archaeological record is not news to most archaeologists, who have long understood the limitations of cultural reconstruction (e.g., Hawkes 1954). But seldom have archaeologists been in a position (lacking a time machine) to give their intuitions a concrete basis. Certainly, in different parts of the world with particular conditions of preservation and taphonomy, what survives and how much of it has been recovered will vary greatly. But for tropical Polynesia, thanks to the triangulation method, we can offer a quantitative estimate of the degree of erosion of the material culture inventory, of the numbers of distinct kinds of objects ± each lexically marked in the Proto Polynesian language ± which have not been archaeologically recovered, and are unlikely to ever be recovered. For us, it is sobering to know that fully 80 percent of the reconstructed Ancestral Polynesian artifact array is missing from our archaeological assemblages. On the other hand, that we have been able to describe the absent categories (even giving them their PPN names), even though we may not know their exact shapes or precise functions, is to us a demonstration of the power of anthropological triangulation. It is, however, in the domains of kinship, social organization, political leadership, belief systems, ritual practice, and the calendar that triangulation provides advances even when archaeology is de®cient as a source. Here the careful employment of semantic history hypotheses, informed by a close scrutiny of the ethnographic archives, and constrained by a phylogenetic model, are more essential than ever, for the independent checks otherwise contributed by archaeology are lacking. Nonetheless, we are con®dent that our reconstructions of social and political organization, as well as religion and ritual, are neither ``conjectural'' nor ``pseudo-history.'' While there are limitations on how far the evidence will take us, and many questions we will never be able to answer to our complete satisfaction, we claim a real advance in our understanding of Ancestral Polynesian culture and societies. One thrust of the post-processual movement in contemporary archaeology has been toward what is sometimes called ``recovering mind,'' or ``cognitive archaeology'' (e.g., Leone 1982; Hodder 1991; Flannery and Marcus 1993; Hodder et al. 1995). We believe we have made some contribution toward that end, but from a rather different perspective, in which archaeologists join in a close partnership with their linguist and ethnographer colleagues, the perspective of historical anthropology.

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In our view, it is not unreasonable for the archaeologist as historical anthropologist to seek to understand the nature of ancient social groups, leadership roles, kinship systems, ritual practices, or even lunar calendars, for many regions of the world at time depths as deep as 3,000±4,000 years, and in some cases, perhaps older. But there are limits to what the triangulation method can achieve, even when informed by stringent application of a phylogenetic model. We will be the ®rst to admit that the approach taken in this book will be of little utility to those who study, for example, the Palaeolithic. Thus we are not advocating our strategy for adoption by archaeologists everywhere, at all times, and in all situations. Not at all. Rather we would encourage its use, with the necessary modi®cations as circumstances require, where success seems likely. Polynesia is one such case, and we doubt that it is unique. Successfully recovering the ancestral node for a phylogenetic set of derivative cultures and societies requires that certain conditions be met. Among these are the following: (a) A demonstration that the set under consideration does indeed constitute a real phyletic group, however much subsequent migration, contact, or borrowing its members may have undergone. Here the evidence of historical linguistics, especially through the genetic comparative method, is invaluable, for it can yield phylogenies based on shared innovations, rather than on mere retentions (which may be shared outside of the set of cultures under consideration), or worse, on perceived similarities which have resulted from borrowing (synologies). Newly improved methods of biological anthropology (such as molecular sequencing) may also prove increasingly useful in this critical stage, in assessing the biological relatedness of populations associated with particular language groups. (b) Using multiple lines of evidence ± linguistic, biological, ethnological, and archaeological ± to determine the speci®c geographic space and particular time period occupied by the putative ancestral culture, and if possible the size and nature of the biological population(s) involved. The historical circumstances of Polynesia, which had no human occupation before 3000 BP, make this step more straightforward than it will be for other regions with greater time depth and more historical complexity. We have tried to lay out some of the principles for correlating linguistic, biological, and cultural evidence (see Chapter 2), but are certain that further methodological re®nement can be achieved. (c) The application of a triangulation method that allows the analyst to go beyond the strict material record of archaeology, and employ multiple lines of evidence in a convincingly integrated fashion. One key to applying this method is to work from domain to domain, ®rst generating terminological sets, then amplifying their meanings through semantic history hypotheses

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generated by comparative ethnography, and testing these against the archaeological record wherever feasible. Application of these steps to Polynesia has yielded a rounded reconstruction of Hawaiki, Ancestral Polynesia, far beyond a lexically attested ``word portrait,'' as has sometimes been the case in linguistically based culture history.3 A full reconstruction of an ancestral node requires a complex process of separate exploration and analysis along each of the pathways of evidence bearing on the problem, before one attempts their integration. With the hindsight endowed by our own research over the past decade, we look back on our earlier attempts to de®ne Ancestral Polynesia (Kirch 1984a; Kirch and Green 1987) as too mechanical, a naõÈvete that obscured the methodological subtleties. (An example is the difference between the reconstruction of *qariki given in Kirch [1984a:63±64], and that offered here in Chapters 8 and 9.) We see our present reconstruction of Hawaiki as analogous to an extension of ethnography into the past, yet anything but a simple projection of the ``ethnographic present'' onto that past! This latter point provides a base for a further comment. The societies of Ancestral Polynesia are sometimes spoken of as ``simple chiefdoms,'' giving rise to later, more ``complex'' social formations with varying degrees of strati®cation and hierarchy, and leading in a few instances to ``archaic'' or ``proto'' states. We ourselves have, at times, indulged in such characterizations, as have many others (see Green 1993:227). Our research has now convinced us that Ancestral Polynesian societies ± though they may have been small scale ± were anything but ``simple'' in their social, political, or religious structures. As Green, in a previous discussion of ``what's in peoples' heads versus what's in the ground,'' put it: Much of any such [linguistic] reconstruction may re¯ect only what is deemed to have gone on in people's heads. Its realisation in the ground will probably be a rather more mundane affair. In fact, even in the realm of social relations, this same asymmetrical situation will probably also apply. Ancestral Polynesian Society [sic] on and in the ground will not look as socially differentiated and complex as the linguistic evidence implies. (Green 1994:183)

Our integrated perspective of historical anthropology now demonstrates that these Ancestral Polynesian societies comprised tiny populations as judged by the later demographic standards of large numbers of people occupying the Polynesian high islands. Yet they were probably not very different in their complexity from the small populations and territories that comprised ethnographically attested atoll societies such as Tokelau or Pukapuka, or the raised coral island societies such as Niue, or even the small high island cases of Anuta, Tikopia, or the Chathams. Sahlins long ago made such a general point in respect to the social structure of Polynesian atoll dwelling groups, claiming that they could be expected to show a

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283

number of interlocking social groups, each dedicated to the exploitation of a particular resource or resource area . . . as a compensating adjustment to selective pressures limiting surplus production. By this means, highly organized groups engaging in particular tasks and distributing strategic goods are created without necessitating specialization. Every member of the community, as a member of each type of group, automatically shares in the control, production and distribution of every product. (1958:245±46)

While noting that the atoll societies were relatively ``egalitarian,'' Sahlins also observed that they were ``structurally complex'' (1958:236, 246). We would maintain that such structural complexity, present in even relatively egalitarian and demographically small-scale societies such as Tokelau (Hooper 1968:238±40), likewise characterized Ancestral Polynesia. And essential to this complexity was a greater degree of ranking and social differentiation than might be anticipated, certainly more than would ever be attested in the archaeological record alone. We envision Ancestral Polynesian societies as having exercised ¯exibility among a set of small-scale interlocking social groups, advantageous (ecologically essential, perhaps) to tiny populations exploiting a diversity of environments, each at some degree of resource and demographic risk. These societies possessed considerable structural complexity, as well as social ranking and heterarchy, a formative base that would lead to greater hierarchy and, eventually, true strati®cation in some of the descendent societies. Thus, while it is certainly true that the degrees of ranking or modes of leadership within Ancestral Polynesia did not equal those of later Polynesian groups occupying the large high islands and archipelagos (supported by populations in the tens and even hundreds of thousands), characterizing the former as ``simple'' is not only uninformative, it is misleading. Finally, we note that this essay in historical anthropology has been underpinned throughout by an evolutionary paradigm, as is evident in Part I. Indeed, a fundamental advantage of a phylogenetic model is its ability to disentangle homologies from analogies and synologies (Boyd et al. 1997:376), thus paving the way for meaningful evolutionary analysis. We make no apology for this stance; it is our foundational position. It is true that the kind of evolutionary paradigm we prefer requires a form of cultural evolution, one quite different from certain evolutionary models prominent in the contemporary literature (see Teltser 1995; Boone and Smith 1998; Trigger 1998). We do not adhere to the strict ``selectionist'' school of cultural evolution (e.g., O'Brien 1996; O'Brien et al. 1998:487±88), but rather ®nd the greatest sympathy with a co-evolutionary model (Durham 1991).4 Our current project, however, while underpinned by an evolutionary perspective ± and in our view contributing to enhanced possibilities for evolutionary analysis ± was not undertaken as a programmatic or substantive

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promulgation of evolutionary archaeology. Our more modest intention has been to ground the possibilities for evolutionary study within an integrative historical anthropology, where as archaeologists who practice anthropology, we have invited seats at the discipline's seminar table. In this role, we will advance the claim that history in an evolutionary framework is contingency bound, and that a diversity of mechanisms contribute to the structuring of both continuity and change. More expansive discussion of co-evolution within Polynesia must be saved for another day, when the many and complex historical trajectories that comprise the Polynesian phylogeny will be our focus, rather than its ancestral node. Then our rounded reconstruction of that ancestral node ± that Hawaiki ± will provide the basis for discerning change and continuity, for discriminating what was retained from what was innovated. The ancestral patterns will be seen as having helped to condition multiple outcomes at a series of later stages in the developmental sequences for each Polynesian island group and society. In short, all that we have endeavored to do here can only advance and enhance the possibilities of an evolutionary archaeology, one ®rmly set within the overarching goals of historical anthropology. In anthropology, as in any science, history matters.

Notes

Prologue 1 On the Polynesian concept of Hawaiki, and for various examples of Polynesian myths incorporating the Hawaiki concept, see Smith (1921), Hiroa (1938:72, 1945:12), Luomala (1955:4±5, passim), Orbell (1985), and Stimson (1957:4±9). Taumoefolau (1996) provides a fascinating linguistic analysis of *Hawaiki, suggesting that it was originally a loan word from Proto Tongic into Proto Nuclear Polynesian. We should also note that the Proto Polynesian word was properly *Sawaiki, with PPN *s changing to /h/ in some Polynesian languages. Given the long-established usage of Hawaiki in Polynesian literature, however, we have opted to retain this form in our title. 2 One contemporary scholar who has been in¯uenced by Sapir's approach is the linguist Robert Blust (1981a), who proposed a generalization of the comparative method of linguistics to provide explanations for the distribution of nonlinguistic traits. 3 As Goodenough (1997:17) observes, one attempt to synthesize the data of world ethnography according to a cultural-evolutionary model of ``major cultural phyla'' was Ralph Linton's book, The Tree of Culture (1955). Aside from being ``seriously ¯awed by inaccuracies of detail,'' Linton's work was written at a time when cultural anthropologists were rapidly moving away from evolutionary perspectives. 4 Efforts of this sort in the Paci®c ®eld have a long history. Earlier ethnologists such as W. H. R. Rivers (1914) and C. G. Seligmann (1910) attempted, on the basis of admittedly uneven and insuf®cient survey data, to advance historical reconstructions for Oceania as a whole. The slightly later reconstructions of E. S. C. Handy (1930), even though based on more intensive comparative ®eldwork, suffered from inadequate theoretical bases, such as a simplistic Kulturkreislehre perspective. Only with the classic study by E. G. Burrows (1938a, 1940), who explicitly applied Sapir's methods, do we begin to ®nd an adequate historical treatment of a Paci®c region. 5 While homology is a well-understood term, synology we have adopted from Boyd et al. (1997:376), ®nding it particularly useful. The term culture history is somewhat problematic, having not only the North American archaeological connotation that has alternatively been called ``traditional archaeology'' by Renfrew and Bahn (1991:407), but also more recent connotations in history (``the new culture history,'' Hunt 1989:3, 10) and in historical linguistics (e.g., Pawley and Ross 1993).

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6 Within the ®eld of Polynesian studies, this shift from an earlier interest in historical reconstruction (represented, for example, by the work of W. H. Rivers, E. S. C. Handy, or R. B. Dixon) to that dominated by the structural-functionalist study of synchronic societies (typi®ed by B. Malinowski and his student R. Firth, or in the American tradition by M. Mead) was not without rancor. Te Rangi Hiroa (Sir Peter Buck), always a strong proponent of the ``historical method'' in anthropology, railed against the ``functional and psychological methods'' that had won out by mid-century. The functional method, according to Hiroa, ``is primarily associated with the names of Malinowski and Radcliffe-Brown, who, like Moses and Aaron, lead their followers into a land of greater promise. The greater ®eld of promise lies in ignoring the bondage of the historical past'' (Hiroa 1945:127). 7 Recently, linguistics and biological anthropology have been joined in some provocative efforts to outline the history of human populations in macroregional and even global terms (e.g., Cavalli-Sforza et al. 1988, 1994; Renfrew 1992; Cavalli-Sforza 1997). 8 For examples, see Kaufman 1976; Jennings 1979; Ki-Zerbo 1981; Tardits 1981; Ehret and Posnansky 1982; Trigger 1989b; Ehret 1998, 1991. 9 A special issue of The Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory (Kepecs and Kolb 1997) also includes papers devoted to the intersection of history and archaeology. 10 This temporal restriction of perspective is exempli®ed in the paper by Kepecs (1997:195) which introduces a special issue of The Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory devoted to integrating archaeological and historical records. 11 This viewpoint is all the more puzzling, given that the historicization of sociocultural anthropology owes much to the French Annales tradition. Taking their lead from Bloch and Braudel, both of whom used non-textual sources in their historical writings, Annales scholars have long been open to a diversity of historical evidence, even if historical documents are still privileged. Ladurie (1979), for instance, would go so far as to write the ``history of rain and ®ne weather,'' drawing upon archaeological, palynological, and paleoclimatological data as well as upon written documents. 12 On the con¯icts between postmodernism and an older empirical, historicist tradition in anthropology, see the insightful review by Geertz (1998); we welcome his observation that ``it is, perhaps, rather too early to exchange roots for routes'' (1998:72). 13 This problem is at the heart of some barbed comments regarding interdisciplinary collaboration on culture-historical matters. For the Paci®c region, for example, Irwin (1992:205; see also 1992:2) has claimed that archaeologists and linguists have for too long known what was in each other's pockets. 14 These are sometimes referred to as ``Science A'' and ``Science B'' after a curricular distinction at Harvard University (Gould 1989:279). See also Chalmers (1990:19), who remarks that among scientists and philosophers of science, ``what is tacitly assumed is that physics constitutes the paradigm of good science to which all other sciences should aspire.''

Notes to pages 15-22 1

287

The phylogenetic model in historical anthropology

1 In adopting this stance, Vogt was re¯ecting a more fundamental perspective on the role of language within anthropology, summed up by Hymes' statement that ``anthropology has a vested interest in the genetic classi®cation of languages'' (1959:50). Hymes went on to observe of genetic classi®cation that ``it identi®es lines of cultural transmission in which regularities of change can be sought . . . it provides a framework against which diffusion can be traced and within which earlier cultural content can be reconstructed; and it may reveal past connections and locations of cultures for which little or no other trace may remain.'' 2 This is not a trivial point, and some detractors to the use of a phylogenetic model in prehistory (e.g., Gosden 1991:262; Smith 1995a, 1995b) have failed to appreciate that the use of linguistic models of subgrouping, or of lexical and semantic reconstruction, are in no way intended to take precedence over proper archaeological data. 3 The concept of ``culture area'' has, of course, a long history in anthropology. In the Paci®c it goes back to such pioneering comparative-synthetic monographs as Rivers (1914), Seligmann (1910), and Williamson (1924, 1933, 1937). In North America, the concept was elaborated by Kroeber (1939) and Wissler (1926). In recent decades, however, the notion of culture areas has suffered from the postmodernist attack on ethnography. As Knauft says, ``from a postmodernist perspective, the ethnographic characterization of culture areas and regions is an artifact ± the result of a Western academic discourse that projects its own cultural biases and assumes incorrectly that these characterizations re¯ect other people's reality'' (1993:3; see also Knauft 1999). As Knauft's own work along with that of other historically oriented anthropologists in New Guinea (e.g., Gewertz 1983; Lutkehaus et al. 1990) suggests, however, a culture area approach in anthropology may be enjoying a renaissance. 4 In this statement, Kirch was participating in then-current debates within the ®eld of archaeology regarding the application of ethnographic analogy to the interpretation of archaeological data (Gould and Watson 1982). 5 Green (1993:228) sets out eleven major processes that he identi®es as operating within Polynesia, resulting in divergence, convergence, or parallel trends. 6 Grace (1966) was one of the ®rst Paci®c linguists to challenge Dyen's lexicostatistically based classi®cation of Oceanic languages, and his critique was an important milestone in the move toward rigorous subgrouping based exclusively on the genetic comparative method. 7 We note that Ehret's work on the Mashariki Bantu languages also eschews time depth based on glottochronology (1998:29, fn. 4), using ± as we also advocate ± independent archaeological evidence to establish chronology. 8 Recent useful discussions of the genetic comparative method, especially as it has been applied to subgrouping in Austronesian historical linguistics, are those of Pawley and Ross (1993:430±41; 1995). Although we advocate the ``comparative method,'' we should comment brie¯y on one other approach, the ``mixed

