Jessica Stone

Preliminary Investigation of Pre-Columbian Sites on the Islands of Mustique and Union in the Grenadines, West Indies

Abstract The Grenadine Islands in the southern Lesser Antilles have received relatively little attention by archaeologists compared to other regions of the Caribbean. However, research over the last ten years on Carriacou, the largest and southernmost island in the Grenadines, has significantly improved our understanding of when these islands were settled in prehistory and subsequent cultural changes that occurred from ca. AD 400 to 1400. An extension of this research project into the smaller islands of Mustique and Union in May 2010 has now provided preliminary data with which Carriacou and other nearby islands such as St. Vincent and Grenada can be compared. Here we provide a description of the sites we investigated and present analysis of recovered archaeological remains through subsurface testing. This represents the first concerted effort by archaeologists since the 1970s to investigate the Grenadines and also reports a new site on Mustique known as Lagoon Bay. Results of this and previous research demonstrates that numerous villages developed in the Grenadines during the terminal Saladoid period and fluoresced shortly thereafter during the Troumassoid period (ca. AD 600 - 1300). Preliminary analysis of materials recovered, including pottery and mollusks, as well as several new radiocarbon dates, provide a framework for guiding future research at these sites, most of which are threatened by development, agricultural activities, and/or erosion.

New Investigations of Early Prehistoric Settlement on Yap, Western Caroline Islands

Recent research on the prehistoric colonization of islands in western Micronesia (northwest tropical Pacific) has revealed a relatively clear picture of multiple, but chronologically disparate entries into Palau and the Mariana Islands between ca. 3200 and 2800 cal BP from groups in Island Southeast Asia (Clark 2004, 2005; Fitzpatrick 2003; Petchey et al. 2016; Rieth and Athens 2017). Despite an increased understanding of when these two major Micronesian archipelagoes were settled, initial human arrival in Yap—a group of four small islands situated between the two other island groups—is still unclear. A paucity of archaeological research and conflicting lines of other evidence (linguistic, paleoenvironmental) have resulted in a significant gap in

Disproving claims for small-bodied humans in the Palauan archipelago

Abstract Recent excavation at Ucheliungs Cave in Palau has provided new evidence in the debate concerning the colonisation of the Palauan archipelago. An abundance of faunal material and the presence of transported artefacts contradict a previous interpretation that the site represents an early burial cave containing purported small-bodied humans. New radiocarbon dates suggest long-term use of the cave for both mortuary activity and small-scale marine foraging that may slightly precede the accepted date for the earliest human occupation of Palau. The results of this research here discount earlier claims for insular dwarfism among the earliest inhabitants of these islands.