Julie S. Field

Household expansion linked to agricultural intensification during emergence of Hawaiian archaic states

The Leeward Kohala Field System (LKFS) covering ∼60 km2 on Hawai‘i Island is one of the worlds best-studied archaeological examples of preindustrial agricultural intensification. Archaeological correlates for households over a 400-y period of intensification of the LKFS (A.D. 1400–1800) indicate that household age, number, and distribution closely match the expansion of agricultural features at both macro- and microscales. We excavated and dated residential complexes within portions of five traditional Hawaiian land units (ahupua‘a), two in the central core of the field system and three in the southern margins. Forty-eight radiocarbon dates from 43 residential features indicate an overall pattern of exponential increase in the numbers of households over time. Spatial distribution of these dates suggests that the core of the LKFS may have reached a population saturation point earlier than in the southern margins. Bayesian statistical analysis of radiocarbon dates from residential features in the core region, combined with spatial analysis of agricultural and residential construction sequences, demonstrates that the progressive subdivision of territories into smaller socioeconomic units was matched by addition of new residences, probably through a process of household fissioning. These results provide insights into the economic processes underlying the sociopolitical transformation from chiefdom to archaic state in precontact Hawai‘i.

Residential chronology, household subsistence, and the emergence of socioeconomic territories in leeward Kohala, Hawai'i Island

Previous research in leeward Kohala, Hawai‘i Island, has determined that the Leeward Kohala Field System (LKFS), a vast agricultural zone covering ~60 km2, developed between the 14th and 18th centuries AD. Additional analyses have documented the establishment of traditional socioeconomic territories, known as ahupua‘a, in tandem with the expansion of the field system. This article further refines the chronology of human settlement and socioeconomic development in leeward Kohala through the analysis of deposits associated with prehistoric residences. Based upon survey and excavation, we present a chronology for Hawaiian household transition and economic development in 2 study areas of leeward Kohala, spanning the field system to the coast. Forty-nine radiocarbon dates from short-lived plant materials and five 230Th dates on corals from residential and ritual features are synthesized into 3 temporal periods, which allow for comparison of residential size, distribution, number, and associated faunal materials from archaeological deposits. Changes in household composition and economy are suggested to have developed in tandem with the establishment of individual ahupua‘a and land divisions within them, and the further development of agricultural production.

Technical note: The use of geographical information systems software for the spatial analysis of bone microstructure.

Geographic information systems (GIS) software is typically used for analyzing geographically distributed data, allowing users to annotate points or areas on a map and attach data for spatial analyses. While traditional GIS-based research involves geo-referenced data (points tied to geographic locations), the use of this technology has other constructive applications for physical anthropologists. The use of GIS software for the study of bone histology offers a novel opportunity to analyze the distribution of bone nano- and microstructures, relative to macrostructure and in comparison to other variables of interest, such as biomechanical loading history. This approach allows for the examination of characteristics of single histological features while considering their role at the macroscopic level. Such research has immediate promise in examining the load history of bone by surveying the functional relationship between collagen fiber orientation (CFO) and strain mode. The diversity of GIS applications that may be utilized in bone histology research is just beginning to be explored. The goal of this study is to introduce a reliable methodology for such investigation and our objective is to quantify the heterogeneity of bone microstructure over an entire cross-section of bone using ArcGIS v 9.3 (ESRI). This was accomplished by identifying the distribution of remodeling units in a human metatarsal relative to bending axes. One biomechanical hypothesis suggests that CFO, manifested by patterns of birefringence, is indicative of mode of strain during formation. This study demonstrates that GIS can be used to investigate, describe, and compare such patterns through histological mapping.

Trends in Marine Foraging in Precontact and Historic Leeward Kohala, Hawai'i Island

Abstract: Traditional Hawaiian fishing and marine exploitation have been studied using both ethnographic and archaeological approaches, but few studies have attempted to investigate intensity of marine foraging over time at a regional scale. In this paper we examine Hawaiian exploitation of the marine eco-system of the leeward coast of Kohala, located on the northern tip of Hawai‘i Island. Over 158,000 specimens of fish, mollusks, arthropods, and echinoderms were recovered during archaeological excavation of 57 precontact (i.e., pre—AD 1778) residential features. These residences span a period of roughly 500 yr and are located both along the coast and in the interior. For these sites, we analyzed taxonomic abundance (NISP), number of taxa (NTAXA), taxonomic evenness, prey indices, and body-size changes over time. Results indicate that intensity of marine foraging increased over time, mirroring trends in increased numbers of residences (and inferred increases in human population size). There were no apparent declines in abundance of particular marine taxa. There were some differences in movement of marine resources into the upland Leeward Kohala Field System (LKFS), with larger-sized fish, mollusks, and echinoderms transported in increasing numbers. Examination of changes in body size suggest significant harvest pressure on fish and mollusks during the first 400 yr of human occupation and population rebound following human abandonment of the region in the postcontact period.

Anthropogenic Burning, Agricultural Intensification, and Landscape Transformation in Post-Lapita Fiji

Slash-and-burn cultivation (swidden) is an important and extensive strategy among agriculturalists in Oceania. The length of the fallow period, in which non-cultivated vegetation is allowed to regrow, is critical to the sustainability of this strategy in tropical environments. Long fallow periods permit greater soil recovery and higher yields over the long term whereas shorter fallow periods drive cycles of soil degradation that ultimately result in a landscape that is too degraded for continued cultivation. Anthropologists recognize that decreasing swidden fallow times is a key form of agricultural intensification that may have shaped interpolity conflict and social complexity. Although it is easy to identify the degraded landscapes that are a legacy of this pattern today, it has been a challenge for archaeologists to identify the timing and rate at which such processes took place in the past. We use alluvial stratigraphic records of charcoal and stable carbon isotopes from a small drainage in Western Viti Levu, Fiji, to reconstruct the timing and rate of intensification of swidden agriculture from long-fallow clearing of native forest, to shorter fallow burning of secondary forest and grassland, to grassland conversion. Results suggest that swidden cultivation in the lower Sigatoka Valley did not commence until centuries after Lapita colonization (ca. 2950 cal BP). Early swiddening apparently used relatively short fallow periods coupled with residential mobility to sustain horticultural yields until mobility no longer became a viable option. Archaeological indicators of resource stress co-occur with persistent swiddening after 1450 cal BP, although these precede the collapse into degraded grassland conditions at 1000 cal BP. Archaeological evidence for conflict increase after landscape degradation, although emerging social inequalities only appear after centuries of degraded conditions and conflict.

Geographical Information Systems in Archaeology

The latest in the Cambridge Manuals in Archaeology Series, Geographical Information Systems in Archaeology by James Conolly and Mark Lake offers a detailed and engaging guide for scholars interested in the application of geographic information systems (GIS) to archaeology. Although there is considerable overlap with Wheatley and Gillings’s Spatial Technology and Archaeology (2002), Conolly and Lake offer a more detailed assessment and critique of the algorithms and equations regularly used in GIS applications, and present a stronger case for the importance of statistics in determining the significance of relationships in spatial and attribute datasets.