Map: Distribution of Widespread Fish Poisons

Below is a map showing the distribution of widespread fish poisons mentioned in the previous posting on the diffusion of ancient fishing practices.

The Tephrosia subspecies and the Derris-Lonchocarpus subspecies are especially noteworthy for the wide range of use. Remember that the subspecies within both Derris and Lonchocarpus and the subspecies between Derris and Lonchocarpus are generally very difficult to distinguish from each other physically. Quigley suggested that Derris and Lonchocarpus might one day be folded into the same genus. Currently they are part of the same tribe.

Quigley suggested that some of the poisons may have been diffused by humans across the Atlantic or Pacific although the more general current theory is that there were two major diffusion areas -- one in the "Old World" and one in the "New World."



Click on image for full size version


The map is developed from Carrol Quigley's work, and one can see a clear tropical distribution of the use of fish poisons. In some instances, as in the use of Anamirta cocculus in Brittany, the plant is imported from warmer regions.

Although archaeological evidence of fish poison use is naturally hard to come by in tropical areas nevertheless the ancient Spirit Cave site in Thailand provides evidence of fish poison plant use prior to 9000 BCE. Archaeological evidence of fish poison use in the New World has also been found in Ecuador (Engoroy Culture) dating to the first millennium BCE.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Béarez, Philippe. "First Archaeological Indication of Fishing by Poison in a Sea Environment by the Engoroy Population at Salango (Manabí, Ecuador)," Journal of Archaeological Science Volume 25, Issue 10, October 1998, 943-948.

Misra, V. N. and Peter Bellwood. Recent Advances in Indo-Pacific Prehistory..., Brill, 1985, 268.

Diffusion of Ancient Sea Fishing Culture

The recent discovery of shell fish hooks in the Persian Gulf offers an opportunity to reexamine the ancient diffusion of sea fishing culture and general maritime culture and the possible Nusantao linkages.

Single-piece, curved shell fish hooks have a strong circum-Pacific distribution in the early Holocene period but also extend all the way to the Persian Gulf and northeastern Africa toward the West.


Distribution of Shell Fish Hooks beginning in Early Holocene


Click on image for full-size map


The sites shown in the map above are generally associated with shell mound cultures. In some of these areas the single-piece, curved shell fish hook is preceded by a straight, multi-piece hook made of non-shell material.

Even after exposure to civilization, the Nusantao Maritime Trade and Communication Network may have used the extreme maritime mode of living as exemplified by the shell mound culture for exploration voyages. Sea fishing/hunting and shellfish collection would allow the Nusantao explorers/merchants to quickly adapt to new, unknown territories without carrying a lot of supplies.

View Full-Size

John Weinstein, © The Field Museum

Shell fish hooks, South Coastal Californians (3000 BC-AD 900), California
(From: http://archaeology.about.com/od/northamerica/ig/Ancient-Americas-/Shell-Fishhooks--California.htm)

The early shell fish hooks from Timor were made from Trochus niloticus, and the same species was used for fish hooks at the Vanuatu and Tikopia sites. Latter peoples of the Pacific favored pearl shell to make fish hooks, and some early theorists had even suggested that the Pacific was colonized by peoples looking for new pearl fishing grounds. The earliest shell hooks predated the Austronesian expansion, but Proto-Austronesians appear to have adopted this item quickly as shown by the PAN reconstruction *kawil "fish hook." The Austronesian speakers generally used the single-piece, curved shell fish hook, either the angling or the trolling variety.

Proto-Oceanic also has another reconstruction for "fish hook" in the form of *kima "shell fish hook, clamshell" that appears to be related to a common word in Papuan languages kimai and its cognates that also mean "shell fish hook, clamshell." Possibly *kima and kimai are remnants of Pre-Austronesian words for these items.

Robert Blust has suggested a diverse set of roots -- kug, kuk, kuy, kul, kel, ku(q), luk, luy, and tuk -- all having the meaning 'to bend, curve.' Some of these roots appear similar to words constructed for Nostratic and other long-range families, but Torsten Pedersen has suggested that these forms may instead have been diffused at an early date by a 'waterfront' people.

A number of words like bend, hook, curve, etc. at least appear related to Proto-Austric *kun[k,q], 'bend', if not the Proto-Austronesian roots. And there are a few words that might relate direction to Proto-Austronesian *kawil such as ga:la "fish hook" and its cognates from the Dravidian languages, gaLa "fish hook" from Pali and Prakrit, and possibly kullab "hook, fish hook," Arabic.

