Settlement and economy in prehistoric Papua New Guinea: a review of the archeological evidence - article ; n°46 ; vol.31, pg 7-75

Susan Bulmer

Description

Journal de la Société des océanistes - Année 1975 - Volume 31 - Numéro 46 - Pages 7-75
69 pages
Source : Persée ; Ministère de la jeunesse, de l’éducation nationale et de la recherche, Direction de l’enseignement supérieur, Sous-direction des bibliothèques et de la documentation.

Informations

• Publié par: JOURNAL_DE_LA_SOCIETE_DES_OCEANISTES
• Publié le: 01 janvier 1975
• Nombre de lectures: 202
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 5 Mo

Extrait

Susan Bulmer
Settlement and economy in prehistoric Papua New Guinea: a
review of the archeological evidence
In: Journal de la Société des océanistes. N°46, Tome 31, 1975. pp. 7-75.
Citer ce document / Cite this document :
Bulmer Susan. Settlement and economy in prehistoric Papua New Guinea: a review of the archeological evidence. In: Journal
de la Société des océanistes. N°46, Tome 31, 1975. pp. 7-75.
doi : 10.3406/jso.1975.2688
http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/jso_0300-953X_1975_num_31_46_2688Seulement and economy
in prehistoric
Papua New Guinea :
a review
of the
archaeological evidence
organisé ce lier, et Susan Ouvert français. colloque Les Susan et Bulmer, par réunit 16, un fut Monsieur 17 colloque La un successivement ici et première certain reproduite 18 en sur Claude mai effet, nombre le communication 1973, nous en thème Lévi-Strauss, présidé raison présente de la « naturalistes Maison par Écologie de présentée son l'essentiel Jacques Professeur des très et Sciences grand Sociétés Barrau anthropologues fut des au celle recherches intérêt. Collège de et en l'Homme Maurice du Mélanésie de Professeur étrangers archéoloFrance, Gode- avait ».
giques récemment effectuées en Nouvelle-Guinée, recherches qui s'attachent à
retracer l'évolution du milieu naturel et celle des modes d'adaptation de
l'homme à ce milieu. Cette préhistoire intéresse au plus haut point celle de
l'Asie du Sud-Est comme celle du reste de la Mélanésie et de l'Australie.
SUMMARY
Introduction 8
Environmental background to human settlement 9
Sea barriers and sea levels 9
Climate 11
Late Pleistocene pluvial 11 .
SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
Volcanic activity 12
Earth movements 13
Distribution of rock resources 13
Salt 14
Plant resources 15
Fossil animals 16
Recent fauna 17
Pigs 18
Man's impact on his environment 19
Forest clearance 19
Tree selections and cultivation . 20
Grasslands 20
Introduced plants 22
Domestication of plants 22 animals 23
The archaeological sites 24
Introduction 24
Montane sites 25
Summary of montane sites 43
Lowland sites 46 of lowland sites 65
Concluding remarks 67
List of tables, figures and maps. , 69
References 69
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I am very grateful to many colleagues for unpublished information about
their current or recent research, but I bear sole responsibility for the inter
pretations of their evidence that appear in this paper. I would also like to
warmly thank Janet M. Davidson, Roger C. Green and R. N. H. Bulmer for
their helpful comments oh an earlier draft of this paper.
SETTLEMENT AND ECONOMY
IN PREHISTORIC PAPUA NEW GUINEA :
A REVIEW OF THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVIDE]N[CE
INTRODUCTION
This paper reviews the evidence concerning human settlement and ec
onomy in prehistoric Papua New Guinea1. Firstly, I briefly discuss the findings
because 1. The it is political the scene territory of nearly of Papua all the New archaeological Guinea is taken work in here western to be Melanesia. the unit for There discussion, is of largely course
no assumption that this modern historical/political unit has boundaries that are necessarily significant
in prehistory. SETTLEMENT AND ECONOMY IN PREHISTORIC PAPUA NEW GUINEA
of environmental scientists and archaeologists concerning the natural back
ground of prehistoric settlement and man's impact on his environment Set
against this is a summary of the evidence from archaeological excavations for
plants and animals utilized by prehistoric man, the location and character of
sites of settlement and trade. Although the data are still fragmentary, result
ing from only fourteen years of research by sixteen archaeologists, patterns
now appear to be emerging from what seemed to be, only a few years ago,
anything but a coherent picture.
In spite of the fragmentary nature of the data, and the likelihood that
any survey will rapidly become dated, a general review is warranted. This
paper is not only directed to my archaeological colleages, but also to non-
archaeologists2, some of whom have recently engaged in reconstructions of
