Abstract
THE exploits of the early Polynesians in discovering and populating, at one time or another, every habitable island in the Pacific mark them as the most daring deep-sea voyagers the world has ever known. In spite of having tools made of stone or shell only, they fashioned large double-keeled ships which they stocked, like arks, with food-plants and animals, and then transported themselves and their women into the unknown. True, there are islands at intervals along the route which they almost certainly took from the eastern end of Asia to the nearer islands of Polynesia, but even these voyages entailed a week or two at sea, while islands like Hawaii and New Zealand took longer to reach. There is some controversy as to whether these emigrants travelled through Micronesia or Melanesia, the inhabitants of both showing certain cultural affinities with the Polynesians, but the author considers that evidence points rather to the northern route, with what one might call a backwash to the marginal islands of Melanesia from Samoa.
Polynesians—Explorers of the Pacific
By J. E. Weckler, Jr. (War Background Studies, No. 6: Publication 3701.) Pp. iv + 77 + 20 plates. (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 1943.)
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RISHBETH, K. Polynesians—Explorers of the Pacific. Nature 151, 599 (1943). https://doi.org/10.1038/151599a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/151599a0