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Notes to pages 22±28

languages'' school, in which the languages of Melanesia (for example) were seen as hybrids, ``the products of contact between Indonesia (western [Austronesian]) and Papuan (non-[Austronesian]) languages that followed migrations of Western [Austronesian] speakers to various parts of Melanesia'' (Pawley and Ross 1993:434). There are compelling reasons, including some fundamental ¯aws mentioned by Pawley and Ross (1993:435), to reject this long-held view regarding the diversity of language, race, and culture within the New Guinea and western Island Melanesian region. In contrast, a family tree diagram for the Austronesian languages based on Dyen's lexicostatistical approach (Dyen 1965; see also Bellwood 1978a: ®g. 5.7, repeated in Terrell 1986: ®g. 14) yields a quite different picture of thirty-four primary branches of Austronesian in or near Melanesia. Debates over ``reticulation versus phylogeny'' have a long history in anthropology, traceable to some of the founding ®gures of the ®eld (e.g., Tylor 1888). Renfrew (1992, 1997) argues that the spread of farming peoples in the mid- to late Holocene was responsible for the continuous distributions of major language families throughout the world. For a time in the late 1960s and early 1970s, numerical taxonomy also enjoyed considerable popularity among archaeologists as a method for the classi®cation of artifacts, largely due to the enthusiasm for this method displayed by David L. Clarke (1968). Hennig's ®rst comprehensive publication of the principles of cladistics actually dates to 1950, in a treatise entitled Theorie der Phylogenetischen Systematik, which Mayr (1982:226) has characterized as ``written in rather dif®cult German, some sentences being virtually unintelligible.'' Consequently, the diffusion (indeed, one might say a classic instance of ``horizontal transmission'' within the international scienti®c community) of Hennig's ideas into Anglophone taxonomy took some time, and did not truly come of age until the publication in English of his principles (Hennig 1965, 1966). Eldredge and Cracraft (1980:33) opine that the concept of synapomorphy is ``one of the most important concepts in comparative biology,'' providing ``the theoretical basis for constructing and testing cladograms.'' Some of the important literature on cladistics which we have consulted, and which we have found to be enlightening, includes: Schaeffer et al. 1972; Szalay 1977; Cracraft and Eldredge 1979; Nelson 1979; Eldredge and Cracraft 1980; Joysey and Friday 1982; Platnick and Funk 1983; Forey et al. 1992. The volume edited by Hoenigswald and Wiener (1987) contains useful papers comparing and contrasting the phylogenetic methodologies in biology and historical linguistics. Eldredge and Cracraft (1980:326±27) distinguish between microevolutionary processes, which concern changes in ``gene content and frequency within species,'' and macroevolutionary processes, which concern changes in ``species composition in time and space within a monophyletic group.'' In their view, hypotheses concerning the former may be tested experimentally and modeled mathematically, whereas hypotheses concerning macroevolution ``require a

Notes to pages 29±38

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cladogram (i.e., a well-corroborated hypothesis that a group is monophyletic) plus distributional data pertaining to component species.'' Spencer (1997:227) has correctly deduced that we fall into the ``processualist'' camp, in part because we favor an approach that takes account of human agency, even though we ®nd aspects of selectionist theory appealing (such as the useful distinction between style and function). Boyd et al. (1997:384) make much the same point when they write that ``good phylogenies are crucial for the proper study of adaptation using the comparative method.'' An observation of Hennig's is relevant here: ``The unsharp distinction between evolution and phylogenesis, or failure to observe the fact that the evolution of organisms is exclusively by way of phylogenesis although ``evolution'' is not identical with ``phylogenesis,'' seems to me an important reason for the misunderstanding and negative attitude often found today among representatives of the humanities and related disciplines'' (1966:198). Berg and Singer (1998) make the case that in fundamental research, ``the most promising discoveries'' are often made at the ``fringes'' of science, especially in simpli®ed experimental systems, citing the cases of Drosophila and Escherichia coli in working out the fundamentals of genetic systems. Similarly, Mayr (1997:28±9) points to the signi®cance of choosing appropriate ``natural experiments'' in the historical sciences. We suggest that Polynesia, precisely because of its simplifying conditions, provides an ideal region for working out some of the fundamental methods in historical anthropology. Areas where a phylogenetic approach has proved useful include Mesoamerica (Flannery and Marcus 1983; Marcus and Flannery 1996), the American Southwest (Shaul and Hill 1998), sub-Saharan Africa (Ehret and Posnansky 1982; Ehret 1998), mainland Southeast Asia (Higham and Thosarat 1994:131±41), and Japan (Hudson 1995). 2

Methodologies

1 Whether Mangaasi represents an ``intrusive'' culture is increasingly doubtful, as evidence has mounted that the distinctive Mangaasi ceramic series in fact developed directly out of the preceding Lapita ceramic series (Spriggs 1997; Bedford et al. 1998). 2 Some scholars have referred to this late stage as Eastern Oceanic, but as Pawley and Ross (1995:65, fn. 12) indicate, none of the attempts to delineate a distinct Eastern Oceanic subgroup ``has been convincing.'' 3 A. Pawley (pers. comm., 1999) has expressed doubts about whether the Reef/ Santa Cruz languages are intrusive or a relic, as there are no close relatives elsewhere, and possibly no relatives at all. 4 Dialectal differences, however, are well documented in some of the larger Polynesian archipelagos, such as the Marquesas, Hawai`i, and New Zealand. 5 Although we have not studied the situation in other regions in detail, we suspect that the two main kinds of processes summarized above will also prove to be

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Notes to pages 39±46

widespread, as Ross (1997) describes. For example, Hines (1998) refers to the necessity of a ``chain model'' in the creation of English. Terrell (1986:49), however, observed that on Dyen's data any age up to 35,000 years might be contemplated! The metaphor we employ does not, therefore, restrict the researcher to only three lines of evidence, which would be a ``tripartite'' rather than a ``triangulation'' method. This situation is more than merely analogous to the construction of cladograms or phylogenies through the joint incorporation of information regarding living sister groups of species (synchronic data), and the paleontological evidence of the fossil record (diachronic data). The incorporation of both kinds of data has occasioned considerable methodological discussion among cladists (e.g., Schaeffer et al. 1972; Szalay 1977). Pawley and Pawley (1998:209) make essentially this same point, writing that ``for doing culture history several disciplines are, ultimately, better than one,'' but noting that ``the challenge . . . becomes how to combine judiciously the evidence from different disciplines.'' Of particular note are the reconstruction of Proto Austronesian and several lower-order interstages of Austronesian, by Robert Blust (n.d.), the Oceanic Lexicon Project at the Australian National University (Ross et al., eds., 1998), and the POLLEX ®le originated by Biggs at the University of Auckland (Biggs 1998). Also noteworthy is the Austronesian Comparative Dictionary Project of Tryon (1995), which does not include reconstructions, but gives many valuable comparative data. Terms range from ``chronic alienation'' and ``mutual contempt'' to complete denial of the possibility or value of ever relating the ®elds of archaeology and historical linguistics in the absence of texts. Pawley and Ross write: ``Some prehistorians evidently ®nd the methods of historical linguistics so arcane or the idea of such detailed lexical reconstructions so incredible, that they prefer to ignore or discount the reconstructions as irrelevant to prehistory. This attitude is no more excusable than that of a linguist who would ignore C14 dates for artifact assemblages because he does not understand how such dates are arrived at or who would discount the relative dating of assemblages in any archaeological site on the suspicion that worms, humans or earthquakes have disturbed the layers'' (1995:48±9). Under other names, these approaches have a long history in Indo-European studies (Diebold 1987:fn. 13). The problem is a familiar one to archaeologists using ethnographic analogy, that if they start solely with ethnographic sources known to them for their inferences about the past, they will be forced to limit their constructions of the past to those same kinds of cultures and societies. In Dyen's view, ``the function of the SHH is to provide the semantic link between the etymon and its re¯exes'' (1985:358). Early versions of POLLEX were Walsh and Biggs (1966), Biggs, Walsh, and Waqa (1970), and Biggs (1979).

Notes to pages 46±56

291

16 Marck (1999b: table 1.2) records that the 1994 version of POLLEX contained 3,645 headwords, of which 1,390 appear to be uniquely PPN innovations, while another 937 are shared with some higher-level proto-languages (ranging from PCP to PAN); these latter constitute shared retentions in PPN. Finally, some 1,318 items are reconstructable to one or another internal subgroup within Polynesian, indicating that they are innovations that took place after the breakup of the PPN speech community. Of these, the largest numbers of innovations are for the PNP (430 items), PCE (450 items), and PTA (141 items) interstages. 17 Note, however, that this brief gloss can be re®ned, as demonstrated by Pawley and Pawley (1998:178). 18 Environmental variation per se plays little role in Burrows' model of differentiation between Western and Eastern Polynesian cultures. However, in a separate paper Burrows (1938b) examined the in¯uence of environment on the differences between the two Western Polynesian cultures of Futuna and `Uvea. 19 We refer here to what Braudel (1980) originally termed the longue dureÂe within his classic tripartite ``wavelength'' theory of historical change, which Sahlins (1981) adapted as the ``structures of the long run'' in his efforts to combine structuralist and historical perspectives on transformation in Polynesian societies. 3

Polynesia as a phylogenetic unit

1 POLLEX gives the PPN gloss of *tangata as `man(kind),' whereas we would argue that `human being (of either sex)' or `person' is a better gloss given the great number of glosses in re¯ected terms. Likewise, Biggs' gloss, of `true, right, genuine' for PPN *ma(a)qoli does not suf®ciently take into consideration the semantic range (in eight out of twenty-four modern re¯exes) which incorporates a concept of `indigenous as opposed to outsiders/newcomers.' 2 This is due largely to a long tradition of superb linguistic scholarship in Oceania, beginning with the great comparative research of Dempwolff (1934±38), and continuing with many other scholars, only the most recent of which we will cite here. 3 There is a possibility, as argued by Blust (1998), that the highest-order subgroups of Oceanic should be divided into just two primary subgroups: (1) the Admiralty Islands, and (2) all other Oceanic groups. The linguistic evidence for this is still slim, although such a scenario would ®t well with the emerging archaeological picture from the Bismarck Archipelago. 4 Since the proto-language lexemes reconstructed for the various eastern subgroups of Oceanic are usually not far removed in time or in linguistic form and meaning from those of the Oceanic subgroup itself, the available lexical reconstructions for different domains in Oceanic serve as a very useful, slightly earlier stage of background data for the speci®c proto-language, PPN, which is our principal focus in this book. These earlier Oceanic-stage reconstructions are to be found in numerous papers cited by Pawley and Ross (1993; see also Pawley and Ross 1995:64 fn. 7), plus in the OCELEX ®les being compiled at the Linguistic Department, RSPAS, Australian National University.

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Notes to pages 58±67

5 In 1993 this number was 1,392 lexemes, which would have to be reduced somewhat, especially among those lexemes exhibiting semantic innovations, as external cognates continue to be found in other OC languages (Pawley 1996a:393). 6 The term ``Outliers'' (capitalized) refers to a group of some eighteen Polynesian societies and their respective languages which are distributed to the west of the main Polynesian Triangle subtended by New Zealand, Hawai`i, and Rapa Nui (Kirch 1984b). These Outliers are found mainly along the fringes of the Solomon and Vanuatu archipelagos, and in Micronesia, and include the ethnographically well-known cases of Tikopia and Anuta. 7 The dating of this breakup is a matter of some contention, depending as it does on archaeological evidence for initial human colonization in central Eastern Polynesia, estimates of which range from as early as 500 BC to as late as AD 600 (Spriggs and Anderson 1993; Kirch and Ellison 1994). We are reasonably con®dent that the evidence will eventually support a date of at least 2000 years BP (see Irwin 1997). 8 Work on the classi®cation and genetic relationships of the Polynesian languages has a long history, which can be traced at least as far back as J. R. Forster's ``comparative table of the various languages in the Isles of the South Sea'' (1996 [1778]). A touchstone of modern comparative study was Emory's (1946) analysis of Polynesian vocabularies, a kind of pre-lexicostatistical approach. Elbert (1953) offered a ``tree diagram,'' de®ning for the ®rst time the critical deep branching between Tongan and Niuean on one side, and all other Polynesian languages. Elbert's tree was further re®ned by Green (1966) and Pawley (1966), and Biggs (1967) provides a useful summary discussion of these articles, along with a comprehensive bibliography of Polynesian linguistics in the critical period between 1946 and 1966. 9 The further implication here, which we will merely point to without elaboration, is that such differentiation had an underlying sociological basis (see Ross 1997). 10 Bowdler (1993) suggests that a region comparable to Ancient Near Oceania may in its early stages have quali®ed as a ``culture area.'' 11 The Comparative Austronesian Project, as its title indicates, has taken the inclusive unit de®ned by Austronesian language speakers as its analytic focus, using a phylogenetic framework (Bellwood et al. 1995). This Project has now resulted in several stimulating comparative analyses (Pawley and Ross 1994, 1995; Fox and Sather, eds., 1996). 12 For counter views, see Terrell et al. (1997), and Welsch et al. (1992). Note, however, the strong opposition to Welsch et al.'s position regarding the nonutility of language-based models in Melanesia contained in the papers by Moore and Romney (1994, 1996) and Roberts et al. (1995). 13 For discussion of this debate, see Blust (1999), Pawley (1996a), Irwin (1997), Kirch (1997b), and Green (1997c). 14 See Oliver (1989:779) for a de®nition of these terms. 15 As Green and Kirch (1997) have argued, the distinction was not so marked at

Notes to pages 69±85

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the time of Lapita settlement of Western Polynesia; its more regionalized focus laid the basis for various interaction trajectories in Polynesia. Nevertheless, unilineal descent principles do apply in certain key ethnographic cases and, as we argue in Chapter 8, provide strong evidence for the interpretation of at least one major Ancestral Polynesian social group (the *kainanga) as having been unilineal. Houghton (1996) has developed a model to suggest that this process was driven by selection and adaptation to long-distance, open-ocean voyaging in their Remote Oceanic world, a model that remains somewhat controversial (see Brace 1998). A reduction in selection pressure in the area without malaria, combined with marked variation caused by genetic drift, seems quite compatible with the evidence for bottlenecks indicated by the mitochondrial DNA 9 base-pair deletion in Polynesians, and by more recent studies of variable tandem repeats in populations from Vanuatu to Eastern Polynesia. See McArthur et al. (1976); Black (1978, 1980). See also general papers by Hammel et al. (1979, 1980), that minimal effective (viable) breeding population sizes are smaller than had been claimed in the literature. The irrefutable evidence for at least one South American contact is the prehistoric introduction of the sweet potato into central Polynesia (Yen 1974; Hather and Kirch 1991). Green (1998a) supports the view that both the Lagenaria bottle gourd and the sweet potato provide evidence of such contact. By ``horizon-like'' we refer to the classic culture-historical use of the term horizon (Willey and Phillips 1958). Such a Samoan ``cultural province'' would have included Futuna and, until the time of heavy Tongan in¯uence and cultural borrowing in late prehistory, the islands of `Uvea and Niuatoputapu as well. In our view, the ``chronometric hygiene'' approach advocated by Spriggs and Anderson (1993) yields far too conservative an estimate. There is considerable evidence that people began moving well out onto islands of the Paci®c Plate in both Eastern Micronesia and Eastern Polynesia c. 2000 ‹ 200 years ago (Athens 1995:268; Irwin 1992, 1997). Kirch and Ellison (1994) discuss some further dif®culties with the Spriggs±Anderson model, such as extreme demographic assumptions. The critical point is that the Rapanui language does not share in a signi®cant number of Eastern Polynesian innovations, and it must therefore have split off from PEP prior to, for example, the divergence of Hawaiian from Marquesan. On archaeological criteria, the latter must have occurred by AD 800 at the latest, and possibly as early as AD 300 (Kirch 1985). This is an issue that has long concerned both of us. Green (1972:672±73) had begun to discuss contacts between cultures both within Polynesia and externally, observing that such contacts were not random, were more complicated than most imagined, and were structured by various factors which he listed. His views were backed up subsequently in a series of papers demonstrating at least 3,000 years of trade and exchange, sometimes over long distances (see Green

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Notes to pages 87±102

1997a:56). The same position was taken with regard to Western Polynesia (Green 1975), leading Irwin (1980) to observe that in Western Polynesia ``isolation . . . was of a selective kind.'' Referring to Irwin's views, Green wrote: ``The model which the present archaeological evidence ®ts best is no longer one of successive developments in isolation . . .'' (1981:144). Green (1981:146) also pointed out how this applied to the linguistic situation. Kirch, with his own research experiences in documenting interaction with respect to Futuna, `Uvea, and Niuatoputapu in Western Polynesia, and more importantly for the southeastern Solomon Islands (Kirch 1986b), summed up his view of interaction in Oceania as follows: ``While island ecosystems are physically bounded, they are not `closed systems,' and our culture-historical reconstructions must re¯ect the reality that Oceanic peoples were adept seafarers who frequently extended their ecosystems through regular contact with adjacent and even far ¯ung islands. The number of true cultural `isolates' among Paci®c Islands is probably very low, including perhaps remote Easter Island and some other Polynesian islands'' (Kirch 1984c:629). 26 Other extra-PN examples of readily detectable borrowing in the Paci®c include Kiribati, which has borrowed from Polynesian (Harrison 1994), and Mele (a Polynesian Outlier) which has borrowed as much as one third of its total vocabulary from the nearby language of Efate (Clark 1998). Part II Introductory remarks 1 Hawaiki or cognate variants appear in Western Polynesia as place names, the most famous being Savai`i Island in Samoa, but not as a concept of an ancestral homeland or spirit world. Again, we note that the proper phonological rendering of the PPN name is *Sawaiki (not *Hawaiki ), the *s to /h/ shift occurring later in various Polynesian languages. As explained earlier, however, we have retained the spelling Hawaiki because of its long history of usage in Polynesian scholarship. 4

The Ancestral Polynesian world

1 In the WoÈrter und Sachen approach of linguistic paleontology, the location of a homeland, such as that of the Proto Indo-European speakers, is argued on the basis of the geographical distribution of distinctive ¯ora, fauna, or other physical characteristics indicated in the lexicon of the proto-language. This approach obviously has serious limitations, as described for example by Renfrew (1987:77±86), although with careful application (as, for example by Mallory [1989, 1997]) it can still provide useful insights to the problem of homeland determination. 2 The only exception to this is `Eua Island in the Tongan group, which has exposures of diabasic, rhyolitic, and epidotic rocks, as well as uplifted marine limestones, all re¯ecting its more ancient andesitic island-arc origin (Hoffmeister 1932).

