Coconut evidence supports Pre-Columbian journeys across the Pacific

Somehow I missed the following article when if first came out despite my subscription to the Coconut Study mailing list!

Baudouin, L & Lebrun, L (2008) Coconut (Cocos nucifera L.) DNA studies support the hypothesis of an ancient Austronesian migration from Southeast Asia to America. Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution 56 (2), 257-262.

Abstract The centre of origin of coconut extends from Southwest Asia to Melanesia. Nevertheless, its pre-Columbian existence on the Pacific coast of America is attested. This raises questions about how, when and from where coconut reached America. Our molecular marker study relates the pre-Columbian coconuts to coconuts from the Philippines rather than to those of any other Pacific region, especially Polynesia. Such an origin rules out the possibility of natural dissemination by the sea currents. Our findings corroborate the interpretation of a complex of artefacts found in the Bahía de Caraquez (Ecuador) as related to South-East Asian cultures. Coconut thus appears to have been brought by Austronesian seafarers from the Philippines to Ecuador about 2,250 years BP. We discuss the implications of molecular evidence for assessing the possible contribution of early trans-pacific travels to and from America to the dissemination of domesticated plants and animals.

Again this appears to be a landmark find that was completely ignored by the mainstream Western press.

The article was published along with a number of relevant studies that came out around the same time on Pre-Columbian chickens in the Americas, along with Pre-Columbian Datura metel and custard apple in South Asia.

The coconut study is based on examination of DNA microsatellite markers and the distribution of varieties that are resistant to the Lethal Yellowing diseases, which are transmitted by insects. For some discussion on the Ecuadorian cultures mentioned in the abstract, see my posts on fish hooks, fish poisons, Solheim's theory on Pre-Columbian contacts, migrations along the Kuroshio Current, and plants across the Pacific.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Kuroshio Current and the Navel of the Sea

The earliest unmistakable description of the Kuroshio Current (Black Tide), also known as the "Japan Current," is given by Chou Ku-Fei (Zhou Chufei) in 1178.

Southwest of the four commanderies (chun) of Hainan there is a great sea called the Ocean of Chiao-chih (i.e., Vietnam or Tonking). In the midst of this sea there are three currents that carry the bubbling waves off in three directions.

-- Ling wai tai ta, translated in TSCC, first edition, 3118, 9-10.

All these currents are found in the ocean off Vietnam. The southern current is said to flow toward the seas of the southern barbarian states. The northern current flows up the Taiwan Strait. The third current is obviously the Kuroshio Current and flows toward the "Great Eastern Ocean," i.e., the Pacific Ocean. The Ling wai tai ta states that east of the state of Toupo is the Island of Women and then further east the Weilu, the cosmic oceanic drain. Chau Ju-kua (Zhao Rugua, 1226 CE) claims that it is in this region that the waters begin to flow east, i.e., where the Kuroshio Current begins. Actually the Kuroshio flows toward the northeast at its point of origin and then turns toward the east near the Bering Sea.

An interesting at least partial confirmation of the idea of a great ocean drain can be found in the islands of Kiribati in the middle of the Pacific Ocean near the equator. The navigators of Kiribati divide the Western Ocean into four toki or boundaries. Arthur Grimble describes these oceanic zones:

Theoretically the western ocean is plotted out into four zones, of which two are named and two merely described. In the first zone beyond the Fish-trap of Kabaki, the sea is said to take a downward slope away from home, and a mariner's return becomes increasingly difficult as he progresses towards the second zone. The second is a region of dead calms, where the downward of the sea becomes sharper still, and wherein dwells the monstrous uu-fish. This dreadful creature is said to be able with one suck (uu) to engulf and swallow a canoe 'together with all its crew'. The third zone, wherein the strayed voyager abandons all hope of life, is called Te wenei-n-anti, shooting star (or wake) of spirits—and is described as the region where a man has two shadows. In the words of my informant: 'If the voyager looks at looks at the sail his shadow is there, and if he looks upon the water his shadow is upon the water'. The fourth zone is called Te-uabuki-te-re — The-capsize-the-somersault — and is haunted by a strange, lonely bird who cries continually, 'I a kaawa, I a kaawa ('I am unhappy, I am unhappy').' Here the doomed canoe is seized in a resistless current which sweeps it west for a day and a night until it reaches the edge of a tremendous maelstrom, where it is sucked into the depths.

