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COMBINING ORAL TRADITIONS AND BAYESIAN CHRONOLOGICAL MODELING TO UNDERSTAND VILLAGE DEVELOPMENT IN THE GULF OF PAPUA (PAPUA NEW GUINEA)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 January 2021

Chris Urwin Open the ORCID record for Chris Urwin [Opens in a new window] ,
Quan Hua Open the ORCID record for Quan Hua [Opens in a new window]  and
Henry Arifeae
Chris Urwin*
Affiliation:
Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory2601, Australia Monash Indigenous Studies Centre, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria3800, Australia
Quan Hua
Affiliation:
Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, Locked Bag 2001, Kirrawee DC, New South Wales2232, Australia
Henry Arifeae
Affiliation:
Papua New Guinea National Museum and Art Gallery, Independence Drive, Waigani, PO Box 5560, Boroko, NCD, Papua New Guinea
*
*Corresponding author. Email: chris.urwin@monash.edu.
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Abstract

When European colonists arrived in the late 19th century, large villages dotted the coastline of the Gulf of Papua (southern Papua New Guinea). These central places sustained long-distance exchange and decade-spanning ceremonial cycles. Besides ethnohistoric records, little is known of the villages’ antiquity, spatiality, or development. Here we combine oral traditional and 14C chronological evidence to investigate the spatial history of two ancestral village sites in Orokolo Bay: Popo and Mirimua Mapoe. A Bayesian model composed of 35 14C assays from seven excavations, alongside the oral traditional accounts, demonstrates that people lived at Popo from 765–575 cal BP until 220–40 cal BP, at which time they moved southwards to Mirimua Mapoe. The village of Popo spanned ca. 34 ha and was composed of various estates, each occupied by a different tribe. Through time, the inhabitants of Popo transformed (e.g., expanded, contracted, and shifted) the village to manage social and ceremonial priorities, long-distance exchange opportunities and changing marine environments. Ours is a crucial case study of how oral traditional ways of understanding the past interrelate with the information generated by Bayesian 14C analyses. We conclude by reflecting on the limitations, strengths, and uncertainties inherent to these forms of chronological knowledge.

Keywords

chronologyoral traditionPapua New Guineavillage development
Type
Research Article
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 63 , Issue 2 , April 2021 , pp. 647 - 667
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Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press for the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona

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