Notes to pages 102±17

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3 Of particular use in preparing this table have been Marck's (1994) study of Proto Micronesian terms for the physical environment, as well as Biggs' (1994) paper on Maori terms for the physical environment; although neither of these papers deals with PPN environmental terminology per se, they suggest possible cognates and have thus provided useful clues. 4 Re¯exes of *takulua refer to Sirius in HAW, MAO, MQA, and TAH, so it is possible that this meaning is a PCE semantic innovation. Elsewhere re¯exes of the term refer variously to Altair, Canopus, ``two large stars,'' or to the planets Jupiter or Saturn. 5 Ross (1995a) reconstructed a set of POC terms for meteorological phenomena which have been of use to us in determining which PPN terms for weather, winds, and so forth are retentions from this earlier interstage. 6 Ross (1995a:280) reconstructs a POC contrast set *raki, `dry season when the southeast trades blow,' and *apaRat, `wet season when northwesterlies blow and the sea is rough.' He suggests that this set was replaced in PPN with *tonga, `southeast trade wind,' and *tokelau, `northwest wind.' If he is right, the PPN change involved not only a lexical replacement, but important changes in meaning as well, for ``whereas the POc terms evidently referred prototypically to seasons, the central meanings of the PPn terms seem to have been winds from a certain portion of the compass'' (1995a:281). 7 Firth, describing the Tikopia, offers a wonderful anecdote of how pervasive the seaward/landward distinction can be to Polynesian peoples. He writes that ``for all kinds of spatial reference they use the expressions inland and to seawards . . . I have even heard a man direct the attention of another in saying: `There is a spot of mud on your seaward cheek' '' (1936:19). 8 In TON, a key witness for the reconstruction of PPN, the pre®x is ki, a directional generally meaning `to, toward,' and also a good PPN reconstruction. PPN *ki is indeed a likely candidate for the pre®x used in the *tahi/*quta directional contrast set. 9 At the POC level, Clark (1994) deals with bird names and Pawley (1996b) with names for reef and shoreline invertebrates, while Geraghty (1994) has compiled PCP ®sh names. 10 Blust (pers. comm. 1999) observes that ``the durability of a sound-meaning match in the area of ¯ora and fauna is directly proportional to its economic usefulness, OR its danger.'' He points to the stone®sh (PPN *nofu) as one taxon with no known economic value, but which is a relatively stable term in Paci®c languages as a whole. Presumably this is because ``of the importance of avoiding it with bare feet on the reef.'' 11 See Hunt and Kirch (1997), Kirch (1993a), Dickinson et al. (1994), and Dickinson and Green (1998) for reviews of the geomorphological and archaeological evidence. 12 Steadman (1993b:222±23) reports that there are two questionable historical reports of Megapodius species in Samoa (M. stairi ) and in Ha`apai (M. burnabyi ), each described from only a single egg specimen. However, such eggs could well have been trade or exchange items, and may actually represent nothing

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Notes to pages 118±32

more than eggs of M. pritchardi brought to Samoa and Ha`apai from Niuafo`ou. 13 In addition to these three Polynesian re¯exes, there are cognates in three Oceanic languages of Vanuatu, making the reconstruction of *malau valid back to the Proto Eastern Oceanic interstage. 14 On the ecological vulnerability and fragility of Remote Oceanic ecosystems, see Fosberg (1963a, 1963b). 5

Subsistence

1 *Kulu is also the term with a deeper history in the Austronesian family, with a reconstruction back at least to Proto Malayo-Polynesian (PMP *kuluR). With regard to the *kulu/*mei semantic problem, Marck (n.d., 7) observes that ``such uncertainties are a part of life in comparative linguistics''! 2 The further question here is whether the Ancestral Polynesian communities utilized Metroxylon palms only for thatching material, or also extracted the starchy pith as a food. The technology for starch extraction is known in such Western Polynesian societies as Futuna (Kirch 1994a), and of course has a widespread and presumably ancient distribution in Melanesia (Barrau 1959; Dutton 1994). We believe that the narrow-necked, globular-shaped plainware ceramic vessels so common in Lapita assemblages, and continuing into Ancestral Polynesian times, may well have been used for the storage of sago ¯our (see Kirch 1997a:161). This is a question which we must defer for the time being, however. 3 Blust (pers. comm., 1999) reports that ``re¯exes of PAN *kali refer speci®cally or primarily to the excavation of tubers in a number of languages in insular Southeast Asia and the Paci®c (cf. Thao kari `dig up or out, as tubers'; Hanunoo kali `digging up, as of rootstocks, tubers, etc.').'' 4 With re¯exes occurring in sixteen Polynesian languages as well as FIJ, modern glosses of wele terms range from `to weed' (EAS, HAW, RAR), or `weed with ®ngers' (SAM), to `clear the ground' (TAH), but all incorporate the same basic meaning. 5 The sole exception is a PPN term, *fusi, which seems to have meant a `swampy area,' and which POLLEX suggests may also have meant such a swampy area under cultivation. For reasons discussed in detail by Kirch and Lepofsky (1993:193±95), it is likely that the application of this term to raised-bed or pond®eld irrigation was a later semantic innovation of the Fiji±Western Polynesian region, but the use of naturally wet, and suitably drained areas may go back to the PPN stage. 6 At the time this article was written, ``Samoic-Outlier'' was still an accepted subgrouping within the Polynesian linguistic model; more recently, revisions by Wilson (1985) and Marck (1996c, 1999b) have shown that the Outlier languages do not constitute a monophyletic group. 7 The term is from Blaikie and Brook®eld (1987). 8 In our view, it is unlikely that they were ``scrapers,'' as suggested by Janetski,

Notes to pages 131±44

9

10

11 12 13 14 15 16

297

because they do not have sharpened edges, and the columella was not removed, so that these ``scrapers'' would quickly clog with vegetable peelings. While Poulsen (1987) may well be correct in his functional interpretation of the perforated Anadara shells as net sinkers or weights, there are other possibilities. One is that these shells were used as coconut graters, the perforation being used to lash the shell (which has a naturally serrated edge) to a wooden shaft or stool, as in ethnographically documented examples. Faunal assemblages have been analyzed and reported from several Ancestral Polynesian sites, including those on Tongatapu (Poulsen 1987:233±40), on Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988), and on Samoa ( Janetski 1980b; Nagaoka 1993). Nagaoka (1993:207±14, tables 13.19, 13.20) provides a useful overview of these data, which we only brie¯y summarize. It is known from an Early Eastern Lapita context from Ha`apai (Pregill and Dye 1989), and by a single jaw fragment from the NT-100 site on Niuatoputapu (Kirch 1988:221). A term which POLLEX reconstructs only to the PNP level, *reke, may have indicated the shank knob or snood end of an angling hook. On this point, see Green's important and extensive discussion of Samoan trolling lures in the early post-contact period (Green 1974a:271±74). A second term for `®shing line' speci®cally is reconstructed to Proto Samoic, *uka. No PPN term for `weight' or `sinker' seems to exist, but one can be reconstructed for Nuclear Polynesian, *kalisi. A term for scoop-net, *kuku-ti, is reconstructed for PNP. 6

Food preparation and cuisine

1 The development of a scholarly approach to Polynesian cuisine and to ``archaeogastronomy'' has been a particular interest of one of us (PVK), as evidenced in recent writings (Kirch 1994a:95±100; 1997a:212±17). This interest dates back to much pleasurable time spent in the traditional cookhouses of Anuta (in 1971), Futuna (in 1974), and Tikopia (in 1977±78). 2 Inexplicably, the fascinating section detailing Tikopian recipes (1936: 103±10) was eliminated from the later, paperback edition now read by students. 3 *Kina probably most often referred to ¯esh foods that accompanied a meal based primarily on starch staples. Its modern re¯exes sometimes also refer to such relishes as coconut. 4 The PPN term *qota quite nicely exempli®es the necessity of amplifying the minimal glosses provided in POLLEX with additional ethnographic detail. Out of twenty re¯exes for *qota listed in POLLEX, the glosses as provided from standard dictionary sources indicate `raw' in every case, but correlate that rawness with ®sh or shell®sh in only six cases. Yet, if one carefully consults the ethnographic corpus for Polynesia, it is abundantly clear that the only kinds of meat regularly consumed in a raw state are ®sh and shell®sh. Moreover, the

298

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11

12

13 14 15 16

17

Notes to pages 144±54

re¯ected terms, as far we can determine, only apply to the consumption of ¯esh foods, not to vegetable products. An apparent PCE innovation was the compound term *koo-moto, meaning `not quite ripe,' possibly restricted to coconuts. The gloss `raw' is clearly one of prime semantic agreement, although this should probably be quali®ed to indicate that it applies primarily to plant foods. In closely examining the various meanings and glosses ascribed to the twentytwo re¯ected terms for *peqe, one is struck by the consistent reference to `soft,' `crushed,' or `easily-crushed.' Those who have spent time with traditional Polynesian peoples who depend to any extent upon the seasonal breadfruit harvest for their subsistence will be well aware of the concern that is expressed on a daily basis for the ripening of the fruit. Ideally, one wishes to harvest the fruit at the peak of its ripeness for cooking. However, a day's delay may result in the fruit falling to the ground, whereupon it all too easily is bruised or crushed and, while still edible, yields a less than satisfactory culinary product. There is a poorly re¯ected term, *mangiti, witnessed only in FIJ and EFU and which may therefore be a borrowing, that has the semantic value of `starch staple' (see Kirch 1994a:98). Interestingly, there was a PNP innovation with the same semantic value, *maluu. One semantic referent of this term, at least in certain modern Polynesian languages, is also to the state of being `intoxicated' (perhaps `stupe®ed' is a better term) with kava, Piper methysticum. And even more recently, there has been an extension of the semantic range for kona to include the state of alcoholic intoxication. This is perhaps an appropriate a place to acknowledge the in¯uence of Douglas Sutton, whose continuous skepticism concerning both the ``reality'' of Ancestral Polynesian Society, and the possibilities of what he (not we) calls ``linguistic archaeology'' have been a friendly if at times contentious inspiration to continue our collaboration into the project whose fruit is this book (see Sutton 1990, 1996). Hiroa's comment on the structural similarity of both dwellings and cookhouses raises a point for archaeologists to consider, for it is likely that the patterns of postmolds will be nearly identical in many cases. Thus it is the associated assemblages that will prove critical in discriminating function: cooking gear and earth ovens for cookhouses, and tool-making activities or other evidence for domestic tasks in the case of dwellings. Half-coconut shells are also the preferred material for igniting earth ovens. The Eastern Polynesian term *fale umu was thus an innovation. PPN *faka-qafu has only six modern re¯exes, but these include TON and TAH in the east, making this a fairly con®dent reconstruction. PPN *fuke is re¯ected in twenty-®ve languages, including FIJ. There is a second, probably closely related term, *suke, for which POLLEX provides a gloss of `open up by removing a cover' but which may also have applied to earth ovens. More detailed zooarchaeological analyses should be able to shed some light on

Notes to pages 154±70

18

19 20

21 22 23 24 25

299

certain food preparation procedures, especially with regard to the butchering and cooking of animal foods, such as pig, chicken, and so on. In PUK, however, olo is the name of a taro pudding, and in TAH oro means `grate the taro.' Thus while PPN *olo certainly had a general meaning of `grate,' we suggest it might also have referred speci®cally to the grating of taro. Alternatively, this may be a semantic innovation of TAH that was borrowed into PUK. The same term seems also to have indicated the gentle heating of leaves over a ®re to render them supple by wilting, prior to using them for parceling food. We have been unable to ®nd a speci®c term for stone-boiling in wooden vessels, although such a method was surely known to the Ancestral Polynesians, given the presence of the earth oven and the widespread distribution of this technique in Oceanic societies. A secondary meaning, which may well have existed in PPN as well, is `brains, bone marrow, spongy matter.' This was presumably due to the elaboration of pounded starch pastes (*popoqi ) in Eastern Polynesia. A speci®c kind of *fai-kai can be reconstructed to PNP: *poke. This seems to have been a pudding based on either taro or breadfruit mixed with coconut cream. A second term is evidenced for PNP: *kao, `dried food, such as sweet-potato, taro, or ®sh.' While PPN *mara clearly continues from POC *ma(n)da, Lichtenberk (1994:278) suggests that the older term had a semantic value of `very ripe, over-ripe' and not necessarily of purposively fermented foods. 7

Material culture

1 In selecting the four examples given in Table 7.1, we have chosen two highisland cultures, and two atoll cultures, as it might be supposed that the different resource bases of these respective island types had an in¯uence on their material cultures. 2 The striking contrast here is with New Zealand, where non-tropical island conditions produce many swamp sites with well-preserved organic artifacts over a 700-year cultural sequence. 3 Spans measured from the tip of the thumb to tip of middle ®nger, the hand bent over onto ®ngers, and thumb put next to middle ®nger knuckle (adding middle ®ngertip to knuckle distance) for which we have no word, are other kinds of likely measurement, based on their use in Tongan bark cloth (Tamahori 1963:93). 4 Koch (1984) gives the most extensive set of indigenous measurement terms known for a Polynesian group, from Tuvalu. 5 While POLLEX gives the PPN form as *kulo, Blust (pers. comm., 1999) advises us that it should more properly be reconstructed as *kuro. This is because TON kulo, which is critical to the reconstruction of the *kulo form, is irregular (one expects kuo), and suggests the possibility that the TON word is a borrowing of

300

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8

9 10

11

12 13

14 15

Notes to pages 170±78

FIJ kuro sometime after the disappearance of PPN *r. Such a historical interpretation would be consistent with the archaeological record of the loss of pottery in Tonga during the ®rst millennium AD, and with later trading of occasional Fijian pots into Tonga. TON haka, hole made in base of a coconut palm for catching and holding water. The same term and meaning also occur EUV, where they may be a borrowing from TON. We are not particularly happy with Ross' gloss ``frying pan'' for this POC term, as this implies a more Western culinary concept. Obviously, the cooking process indicated is one of roasting or grilling, rather than frying (the latter implying the use of oil, as well). May and Tuckson's (1982:355) de®nition of a pottery frying pan for cooking sago ``pancakes'' (usually without the use of grease) may be more germane. But note that re¯exes for PPN *saka are limited to Western Polynesia, and as a FIJ noun saqaa, one of two words for a restricted-neck water jar (Geraghty 1996b:428) that now has only two equivalent nominal re¯exes with an associated `water storage container' meaning in Polynesian. Lichtenberk (1994: 275) gives a different POC lexeme with the meaning of a `plug or bung' made from leaves for stopping pottery vessels, with re¯exes extending as far east as FIJ. Evidence for such an extension in meaning certainly exists in Samoan where `ele is a re¯ex which ethnographically meant specially gathered red earth or clay (Kramer 1902: 305; Hiroa 1930:302±3). Green (1974b:151±52) indicates it was used in bark cloth decoration, in under house ¯oor burial pits, and possibly in the red slip on some of the pottery vessels. By the Ancestral Polynesian period, most of the elaborate and highly decorated Lapita pot forms had been lost, and decoration on pottery was either absent, or con®ned to a few simple indentations on some pot rims (Green 1974b:128). Thus we defer discussion of PPN *kanu, `design pattern on pottery, tapa, tattooing,' to the section on barkcloth (and tattooing) below. However, Ross' (1996b:76) suggestion of another meaning for POC *pilit, found also in PPN with the meaning of `braid,' could have carried the meaning of `strip of clay around the top of the pot' for the rims of some of the Polynesian Plainware vessels. The archaeological evidence suggests this was done to form some pot rims (Kirch 1988:163). The x in these reconstructions stands for a velar fricative. Tongan has kie (Churchward 1959: 263) or loukie (Yuncker 1959:50) for a botanically unidenti®ed kind of pandanus species, and POC *kiRe, but the rare Freycinetia urvilleana itself goes under the name kahikahi. However, it remains likely that PNP *kiekie applied to Freycinetia plants at the Ancestral Polynesian stage, in those islands where it occurred, and was used to make ®ne mats. We wish to acknowledge here permission to use Leach's exhaustive and sophisticated analytical review of all the Samoan adz data (Leach MS). Both Duff (1959) and Green (1971) recognized triangular cross-sectioned adzes as a Polynesian innovation, but did not fully comprehend the technological basis

Notes to pages 180±96

16 17

18 19 20

21 22

23

24 25

301

of their manufacture, as a new addition to the unifacial and bilaterally ¯aked adz forms preceding them in the Lapita adz kit. Nor did they place the timing of the innovation as occurring within Ancestral Polynesian culture. A technologically-inferred axe type function may be indicated for certain stone implements found in Mangareva (Hiroa 1938:269±71), and in New Zealand (Duff 1956: 184±90). Ethnographic examples of pump drills with wooden cross-bars bearing a variety of drill points in a range of materials are described by Hiroa (1930:495±96), Koch (1984:152), MacGregor (1937:155±56), Emory (1975:141), Linton (1923:347±48), Best (1974:66±91) and Hiroa (1962:194±96). It is linguistically not out of the question that we have here a unique shared irregular shift of *v to *m in these words. The bark of the breadfruit tree (Artocarpus altilis) and some trees in the genus Ficus were also used. Thus Shipibo (like the Polynesians) have a separate term (``ouenea'') for their highly distinctive designs which adorn pottery, textiles and clothing, human skin, calabashes, turtle carapaces, house posts, canoes and canoe paddles, spindle whorls, sand markings and doodles. This sounds highly comparable to Polynesian art styles as we understand them, with rock art substituting for sand painting and ``doodles'' (Millerstrom 1997:192). A ceramic dentate-stamped buttocks piece of a human ®gure and the head of a human ®gurine bearing decorative motifs suggesting tattooing attests to its presence in Western Lapita sites as well (Summerhayes 1998:160). A shark's tooth with drilled hole (as for attaching to a wooden handle), recovered from the plainware contexts of the To`aga site in American Samoa (Kirch 1993b:164) could have been from a club-like weapon known ethnographically in many Polynesian societies, but could also have been part of a cutting implement, or even an item of personal adornment. No lexical reconstruction for a sharktooth implement or weapon has been put forward. There is a substantial ethnographic literature on the subject of these string ®gures, which are ubiquitous in Polynesia (e.g., Handy 1925; Hornell 1927; Firth and Maude 1970). One aim of this early twentieth-century ethnographic concern with string ®gures was comparative analysis to infer culture-history (Hornell 1927:6±9). Given the rich lexical data associated with the ®gures themselves, a renewed analysis informed by a modern phylogenetic approach might well be worth the effort. Blust (pers. comm., 1999) also informs us that such string ®gures have a very deep history among Austronesian speakers, and that the PPN term *fai probably derives from PAN *paRiS (`stingray', term applied to the constellation Scorpio, Southern Cross, or other astronomical features). A Triton shell ``ornament'' with a circular perforation which looks exactly like a typical puu, and would be so interpreted, except for its rather small size (Poulsen 1987:204). A CEP innovation, *tapu-a®, a compound term derived from *tapu (`sacred') and *a® (`®re'), seems to apply to a more formalized, stone-outlined hearth found

302

Notes to pages 196±202

within the principal dwelling houses of certain Eastern Polynesian societies. Green (1986:53) discusses their archaeological occurrence, but could ®nd no PPN term for them. The likely PPN term seems to be a continuation of PCP *dravu, from POC *rapu(R), meaning `hearth, ®replace,' as well as `ashes' (Lichtenberk and Osmond 1998:147). 26 At the slightly earlier Early Eastern Lapita site of NT-90 on Niuatoputapu, the spatial distribution of cultural materials was suggestive of a linear zone of dwellings, with a separate zone of cookhouses immediately inland (Kirch 1988:90±92, 241). 27 Blust (1999) addresses this debate, and argues that ``the double canoe was invented in the triangle formed by Fiji, Tonga and Samoa in the ®rst few centuries BC, and that it was this technological innovation which permitted An speakers to master the remaining physical obstacles in their way and thereby complete the human colonization of the Paci®c'' (1999:82). 28 Anchor stones have been found archaeologically in Samoa dating to the last millennium and a half, but not earlier (Green 1974a:270). 8

