Jerome Mialanes

New direction in human colonisation of the Pacific: Lapita settlement of south coast New Guinea

Abstract Expansion of Austronesianspeaking peoples from the Bismarck Archipelago out into the Pacific commencing c.3300 cal BP represents the last great chapter of human global colonisation. Bismarck Indonesia Archipelago Papua New Guinea Torres Strait Caution Bay The earliest migrants were bearers of finelymade dentate-stamped Lapita pottery, hitherto found only across Island Melanesia and western Polynesia. We document the first known occurrence of Lapita peoples on the New Guinea mainland. The new Lapita sites date from 2900 to 2500 cal BP and represent a newly-discovered migratory arm of Lapita expansions that moved westwards along the southern New Guinea coast towards Australia. These marine specialists ate shellfish, fish and marine turtles along the Papua New Guinea mainland coast, reflecting subsistence continuities with local pre-Lapita peoples dating back to 4200 cal BP. Lapita artefacts include characteristic ceramics, shell armbands, stone adzes and obsidian tools. Our Lapita discoveries support hypotheses for the migration of pottery-bearing Melanesian marine specialists into Torres Strait of northeast Australia c.2500 cal BP.

Imported obsidian at Caution Bay, south coast of Papua New Guinea: Cessation of long distance procurement c. 1,900 cal BP

Abstract Until now, the evidence for imported obsidian along the south coast of Papua New Guinea has been limited to eleven excavated sites all dating after c. 2,000 cal. BP. Here we present new archaeological evidence for the sourcing and importation of 4,689 obsidian artefacts from 30 excavated sites at Caution Bay. pXRF analysis of a sample of the artefacts revealed that all but one came from a source on West Fergusson Island some 670 km away. During Lapita (here beginning c. 2,950 cal. BP) and post-Lapita times, the proportion of sites with obsidian artefacts was high, and remained so for a thousand years before suddenly ceasing c. 1,900 cal. BP. Technological analyses of obsidian artefacts from Bogi 1 and ABKL—the richest obsidian sites at Caution Bay—indicate intense unipolar and bipolar reduction and the occasional recycling of unipolar flakes into bipolar cores during both Lapita and post-Lapita times. We suggest that this is a result of the importation of obsidian to Caution Bay through down-the-line exchange.