S. Starostin has suggested a term for "fish trap, net" as found in his hopelessly large language family called "Borean" in which he combines an expanded Austric grouping together with Sino-Caucasian. Here again it's possible that an early long-range diffusion by a maritime culture may explain this term rather than genetic language inheritance. Here are some examples of the possible related forms:

PMP *saruk "type of fishing net"
Proto-Austric *[ʒ]al "fishing net or basket"
UAN *zalah or *d'ala' "fishing net"
Proto-Sino-Tibetan *[ʒ́h]ŏn (˜-ɫ) "fish trap or basket"

Following is a list of Proto-Austronesian (PAN) and Proto-Malayo-Polynesian (PMP) fishing terminologies giving a good idea of the importance of sea fishing as an early source of sustenance in this region.

Fishing Terms	PAN	PMP
bait		*baŋi
bait, trolling lure	*paen	*paen
fish basket trap	*bubu	*bubu
fish corral		*belat
fish drive		*kebuR
fishhook	*kawil	*kawil
fishing dip net		*lawa(n,q)
fishing net		*saruk
fishing line		*hapen
fishing net float		*apung
fishing pole		*bitik
fish poison		*tuba
seine net		*puket
sinker		*buliq
spear		*saet
torch, torch fishing		*damaR

Diffusion of Fish Poisons

One of the most interesting areas of research is the widespread use of fish poisons to stupefy and then catch fish, and its relevance to early migration and the development of early agriculture.

For sea fishing, the poisons are usually cast into inter-tidal pools during low tide to stun fish, which are then easily scooped up by hand, net, etc.

Proto-Austronesian *tuba "fish poison, to poison fish" usually refers to either the Derris or Tephrosia species although many other plants are also used. Some species like Barringtonia, which has a waterborne seed, may have been diffused mainly by sea currents. However, other plants like Derris uliginosa, Derris elliptica, Mundulea suberosa, Anamirta cocculus and a number of Tephrosia species do not transfer well over water and are often found in areas where their wild progenitors are lacking or rare, suggesting human agency.

"...Derris uliginosa, is used as a fish poison from the Zambezi River in Africa, through India and Southeast Asia to the Philippines, Java, Australia, Fiji, and the Marquesas. This distribution is much more indicative of a possible human role in its dissemination because Derris, when used as a fish poison, is commonly a cultivated plant and may have been spread over some of its broad range by human action. A third fish poison, Mundulea suberosa, "probably as a result of age- long cultivation" (Howes 1930:133) is used throughout tropical Africa as well as in Madagascar, India, and Ceylon. Or again, Anamirta cocculus is reported from Brittany to the Philippines, including Palestine, Arabia, Persia, India, Malaya, and Java. Another widely distributed plant used in the same way is Derris elliptica, reported from India, Malaya, Indonesia, Borneo, Philippines, the Caroline Islands, and New Guinea."

(Quigley 1956:510)

A strong argument can be made for the distribution of these plants along the spice trade routes in the Old World and by the Lapita expansion in the Pacific.

Tephrosia purpurea (Tephrosia piscatoria) appears to have a pantropical range as a fish poison and often is cultivated without wild parents throughout much of its range. The plant is native to tropical Asia.

Many of the Tephrosia species used for fish poisoning are nearly identical and can often be distinguished only by experts. The same can be said for the Derris and Lonchocarpus species suggesting that these plants may have been mistaken by migrants for the same plants used as fish poisons in former habitats. Another possibility is that early voyagers sought out similar looking plants with the idea that they possessed similar properties.

Quigley lists a number of other fish poisons with spotty pantropical distributions:

Pantropical plants of other genera which are recorded as piscicides in at least part of their range are Cissampelos pareira L. (used in the Philippine Islands and the West Indies according to Quisumbing 1947:146 and Killip and Smith 1935:14); Sapindus saponaria L. (Killip and Smith 1935:14); and Entada phaseoloides L. (used in the Philippines, India, and South Africa, according to Quisumbing 1947; Chopra 1941; and Watt and Breyer-Brandwijk 1932).

(Quigley 1956:520)

Many of the fish poison plants are wasteland weeds and easily cultivated making them ideal for semi-nomadic seafarers to carry along with them. The fish poisoning method does not require as much local knowledge of fish habits and fish species for success as do most other types of sea fishing.


Seascape

Proto-Malayo-Polynesian naturally has many reconstructed terms for the seascape. Here is a partial list of PMP and PAN terms:

*lahud ‘downriver, towards the sea’
*qarus 'current'
*qalun ‘long rolling wave, swell, billow’
*budaq 'foam, froth'
*busa 'foam'
*ruab 'high tide'
*lajay 'coral'
*buŋa ni batu ‘coral sponge’
*sakaRu ‘reef, shoal’
*namaw ‘sheltered water: deep place in a river; cove, harbour, lagoon'
*l(i,u)mut 'seaweed'
*ma-qaCi 'ebb, low tide' (PAN)
*sawaq 'channel, passage'
*qaNud 'drifting on current'
*Nabek ‘breakers, surf, waves’ (PAN)

Remember that the early seafarer did not have the same technologies as those in medieval times or during the Age of Exploration. The vessels were generally smaller with less storage space and lacking waterproof compartments. The sails and materials of those early boats generally necessitated going along with the wind and currents as much as possible and not fighting against these elements. The ability to live as much as possible off the sea itself would have been of great advantage to early explorers and sea traders.