The "Fish-trap of Kabaki" is delineated by a line from the Caroline Islands southeast toward Samoa. So the four toki refer to regions to the west of that line. Grimble thought the South Equatorial Current was meant, although it could just as easily be the North Equatorial Current that also flows toward the Carolines and then continues westward merging with the Kuroshio Current. This ocean current to the West is found mentioned in genealogical stories going back 15 to 20 generations.

In Sulawesi, the landlocked Toraja have a vague myth that might also preserve ancient memories of an oceanic current near an island to the north some 25 generations ago from which they believe clan ancestors ventured to their current home.

The Toraja state the creator god Puang Matua was located in the "center of the sky" across the ocean to the north of Sulawesi. The deity went to the "center of the sea" to fetch gold that was used in creating Manturino, ancestor of water buffaloes; Golden Stem, ancestor of the rice plant; and Datu Laukku, the first human. All three are said to be split from the same "umbilical cord." Other than gold, the elements used to create these beings were the "yellow egg of the Earth," "the Prince of Water," and the "heat of fire." These were all located at the center of the sea at a place known as "River of the Earth" (Atena Padang) and the "source of foam." The ancestors of the Toraja descended from Heaven on a ladder to the island of Pongko directly below the Skyworld and north of Sulawesi.

The Atena Padang or "River of the Earth" near the "center of the sea" and located toward the north of Sulawesi might preserve the same ancient knowledge as found in the Chinese and Kiribati versions. The Bare'e-speaking Toraja know of the Puse Ntasi "Navel of the Sea" through which nine currents flow sometimes interrupted by the giant crab that causes the tides. Water evaporates there and turns into clouds. Here was the great mango tree, the Taripa Djandji or Taripa Djambi where we find various deities and animals dwelling.


Navel of sea, world tree, guardian, tides, ocean currents, earthquakes, etc.

We find scattered in Southeast Asia, various myths related to the navel of the sea that often contain explanations for tides and currents. The associated motifs generally include:

1. Navel or center of the sea that drains waters of the world
2. A submarine tree, pillar, etc. at the navel linking to the underworld and/or the skyworld
3. An animal, fish, bird, deity, etc. dwelling at the navel or the base of the tree/pillar
4. Cause of ebb and flow of tides (usually due to a giant serpent, whale, crab, bird, etc. that covers the drain being attracted by the Full Moon)
5. Cause of ocean currents due to water flowing in and out
6. Cause of earthquakes caused by creature at navel that shakes world pillar
7. Relationship to Sun and Moon e.g., eclipses, tides, lunar months, etc.
8. The sea flood (rising sea levels) is associated with the navel of the sea.
   

Here is a sampling from the region in which a number of these motifs are contained. The myth is very diverse on the island of Mindanao.

In 1698, Gaspar de San Agustin gives one of the earliest accounts of these motifs in the insular Southeast Asia and Pacific region in his Conquista de las Islas Filipinas. He describes the myth of the formation of the island of Bohol in the central Philippines. A goddess falls from a hole in the skyworld to fetch the medicine of the cosmic balete tree growing at the bottom of the ocean. A toad helps her and happens to bring up some earth growing around the balete tree, which is deposited on the back of a giant turtle. This earth eventually grows into the island of Bohol.

The Manobo of Mindanao, Philippines, believe that a great python guards the central mushroom-shaped pillar of the earth. They also have many variants of the navel of the sea (Pusod to Dagat) myth assigning to it the tides and the evaporation of water. The python shakes the pillar causing earthquakes.