economic prehistory based on ethnographic data, and others of whom are
interested in the findings for a variety of reasons. It is at least worth point
ing out that the time is past when speculation about the prehistory of Papua
New Guinea can proceed without taking into account the archaeological data.
However, the source material is scattered, largely in unpublished papers and
theses, and indeed a good proportion of it is still being written, so it is imposs
ible for persons not immediately involved in the field to keep abreast of the
findings. It is also of interest to compare the findings from Papua New Guinea
with recent results of archaeological work in Indonesia, mainland Southeast
Asia, Japan, Estern Melanesia, and Australia. Some of these areas appear to
have close prehistoric links with Papua New Guinea, but such comparisons
will only be attempted very briefly in this paper.
ENVIRONMENTAL BACKGROUND TO HUMAN SETTLEMENT
Other archaeologists, such as Golson (1972) and Allen (1971), have sum
marized current knowledge of the environment of prehistoric settlement in
Papua New Guinea, so I will here mainly discuss more recent findings. In
general, the environmental background of human settlement in this area is
imperfectly known, and archaeology has not yet contributed much to this
knowledge. However, some environmental data are available in material
excavated by archaeologists, particularly some evidence of waterlain deposits
and faunal change. As well, data are now available from 15 palaeoecological
sites in montane New Guinea, providing at last some detailed information
about particular local areas.
Sea barriers and sea levels.
Of particular interest to prehistorians is the role of changing sea levels
during the Pleistocene and of the sea barriers in the Indonesian area. These
2. This is a much expanded version of a paper delivered to the seminar "Écologie et Société en
Mélanésie", in Paris, May 1973. SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES
are reviewed by Calaby (1972) in relation to animal distributions and by
Jennings (1971) in relation to the human settlement of Australia. The
ancient sea barriers between Australasia and mainland Asia have never in the
last 50,000 years been less than 50-100 km wide (Jennings 1971 : 6). The
role these played in human settlement is not known, other than that they seem
to have prevented the spread of man into Australasia until relatively recent
times, and that they required man to use rafts or boats to make this journey
(Golson 1972 : 391-7).
Much has also been made of the importance of the land bridge between
New Guinea and Australia during times of low sea levels. The final drowning
of the Torres Strait is thought to have occurred between 6,500 and 8,000 years
ago, following a late Pleistocene low about 125 m below present sea level from
about 18,000 to 20,000 years ago. It deserves to be mentioned that there
is no evidence yet of close cultural relationship between the peoples of the
late Pleistocene in Australia and New Guinea. The distinctive * waisted blade'
assemblage of the late Pleistocene sites of montane New Guinea and possibly
of New Britain has yet to be excavated from an Australian site, and the cha
racteristic stone assemblages of the early and Tasmanian sites
(Mulvaney 1969 : 133f) have not yet been found in a New Guinea archaeol
ogical site. However, there are some parallels between the New Guinea
assemblages and the 'Hoabinhian' assemblages of Southeast Asia (Bulmer
1971a), and a number of archaeologists have pointed to similarities between
the Australian stone tools of early sites and those of the Hoabinhian (Mat
thews 1966 ; Mulvaney 1969 : 146-52), so the problem of the relationship
between the New Guinea and Australian material may eventually be resolved.
It is of course possible that the apparent differences between them reflect
the fact that the montane New Guinea assemblages relate primarily to the
exploitation of temperate or sub-tropical montane forest environment, and
that the known Australian assemblages relate to other environmental or eco
nomic conditions.
In this respect, the total absence of early evidence from lowland New Guinea
and western Melanesia, other than the undated Passismanua collection of sou
thern New Britain (Chowning and Goodale 1966 ; Shutler and Kess 1969 ;
Bulmer 1971a), means that conclusions should not yet be drawn. As Jones
(1968) has pointed out for Tasmania, the sea level changes might well mean
that some, if not most, of early human settlement sites are now submerged
beneath the sea. However, such evidence as remains has not yet been found
in Papua New Guinea.
There is some evidence for a post-Pleistocene higher sea level or fluctua
tions of sea levels, during the last 5,000 years, but there is disagreement
about their precise char