Social and political organization

1 By this we mean that archaeology can conceivably contribute much more, for example, to the reconstruction of ancient household units and their spatial variation, through the application of ``household archaeology'' and similar approaches. As we point out in Chapter 7, however, this will require entirely different excavation strategies than have been used to date for sites of the Ancestral Polynesian period. 2 We here clarify the terminology of social units we would reconstruct, given criticisms of our prior use of the term ``society'' (Kirch 1984a; Kirch and Green 1987; cf. Sutton 1996). Our practice derives from Oliver's framework (1989:126±29), whose de®nitions we adopt with modi®cations. We employ the following social unit terminology: (1) Social group: Any aggregate of persons who interacted with one another, directly or seriatim, with some regularity and at the time more-or-less distinctly from all other persons. (2) Household: A domestic group consisting of persons who regularly slept in proximity and who shared in the production, preparation, and consumption of food. Archaeologists in Polynesia have referred to such dwellings and their associated features as a ``household unit'' (e.g., McCoy 1976; Jennings et al. 1982). (3) Community: A group of people who resided in a cluster of households (usually spatially distinct from other such clusters) and who shared sentiments of unity, including distinctiveness from like units elsewhere, disposing them to interact among themselves in peaceful and cooperative ways, including non-war mechanisms for dispute settlement. (4) Society: The highest-level social entity with some measure of cultural homogeneity and distinctiveness, obviating the need to introduce the even more equivocal term ``tribe.'' The ``society'' was composed of an aggregate of people residing within a local region that facilitated regular interaction, speaking the same language (or languages), and sharing in large measure, and

Notes to pages 202±10

3

4 5

6 7

8 9 10

11

12

13

14

303

more or less distinctively, a common set of cultural premises, values, and practices. It is de®ned by the possession of a common culture which, as Oliver (1989:127) stresses, is a feature that may to a certain extent be assessed in material terms from the archaeological record. Hereafter we use the term House with a capital H to distinguish the larger anthropological concept, which includes not only a physical dwelling but also the social group which af®liates to the House, as well as other forms of tangible (land) and intangible (rights, history) property which also go with a House. These including Madagascar (Bloch 1995a, 1995b), aboriginal Taiwan (Paiwan, Chiang 1992), Tanimbar (McKinnon 1991, 1995), Melanesia (Young 1993), New Zealand Maori (Van Meijl 1993), and Tikopia (Kirch 1996, in press). Firth (1936) essentially recognized the fundamental nature of the House in Tikopia social organization, but later applied the term ``ramage'' (Firth 1957) to such groups. It might have been better to simply use the indigenous Tikopia term, paito. For a marvelous ethnographic exposition of this principle, see Firth's (1936:81±87) discussion of house names as ``tabloid history'' in Tikopia. The naming of houses in Tokelau is described by HoeÈm (1992:39). To our knowledge, the ®rst scholar to comment extensively on the interesting geographic distribution of rumah cognates was Codrington (1885:22±24), who noted that re¯exes of this term were found both in island Southeast Asia and in Melanesia, but not in Polynesia. This is also true of contemporaneous sites in Fiji (Best 1984; Crosby 1988) `Land' is the prominent gloss for PPN *fanua, but the term also carries two other meanings, `placenta,' and `people of the land.' The range of meanings listed for PPN *kai include `people of a place,' `to people a place,' and `to occupy.' Among the processes leading to these changes in social grouping and land tenure, Burrows suggested ``intermarriage, adoption, migration, and ± perhaps most powerful of all ± warfare arising from rivalry over land or ambition for enhanced status'' (1939:21). As we will demonstrate below, Goodenough made a fundamental error in assuming not without reason that the terms kainga and kainanga were simply ``variants'' of each other. As we can now demonstrate linguistically, they are in fact distinct terms with separate etymologies, although they almost certainly share a common root, POC *kai(n), ``people''. As we will argue below, Goldman was correct in identifying the Polynesian word kainga with this ``utility-minded land-holding group,'' while we would suggest that the ``comprehensive genealogical network'' was lexically indexed by the PPN term *kainanga. Probably because he never undertook primary ethnographic ®eldwork in Polynesia, Goldman was vili®ed by some Paci®c experts (e.g., Howard 1972). Nonetheless, we have nothing but the greatest respect for his careful comparative insights. Koskinen's discussion of these terms comes at the end of his monograph on ariki,

304

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17

18

19 20

21

22 23

Notes to pages 211±18

the Polynesian term for chiefship, and is raised in relation to that term. He is (purposively?) elusive, but on the speci®c social group which he thought to have been headed by the ariki ± if we read him correctly ± this would have been the kainanga. Given the geographic distribution of cognates of *kainanga, the term may have arisen at the Proto Remote Oceanic interstage indicated in the recent subgrouping model of Ross et al., eds. (1998: ®g. 1). As Hage (1998a) has observed, the fact that PPN kin-terms include what is called a ``bifurcate merging terminology,'' in which the father's brother and the mother's brother are lexically distinguished, is strong supporting evidence for ``a rule of unilineal descent since it separates patrilateral from matrilateral relations: F = FB = MB.'' Hage further cites Murdock's cross-cultural study demonstrating that this kind of bifurcate merging terminology is typically associated with unilineal descent. Note also that many of the Eastern Polynesian re¯exes have the term *mata pre®xed to *kainanga, and that this is uniformly the case for all languages within the Proto Marquesic branch of Eastern Polynesian. This compound form also occurs in NIU, which Marck (1999a:141) regards as an example of borrowing from central Eastern Polynesia. To our knowledge, re¯exes of *kaainga in languages outside of Polynesian are restricted to Kiribatese in Micronesia and the Lau Islands in Fiji. Marck (1996b, see especially fn. 16) puts the Kiribatese occurrence down to borrowing from Polynesian. The Lau occurrence, with a meaning of `relations' (Hocart 1929:33), is dif®cult to appraise. It could be a TON borrowing or an inherited form, such as vate (for `house, dwelling') from the Tokalau±Fijian±Polynesian interstage. As Marck (1996b) indicates, PPN *kaainga would seem to have developed later than POC late stage *kainanga, after the loss of the ®nal n consonant in kai(n), possibly in Proto Polynesian itself. Marck's shorter textual gloss in his 1996a paper (repeated in Marck 1999a:241) is less satisfactory: ``agricultural and especially residential land of people belonging to a social group and the dwellings thereon.'' Green (1986:53), in reviewing similar information, averred that PPN *kaainga came fairly close to the archaeological usage of ``household unit'' which had ``widespread meanings associated with the term . . . `to be related' as of a family or line, and `home' or `dwelling place' or in Eastern Polynesia `the portion of the land where one makes a home.' '' Green's error was to ignore its fundamental constitution as a social group. This is, indeed, precisely the situation in such ethnographically documented societies as Futuna (Burrows 1936; Kirch 1994a) where the two groups are labeled the kutunga and the kaainga, or Tikopia (Firth 1936) where they are the kainanga and the paito. See discussion in McKinnon (1995) for such a case in Island Southeast Asia. In POLLEX, Biggs distinguishes at least nine meanings for PPN *mata, including `mesh of net,' `point,' `point of land,' `face,' `eye,' `raw, unripe,' `social grouping of people,' `numeral unitiser for group of ®sh,' and `see, look at.'

Notes to pages 218±35

305

24 Examples include words for social groups, as in FIJ matanggali, or Proto Central Eastern Polynesian (PCE) *mata-kainanga. 25 Blust (pers. comm., 1999) points out that there has been some confusion in the literature regarding the POC terms *tubuq, `to grow,' and *tibu, *topu, *tubu, `grandparent.' ``The morphemes meaning `to grow' and `grandparent' were clearly distinct in PMP [*tumbuq vs. *tempu, *timpu, *tumpu], and remained so in POC, since we know that PMP *-q was retained as POC *-q in at least a few languages. Moreover . . . there were at least three variant forms for `grandparent,' distinguished by the penultimate vowel, only one of which partially resembled the word for `to grow.' '' Blust thus regards the suggested interconnections among words for `grandparent' and `to grow' as speculative, and we agree that more work on this problem is desirable. 26 With a TAH re¯ex and an extra-PN witness in FIJ, the term is of certain PCP antiquity, and not a later borrowing into Polynesian. 27 There is a third PPN etymon, *taqo-kete, for which a semantic reconstruction is ambiguous, but which may also have indexed a senior, same-sex sibling (Marck 1999a:270±71). 28 Because it is very likely to have been a borrowing, we do not here deal with PPN *tuqi, glossed by POLLEX as `king,' which seems to us to be a dubious semantic reconstruction for the PPN stage. 29 Hocart (1929:51) makes an interesting and suggestive ethnographic observation for Lau, that there the sau, while a common chie¯y title, was in a sense subject to the turanga for whom he helped to bear the reign by doing much of the work with and for the latter. A similar situation prevailed in Tonga, where the hau wielded the secular power for a sacred leader, the Tu`i Tonga. Other re¯exes of *sau, however, preserve the sense of paramount chief (ROT, West FIJ, EFU), leaving a semantic history hypothesis for PPN *sau ambiguous. 30 The concept of rank or status is also inherent to the meaning of the PCP and PPN term *tuqulanga. Hocart (1929:49±50) makes the point that translation of the FIJ word turanga as `chief ' is misleading, for it has other meanings which embody the construct of rank (turanga, `noble,' versus kaisi, `low born'). In FIJ, turanga developed the meaning of `chief ' also, while for Polynesia the POC term for oldest child, *adiki (Lichtenberk 1986; see also Pawley 1982) became PPN *qariki, initially with the prime meaning of leader of the *kainanga. 31 How this is played out ethnographically is perhaps best demonstrated for Tikopia by Kirch (1996), with the exception that there the term *kaainga was replaced by paito, whereas kainga developed a third sense in which once small settlements have become villages. The change to paito involved the transference of the PPN term for cookhouse, a central feature of *kaainga and indeed of the household group, to the social group itself. This was accompanied by a further semantic shift in the meaning of fare (PPN *fale) from its original meaning of `dwelling house,' to that of a ritual god-house or temple in Tikopia.

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Notes to pages 239±43 9

Gods, ancestors, seasons, and rituals

1 We do not intend to revisit the complex theoretical debates on these topics, but some ¯avor of the long-standing anthropological issues with regard to mana may be found in Handy (1927:26±50); Hocart (1927); Williamson (1933:130±47); Hogbin (1936); Firth (1940); Keesing (1984); and Shore (1989). 2 In addition to the core semantic value of `supernatural power,' there is a secondary meaning found in ten of the documented re¯exes, of `thunder.' This was probably also another meaning of PPN *mana. 3 That both terms are good PPN reconstructions is certain since they both have extra-Polynesian witnesses, and can be reconstructed back to POC *qatuan and *qanitu, respectively. 4 It is possible that *tupuqa referred to the spirits of ancestors, a point that will be discussed further below. 5 In his paper on Rennell Island religion, MacGregor comments that ``the distinction between atua, gods, and aitu, supernatural spirits, is not clear in many Polynesian islands and the two terms may be used in opposite senses in adjacent islands. At Rennell both words are used in reference to Te Aitu Tabu [the second great god of Rennell]'' (1943:33±34). 6 Marck (1996a:249±50) reconstructs *Tuu to the PNP level, and states that ``PCE *Tuu was a ®rst-order anthropomorphic god and . . . his status as god of war continued one held in PNP, though in this case we can be less certain about his parentage.'' As we know, the PNP stage correlates with the ®nal breakup of the PPN speech community, and innovations present in the former may have begun before this ®nal stage. It is thus conceivable, therefore, that PPN *Taangaloa had a twin sibling in the form of a PPN *Tuu, although the absence of an independent witness from TON or NIU does not let us back up this claim de®nitively. 7 This is because the names in TON are not consistent, being Limu and Kele (Marck 1996a: table 1). However, it is quite likely that these are TON innovations. 8 According to Luomala (1949), Maui or Maui-like myths also appear in parts of Melanesia and Micronesia, so this culture-hero may have a deeper time depth than Ancestral Polynesia. He appears, for example, in Rotuma as ``Moeatikitiki'' (1949:206), although this particular instance is likely to be a borrowing into ROT from a Polynesian language (i.e., from Maui-tikitiki). 9 Biggs (POLLEX) seems uncertain of the status of *tupuna, listing it only as ``*??*: Grandparent,'' and providing no witnesses. An incomplete search by Kirch, however, revealed numerous re¯exes, such as EAS tupuna `ancestor, grandparent, forefather,' TUA tupuna `ancestor,' TIK tupuna `ancestor,' PUK tupuna, `grandparent,' MVA tupuna `grandparent,' and ANU tupuna `grandparent.' The term would seem to us to be very robustly reconstructed to PNP, and a case of prime semantic agreement. The Fijian term tubuqu, `grandmother,' may also be cognate. Marck (1996b:15) reconstructs PPN *tupuna as `grandparent,' noting also that its re¯exes frequently refer to ``ancestors of higher generations along with collaterals of grandparents and higher generations.''

Notes to pages 243±46

307

10 To non-linguistic specialists, the whole matter may be, as Marck (1996b:18) admits, a ``tedious discussion,'' but we think it important nonetheless. Although, as noted, it makes no difference to our fundamental argument regarding the signi®cance of ancestors, we are inclined to think that there were indeed two separate terms, *tupuna and *tupunga. Marck states that *tupuna was formed by adding the POC third person singular possessive marker to the old POC root, *tubu. We suggest that *tupunga could similarly have been formed by adding the suf®x -nga, which takes a verbal form and makes it a nominal, to the same root *tubu. This new form *tupunga would thus have the connotation of `raising up ancestors.' However, we leave it to the linguists to de®nitively resolve these ``tedious'' issues, if they can. 11 Dempwolff (1934±38) reconstructed *(t,T)umpu as `ancestor, Sir.' 12 Thus, Fox writes that ``when this conception is applied to social groups, the logic of the metaphor would imply that the groups so de®ned are `ascent groups' rather than `descent groups' '' (1995:35). 13 Much to his credit, the ethnographer E. S. C. Handy recognized such origin structures for Polynesian societies, for he writes ``it is correct to say in Polynesian parlance that men are ascended, not descended, from their ancestors'' (1927:19). 14 Firth (1970:67) offers some intriguing comments about the Tikopian re¯ex of this term, tupua, which may bear on its original meaning in PPN. He argues that the term ``was phonologically and perhaps semantically related to tupu, to grow,'' and also to tupuna. Concerning tupua, Firth writes: ``The term was used as an equivalent to atua [deity] sometimes in referring to a ghost or an ancestral spirit, and as differentiated from atua at other times, to indicate supernatural beings of olden times who had never been human beings, as opposed to the more recent spirits of dead men. But more speci®cally in ritual contexts tupua was the term applied to those spirits who were believed to be the most powerful, heading the list in worship; in this sense the term may be translated god or deity'' (1970:67). For other occurrences of tupua and its variant cognates, see Handy (1927:93±94). 15 See, for example, Emory's reference to the invocation to atua tangata, ``immediate ancestors,'' during turtle feasts on Reao Atoll (1947:69). 16 Gordon MacGregor, who was fortunate enough to spend two weeks on Rennell Island in 1933 while the traditional religious system was still functioning, describes ``the invocation of an ancestral spirit''(1943:35±36). 17 The Hawaiian term `aumakua is a re¯ex of the PNP innovation *kau-matua, a compound term based on PPN *kau, `group, company,' and PPN *matuqa, `mature, parent.' The term presumably referred to the collective `parents' of a group. In some Eastern Polynesian languages, the word has come to mean `old man or woman,' but in HAW it designated the personal or family gods of a household. 18 Indeed, this ®ts well with the notion of a semantic as well as lexical innovation at the PCE level, of *tahunga, derived from PPN *tufunga, but now with the speci®c semantic value of `priest.'

308

Notes to pages 247±56

19 It would probably be more accurate to gloss this as `vessel of the god,' thus keeping the Polynesian metaphoric play on the multiple semantic values of *waka. 20 Bellona is one of the very few Polynesian societies that did not retain a re¯ex of *qariki for its chiefs; the Bellona term (tunihenua) is a local innovation. 21 The speci®c titles in Mangaia were ariki-pa-uta (Inland High Priest), ariki-pa-tai (Shore High Priest), and ariki i te ua i te tapora kai (Ruler of Food). 22 MacGregor (1943:35) further describes a visit to the god house of the chief Taupongi: ``The god house, named Te Nganguenga, was built like the dwelling houses of the island: it was a rectangular frame with a gable roof and eaves which were only a foot or two from the ground. Before the house was a little cleared space, a marae, which had a short upright coral slab at each side.'' 23 Another Eastern Polynesian example of miniaturization of ritual structures is Rapa (Heyerdahl and Ferdon 1965). 24 This reconstruction is not contained in POLLEX, but we believe it is entirely supported by the lexical and ethnographic evidence. We adduce the following witnesses in support of this reconstruction: TON: fare fa`ahikehe: heathen temple fare fe`ao: in old Tonga, house built near a heathen temple for the reception of the sick fare lotu, church building RAR: `are atua: house full of gods SAM: fale aitu, god house TIK: fare, house esp. traditional; ritual temple EFU: fale atua, god house, temple TUA: fare tini atua, miniature god house on marae TUA2: fare heiao, store house in which sacred relics of departed ancestors were guarded HAW: hale o Lono, temple of Lono hale mana, house for ritual paraphernalia on Luakini temple MIA: `are ei `au, miniature god house on marae. 25 Fox (1993:21) claims that ``this focus on the posts of the house is a signi®cant feature of many Austronesian houses,'' that the housepost ``expresses an idea of botanic continuity that is consistent with the overall imagery of the house'' as an origin structure (see discussion earlier). 26 According to Monberg (1991), sacred or ritual mats were also used in Bellona, although the terms for them are not cognate with *tapakau/*takapau. MacGregor (1943:35±37) also describes the use of ceremonial mats in several different Rennell Island rituals, but does not give the term for these. It seems that in Rennell and in Tikopia, mats were symbolic markers of the place of the ancestor or deity being invoked, and offerings were placed on these at various times during ceremonies. 27 There is a second term, PPN *qepa, which may refer to a another, distinct kind of ceremonial or ritual mat. The term has re¯exes in fourteen Polynesian languages, but the meanings vary widely, from `®ne sleeping mat' (ECE) to