The Bagobo of Mindanao conceived of a great eel known as Kasili that was wrapped around the base of the world pillar at the navel of the sea. His companion was the giant crab Kuyamang who when attracted by the Full Moon left the great hole causing the tides. Kasili or a great serpent causes earthquakes by shaking the world's pillars.

Among the Subanu of Mindanao, the hero Punbenua ventures to the Pusu Dagat "navel of the sea," to obtain the liver of the black snake that dwells at the base of the submarine Dangal Bahal tree. The Pusu Dagat is responsible for the ebb and flow of the tide.

Also from Mindanao, the Tiruray believe that a great dragon known as Diwata or Naga lives at the Fused Dagot "Navel of the Sea," that swallows the Sun at its setting.

Among the Mandaya, the Sun and Moon had a child, the giant crab known as Tabanakaua. The crab went to live at the navel of the sea and caused the tides by moving in and out of the cosmic drain. His moving about causes the waves and ocean currents. When angry at his mother he tries to swallow her causing the eclipse.

A widespread myth among Malays and Javanese is that of the Pusat Tasik "Navel of the Sea" in the middle of the sea where the Pauh Janggi tree grows. Here is a giant crab at the foot of the cosmic tree that causes the tides and currents by moving in and out of the navel. A great Garuda or Roc bird is perched on the branches of the Pauh Janggi. Also, in Kelantan the deity Si Raya, who appears to be the same as the Cham whale god Po Rayak (Po Riyak) is also thought to dwell at the Pusat Tasik through his identity as To Rimpun Alam. From at least Rumphius' day during the mid-17th century, the Pauh Janggi has been linked by some populations in the region with the coco de mer, although the word "pauh" refers to a wild mango tree species. The coco de mer occurs only in the Seychelles island group today but its fruit often float to the Maldives off the coast of India. However, more than a century earlier than Rumphius, Pigafetta describes the location of the tree near the Island of Women during the voyage of Magellan.

He [the Maluku pilot] told us moreover that an island called Ocoloro, below Java Major, is peopled by women alone, who are rendered pregnant by the wind. Should they produce a boy they kill him immediately ; if a girl she is reared. If a man at any time tries to visit the island they put him to death.

Other tales were likewise related to us. North of Java Major, in the Gulf of China, called by the ancients Sinus Magnus, there is said to be a very large tree, called Campanganghi (cam panganghi), on which there are birds called garuda, of such immense size, and so strong, they can carry a buffalo or an elephant to the place of the tree called Puzathaer (puza thaer). The fruit of the tree, which is called Buapanganghi (bua panganghi), is larger than a cucumber... This tree cannot be approached on account of the whirlpools about the island, which extend three or four leagues from shore.

Now as Pigafetta's Java Major is the island of Borneo, we can see that the myth relates to a location that agrees more with the Chinese account of the Weilu and Kuroshio Current, especially as the "Gulf of China" would mean all the sea opposite the coast of South China. The description of the Island of Women matches much of the detail given by Chau Ju-Kua three centuries earlier of the location with the same name located southeast of Quanzhou.

In olden days, whenever a ship was wrecked by a tempest on these shores, the women would take the men home with them, but they were all dead within a few days....The women of this country conceive by exposing themselves naked to the full force of the south wind, and so give birth to female children.

Also, Muslim literature generally locates the Roc or Ruk bird in Zabag or Wakwak. From Pigafetta's Puzathaer, we get Malay Pusat Air "Navel of the Waters." The "bua" of "Buapanganghi" is likely one of the words, bua, buah, etc. derived from PMP *buak that are found throughout the region meaning "fruit." Some have suggested that Panganghi is a corruption of Pauh Janggi. The word "janggi" appears to probably be a corruption of Toraja "djandji" as mentioned above for the taripa djandji or djambi (taripa "mango," djampu "fruit"). Malay also has the word "djandji," so there must have been some miscommunication along the way. The evidence suggesting the Toraja name is the more original form is that among the Bare'e, taripa djandji is the common way of saying "mango tree," while in Malay, Pauh Janggi refers only specifically to the mythical tree. Also, since "pauh" is the Malay word for a wild mango tree, it is likely that at a late date the Pauh Janggi was conflated by some groups with the coco de mer. The Toraja's seafaring linguistic cousins, the Bugis, are known to collect giant mango stones, which they decorate in silver.

