Early Lapita settlement site at Bourewa, southwest Viti Levu Island, Fiji

Abstract

A newly-discovered Lapita settlement at Bourewa on southwest Viti Levu Island, Fiji, was established originally on an offshore island perhaps as much as 1220 BCE by people whose main concern was optimal access to the broad fringing reef. Satellite settlements were established at nearby Rove and Waikereira later in Lapita times. The three oldest radiocarbon dates obtainedfrom the base of the tightly-packed shell midden layer excavated at Bourewa and charcoal in the beach sand below are calibrated/corrected to 1220-970 BCE, 1210-940 BCE, and 1130-910 BCE.The BourewaLapita site appears to be the oldest-known in Fiji.

Evolution of Polynesian bark cloth and factors influencing cultural change

“…By 2900 years ago, maritime explorers had begun voyaging east beyond the Solomon Islands and established the first human settlements in Remote Oceania (Burley and Dickinson, 2001;Nunn et al, 2004;Fig. 1).…”

Human‐Mediated Prehistoric Marine Extinction in the Tropical Pacific? Understanding the Presence of Hippopus hippopus (Linn. 1758) in Ancient Shell Middens on the Rove Peninsula, Southwest Viti Levu Island, Fiji

“…Some of the earliest people to settle the island groups of Oceania (Figure ) appeared in the Bismarck Archipelago (Papua New Guinea) around 3300 years ago and are known today as Lapita, their distinctive cultural traits having been widely commented on (Kirch, ; Green, ). Among these was a high dependence on marine foraging, particularly in Remote Oceania where it is likely to have sustained the earliest people almost entirely for the first 50–200 years that they occupied island groups such as Vanuatu (Galipaud & Kelly, ), Fiji (Nunn et al., ) and Tonga (Burley & Dickinson, ). A conspicuous manifestation of the dependence of early Lapita settlers on marine foods is the stilt houses that they occupied and built out across coastal flats; examples have been described from the Bismarcks, the eastern outer Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and Fiji (Kirch, ; Nunn et al., ; Walter & Sheppard, ; Galipaud & Kelly, ; Nunn, ).…”

Geoarchaeology of Tonga: Geotectonic and geomorphic controls

“…The clustering of the known Lapita sites near the inland edge of large offshore reef tracts, which are concentrated along the windward eastern side of the Vava'u Group, suggests that a prime consideration for siting initial habitations was proximity to reef resources. Other recent studies elsewhere within the Lapita cultural region highlight the attraction of readily accessible reef resources for the location of Lapita settlements (Nunn et al, 2004). Fringing and offshore reefs are less abundant along the leeward western side of the Vava'u Group, and our systematic search of Hunga and Ovaka, lying southwest of Vava'u (Figure 10), has recovered no Lapita potsherds.…”