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Tuna Tagging and Shell Fishhooks: A Comment from Oceania

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Fred M. Reinman
Fred M. Reinman*
Affiliation:
Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, Illinois
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Abstract

The possibility of tuna fish being an agent for the diffusion of the circular shell fishhook found in California and Oceania is discussed. Data from the latter area indicate a specific type of hook and of fishing technique for these fish, suggesting that the circular shell hook would not be used in this way. The experimental evidence of Robinson (1942) and Glidden (Heye 1921) and an examination of the function of fishhooks further suggest that the circular shell hooks function best in a different subenvironment of the sea and for a different group of fish than the tunas. While it is impossible to state unequivocally that the tunas could not be the agents of diffusion for this hook, the specificity of the existing tuna-fishing techniques and the evidence for a different use of the circular hook make it more improbable than is suggested by Heizer or Landberg.

Type
Facts and Comments
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , January 1968 , pp. 95 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1968

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