We find that even into the late period that the large kingdoms and empires of Southeast Asia still maintained communities that lived on the water. The king of Sanfotsi exempted these people from taxes, possibly a recognition of their importance to the ancient maritime culture of the region.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Quigley, Carroll. "Aboriginal Fish Poisons and the Diffusion Problem," American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 58, No. 3, (Jun., 1956), 508-525.

Landberg, Leif C. W. "Tuna Tagging and the Extra-Oceanic Distribution of Curved, Single-Piece Shell Fishhooks in the Pacific," American Antiquity, Vol. 31, No. 4 (Apr., 1966), 485-493.

O’Connor, S. "Unpacking the Island Southeast Asian Neolithic Cultural Package, and Finding Local Complexity," IN: Bacus, Elisabeth A, Ian C. Glover, Vincent C. Piggot. Uncovering Southeast Asia's Past, NUS Press, Singapore, 2006.

Pawley, Andrew. "The origins of early Lapita culture: The testimony of historical linguistics," http://epress.anu.edu.au/terra_australis/ta26/pdf/ch02.pdf, 2007.

Phillipson, David W. African Archaeology, Cambridge University Press, 2005, 181-2.

Ross, Malcolm D.; Andrew Pawley; Meredith Osmond, eds. The lexicon of Proto-Oceanic: the culture and environment of ancestral Oceanic society. Canberra: Australian National University E Press, 2007.

White , Nancy. South American Archaeology: Archaic/Preceramic (6000-2000 B.C.): Emergence of sedentism, early ceramics, http://www.indiana.edu/~arch/saa/matrix/saa/saa_mod03.html, 2005.

The impact of the Austronesian expansion: Admiralty Islands

A new study examines again the Austronesian expansion from the view of migrating Austronesian speakers reaching Melanesia.

One problem with these studies is that they do clearly differentiate between Austronesian and Malayo-Polynesian expansion. Even if we grant that Austronesian speakers originated in Taiwan, as the new study claims, it is highly doubtful that the Malayo-Polynesian expansion radiated from that region. There are no Malayo-Polynesian languages in Taiwan, and the general distribution of the linguistic branches do not jibe with a Taiwan location.

Another thing is we should not assume anything about the "race" of the Austronesian speakers, or for that matter the "Melanesians" back in the Neolithic period when these expansions occurred.

Austronesian speakers in the Pacific -- Micronesians, Melanesians and Polynesians -- for example, all have significant percentages of Y chromosome C2 haplogroup. In some Polynesian areas, C2 is the dominant haplotype. However, C2 has not been found in Taiwan so far.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Mol Biol Evol. 2008 Apr 3

The impact of the Austronesian expansion: evidence from mtDNA and Y-chromosome diversity in the Admiralty Islands of Melanesia.

Kayser M, Choi Y, van Oven M, Mona S, Brauer S, Suarkia D, Schiefenhövel W, Stoneking M.

Department of Forensic Molecular Biology, Erasmus University Medical Center Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

The genetic ancestry of Polynesians can be traced to both Asia and Melanesia, which presumably reflects admixture occurring between incoming Austronesians and resident non-Austronesians in Melanesia before the subsequent occupation of the greater Pacific; however, the genetic impact of the Austronesian expansion to Melanesia remains largely unknown. We therefore studied the diversity of non-recombining Y-chromosomal (NRY) and mitochondrial (mt) DNA in the Admiralty Islands, located north of mainland Papua New Guinea, and updated our previous data from Asia, Melanesia and Polynesia with new NRY markers. The Admiralties are occupied today solely by Austronesian-speaking groups, but their human settlement history goes back 20,000 years prior to the arrival of Austronesians about 3,400 years ago. On the Admiralties we found substantial mtDNA and NRY variation of both Austronesian and non-Austronesian origin, with higher frequencies of Asian mtDNA and Melanesian NRY haplogroups, similar to previous findings in Polynesia, and perhaps as consequence of Austronesian matrilocality. Thus, the Austronesian language replacement on the Admiralties (and elsewhere in Island Melanesia and coastal New Guinea) was accompanied by an incomplete genetic replacement that is more associated with mtDNA than with NRY diversity. These results provide further support for the "Slow Boat" model of Polynesian origins, according to which Polynesian ancestors originated from East Asia but genetically mixed with Melanesians before colonizing the Pacific. We also observed that non-Austronesian groups of coastal New Guinea and Island Melanesia had significantly higher frequencies of Asian mtDNA haplogroups than of Asian NRY haplogroups, suggesting sex-biased admixture perhaps as a consequence of non-Austronesian patrilocality. We additionally found that the predominant NRY haplogroup of Asian origin in the Admiralties (O-M110) likely originated in Taiwan, thus providing the first direct Y-chromosome evidence for a Taiwanese origin of the Austronesian expansion. Furthermore, we identified a NRY haplogroup (K-P79, also found on the Admiralties) in Polynesians that most likely arose in the Bismarck Archipelago, providing the first direct link between northern Island Melanesia and Polynesia. These results significantly advance our understanding of the impact of the Austronesian expansion and of human history in the Pacific region.