Notes to pages 256±61

28 29

30 31

32

33

309

`native mats on which dead chief is laid' (SAM), to `tribute' (MVA). Quite possibly the originally PPN meaning was that of a ®nely woven Pandanus mat which may at times have been used in certain ceremonials or rituals. The exceptions are New Zealand where the plant was unsuited to the temperate climate, and Rapa Nui where it may have been introduced but failed to survive. Crowley (1994) notes that the PPN term *kawa seems to be an innovation at this stage, and that the Fiji term yaqona is not cognate but rather an extension of the term *kona, `bitter.' He suggests that *kawa itself might originally have meant `bitter, sour' as well. However, he also cites Geraghty to the effect that the term must be fairly old in Polynesia, for it appears as Polynesian loan in certain Micronesian languages. Crowley is correct to be cautious, but we feel that the case for *kawa meaning P. methysticum in PPN is quite strong; this does not preclude a polysemous range also including `bitter,' which as any kava drinker knows is quite true. That *taa-noqa can be reconstructed back to PCP, based on extra-Polynesian witnesses in FIJ and ROT, is additional evidence ± contra Crowley (1994) ± that *kawa meant `kava' and not simply `bitter, sour.' Such rites need not be con®ned to critical events in the human life cycle. In 1971, Kirch witnessed a wailing ceremony held on Anuta Island for the wreck of a large sea-going canoe which had been damaged on the reef while returning from ®shing. Dening (1980:263±64) poignantly describes how, in the Marquesas, the nineteenth-century Catholic missionaries explicitly used concepts of time to ``civilize'' the Marquesans, in the process stripping away entirely the indigenous systems of time-keeping. Much of this early and frequently fragmented literature was synthesized by Williamson (1933, 1). For Western Polynesian societies, reasonably detailed accounts of time reckoning are available for Tonga (Collocott 1922) and Futuna (Kirch 1994b:264±67), with more patchy information for Niue (Loeb 1926:188±89), Samoa (Turner 1884:203±8; Williamson 1933, 1:154±65), Tokelau (MacGregor 1937:90±92), and Vaitupu (Kennedy 1931:9±11). For Outlier societies, only Firth (1967b:28±30) for Tikopia and Emory (1965:344±46) for Kapingamarangi provide any detailed information. For Eastern Polynesia, Hiroa (1932a:218±31) provides one of the only truly comprehensive, ®rst-hand ethnographic accounts for Rakahanga, while for the Societies (Henry 1928:327±34; Oliver 1974:264±70; Babadzan 1993:223±33) and Hawai`i (Malo 1951:30±36; Handy and Handy 1972:28±40; Kamakau 1976:13±19; Valeri 1985:194±99) there are excellent summaries based on nineteenth-century sources. More spotty information is available for Tongareva (Hiroa 1932b:215±20), Pukapuka (Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1938:24±5), Mangaia (Gill 1876:43±44), the Marquesas (Handy 1923:347±52), Mangareva (Hiroa 1938:411±14), New Zealand (Best 1922, 1925:214±17), Tuamotu (Emory 1946:192±95), and Rapa Nui (MeÂtraux 1940:49±54). Other valuable sources include Makemson's (1941) synthesis of Polynesian astronomical and calendrical knowledge, Burrows' discussion of month names (1938a:82±83,

310

34 35

36

37 38

39

40 41

42

43

Notes to pages 261±69

table 5), Emory's comparison of month names (1946:192±220), and AÊ kerblom's (1968:97±99) briefer account. The term *mata-®ti is itself an Eastern Polynesian innovation, but an early one, as it is re¯ected in EAS, as well as in RAR, TAH, and HAW. The precession of the equinoxes is the slow, continuous westward motion of the equinoxes around the ecliptic, resulting from the precession of the Earth's axis, due to gravitational forces. The Earth's axis precesses with a period of 25,800 years. Makemson (1941:232) commented on the extra-Polynesian distribution of cognate names for the Pleiades: ``Variants of the widespread name Matariki are found in both Micronesian and Melanesian dialects, referring to the Pleiades (Churchill), in such forms as Makeriker, Magarigar, Magirigir, and Marikir from Micronesia and Mitariki from Melanesia.'' This account is especially valuable not only for its early date, but because it was recorded in Tahitian language text as well; here we reproduce only the English translation, but the Tahitian is given in Henry (1928). There is some extra-Polynesian evidence for a two-season year regulated by the risings and settings of the Pleiades. For example, of the traditional Gilbertese calendar, Grimble writes that ``The year is considered to begin with the appearance of the Pleiades in the nikaneve of the ®rst purlin to eastward, just after sunset, which in these equatorial islands is always within a few minutes of 6 p.m.'' (1972:223). The Te Auti season ends ``when Antares is observed to appear at the same altitude at 6 p.m. ± i.e. about the second week of June. The second season (tannaki ) of the year (ririki ) then begins, and lasts until the Pleiades reappear at sunset'' (1972:224). Makemson writes that ``the Pleiades year had originally begun in the autumn, about September 22, and has been gradually sliding toward the winter solstice as a result of the precession of the equinoxes and the discrepancy between the sidereal and tropical years at the rate of 14 days per 1,000 years'' (1941:78). Malinowski also writes that ``even the name for `year' is taytu [cognate to *taqu?], a small species of yam, which is the staple crop of the district'' (1935:52). For those interested in tracing the history of the Polynesian lunar calendar, the PEC phase marks a major period of lexical innovation, probably because by the PEC stage the speakers of various Polynesian languages had now expanded well beyond the original PPN geographic homeland. Since, as we argue below, the original PPN calendar was strongly correlated with local ecological conditions and with yam horticulture, it is not surprising that the calendar was signi®cantly reorganized once people had left the homeland region, and once their ecological settings and horticultural practices had changed. The name madaligi also occurs as a month (`January') in NUK, which may be additional evidence for a PPN reconstruction for this second semantic value; however, there is a strong possibility that the NUK term is a Micronesian borrowing. Hocart (MS [1913]: 4,887), citing his Rotuman informant Mou, says ``they used to watch the vatu`a tree which ¯owers red and a group of small stars (not yet

Notes to pages 269±73

44

45

46

47

48 49 50

51

311

visible) called Mafriri`it [small eyes]. When Mafriri`it appear in the morning it is time to plant yams.'' Among the atoll societies of the Tuamotus, where turtles were a particularly important food and became key offerings in marae ceremonies, the linkage between the Pleiades and turtles was strongly developed. Emory (1947:61) says that ``At Vahitahi, Honu (Turtle) was the child of Takero (Belt of Orion) and Matariki (Pleiades).'' He also remarks that ``Matariki, which stands for a female turtle, is the name of the Pleiades.'' Williamson (1933:157±64) synthesizes considerable ethnohistoric and ethnographic information on the rising of the palolo, which he regards as a ``seasonal timekeeper.'' It evidently rises consistently in the October±November period of the year. The palolo worm is known to have been a key calendrical marker in other Oceanic societies as well. For example, Malinowski writes of the Trobriand temporal sequence that ``the moon of Milamala coincides with the appearance of the palolo worm on the fringing reef, which is also called by the natives Milamala'' (1935:54). Woodworth (1995:477) states that ``the palolo appears on Samoa in the months of October and November during the last quarter of the moon. This is the time of the lowest or spring tide when at low tide the reef ¯at is exposed at shallow places or is barely washed over. At that time the sun is nearest its zenith.'' PNP *Munifa is, however, widely re¯ected in SAM, TOK, ECE, MRA, PEN, TUA, TAH, RAR, and MVA. While Perks (1980) and other nineteenth- and twentieth-century writers give the Bauan kelikeli `to dig up', Wilkes (1845) gave kelekele, `covered in earth,' for another version of the calendar. Makemson (1941:94) provides the following comment on the dif®culty of reconciling the lunar month with the solar year: ``Omitting the quarter-day [in the solar year of 365.24 days], which could not have given the Polynesians much concern, there still remains an excess of 11 days during which the Moon attains a growth between ®rst quarter and full. If then the next year dates from the ®rst new Moon after the expiration of the Pleiades year, the current year would contain 13 lunar months or 384 days, while the following year would commence 19 days after the advent of the star cluster [Pleiades] on the eastern horizon. The second solar year will thus contain 365 minus 19 or 346 days. Eleven lunar months use up 325 of these days while the twelfth carries over into the third year by an excess of 8 days. Hence the third consecutive year will commence on the ninth day after the initial rising of the Pleiades.'' Babadzan (1993) thus argues that the commencement of the year, in Tahiti and Hawai`i if not other societies, was not an ``event'' but a ``process'' (and a highly ritualized process at that). His discussion, drawing upon the Hawaiian ethnographic literature as well as that from Tahiti, is worth quoting here at length: Revenons au probleÁme de la determination d'un eÂventuel deÂbut de l'anneÂe. . . Ce rite annuel [Makahiki] est un rite de passage, au sens ouÁ le renouvellement de l'anneÂe est un processus, qui demande du

312

Notes to pages 273±83

temps pour s'accomplir, comme tout processus de re-geÂneÂration. A ce compte, l'arriveÂe des PleÂiades marque effectivement dans toute la PolyneÂsie le debut de ce processus, aussi bien dans les rites annuels que dans le mythe de creÂation qui les fonde . . . Le lever des PleÂiades marque en effet le deÂbut de la saison chaude (et le prochain changement de la course du soleil): mais l'abondance, reÂsultat du processus, et objectif mateÂrial des rites, se fait encore attendre. Aussi pourrait-on eÂgalement consideÂrer la ®n de cette peÂriode rituelle, marqueÂe aÁ Tahiti par les offrandes des preÂmices, comme une autre possibilite de ceÂleÂbrer le debut de l'anneÂe. (Babadzan 1993:231) 52 In this regard, Ancestral Polynesian time-keeping was similar to the various ``natural cycles'' described by Oliver (1974:264) for the Maohi of the Society Islands. Epilogue 1 We hasten to note, however, that often such peoples have a well developed oral narrative tradition of their history. 2 Here we express our agreement with John Bintliff (1993:100) on several points: that the future of archaeology lies with a version of ``cognitive processualism''; that the ®eld needs to become a ``hybrid `Human Science of Archaeology' '' which can draw as readily upon material evidence (and lexical reconstructions!) as upon Foucaultian theory; and that, to quote ``the world's most famous archaeologist, Professor Indiana Jones . . . `Archaeology is about Facts; if you want the Truth, go next-door to the Philosophy Department!' '' 3 Examples of such ``word portraits'' include Blust (1995a), Pawley and K. Green (1971), and Zorc (1994). Not that there is anything wrong with such exercises, which indeed prove useful starting places for historical anthropology. They are not, however, the kind of robust or rounded reconstructions that historical anthropology is capable of producing. 4 With regard to competing models of evolutionary process in biology, Harvey and Pagel (1991:205) offer the following comment, which in our view is equally relevant to historical anthropology: ``Nowadays the limiting factor is not the range of available models, but knowing which one to choose. The choice comes down to deciding which model makes the most realistic assumptions about the evolutionary process. Tell us how to reconstruct the past, and we shall perform the comparative analysis with precision.''

Glossary of terms

analogous change Changes which arise independently, in response to similar contexts or selection pressures, and which do not re¯ect common ancestry or shared inheritance. ancestral culture That historical culture from which a set of modern ``daughter'' cultures has derived through subsequent change and differentiation. apomorphous In cladistic terminology, a ``derived'' character shared by members of a monophyletic group. borrowing In linguistics, words or sounds taken into one language from another. Culturally, borrowing consists of taking a ``trait'' or cultural feature from one culture to another, and is a major form of ``horizontal transmission.'' cladistics The particular school or method of phylogenetic analysis founded by Willi Hennig, in which classi®cation is based exclusively on genealogy. cognate Words in two or more languages that are derived by direct inheritance from a common ancestor, and display regular sound correspondences. culture area A geographic region containing a set of cultures sharing common systemic patterns, and assumed to be historically related. Unfortunately, some culture areas (such as ``Melanesia'') were often designated in an ad hoc manner, and thus may not have a real phylogenetic basis. daughter language A language which has descended from a speci®ed proto language. dialect chain A network of widely distributed, related speech communities which have yet to become separate languages. Dialect chains are apt to form innovation-linked subgroups in which the innovations exhibit a non-exclusive overlapping pattern among the set of dialects. direct historical approach An approach in historical anthropology in which one works backwards in time from the ethnographic present, or from the ethnohistorical record, into late prehistory and thence into earlier time periods. This approach is most successful when there is demonstrable cultural continuity from historically documented cultures back into the archaeological record. direct inheritance In linguistics, inheritance of a word or sound from an ancestral language, rather than through borrowing (indirect inheritance).

313

314

Glossary of Terms

foundation language The closely related speech communities of the ®rst wellestablished populations occupying an island region, as opposed to the language or languages spoken by any later or intrusive populations. homologous change Change which occurs within a set of related, or sister groups, all of which share a common ancestry. horizontal transmission In cultural evolution, the lateral transmission of cultural traits between groups, often referred to by such terms as ``diffusion'' or ``borrowing.'' indirect inheritance In linguistic terminology, borrowing. innovations, uniquely shared A set of innovations unique to the daughter languages of a particular subgroup (and not found outside of that subgroup), and thus arising at the stage of the proto-language ancestral to the set of daughter languages. Uniquely shared innovations are critical to the robust de®nition of subgroups, in opposition to shared retentions. interstage language A proto-language at some stage intermediate between a higher-order proto-language and its descendant daughter languages. invading language (intrusive language) A language spoken by a group of people who are not the ®rst inhabitants of an island or region. lexeme A sound, word, or phrase which is a minimal unit of meaning. lexical reconstruction Lexical reconstruction (in opposition to semantic reconstruction) starts with the proposition that a language had a word with a particular meaning, and asks in a rigorous fashion which among its reconstructable morpheme sequences most likely displays that meaning, a technique called by Indo-European scholars an onomasiological query. monophyletic A group de®ned exclusively on the basis of synapomorphy (in cladistics), or in the linguistic sense, de®ned on the basis of shared innovations (phonological, lexical, or morphological). Near Oceania That part of Oceania ®rst settled by modern humans around 36,000 years BP, and including New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, and the main Solomon Islands. network-breaking model A model of a dialect chain in which there is a gradual weakening of ties between the network of sister dialects, until sharp language boundaries appear within the chain, at which point the break-up may be said to be complete. paraphyletic A group de®ned on the basis of symplesiomorphy (as opposed to synapomorphy), and thus including some, but not necessarily all, of the descendants of a particular ancestor. parental population A historical, biological population of inter-breeding individuals (sharing a common gene pool) from which a group or set of modern populations have all descended. phylogenetic model (or tree) A genealogical history of a group, usually graphed as a tree or as a cladogram, which maps ancestor±descendant relationships. phylogeny The study of lines of descent from a common ancestor.

Glossary of terms

315

plesiomorphous In cladistic terminology, characters which are derived from the ancestral state preceding transformation (which may therefore be shared with other taxa outside the monophyletic unit under consideration). polyphyletic A group whose members share certain similar characters due to convergence, rather than due to common descent. prime semantic agreement Homosemy, or sameness of meaning among a set of cognates or re¯exes in a group of daughter languages assigned to each of the major branches (or subgroups) within a higher-order grouping or language family, for a given reconstruction of a proto-form or etymon. proto-language An extinct language ancestral to a group of related daughter languages, and from which the latter have derived. radiation model A radiation model posits an initial period of uni®ed development undergone by a localized, homogeneous language community, followed by a period of geographic expansion, leading to the creation of dispersed, and sometimes isolated, daughter communities which develop independently after dispersal or radiation. This kind of model is often diagrammed as a ``family tree.'' re¯ex A sound or word in a daughter language that corresponds to a sound or word in an ancestral language. Remote Oceania That part of Oceania which was not settled by modern humans until after 3300 years BP. retentions, shared A linguistic feature, such as a lexeme, that has been inherited among a group of related languages from the common protolanguage. Shared retentions derived from an early stage in the history of a language family cannot be used to de®ne later subgroups (see innovations). segment of cultural history K. Romney's term for a group of cultures (``tribes'') related to each other by descent from a common ancestral culture. A culturally monophyletic group. semantic history hypothesis In terminological reconstructions for a particular proto-morpheme or lexeme where there is not prime semantic agreement among the daughter language re¯exes, a semantic history hypothesis must be forwarded to explain the various probable changes in meaning that have taken place over time from a postulated initial semantic value. semantic reconstruction In opposition to lexical reconstruction, semantic reconstruction asks the question of what was the probable meaning for a given proto-morpheme or lexeme within a given semantic ®eld; the technique is called by some Indo-European scholars semasiology. shared innovations See innovations. symplesiomorphy The presence of plesiomorphous characters in a set of species, marking them as sharing these characters by virtue of descent from a common ancestor, but not necessarily indicating a monophyletic group. triangulation methodology The method of bringing independent lines of evidence (from archaeology, comparative ethnography, biological anthropology, linguistics, comparative oral narrative, etc.) to bear on the

316

Glossary of Terms

reconstruction of some aspect of cultural history, thereby reducing the potential ``triangle of error.'' witness An example recorded from a daughter language within a subgroup or language family, judged to be an instance of independent evidence bearing on a particular linguistic question.