Maori legend tells of the Te Parata, a giant taniwha, a dragon or serpent-like creature, that creates a great whirlpool far beyond the horizon at "mid-ocean." The maelstrom sucks in passing canoes. Te Parata's inhaling and exhaling of the waters causes the tides. In Rarotonga, the great navigator Tangiia traveled with the Samoan Karika to 'Avaiki (Savai'i) in Samoa in possibly the 13th century. From there Tangiia ventured much further West to the original homeland known as 'Avaiki te Varinga or Atia te Varinga. Where exactly this was is hard to say, but on the return journey eastward he stopped at Uea (Wallis Island) . It was while traveling westward from Savai'i to Atia te Varinga that Tangiia encountered the Fafa, a great whirlpool.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Demetrio, Francisco. "Creation Myths among the Early Filipinos," Asian Folklore Studies, Vol. 27, No. 1 (1968), 41-79 .

Downs, Richard Erskine. The religion of the Bare'e-speaking Toradja of Central Celebes, 's-Gravenhage, Uitgeverij Excelsior, 1956

Eugenio, Damiana L Philippine Folk Literature: The Myths, University of the Philippines Press, 1993.

Grimble, R. Migrations, myth and magic from the Gilbert Islands: early writings of Sir Arthur Grimble, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972.

Kruyt, Albert C. Woordenlijst van de Baree-taal, M. Nijhoff, 1894.

Jocano, F. Landa. Outline of Philippine Mythology, Manila: Centre Escolar University Research and Development Center, 1969.

Tregear, Edward. The Maori Race, Wanganui, 1904.

Tsintjilonis, D. "Embodied difference; The body-person of the Sadan Toraja," Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 153 (1997), no: 2, Leiden, 244-272.

Solheim on Nusantao Voyages to the Americas

Archaeologist Wilhelm Solheim has proposed lately that Jomon-like Valdivia pottery of Ecuador and other pottery resembling the Sa-Huynh-Kalanay tradition has its ultimate origin in Southeast Asia.

Solheim quotes the seminal work of the late James Ford, A Comparison of Formative Cultures in the Americas: Diffusion or the Psychic Unity of Man:

At about 3000 BC after a long sea voyage from the southwestern Japanese Islands, a group of fisherman landed on the coast of Ecuador. Meggers, Evans, and Estrada (1965), who have presented the evidence in support of this happening, so novel in terms of currently accepted theory about New World cultural development, have modestly suggested that perhaps this was a single boatload of fishermen, lost at sea in a storm, who were unwillingly brought to the shores of America by the North Pacific ocean current.

There is reason to suspect, however, that this might have been more in the nature of an exploring and colonizing expedition involving a number of individuals of both sexes and varied skills. Subsequent events in the Americas suggest that these people had a seafaring, exploring and colonizing tradition, similar to that fo the later Polynesians and Vikings. Solheim (1964[a]:360, 376—84) has offered statistical evidence to show that one of three sources of Malayan and Polynesian ceramic traditions was influenced from the Japanese Islands at an estimated date of 1000 to 500 BC. The extensive spread of this 'Sa-Hunh-Kalanay' tradition in the southwestern Pacific certainly implies a seafaring tradition. Most of the ceramic shapes, decorative elements, and design motifs are similar to those postulated to have spread to the Americas between 3000 and 1000 B.C.

The remarkable variety of the Valdivia ceramics suggests that more than one or two individuals, or lineages, founded and maintained this tradition. The highly selective fashion in which certain elements of the complex were spread to other parts of the Americas, also argues that specialization in this craft had already developed. Furthermore, as varied as it is the Valdivia ceramic complex does not represent the entire range of pottery manufactured at 3000 B.C. in southwestern Japan. As with the early English settlement at Jamestown in Virgina, the products manufactured corresponded to the experience and training of the craftsmen brought from the mother country (Ford 1969: 183-184).