First evidence of shell fish-hook technology in the Persian Gulf

A new article is out on the discovery of shell fish hooks in the Arabian Gulf (Persian Gulf). Previously shell fish hooks had been discovered at Indian Ocean sites on the Arabian peninsula but not in the Gulf. Here is the abstract of the article.

First evidence of shell fish-hook technology in the Gulf

Authors: Méry, Sophie¹; Charpentier, Vincent¹; Beech, Mark²

Source: Arabian archaeology and epigraphy, Volume 19, Number 1, May 2008 , pp. 15-21(7)

Publisher: Blackwell Publishing

Abstract:

The technology of shell fish-hooks and line fishing is well attested in the coastal areas of the Indian Ocean during the Neolithic period (fifth-fourth millennium BC). Their presence in the coastal area of the Arabian Gulf is now confirmed by new findings from Akab (Umm al-Qaiwain) and Shimal (Ra's al-Khaimah) in the United Arab Emirates.

One of the article's authors, Mark Beech, wrote an article, The Development of Fishing in the U.A.E.: A Zooarchaeological Perspective, in which he compares the use of shell fish hooks in the Gulf with practices in the Pacific (without suggesting direct links).

Shell fish hooks are found in the Neolithic kits of Insular Southeast Asia especially in Taiwan and Timor, but are more abundant in Oceania. The word "fish-hook" has been reconstructed in Proto-Austronesian as *kauil and in Proto-Malayo-Polynesian as *kawil.

Beech, citing Charpentier and Méry (1997), notes that the limestone tools found at apparent shell fish hook workshops in Oman resemble tools used for the same purpose in Polynesia at a much later period. He quotes Sir Joseph Banks' observation on the island of Tahiti:

. . . the shell is first cut by the edge of another shell
into square pieces. These are shaped with files of coral,
with which they work in a manner surprising to any one
who does not know how sharp corals are. Ahole is then
bored in the middle by a drill [. . .] the file then comes
into the hole and completes the hook . . .’

(Best 1929: 32–3)

Other similarities between the shell mound fishing cultures of Oman and the Arabian Gulf with those of the Pacific and Southeast Asia, although of different chronology, include the use of gorges and lures, and stone wall fish corrals. In both regions, we find that Neolithic cultures also practiced sea mammal hunting.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Parasites as probes for transoceanic human migrations?

A new study supports earlier evidence from parasite studies suggesting a seaborne migration to the Americas. This study seems to mainly analyze data from previous research involving helminths found in mummies and coprolites (dung fossils). There has been a flurry of articles recently supporting the theory of transpacific or transoceanic Pre-Columbian contact and/or migration between Asia and the Americas. Helminths are not found in Siberia, Alaska or northern Canada. One South American mummy that contained helminth (Ancylostoma duodenale) eggs dated back to 1500 BCE.

Trends Parasitol. 2008 Mar;24(3):112-5.

Epub 2008 Feb 11.

Parasites as probes for prehistoric human migrations?

Araujo A, Reinhard KJ, Ferreira LF, Gardner SL.

Fundação Oswaldo Cruz/Escola Nacional de Saude Publica; Rua Leopoldo Bulhoes 1480, Rio de Janeiro 2104-210, RJ, Brazil.

Host-specific parasites of humans are used to track ancient migrations. Based on archaeoparasitology, it is clear that humans entered the New World at least twice in ancient times. The archaeoparasitology of some intestinal parasites in the New World points to migration routes other than the Bering Land Bridge. Helminths have been found in mummies and coprolites in North and South America. Hookworms (Necator and Ancylostoma), whipworms (Trichuris trichiura) and other helminths require specific conditions for life-cycle completion. They could not survive in the cold climate of the northern region of the Americas. Therefore, humans would have lost some intestinal parasites while crossing Beringia. Evidence is provided here from published data of pre-Columbian sites for the peopling of the Americas through trans-oceanic or coastal migrations.