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Subject index

Figures are indicated by a suf®xed -f, and tables by a suf®xed -t. Notes (suf®xed -n) are referred to by number. Aberle, D. F., 44 abraders, coral, 132, 181f adaptation, 21 adzes, 102, 163, 178, 300n15; Ancestral Polynesian, 176±82, 179f; Lapita adz kits, 301n15; plano-convex, 1; PPN lexical categories for, 180±82; shell, 178, 180; distinctive Polynesian kit, 78; stone, 220. See also tattooing chisel Africa, 4, 6, 202, 289n22 Aitutaki Island, 88 AÊkerblom, K., 310n33 Anadara shells, 152 analogy, 28, 29, 279, 283. See also homology; synology ancestor/ancestors, 224, 243, 244, 245, 249, 255, 256, 267, 306n4, 306n9, 307n10, 307n11, 307n13; burial of, 255; dei®cation of, 245; eponymous, 217; PPN terms for, 240t. See also ascent groups; descent groups ancestral: characters, 28; cultures, 41; estates, 215 Ancestral Polynesia, 89; archaeological record for, 83; archaeological sites and assemblages, 81±83, 82t; breakup and dispersion of, 79±81; calendrics in, 273; ceramics/pottery in, 167±73; cooking in, 151; culture in, 30, 53; ethnobotanical knowledge in, 109±15; material culture in, 164; priest-chief, 231; ritual architecture in, 249; ritual spaces, 255; social groups

356

in, 207±19; concepts of time and space in, 75±79. See also Proto Polynesian Ancestral Polynesian homeland, 77; Hawaiki as the, 95±97, 99±101. See also Polynesian homeland; pre-Polynesian homeland Ancestral Polynesian Society (APS), 19, 41, 205±7, 282; breakup and dispersion of, 79±81; exchange in, 219±21; reconstruction of, 19; time keeping in, 312n52; social groups in, 207±19; transition from Lapita, 206±7; cultural variations in, 101 Ancient Near Oceania, 63. See also Near Oceania Anderson, A., 293n23 Anell, B., 120 animal husbandry, 129. See also chickens; dogs; pigs anthropology, 142; archaeology in, 3; biological, 3, 42, 91, 281; comparative method in, 23; evolutionary approach in, 2; historical, 3±8, 23±25, 53, 95, 116, 142, 278, 289n21, 312n3, 312n4; holistic perspective in, xiii, 2, 9; physical, 2; phylogenetic approach in, 9, 13, 28±29; postmodernist critique in, 6; history of, 277. See also archaeology; history; triangulation method anthropomorphic gods, 70; ®rst order, 239, 242, 275 Anuta Island, 33, 213, 244, 282, 309n31 Aoa Valley (Tutuila), 128±29

Subject index APS. See Ancestral Polynesian Society arboriculture, 125, 128, 129, 146. See also breadfruit; tree crops; Tahitian chestnut; vi apple archaeogastronomy, 143, 147, 160, 162, 297n1 archaeological: assemblages, 56; perspectives, 74±75; record, 33, 52, 77, 83, 279, 280; sites, Ancestral Polynesian, 84f archaeology, 28, 29, 72, 79, 91, 99, 147, 162, 163, 165, 200, 278, 279, 290n11, 302n1, 312n2; anthropological, 3; cognitive, 279±80; ethnoarchaeology, 135±37; evidence in, 18, 30, 32, 42, 118, 133±35, 142, 154, 160; evolutionary, 29; historical, 4; holistic, 4, 8; household, 302n1; linguistics and, 7, 32, 34; problems of con®rmation in, 44; radiocarbon dating in, 27; sourcing in, 66±67, 79, 87; zooarchaeology, 118, 121, 133±35. See also culture history; direct historical approach armbands, 189 aroids, 122. See also taro arrowroot, Polynesian, 125 ascent groups, 213, 224, 231, 307n12; unrestricted, 217; unilineal, 235. See also ancestors; descent groups; kinship; social groups Asipani site (Futuna), 128 Atiu Island, 88 atoll societies, 283 Austronesian: homeland, 55; language family, 7, 22, 55; subgrouping of, 36, 38, 39f Babadzan, A., 238, 311n51 bananas, 121, 122. See also tree crops Bantu languages, 6. See also Africa bark cloth, 184±87; decorated, 220 Barrau, J., 120, 125, 143 basketry, 175, PPN terms for, 175 beads, 189 Beasley, H. G., 120 Bellona Island, 238, 245, 248, 250, 308n20

357 Bellwood, P., 24, 63, 225, 227 Berlin, B., 109 Bernice P. Bishop Museum, 71 Biersack, A., 5, 8 Biggs, B., 35, 46, 60, 62, 79, 87, 110, 112, 146, 279, 290n10, 292n8, 295n3, 304n23, 306n9. See also POLLEX project birds, 134; landbirds, 121; names for, 295n9; population declines of, 117; seabirds, 121, 134. See also megapodes Bismarck Archipelago, 55, 63, 101, 291n3 Blust, R., 6, 45, 106, 107, 171, 204, 285n2, 290n10, 291n3, 295n10, 301n23, 302n27, 305n25, 312n3 Boas, F., 2 body decoration, 187±89. See also tattooing Borofsky, R., 49 borrowing, 3, 24, 28, 87, 91, 102, 213, 231, 281, 304n17, 310n42 bottle gourd (Lagenaria sp.), 293 bottlenecks, genetic, 73, 293n18 Bourdieu, P., 202 bow and arrow, 190, 192 bowling, 190 Boyd, R., 28, 285n5, 289n19 bracelets, 189 Braudel, F., 4, 286n11, 291n19 breadfruit, 65, 121, 122, 125, 145±46, 276, 298n7, 301n19; cultivar terms in PPN, 115; fermentation of, 159; pits for storage of, 159, 161f. See also arboriculture; tree crops Brown, C. H., 110±11 Buck, P. H. See Hiroa, T. R. burials, 255 Burrows, E. G., 16, 18, 48, 71, 80, 96, 136, 150, 208, 239, 268, 285n4, 291n18, 303n10, 309n33 calendar, 100, 261, 280, 309n33; Ancestral Polynesian, 268±69, 271t, 273, 274f; horticultural, 268±69; intercalations and, 273; Pleiades year, 263; Polynesian, 260±73, 262t; pre-Polynesian, 261, 271; solar, 261, 272; Tongan, 272. See also lunar calendar; Pleiades; year

358

Subject index

Cann, R. L., 88 canoes, 196±97, 204; double-hulled, 197, 302n27 carpenters, 225 Carsten, J., 202, 205 Chatham Islands, 80 chert, 183, 220 chickens, 121, 129; PPN term for, 142. See also domestic animals chiefdoms, 282 chief-priest, Ancestral Polynesian, 247±49 chiefs, 226, 304n14; in Ancestral Polynesia, 247±49; chief/big man distinction, 69; paramount, 234, 305n29; Polynesian, 67±69, 226±27 cladistics, 26, 288n13, 288n15; cladograms, 290n8; historical anthropology and, 23; theory and methods of, 26±7. See also phylogeny; taxonomy; triangulation method Clark, R., 200, 279, 295n9 coconut, 122, 125; containers of, 175; cream, 157; graters, 153f; oil, 157 coconut robber crab, 136±37 Codrington, R. H., 303n7 co-evolution, 8, 283±4. See also evolution cognitive archaeology, 279, 280. See also archaeology Collocott, E. E. V., 271, 272 community structures, 193±96, 302n2 Comparative Austronesian Project, 6, 63 comparative ethnography, 42, 91, 99, 118, 135±37, 143, 162, 278 conical clan concept, 225 containers, 173±76; bamboo, 175; coconut shell, 175; food, 153; for kava, 173; wooden vessel, 173. See also pottery controlled comparison, method of, 14, 16 cooking: Ancestral Polynesian, 151±59; cookhouses, 302n26, 305n31; equipment, 146±54; facilities, 146±54; Futunan, 143; methods, 154±59; Samoan, 143; utensils, 151 coral, 105±6 cordage, 197±99

cosmology: Polynesian, 240±41; Eastern Polynesian, 275 Cracraft, J., 288n17 craftsmen, 246 crop plants, 116, 121; POC terms for, 120; PPN terms for, 123t, 125, 126. See also tree crops Crowley, T., 309n29, 309n30 cult house, 248 cultural: convergence, 208; differentiation, 13; evolution, 16, 8, 29, 283; phylogenetic model of culture, 25. See also evolution culture, dual transmission model of, 25 culture area, 16, 287n3, 292n10 culture history, 3, 7, 8, 30, 285n5, 290n9, 310n23; segment of, 14, 32, 53, 70, 95, 278. See also archaeology; direct historical approach; triangulation method Curcuma longa, 259, 269 dart, 192 death, rituals of, 257±60 deity, 241±42, 307n14 demons, 243. See also spirits Dempwolff, O., 291n2, 307n11 dendritic model, 24. See also cladistics, family trees Dening, G., 4, 309n32 descent groups, 18, 202, 307n12; corporate, 214; land and, 209±10; Polynesian, 69±70; ranking of, 225; unrestricted, 209, 217. See also ascent groups; social groups Dewar, R., 24 Di Piazza, A., 143, 157 diachronic semasiology, 45. See also semantic history hypothesis dialect: chains, 35, 55, 58, 279; geography, 36; linkages, 55; variation, 58, 289n4 Diebold, A. R., 45 diffusion, 16, 24, 28, 48, 71, 85, 231 direct historical approach, 3, 4; archaeology and, 51±2. See also archaeology; culture history; triangulation method directional systems, 106 divergence, linguistic models of, 35±8

Subject index Dixon, R. B., 286n6 dogs, 121, 129; PPN term for, 142. See also animal husbandry domesticated animals, 116, 121, 129. See also animal husbandry Doran, E., Jr., 66 drills, 183; bow, 181f; pump, 183±84, 301n17 Driver, H. E., 71 dual transmission, 25 Duff, R., 51, 300n15 Dumont d'Urville, J. S., 54 Durham, W. H., 13, 25 Dye, T., 135, 228, 231 Dyen, I., 6, 27, 38, 39, 45, 46, 78, 287n6, 288n9, 290n6, 290n14 earth oven, 147, 148f, 195, 298n13, 298n16. See also cooking Easter Island. See Rapa Nui Island Eastern Micronesia, 75 Eastern Polynesia, 44, 65, 79, 85, 89, 100, 106, 111, 130, 150, 157, 159, 231, 239, 241, 242, 245, 246, 251, 259, 274, 291n18, 299n22, 304n17, 304n20, 307n17; cosmology in, 275; cultural traits distinguishing, 48, 71, 72t, 70, 81; exchange network of central region, 87; initial settlement of central region, 79; innovation in, 152, 310n34; marae in, 254; ritual transformation in, 273±76. See also Central Eastern Polynesia; Western Polynesia ecosystems, human impact on, 117. See also extinctions Eggan, F., 14 Ehret, C., 6, 287n7 Eldredge, N., 288n17 Emory, K. P., 238, 248, 250, 268, 292n8, 307n15, 309n33, 311n44 equinoxes, precession of the, 264±65, 310n35, 310n39. See also calendar ethnobotanical knowledge, Ancestral Polynesian, 109±15. See also folk categories

359 ethnogenesis, 23 ethnographic analogy, 287n4, 290n13 ethnohistory, 3, 4 `Eua Island, 118 evolution, 28±29, 284; cultural, 8, 16, 29, 283; dual transmission model of, 25 exchange, 66, 293n25; Ancestral Polynesian, 219±21; inter-archipelago, 79; interisland, 67, 79 exogamy, 213 extinctions, 117, 118. See also birds Falefa Valley (Samoa), 208 Falemoa site (Samoa), 129, 132 family trees, 22, 23, 33, 35, 37, 39, 60, 279, 288n9. See also cladistics, phylogeny Feinberg, R., 244 fermentation, 159. See also breadfruit Fiji Islands, 22, 56, 65, 66, 69, 73, 74, 75, 77, 86, 100, 101, 109, 112, 267, 271, 303n8 ®les, 181f; branch coral, 132; sea-urchin spine, 132 ®rst fruits, 226, 238, 257, 259, 260, 265, 267, 272 Firth, R., 3, 143, 157, 238, 244, 248, 249, 286n6, 295n7, 303n5, 306n1, 307n14, 309n33 ®sh, 134; ¯ying ®sh, 139; PCP names for, 295n9; PPN names for, 112, 113; rays, 134; sharks, 134 ®shhooks, 133, 163; angling, 121; one-piece, 132; PPN terms for, 139±40; trolling hook, 133, 140; Turbo shell, 133f ®shing, 131±37; angling, 137; Lapita, 120±21; lexical evidence for, 137±41; night ®shing, 139; poisoning, 139. See also nets ®shing gear: nets, 133, 137, 141; octopus lure rig, 132±33; rod, 140. See also ®shhooks Flannery, K. V., 4, 16, 19, 22 folk classi®cation, in PPN, 109±15 food: preservation of, 159±60; PPN categories for, 144; social dimensions of, 160±62; storage of, 159±60

360

Subject index

food preparation, 154±56; boiling, 156; cookhouses, 149; POC terms for, 144; PPN terms for, 154. See also food preparation equipment; pudding complex food preparation equipment, 147±49; coconut graters, 148, 149, 152; coral food pounders, 159; nut-cracking hammers, 148; pounders, 149±50; shell scrapers, 148, 151; stone food pounders, 152, 159 foundation culture, 33, 34, 75 foundation language, 33, 34, 55 founder effect, 21, 73 founder ideology, 225, 227 Fox, J. J., 63, 244, 255, 308n25 French-Wright, R., 120 Freycinetia plants, 300n13 fruit bats, 117, 134; population declines of, 117 Futuna Island, 77, 79, 89, 101, 115, 125, 128, 130, 148, 170, 178, 220, 232, 238, 248, 250, 260, 267, 272, 293n22, 296n2, 304n21, 309n33 games, 190±92 Geertz, C., 286n12 gender relations, 235 genetic: classi®cation of languages, 287n1, 292n8; comparative method, 22, 287n8; diversity, 60; model, 13 Geraghty, P., 36, 96, 242, 295n9 ghosts, 243. See also spirits glottochronology, 15, 21, 27, 41, 287n7. See also lexicostatistics; linguistics God houses, 251, 255, 305n31, 308n22 gods, 256. See also anthropomorphic gods; demons; spirits Goldman, I., 18, 49, 53, 70, 209, 210, 235, 279±80, 303n12, 303n13 Goodenough, W. H., 14, 16, 29, 30, 31, 32, 209, 217, 285n3, 303n11 Gould, S. J., 8, 12, 21 Grace, G., 39, 287n6 grandparent, 243, 305n25, 306n9. See also ancestors, kinship greater yam, 125

Green, K., 99, 105, 312n3 Green, R. C., 19, 33, 35, 36, 39±41, 45, 63, 77, 87, 147, 160, 168, 172, 185, 193, 205, 282, 287n5, 292n8, 293n20, 293n25, 300n15, 302n25, 304n20 Green Sea Turtle, 260 grinding stones, 181f, 182 Grinker, R. R., 205 Ha'apai Islands, 101, 116, 118, 297n11 habitus, 202, 205 Haddon, A. C., 196 Hage, P., 6, 86, 304n16 Handy, E. S. C., 49, 71, 238, 245, 247, 285n4, 286n6, 306n1, 307n13 Harary, F., 6, 86 harvests, 226, 265; annual ceremony, 238, 260. See also ®rst fruits Hawai'i Island, 1, 164 Hawaiian Islands, 80, 85, 87, 88, 115, 130, 214, 231, 238, 245, 248, 251, 256, 260, 261, 263, 307n17, 309n33, 311n51 Hawaiki, 1, 8, 65, 93, 285n1; as ancestral Polynesian homeland, 95±97, 282. See also homelands hearth, 195±96. See also earth oven Hennig, W., 26, 288n13, 289n20 heterarchy, 131, 204, 217, 283 hierarchy, 131, 204, 217, 235, 282 Hiroa, T. R ., 50, 51, 93, 136, 143, 149, 150, 157, 163, 175, 183, 190, 192, 237, 239, 245, 264, 273, 286n6, 298n12, 309n33 historical linguistics, 27±28, 42, 72, 79, 162, 277, 278, 279, 288n16, 290n11 historical particularism, 2 historical reconstruction, 286n6. See also triangulation method history, 16, 28, 29, 89, 95, 277, 284; Annales tradition in, 4, 286n11; of anthropology, 277; in an evolutionary framework, 284; science and, 8. See also culture history; direct historical approach; ethnohistory; longue dureÂe Hocart, A. M., 144, 267, 305n29, 305n30, 306n1, 310n43

Subject index

361

homeland regions, 89, 91; dispersal centers and, 38 homelands: Ancestral Polynesian, 77, 95±97, 99±101; pre-Polynesian, 96 homologous change, 13, 16, 18 homology, 3, 28, 29, 213, 279, 283, 285n5 Hooper, A., 248 Hooper, R., 112, 114 horizontal transmission, 24, 25, 71, 85±86, 213. See also borrowing Hornell, J., 196 horticulture: Ancestral Polynesian, 125, 126±30; Oceanic, 120. See also arboriculture; crop plants; shifting cultivation House, 202, 247, 303n3, 303n5; architectonic aspects of, 205; forms, 193; names for, 303n6; C. LeÂvi-Strauss' concept of, 235 House societies, 201±7, 215±18; in the Austronesian world, 202±3; criterial features of, 203±5; as social formation, 205 household unit, 235, 302n2, 304n20, 305n31 housepost, 308n25 houses, 193±96 Howard, A., 49, 223 Hugh-Jones, S., 202, 205 Hunt, T. L., 85, 87 hunting, 131±37 Huntsman, J., 248

Irwin, G. J., 294n25 Island Melanesia, 63, 288n9 Island Southeast Asia, 55, 205, 303n7, 304n22 isolation, 21, 62, 81, 83±89, 81

independent invention, 231 Indian almond, 125 Indo-European languages, 6, 35, 99, 290n12, 294n1; wave model and, 37 innovation, 81, 89; in Eastern Polynesia, 152; of material culture, 81; Oceanic languages and, 37; shared, 22, 281; subgrouping and, 37, 56 intensi®cation, 130±31 interaction, 81, 83±89; inter-island, 85. See also exchange intrusive: culture, 33; language, 33 invertebrates, POC names for, 115, 295n9 irrigation, 130±31

Lagenaria. See bottle gourd land, 214, 303n9; control over, 213; estate, 204, 210; holding, 208, 210; rights to, 208. See also social group land tenure, 303n10 languages, genetic classi®cation of, 287n1. See also linguistics Lapita, 159, 163, 185, 256, 289n1; cultural complex, 33, 36, 55±56; Early Eastern, 1, 77, 89, 91, 118, 171, 185, 207, 220; Ancestral Polynesia, transition to, 206±7; Eastern, 168; Remote Oceania, colonization of, 235; settlers, Fiji-TongaSamoa, 271; subsistence 121±22

Janetski, J. C., 132 Kaeppler, A., 86 Kahiki, as ancestral homeland, 85 Kapingamarangi Island, 238, 248, 250, 309n33 kava, 226, 256±57, 298n10, 309n30; ceremonial use of, 70; containers, 172; wooden bowl for, 173. See also Piper methysticum; Piper wichmannii kinship, 202, 205, 208, 224, 280; bifurcate merging terminology, 304n16; landholding and, 208; PPN terms for, 221, 223t; sibling classi®cation types in Oceania, 6, 68f; sibling term pattern, 69. See also ancestor; grandparent Kirch, P. V., 4, 5, 18, 19, 78, 85, 86, 125, 130, 132, 135, 147, 148, 154, 160, 168, 170, 204, 210±11, 225, 226, 227, 238, 282, 287n4, 293n23, 294n25, 296n5, 305n31, 309n31 Kirkpatrick, J., 223 Knauft, B., 6 Koskinen, A., 201, 210, 226, 249, 303n14 Kroeber, A. L., 2, 71, 287n3

