Tonga was unique in the prehistoric Pacific for developing a maritime state that integrated the archipelago under a centralized authority and for undertaking long-distance economic and political exchanges in the second millennium A.D. To establish the extent of Tonga's maritime polity, we geochemically analyzed stone tools excavated from the central places of the ruling paramounts, particularly lithic artifacts associated with stone-faced chiefly tombs. The lithic networks of the Tongan state focused on Samoa and Fiji, with one adze sourced to the Society Islands 2,500 km from Tongatapu. To test the hypothesis that nonlocal lithics were especially valued by Tongan elites and were an important source of political capital, we analyzed prestate lithics from Tongatapu and stone artifacts from Samoa. In the Tongan state, 66% of worked stone tools were long-distance imports, indicating that interarchipelago connections intensified with the development of the Tongan polity after A.D. 1200. In contrast, stone tools found in Samoa were from local sources, including tools associated with a monumental structure contemporary with the Tongan state. Network analysis of lithics entering the Tongan state and of the distribution of Samoan adzes in the Pacific identified a centralized polity and the products of specialized lithic workshops, respectively. These results indicate that a significant consequence of social complexity was the establishment of new types of specialized sites in distant geographic areas. Specialized sites were loci of long-distance interaction and formed important centers for the transmission of information, people, and materials in prehistoric Oceania.Polynesian archaeology | geochemical sourcing | complex societies A rchaeological evidence for prehistoric interaction is critical to understanding the role of intersocietal contact and the power strategies used by elites in the formation of complex societies. In the first half of the second millennium A.D., a powerful and complex society emerged in the Tonga Islands (Fig. 1) that was unique in the Pacific for the way it aggregated an entire archipelago under a single political system. Considered a maritime empire/chiefdom (1-3), Tonga has recently been categorized as a primary/archaic state that, along with the late-prehistoric polities of the Hawaiian Islands, were the most complex societies in prehistoric Oceania (4, ref. 5, p. 146). The ancient Tongan state/ chiefdom was headed by the paramount Tui Tonga (Lord of Tonga) and administered by closely related chiefly families, and it was exceptional in Polynesia for a network of political and economic relationships that extended to other islands and archipelagos (2, 6). The control and redistribution of exotic goods is posited as an important source of capital used to support political centralization (7,8), but it has not been feasible to model prehistoric interaction in the expansive Tongan state using archaeological data because of the paucity of excavations at the central places of the chiefdom and the li...

RAPA NUl, THE SMALL REMOTE ISLAND that constitutes the easternmost corner of the Polynesian triangle, was found and populated long before the Europeans "discovered" this part of the world in 1722. The long-standing questions concerning this remarkable island are: who were the first to populate the island, at what time was it populated, and did the Rapa Nui population and development on the island result from a single voyage? Over the years there has been much discussion, speculation, and new scientific results concerning these questions. This has resulted in several conferences and numerous scientific and popular papers and monographs. The aim ofthis paper is to present the contemporary views on these issues, drawn from the results of the last 45 years of archaeological research on the island (Fig. 1), and to describe recent fieldwork that Martinsson-Wallin completed on Rapa Nui.Results from the Norwegian Archaeological Expedition to Rapa Nui in [1955][1956] suggest that the island was populated as early as c. A.D. 400 (Heyerdahl and Ferdon 1961: 395). This conclusion was drawn from a single radiocarbon date. This dated carbon sample (K-502) was found in association with the so-called Poike ditch on the east side of the island. The sample derived from a carbon concentration on the natural surface, which had been covered by soil when the ditch was dug. The investigator writes the following:There is no evidence to indicate that the fire from which the carbon was derived actually burned at the spot where the charcoal occurred, but it is clear that it was on the surface of the ground at the time the first loads of earth were carried out of the ditch and deposited over it. (Smith 1961 : 388) This sample is dated to 1570 ± 100 B.P. and it is so far the earliest date from an excavated site on the island. Using a calibration program, this date is estimated to be cal A.D. 320-670 at the 95 percent confidence interval. (This date and the following A.D. dates were calibrated using the computer program Oxcal. v.2.18 at two sigmas.)Two worked obsidian pieces, five obsidian chips, three sling stones, a basalt sinker or anchor, and three adzes were found during the excavation of the ditch, but none of them was found in direct association with the early dated carbon sample. The butt end of a chipped adz with triangular cross section (type 2-A) Helene Martinsson-Wallin is an associate professor at the Kon-Tiki Museum in Oslo, Norway, and Susan Crockford is employed by Pacific Identifications, Inc., Victoria, British Columbia.

Using diatoms, pollen, and geochemistry, we explore human habitation around Lina myr, Gotland, in relation to shore displacement. Archeological evidence has shown that Lina myr was an important area for its prehistoric human inhabitants. We investigate if and when Lina myr was connected to the sea and could therefore have been part of an inland water system useful for transport. A chronology was based on 14C AMS dating of terrestrial macrofossils and bulk sediments with dates ranging between 9100 and 2360 cal. yr BP. The initiation of the Littorina transgression was dated to 8500 cal. yr BP. A twofold pattern for the maximum sub-phase of the Littorina Sea is suggested from 8100 to 7500 cal. yr BP and from 6500 to 6000 cal. yr BP. The onset of cultivation and grazing was indicated by the presence of Hordeum and Plantago lanceolata in the pollen record during the Late Neolithic, at about 4580 cal. yr BP. During this time sea level was relatively higher than today and the Lina myr basin was connected with the Littorina Sea, which it continued to be until isostatic uplift caused it to become isolated at about 3820 cal. yr BP. After about 3000 cal. yr BP, human-made landscape changes intensified, grasslands increased, and shrublands decreased.

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