The ‘Lapita Voyage’ – in honour of the greatest seafaring people in the history of Man, the Polynesians
2,500 years ago the central Pacific islands were uninhabited.
These central Pacific islands are scattered over 1/3 of our globe’s surface. That is an area larger than the surface of the moon.
Within a thousand years the Polynesians had settled this vast area of remote islands.
No other ethnic people have ever established settlement over a wider ocean area.
The Polynesian Triangle: Hawaii (north) - Easter Island (east) - New Zealand (west), equivalent in area to London - Calcutta - Dar-es-Salam
» What makes the migration of the Polynesians into the Pacific so fascinating?
They had the vision and courage to venture out for unknown islands.
Using fire, stones and shells they built seagoing boats, which sailed 2/3 of the equatorial waters of this world.
Their vessels were faster than those used by the ‘discoverers’, e.g. James Cook, Bougainville etc.
They were able to sail to windward against the prevailing trade winds.
They were able to live on their boats for weeks and settle new islands with their animals and plants.
Their voyages were carefully planned expeditions into the unknown.
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» Thor Heyerdahl
In 1946 Thor Heyerdahl sailed with a crew of wartime heroes downwind on a raft from Peru, westwards across the Eastern Pacific, trying to prove that the Polynesian Islands had been settled from South America.
Though this voyage was adventurous and sensational, his thesis turned out to be wrong.
60 years ago Thor Heyerdahl assumed that the ancient Polynesians were incapable of building boats that could sail to windward against the prevailing Easterly trade winds.
This assumption was based on information propagated by Missionaries and Western Colonial administrators of the Pacific islands, who forbade their subjects any offshore sailing in their native craft in order to get control over them. This resulted in the near loss of the arts of boatbuilding and navigation and the misconceptions in Western culture that the Polynesians did not have seaworthy boats that were able to sail to windward.
Thor Heyerdahl's book sold millions of copies and fascinated several generations.
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» The Polynesians came initially from Taiwan
Linguistic evidence: Linguists call the root language of Taiwan Proto-Austronesian, from which developed Malayo-Polynesian and finally Polynesian.
DNA-evidence: On nearly all Polynesian islands domesticated pigs are common. According to latest DNA-analysis, they originate from Taiwan and surrounding areas.
The archaeological evidence: Along the migration route from Taiwan into the Pacific, archaeologists have found potsherds of similar type. From the Bismarck-Archipelago (Papua New Guinea) to New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa these potsherds are called Lapita pottery (named after a site in New Caledonia) because of their significant likeness.
Examples of Lapita pottery. The distinctive faces have been integrated into our logo.
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» Lapita sites
The name Lapita derives from a pottery-site in New Caledonia
The black dots show sites where Lapita pottery has been found. » to the map
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