362

Subject index

Lau Islands, 96, 144, 260, 304n18, 305n29; Southern Lau, 267 Leach, H. M., 177±78 leadership, 210, 226±35 Lebot, V., 256 Lepofsky, D., 130, 296n5 LeÂvi-Strauss, C., 201, 202, 205, 235 lexical reconstruction, 15, 22, 38, 44±46, 48, 99, 247, 279. See also semantic reconstruction; terminological reconstruction,; WoÈrter und Sachen method lexicostatistics, 15, 21, 27, 41, 287n6, 288n9. See also glottochronology Lichtenberk, F., 144, 152, 156, 171, 227, 299n25 Lifuka Island, 118 linguistic paleontology, 294n1b linguistics, 19, 91, 99; anthropological, 3; archaeological evidence and, 32, 34; comparative method in, 27; dating and, 34; evidence, 32; historical, 2, 6; models of divergence, 35±38. See also glottochronology; lexical reconstruction; lexicostatistics; semantic reconstruction; terminological reconstruction Linton, R., 71, 285n3 lithic resources, 101±2 lizards: iguanid, 134; population declines of, 117; PPN term for, 112 loan words, 87 longue dureÂe, 5±6, 28, 291n19. See also history Lum, J. K., 88 lunar calendar, 128, 259, 267±73, 268t; Polynesian, 310n41; PPN, 269; modi®cations and elaborations to, 276; thirteen month, 269. See also calendar; Pleiades; lunar months lunar months, 261, 267, 311n50; names in Polynesian proto-languages, 270t Luomala, K., 243, 306n8 Mace, R., 23 MacGregor, G., 238, 248, 306n5, 307n16, 308n22

macroevolution, 288n17. See also evolution macrotaxonomy, 26. See also cladistics; phylogeny Madagascar Island, 24 Makemson, M. W., 262, 263, 268, 273, 309n33, 310n35, 310n39, 311n50 Malinowski, B., 267, 286n6, 310n40, 311n46 Mallory, J. P., 294n1b mana, 70, 306n1 Mangaasi culture, 33, 289n1. See also pottery Mangaia Island, 79, 88, 152, 248, 251, 264, 308n21, 309n33 Mangareva Island, 87, 254, 260, 310n16, 309n33 Manihiki-Rakahanga Islands, 214 Manu'a Islands, 118, 178 marae, 70, 249, 250, 251, 276, 308n22; Central Eastern Polynesian, 276; ceremonies, 311n44; Eastern Polynesian, 254; Tuamotuan, 251, 253f. See also ritual Marck, J., 86, 90±91, 102, 122, 211, 213, 214, 224, 239, 242, 243, 244, 291n16, 295n3, 296n6, 304n17, 304n18, 304n19, 306n6, 306n9, 307n10 Marcus, J., 4, 16, 19, 22, 67 Marquesas Islands, 80, 87, 88, 91, 160, 168, 214, 260, 309n32, 309n33 Marxist theorists/Marxism, 29 material culture: Ancestral Polynesian, 164; archaeological record of, 279; perishable, 164 mats, 300n13; plaited coconut leaf, 255; as ritual paraphernalia, 255, 308n26, 308n27; woven, 220 Matthews, P., 185 Maui: as ancestor name, 243; as god or mythical being, 306n8 Ma'uke Island, 88 Mauss, M., 221 Mayr, E., 8, 25, 288n13, 289n21 Mead, M., 3, 286n6 megapodes (Megapodius), 117±18, 295n12. See also birds; extinctions Melanesia, 38, 63, 202, 303n7, 306n8; Eastern, 256. See also Island Melanesia

Subject index men's house, 206 Merrill, E. D., 120 Mesoamerica, 289n22 meteorological phenomena: POC terms for, 295n5; PPN terms for, 106 microevolution, 288n17. See also evolution Micronesia, 63, 65, 88, 159, 304n18, 306n8, 310n42. See also Nuclear Micronesia; Eastern Micronesia migration, 281 mollusks, 134 Monberg, T., 238, 245, 248, 308n26 monophyletic classi®cation, 25. See also cladistics; phylogeny month names, 309±10n33. See also calendar; lunar calendar Moore, J., 23, 24 Murdock, G. P., 225 musical instruments, 192±93 myths, 204 navigation, inter-archipelago, 106 navigator, PPN term for, 225 Near Oceania, 24, 30, 51, 63. See also Ancient Near Oceania; Remote Oceania needles, 188±89 NendoÈ Island, 33, 55 Neris sea-worm, 100, 271 nets and netting, 132; ®shing with, 141; seine nets, 204 network-breaking model, 36, 41 New Caledonia Island, 33 New Guinea Island, 38, 55, 63, 73, 287n3, 288n8 New Zealand, 80, 85, 202, 232, 251, 299n2, 301n16, 309n28, 309n33 Niuafo'ou Island, 117±18 Niuatoputapu Island, 77, 101, 116, 129, 132, 134, 135, 147, 148, 160, 168, 178, 183, 220, 260, 265, 293n22, 297n10, 297n11, 302n26 Niue Island, 232, 234, 309n33 Non-Austronesian languages, 55. See also Trans-New Guinea Phylum nose-¯ute, bamboo, 193

363 Nuclear Micronesia, 65 Nuclear Polynesian (NP) languages, 59, 60, 78, 90 numerical taxonomy, 26, 27, 288n12. See also cladistics; phenetics obsidian, 102, 105, 148±49, 183, 220 Oceania, cultural regions in, 62±5. See also Near Oceania; Remote Oceania Oceanic languages, 55; highest-order subgroups of, 55±56, 56f, 291n3; innovations in, 37; Proto Paci®c subgroup of, 41. See also Austronesian languages Ofu Island, 116, 129, 132, 147 Oliver, D. L., 214, 219, 238, 303n2, 312n52 Ontong-Java Island, 18 oral history, traditions, 4, 18, 42, 80, 85, 88, 117, 278 origin structures, 244. See also ascent groups; descent groups ornaments, 188f Osmond, M., 45±46, 120, 144, 163 Outliers. See Polynesian Outliers oven-house, 146±54 Paci®c Rat, 80, 88, 116 palms, Metroxylon, 296n2 palolo sea-worms, 272, 276, 311n45, 311n46, 311n47 Pandanus, 149, 300n13, 309n27 paper mulberry, 125, 185 parental populations, 41 Pawley, A., 7, 8, 30, 33, 35, 37, 38, 39±41, 44, 45±46, 78, 87, 99, 105, 196, 205, 210, 211, 226, 227, 287n8, 290n9, 292n8, 295n9, 312n3 Pawley, M., 196, 289n9 phenetics, 26. See also numerical taxonomy Philippine Islands, 38 phylogenetic model, xiii, 9, 13, 19, 25±28, 30, 278, 280, 283, 287n2; application to Polynesia, 53±91; in biology, 288n16; cultural evolution and, 25; historical anthropology and, 28±9; in historical linguistics, 288n16; history of, 14±16;

364

Subject index

phylogenetic model (cont.) triangulation method and, 42±44. See also cladistics; triangulation method phylogeny, 83±89; Polynesian, 215, 231; See also cladistics pigs, 121, 129, 142. See also animal husbandry; domestic animals Piper: methysticum, 125, 256, 298n10, 309n29; wichmannii, 256. See also kava plaiting, 175. See also mats plant taxa, PPN reconstructions of, 110 Pleiades, 260, 264; acronitic rising of, 262, 263, 264, 265, 267, 272, 273; acronitic setting of, 263, 264, 265; cycle, 261±65, 310n36, 310n38, 311n44, 312n51; heliacal rising of, 262, 264, 265, 266f, 267, 269, 273; PPN names for, 106; PPN term for, 263; year, 310n39, 311n50. See also calendar; year plesiomorphy, 26. See also cladistics, synapomorphy POLLEX project, 46±48, 58, 99, 102, 112, 279, 290n10, 290n15, 297n4 Polynesia, 63; as a biological unit, 73±74; cultural differentiation within, 70±73; cultural patterns de®ning, 65±70; as an emic category, 54; phylogenetic differentiation in, 89±90; population expansion, 91; prehistoric interaction within, 87. See also Eastern Polynesia; Polynesian Outliers; Western Polynesia Polynesian homeland, 35. See also prePolynesian homeland Polynesian languages, 58, 292n8; family-tree classi®cation of, 60±62, 61f. See also Nuclear Polynesian languages (NP); Polynesian Outlier languages; Tongic language (TO) subgroup Polynesian Outliers, 33, 59±60, 62, 79, 89, 107, 168, 238, 257, 259; languages of, 33, 60, 296n6 Polynesian peoples, biological origins of, 73±74 Polynesian Plainware. See pottery

polysemous words, 231 Pome'e-Nahau (NT-93) site, 160 pond®eld irrigation, 276, 296n5 posts, 255, 308n25 pottery, 147, 166±73, 300n5; Ancestral Polynesian vessel shapes, 169f ; Ancestral Polynesian, 167±73; classi®cation of, 168±70; designs, 185; Lapita dentatestamped, 56; manufacture, Polynesian cessation of, 168; Polynesian Plainware, 1, 78, 81, 169, 171, 208, 296n2, 300n11; POC terms for, 170; regional differentiation in, 170 Potusa site (Samoa), 129, 132 Poulsen, J., 132, 147, 148, 152, 160, 168, 183, 188, 267n9 pre-Polynesian homeland, 96 priests, 228, 246, 275, 307n18; inspirational, 231 priest-chief, 211, 213, 248, 255; Ancestral Polynesian, 231. See also chief-priest, Ancestral Polynesian priestly class, 231 prime semantic agreement (PSA), 46, 102, 122, 227, 240, 256, 298n6 primogeniture, 228 Primordial Pair, 91, 242±43, 275 Proto Austronesian (PAN), 38, 290n10; reconstruction of, 6; terms for architecture and settlements, 206t Proto Central Paci®c (PCP), 38, 41, 41, 56±60, 78; dialect chain model of, 58f; interstage, 56; dialect chain, 78 Proto Central-Eastern Polynesian (PCE), 60; speech community, 80 Proto Eastern Malayo-Polynesian, 38 Proto Ellicean (PEC), 60 Proto Malayo-Polynesian, 107 Proto Marquesic, 304n17 Proto Micronesian, 295n3 Proto Oceanic (POC): architectural forms, 205±6; social groups, 208±11 Proto Oceanic (POC) terms, 33, 46; for architecture and settlements, 206t; for food preparation, 144; for meteorological

Subject index phenomena, 295n5; for pottery, 170; for social groups, 208±11 Proto Polynesian: homeland, 60; lunar calendar, 259; social groups, 208±11 Proto Polynesian (PPN) language, 38, 41, 46±48, 56±60; adzes, lexical categories for, 180±82; cooking utensils lexemes, 151; domesticated plants categories, 115, 122; endpoint of, 79; folk biology, 110; folk categories/taxa, 112, 114; food categories, 144; lexical reconstructions, 99, 110; north±south dialect differentiation in, 59f; plant taxa reconstructions, 110; tattooing lexemes, 189. See also Proto Polynesian terms Proto Polynesian (PPN) terms: for adornments, 186t; for ancestors, 240t; for architectural features, 194t; for astronomical phenomena, 106; for bark cloth, 186t; for basket, 175; for the biological world, 112; for birds, 112; for breadfruit, 115; for canoes, 198t; for chicken, 142; for clothing, 186t; for containers, 167t, 173, 174f; for cooking, 155t; for cordage, 198t; for crop harvesting, 128; for crops, 123t, 122, 125, 126; for directionals, 107; for dog, 142; for exchange, 221t; for ®sh, 112, 114; for ®shhooks, 139±140; for ®shing gear and apparatus, 139; for ®shing rod, 140; for food preparation, 154; for gods, 240t; for horticulture activities, 126, 127t, 128; for household units, 194t; for industrial tools, 176t; for invertebrates, 112, 112t; for kinship, 221, 223t; for life forms, 111t; for lizards, 112; for lunar months, 261, 271t; for marine exploitation, 137, 138t; for musical instruments, 191t; for navigator, 225; for ornaments, 186t; for persons, 222t; for physical world, 103t; for pig, 142; for the Pleiades, 263; for pudding complex, 158, 158t; for ritual, 258t; for sago palm, 124; for the sea, 106; for a sea expert, 225; for snake, 100, 112; for social dimensions of food, 160±162; for social

365 groups, 211, 212t; for social ranking, 229±30t, 233t; for spirits, 246t; for sports, 191t; for stars, 106; for taste, 144±45, 145t, 146; for tattooing, 186t; for thatch, 124; for things, 165±66, 166t; for valuables, 220; for warfare, 191t; for warrior, 225; for weather, 106; for specialists, 225 Proto Samoic-Outlier (PSO), 107 Proto Tongic (PTO), 41 proto-languages, 41 pudding complex, 152, 156±59. See also cooking Pukapuka Island, 18, 137, 213, 231, 232, 260, 263, 282, 309n33 Pulotu, 96. See also Hawaiki r/K selection continuum, 21 radiation model, 36 radiocarbon: chronology, 79; dating, 27, 43, 63, 77 Rakahanga Island, 264, 309n33 rank and ranking, 204, 217, 226±35, 283, 305n30. See also hierarchy Rapa Island, 308n23 Rapa Nui Island, 80, 85, 139, 248, 251, 254, 260, 309n28, 309n33 Rapanui language, 293n24 Rarotonga Island, 88 Rattus exulans. See Paci®c Rat Reao Atoll, 307n15 red ochre, 185 Reinman, F. M., 120 religious facilities, Polynesian, 249. See also marae Remote Oceania, 13, 29±30, 31, 32, 36, 38, 39, 51, 55, 89, 121, 159, 209; human expansion into, 63±65; Lapita colonization of, 235. See also Near Oceania Renfrew, C., 6, 288n11, 294n1b Rennell Island, 238, 248, 250, 306n5, 307n16, 308n26 Rensch, K. H., 78 rhizotic model, 24

366

Subject index

ritual: architecture and, 249; cycles, 260±73, Ancestral Polynesian, 266f; duties, 248; feasts, 276; of growth, 257±60; of life, 257±60; paraphernalia, mats as, 255, 308n26, 308n27; practice, 246, 280; practitioners, 246±49; spaces, 249±56; transformations, Early Central Eastern Polynesian, 273±76 Rivers, W. H. R., 285n4, 286n6, 287n3 Romney, K., 14, 24 Ross, M., 7, 8, 35, 37, 38, 44, 45±46, 120, 170, 172, 175, 287n8, 295n5, 300n11 Rotuma Island, 269, 306n8, 310n43 Rotuman language, 58, 87 sago palm ¯our, 296n2 Sahlins, M., 4, 5, 16, 49, 53, 69, 282, 283, 291 Samoa Islands, 1, 77, 79, 86, 87, 91, 100, 101, 109, 112, 129, 132, 149, 152, 160, 168, 172, 178, 180, 220, 232, 242, 251, 271, 294n1, 297n10, 302n28, 309n33, 311n47 Sand, C., 78, 168±69, 171 Santa Cruz Islands, 33. See also NendoÈ Island Sapir, E., 2, 4, 8, 9, 13, 16, 30, 38, 42, 48, 285n4 Sasoa'a site (Upolu), 147, 193, 195f Savai'i Island, 1, 101, 251, 294n1 sea expert, PPN term for, 225 sea-craft complex, Polynesian, 66. See also canoes sea-level change, 116 seasons, 273. See also calendar, year sea-urchins, 134 sea-worms, 100, 271, 272, 276. See also palolo sea-worms selectionist theory, 289n118. See also evolution Seligmann, C. G., 285n4, 287n3 semantic history hypothesis, 45, 46, 102, 201, 203, 228, 234, 249, 255, 279, 280, 305n29. See also semantic reconstruction semantic reconstruction, 45, 48, 279. See also lexical reconstruction sennit, 197

shaman, 246 shared retentions, 213, 231 shell: artifacts, 183; exchange valuables, 220; scrapers, 122 shifting cultivation, 116, 128, 129 Shore, B., 65, 70, 239, 240±41, 306n1 sidereal: calendrics, 261; events, 264; year, 310n39 Simpson, G. G., 18 sling stones, 190 Smith, S. P., 95 social differentiation, 283 social groups, 208±11, 218±19, 302n2, 303n10, 305n31; Ancestral Polynesian, 236f, 207±19; and control of estate, 215; Polynesian early form, 208; residentially oriented, 235; strati®cation in, 217, 283; words for, 305n24. See also ascent groups; descent groups; kinship social organization, 202, 280 social structures, 131, 201 social units, terminology of, 302n2 Society Islands, 79, 86, 88, 196, 214, 232, 254, 263, 309n33, 312n52 solar year, 272, 311n50. See also calendar Solomon Islands, 109 sorcerer, 246 South America, 51, 75, 293n20 Southeast Asia, 289n22 Southern Cook Islands, 88, 168 spears, 190 specialists, PPN terms for, 225 spinning top, 192 spirits, 243, 306n5; ancestral, 307n14; spirit medium, 246; spirit world, 242 sports, 190±92 Spriggs, M. J. T., 293n23 status rivalry, 70, 209, 235 Steadman, D. W., 137, 295n12 storage pits, 196 strati®cation, social, 217, 283 string ®gures, 301n23; games, 192 Su'a, T. I., 143, 157 subgrouping models, 22, 279. See also cladistics; linguistics; phylogeny

Subject index supernatural beings. See spirits Sutton, D. G., 81, 227, 231, 235, 298n11 Swadesh, M., 27 sweet potato, 125, 293n20 swidden cultivation systems, 128 synapomorphy, 26 synodic months, 261. See also calendar; lunar months synology, 24, 28, 29, 279, 281, 283, 285n5. See also analogy; homology systemic cultural patterns, in Polynesia, 65±70 Tafahi Island, 102, 183 Tahiti Island, 238, 311n51 Tahitian chestnut, 125 Taiwan Island, 38, 39 tapu, 70, 239±41 taro, 121, 125; pond®eld irrigation of, 276 taste, PPN terms for, 144±45 tattooing, 187±89, 301n21; chisel for, 182; PPN terms for, 189 Taumoefolau, M., 93, 96, 234, 235 Tavai site (FU-11), 122, 128 TcherkeÂzoff, S., 225 temples, 250, 305n31; architecture, 255. See also marae terminological reconstruction, 45±46, 48, 141, 142, 247, 279 Terrell, J., 24, 35, 85, 88, 290n6, 292n12 theology, Polynesian, 240±41 Thomas, N., 50 Tikopia Island, 18, 33, 85, 203, 204, 214, 231, 238, 244, 245, 248, 249, 261, 282, 295n7, 303n4, 303n5, 304n21, 305n31, 308n26, 309n33 time: depth, 39±41; and space, concepts of in Ancestral Polynesia, 75±79, 309n32, 312n52; and the ritual cycle, 260±73; reckoning of, 260±73, 260. See also calendar To.6 site (Tongatapu), 147 To'aga site (Ofu Island), 116, 129, 132, 133, 134, 147, 183, 260, 301n22 Tokalau-Fijian-Polynesian interstage, 304n18; and PCP dialect chain, 58

367 Tokelau Islands, 79, 87, 107, 168, 231, 248, 263, 282, 303n6, 309n33 Tonga Islands, 1, 73, 77, 79, 86, 89, 100, 109, 115, 170, 172, 214, 220, 231, 242, 248, 251, 259, 267, 271, 300n5, 305n29, 309n33 Tongan maritime empire, 86 Tongareva Island, 309n33 Tongatapu Island, 101, 107, 116, 129, 147, 168, 178, 180, 208, 251, 252f, 297n10 Tongic (TO) language subgroup, 59, 78, 90 tools, industrial, 176 torches, 139 Trans-New Guinea Phylum, 63 tree crops, 116, 146. See also arboriculture; breadfruit triangulation method, 42±44, 95, 116, 117, 118, 120, 131, 141, 143, 162, 163, 200, 201, 249, 278, 280, 281 Trigger, B., 4, 7 Trobriand Islands, 311n46 trumpet, 192±93 Tuamotu Islands, 238, 248, 251, 253f, 260, 309n33, 311n44 turmeric, 265 turtles, 311n44; feast, 307n15; sacred status of, 260; sea turtles, 265, 269. See also Green Sea Turtle Tutuila Island, 128±29, 177, 183 Tuvalu Island, 79, 87, 168 `Upolu Island, 147, 208 `Uvea Island, 77, 79, 87, 89, 101, 170, 267, 293n22 Vailele site (Samoa), 160 Vaito'otia-Fa'ahia site, 182, 196 Vaitupu Island, 263, 309n33 Valeri, V., 238, 273 Vanikoro Island, 33 Vanua Levu Island, 101 Vanuatu Islands, 33, 109, 256, 296n13 Vava'u Island, 101 vi apple (Spondias dulcis), 125 Viti Levu Island, 101

368

Subject index

Vogt, E., 14±16, 21, 32, 50, 287n1 voyaging, 293n16; inter-island, 86; two-way, 80, 85. See also canoes, exchange, interaction wailing, 259 Wallerstein, E., 277 Walter, R., 120 war and warfare, 190 warrior, PPN term for, 225 water-craft, ancestral, 196. See also canoes Waterson, R., 203, 205 weapons, 190 weeding, 126 Weisler, M. I., 87 Western Polynesia, 43, 56, 60, 70, 91, 99, 107, 224, 234, 241, 250, 257, 259, 267, 291n18, 294n25, 294n1; cultural traits

distinguishing, 48, 71 72t, 81; Lapita settlement of, 293n15. See also Eastern Polynesia whetstones, 181f, 182 Williamson, R. W., 95±96, 208, 226, 238, 268, 287n3, 306n1, 309n33, 311n45 WoÈrter und Sachen method, 38, 60, 99, 294n1b. See also homelands Wylie, A., 44 yams, 121, 122, 267, 271; cycle, 265±67; ®rst yams offerings, 272; horticulture, 310n41; planting of, 128. See also ®rst fruits; greater yam; sweet potato year: sidereal, 310n39; solar, 272, 311n50; tropical, 310n39; two-season, 310n38. See also calendar Yen, D. E., 120, 125, 127, 131, 143, 156±57

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions Note: Where a PPN reconstruction is polysemous, semantic variants are distinguished by a brief gloss in brackets. *afaa, 104, 106 *afo, 138, 140, 197, 198 *(a)folau, 194 *afu-afu, 104 *aka, 123 *alanga, 165, 166 *amo, 199 *angi, 104 *asu, 198 *atua, 245 *aveloa, 115 *awa, 103, 106 *faaliki, 194 *faangongo, 150, 154 *faangota, 137, 138 *faasua, 113 *fa®e, 150, 151 *fai [make, do], 158 *fai [cat's cradle, string ®gure games], 191, 301 *fai-kai, 157, 158, 299 *faka, 272 *fakaafu, 128 *faka-fana, 155, 156 *faka-peqe, 145, 146 *faka-qafu [preparing oven for lighting], 150, 151, 298 *Faka-qafu [lunar months], 270, 271, 272 *fale, 193, 194, 196, 207, 236, 305 *fale-qatua, 194, 254, 255, 260 *fana, 191

369

*fanaa, 198 *fanga, 138, 141 *fang(o,u), 193 *fangufangu, 191, 193 *fanua, 103, 105, 208, 303 *f(a,o)ulua, 198 *faqa-si, 165, 166 *faqi, 258 *faqi-totoka, 194, 207 *faqo, 194 *faqu, 186 *fara, 123, 175 *fata, 194 *fatu [stone, rock], 103, 105, 231 *fatu [weave, kidney, to fold, viscous, clotted], 231 *fatu [leader of the kaainga], 232, 233, 234, 236 *fatu-qariki, 232 *fatunga, 194 *feke, 113, 114 *feo, 103, 105, 113, 114 *fequnu, 198 *fetuqu, 104, 106 *fetuqu-qaho, 104, 106 *®lo, 198, 199 *®ngota, 111, 112, 114 *®ri, 198, 199 *®ro, 155, 156 *fohe, 198 *fohu, 166, 184 *fono [deliberate assembly of people], 196, 211, 257

370

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions

*fono [food served with kava], 256, 257, 258 *fonu, 114, 260 *fosa, 223 *fota, 141 *fuata [crop, especially of breadfruit], 127, 128 *fuata [shaft of a spear], 191 *fue, 186 *fuke, 150, 151, 298 *fungaona, 223 *fungawai, 223 *fuqanga, 176, 182 *fusi, 103, 105, 296 *futa, 138 *futi, 123 *futu, 138, 139 *hakau, 103, 106 *hama, 198 *hanga, 166 *hau, 187, 189 *hiko-®, 150, 151 *hoka, 150, 151 *i®, 123 *ika, 111, 114 *ike, 186 *ipu, 150, 154, 167, 171, 175 *isu, 198 *kaainga, 204, 207, 210, 211, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 232, 235, 236, 304, 305 *ka(a)wei, 173, 198 *kafa, 194, 197, 198 *ka®ka, 123 *kafu, 186 *kai [food], 144, 158, 297 *kai [people of a place], 208, 221, 236, 303 *kainanga, 207, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 217, 218, 225, 227, 231, 232, 235, 236, 247, 257, 293, 303, 305 *kakai, 208, 210, 221, 236 *kalaa, 103, 105 *kala-misi, 113 *kalewelewe, 115

*kali, 194 *kalolo, 191 *kamakama, 113 *kaniwa, 104, 106 *kanu, 185, 186, 300 *kape, 123 *kapu, 167, 171, 175 *kasi [Asaphidae spp.], 113 *kasi [shell scraper], 150, 151 *kaso, 194 *kasoa, 186, 189 *kasokaso, 123 *kato, 167, 175 *kau [wood, timber], 194 *kau [group, company], 307 *kawa, 123, 256, 257, 258, 309 *kawa-sasa, 138, 139 *kawa-susu, 138, 139 *kawe, 223 *kaweinga, 104, 106 *kawiki, 113 *kea, 114 *kele, 103, 105, 167, 172, 187 *kele-mutu, 111, 112 *keli, 127, 172 *keo(h,s)o, 165 *kete, 167, 175 *kiato, 198 *kie, 186 *kiekie, 186 *kili, 176, 182 *kili-kili, 194, 195 *kina [sea-urchin], 113 *kina [food eaten with another food as relish], 144, 161, 297 *kofu, 155, 156, 186 *kohe, 175 *koho, 127 *koka, 186, 187 *kolo, 191 *koloa, 165, 220, 221 *kona, 145, 146, 309 *konga, 166, 176 *kora, 155, 156 *koro, 190

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions *koso, 127, 151 *kuka, 113 *kuku, 113 *kulii, 129 *kulo, 150, 154, 167, 170, 171, 174, 200, 299 *kulu, 122, 123, 124, 296 *kumete, 150, 153, 154, 167, 173 *kupenga, 138, 141 *kuro, 299 *laa, 198 *lafo, 191, 192 *laki, 104, 106 *lalo, 104, 107 *langa, 127 *langi, 104, 240, 242 *lango, 115 *lapu, 155, 156 *laqaa, 104, 106 *laqo®e, 104, 106 *lase, 103, 105 *laulau, 153, 167, 175 *leu, 144, 145 *leu-leu, 186 *li(h,s)a, 270 *Li(h,s)a mua,*Li(h,s)a muli, 270, 271 *liko, 138, 139, 141 *lipi, 166 *lohu, 128 *loka, 103, 106 *loki, 194 *lolo [¯ood], 104 *lolo [coconut milk/cream or oil], 157, 158 *lolo-qi, 157, 158 *loo, 114 *loto, 103, 106 *loto malae, 250 *loto-qaa, 193, 194 *lotu, 257, 258 *lua, 194, 195 *lufa, 197, 198 *lunga, 107 *maa, 159, 160

371

*maa-kona, 161 *maangalo, 145, 146 *ma(a)qoli, 291 *maasina, 104, 106, 261 *maasoaqa, 123 *maatai, 225 *maatuqa, 223 *Maaui, 240, 243 *mae, 144, 145 *maea, 197, 198 *mafu, 158 *mafuike, 103, 105 *mahu, 161 *mahuku, 111, 127 *maka [stone or rock], 183 *maka [sling, to hurl or to sling], 190, 191 *makupuna, 223 *malama, 261 *malaqe, 246, 254, 255, 260 *malau, 60, 117, 296 *malie, 146 *malo, 186 *mama, 186, 189 *mana, 239, 240, 244, 306 *manu, 111 *manumanu, 111 *mao, 104 *ma-oha, 155, 156 *m(a,o)kupuna, 222 *maopo, 115 *maqa, 223 *maqai, 145, 146 *maqala, 126, 127 *maqunga, 103, 105 *mara, 159, 160, 299 *masafu, 191 *masaki-tanga, 223 *masi, 159, 160 *mata [headland], 103, 105, 304 *mata [mesh of net], 138, 141, 304 *mata [raw], 144, 145, 304 *mata [point, blade, or cutting edge], 166, 183, 304 *mata [a social group], 210, 218, 235, 304 *mata-a-pule, 222

372

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions

*Mata-liki [Pleiades], 104, 106, 260, 261, 263, 264, 265, 266, 269, 270 *Mataliki [lunar month], 260, 269, 270, 271 *matangi, 104, 106 *mataqu [®shhook], 43, 138, 139, 140 *mata(q)u [adz, axe tattooing comb], 176, 180, 181, 182, 189 *ma-tila, 138, 140 *matuqa, 223, 307 *mei, 122, 123, 296 *mele, 106 *meqa, 165, 166 *moa [chicken (jungle fowl)], 129 *moa [whipping or spinning top], 191 *moana, 103, 106 *moho, 145, 146 *moko, 112 *mongamonga, 115 *mori, 258 *moti-moti, 104 *moto, 144, 145 *motu, 103, 105 *mua, 271 *muli, 271 *mutu, 114 *nafa, 191 *namu, 115 *natu, 155, 156 *ngafa, 166 *nga®-nga®, 186 *ngalu, 103, 106 *ngaqati, 166, 167 *ngasau, 191 *ngata, 100, 111, 112 *ngatu, 186 *nguu-feke, 113, 114 *niu, 123, 175 *noa, 239, 240 *nofu, 295 *nono, 115 *nonu, 123 *nuku, 103, 105 *olo, 154, 155, 299

*oqa, 198 *paa [trolling lure], 138, 139, 140 *paa [plate, platter, bowl], 150, 153, 167, 170, 172, 174 *paa [wall, fence, enclosure], 193, 194 *paasua, 113 *paepae, 193, 194 *paito, 150, 151, 194, 196, 236, 305 *paka, 111, 112, 114 *pala, 145 *palai, 123 *palalafa, 150, 152 *pala-tuqu, 145 *pale, 186 *pali, 103, 105 *palolo [Neiris sea-worm], 60, 100, 271 *Palolo [lunar months], 271, 272 *pani, 187 *paopao, 198 *papa, 198 *pasu, 191 *patu, 191 *pekepeke, 157, 158 *pela, 103, 105 *penu, 155, 156 *peqe, 145, 298 *pili, 112 *pilita, 123 *pipi, 113 *pisi, 113 *poqoi, 158, 159 *poqou, 222 *pou, 193, 194, 207, 246, 254, 255 *puaka, 129 *puke, 127 *pulaka, 123 *pulapula, 127,128 *pule [cowries], 113, 114 *pule [authority], 257, 258 *puli, 173 *puli-puli, 167 *pulotu, 240, 242 *punga, 103, 105, 113 *puou, 115

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions *pu(q)u, 191 *pusa, 167, 173 *putu [object with holes or perforations], 166 *putu [funeral feast, offering to the gods], 258, 259, 260 *qaa, 194 *qafa, 138, 141 *qafu, 196, 246, 254, 255, 276 *qahawena, 223 *qaitu, 240, 241, 242, 243 *qalili, 113 *qalopoqou, 222 *qao, 104 *qariki, 207, 211, 214, 217, 222, 226, 227, 228, 229, 230, 231, 232, 234, 235, 236, 247, 249, 255, 257, 282, 305, 308 *qaro, 165 *qato, 123, 124, 194 *qatua, 240, 241, 242, 243 *qau, 103, 106 *qau-kawa, 138, 139 *qau-talu, 127, 128 *qepa, 308 *qilamutu, 223 *qinati, 161, 258, 259, 260 *qo-fa®ne,*(q)a-fa®ne, 223 *qoho, 162 *qola, 176 *qolongaa, 138, 140 *qone, 103, 105 *qora, 138, 141 *qota, 144, 145, 297 *qu®,*qu®-lei, 123 *quha, 104, 106 *qulu, 126, 127 *qulu-matuqa, 222, 223 *qumoti, 167, 171 *qumu, 147, 150, 151, 194, 195 *qunga, 112 *qura, 113 *quta, 107, 295 *quuquu, 113, 114 *rama, 138, 139

373

*rano, 103, 105 *raqa-kau, 111 *rara, 155, 156 *rau, 138, 141 *rei, 186 *renga , 125, 258, 259, 269 *rofa, 166 *roqi, 158 *rumane, 113 *saawaki, 113 *safu, 103 *saka [boil food in water], 155, 156, 170, 171, 300 *saka [water jar], 174, 300 *samu, 161 *saqa, 218, 219, 236 *saqalo, 155, 156 *sasake, 104, 107 *sau [wind, breeze], 104 *sau [ear-pendant], 186, 189 *sau [return gift or services], 221 *sau [ruler, high-ranking elite, to have command or rule over a group of people], 222, 234, 235, 236, 305 *sau ariki, 96, 234, 23 *Sawaiki, 285, 294 *sei, 186 *sele, 176, 183 *selu, 186 *siapo [paper mulberry plant], 123, 185 *siapo [bark cloth], 185, 186 *sii, 137, 138 *sika, 138, 141 *Siringa kelekele, 270, 271 *Siringa maqa, 270, 271 *sisi, 154, 155, 156 *sisifo, 104, 107 *soaka, 123 *soi, 123 *soko, 221 *soli, 221 *songe, 161 *sua, 127, 128 *sui, 221

374

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions

*suke, 150, 298 *sulu, 186 *sumu, 114 *sumukaleva, 114 *sumulenga, 114 *sunu, 155, 156 *suqa, *suqa-malie, 145, 146 *taa, 167, 172 *Taangaloa, 240, 242, 243, 245, 275, 306 *taanoqa, 167, 172, 173 *taa-noqa, 256, 258, 309 *ta(a)qonga, 165, 166, 221 *taaua?, 222 *taaula, 246, 247, 249 *tafu, 150, 151 *tafu-raqa, 114 *tahi, 103, 106, 107, 295 *(tahi)-masa, 103 *tahina, 223, 225, 236 *taka, 187 *takele, 198 *taku, 257, 258 *takulua, 104, 106 *tala, 165 *talai, 181 *tali, 199 *talie, 123 *talo [taro], 46, 123, 257 *talo [invoke supernatural assistance, pray, incantation], 257, 258 *talu, 126, 127, 128 *tama, 222, 223 *tama (na), 223, 225 *tamaqiti, 222 *tamariki, 222 *tanga, 167 *tangata, 221, 291 *tangata ma(a)qoli, 54 *tangi, 258, 259 *tao, 138, 141, 191 *taonga, 220 *tapa, 186 *tapakau,*takapau, 194, 246, 255, 308 *tapatapa, 113

*tapu, 239, 240 *taqahine, 222 *taqo, 150, 151, 155, 156 *taqo-kete, 223, 305 *taq(o,u)fufu, 194 *taqu, 261, 263, 264, 265, 267, 271, 271, 272, 273, 276, 310 *tataa, 198 *tatau [wring out, express as with coconut cream], 155, 156 *tatau [tattoo, of face or body], 187 *tau, 191 *taulekaleka, 222 *taumafa, 258, 259 *tau-poqou, 222 *tauqa, 191 *tauqi, 221 *taura, 197, 198 *tau-raki, 159 *tau-tahi, 137, 138, 222, 225 *tawa, 123 *teka, 190, 191, 192 *tia, 193, 194 *tifa, 113 *ti®ti®, 114 *tii, 123 *tika, 191, 192 *tili [to cast, throw, ®sh with net], 137, 138, 139 *tili [kind of hand net], 138, 141 *timu, 104 *tina (na), 223 *tingo, 123, 125, 259, 265, 269 *tio, 113 *titi, 186 *toa, 222, 225 *toafa, 103, 105 *tofe, 113 *to®, 181 *toka, 103, 106 *tokelau, 104, 106, 107, 295 *toki, 46, 176, 180, 181, 182, 200 *toli, 127, 128 *tonga, 104, 106, 107, 295 *tongi, 181

Index of Proto Polynesian (PPN) Reconstructions *too, 123, 144 *toqa, 191 *toqonga, 220, 221 *totongi, 221 *tuafa®ne, 223, 225 *tuahi, 150, 152 *tuaka (na), 223, 225, 236 *tuangaqane, 223, 225 *tuaqa-tina, 225 *tufunga, 193, 222, 225, 236, 246, 248, 275, 307 *tui, 186, 189 *tuki, 155, 156 *tulu, 193, 194, 207 *tumutumu, 165 *tunu, 155, 156, 167, 172, 173 *tupa, 113 *tupe, 191, 192 *tupu, 224, 244 *tupulanga, 224 *tupuna, 222, 223, 225, 240, 243, 244, 245, 255, 306, 307 *tupunga, 222, 224, 240, 243, 244, 245, 255, 307 *tupuqa, 240, 242, 243, 244, 306 *tupuqanga, 224 *tuqa [back], 165 *tuqa [commoner, person without rank], 222 *tuqa-(a)-koi, 196 *tuqa-hakau, 103, 106 *tuqa-siwi, 103, 105

375

*tuqa-tina, 223 *tuqi, 305 *tuqulanga, 305 *tutu, 186 *tutu-a, 186 *Tuu, 306 *tuukau, 176 *tuutuu, 112 *uka, 197, 198 *uru, 150, 151 *uto, 138, 141 *utu, 127, 128 *waatia, 158 *wai, 103, 105, 272 *Wai mua,*Wai muli, 270, 271, 272 *wai-puna, 103, 105 *wai-tafe, 103, 105 *waka [sailing canoe], 46, 47, 198 *waka [medium or bodily abode of a god], 246, 247, 308 *walo, 113 *wana, 113 *wao, 126, 127 *waru, 154, 155 *weka, 223 *wele, 127, 128 *weli, 113 *wii, 123 *wili, 176, 184