Solheim believes based on the similarities of the Valdivia and other assemblages in decoration and form with the Sa-Huynh-Kalanay complex that Nusantao voyagers from were making infrequent visits to the west coast of the Americas starting around 3000 BCE using the Kuroshio (Japan) Current.




Some examples given by Wilhelm Solheim of pottery decoration showing relationship with Sa-Huynh-Kalanay designs.

Top row: The third from the left is from Puerto Hormiga, Columbia with the rest from Valdivia, Ecuador.

Second row: The third from the left is from Barlovento, Columbia with the rest from Valdivia, Ecuador.

Third row: Valdivia; Machalilla, Ecuador; Veracruz, Mexico.

Bottom: Veracruz, Mexico.

Redrawn by Ric de Guzman in John N. Miksic, Earthenware in Southeast Asia: Proceedings of the Singapore Symposium.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Ford, J. A. A Comparison of Formative Cultures in the Americas: Diffusion or the Psychic Unity of Man, Smithsonian Contributions to Anthropology Vol. 11, Washington D.C., Smithsonian Institution Press, 1969.

Miksic, John N. Earthenware in Southeast Asia: Proceedings of the Singapore Symposium, National University of Singapore Press, 2003, 20-21.

Solheim II, Wilhelm G. Archaeology and Culture in Southeast Asia: Unraveling the Nusantao, University of the Philippines Press, 2006.

Nan'yo and the Search for the Japanese Homeland

Yanagita Kunio, known as the "founder of Japanese folklore studies" and the "father of Japanese ethnography," popularized the idea that the ancestors of the Japanese migrated from the South Seas to Okinawa and then to Japan using the Kuroshio Current.

Reportedly he was inspired when he found a palm nut washed ashore by the Kuroshio while walking on Iragomisaki beach in Aichi Prefecture.

Studying the movement of cowrie shells from the South northward, he linked the shell trade with rice cultivation in his books Takaragai no Koto (The Cowrie) and Kaijo no michi (Ocean Road).

The South Seas were divided into two parts, Uchi Nan'yo (Inner South Seas) consisting mainly of Micronesia, and Soto Nan'yo (Outer South Seas) referring to Southeast Asia and especially the Philippines and Indonesia. Interestingly, the Southeast Asian countries were seen as an expansion of the Pacific island ones, rather than vice a versa.

Cultural anthropologist Shinji Yamashita wrote concerning Japanese conquests in the 20th century that "colonization of the Nan'yo differed from European colonization in that it entailed the return of the ancestors to their homeland" in Japanese minds of that period.

Earlier in this blog, I have written of how the Japanese prized aged earthenware jars from Southeast Asia, and particularly Luzon, since about Sung Dynasty times. This near obsession with old, earthenware jars may stem from ancient beliefs in ancestral homelands like Takamagahara and Tokoyonokuni overseas to the South in Japanese legendary history. It was from the earth of Takamagahara that earthenware, handmade (ta-kujiri) "Heavenly Jars" were fashioned and sacrificed by the first Emperor Jimmu.

The hidden Christians of Japan came to regard Luzon (Roson) in the Philippines as a sacred land apparently conflating Christian and Shinto beliefs after the government crackdown on foreign missionaries. The fabled Southeast Asian Namban jar trade dissipated probably due to the response of Christian colonial governments in Southeast Asia.

When Japan took over Taiwan in the latter part of the 1800s, interest in Nan'yo began to blossom anew. Writers like Suzuki Tsunenori and Shiga Shigetaka ventured into the Pacific islands and their journals captured the public imagination. The new interest in the Pacific and Southeast Asia went against the grain of the Meiji Era idea of datsua nyuo or disassociation with Asia in favor of Westernization.

One researcher rebelling against these new ideas was Kimura Takatora who fiercely rejected any association with South Sea Islanders, Koreans, Chinese, etc., but instead argued that the Japanese were a "Graeco-Latin" race whose homeland Takamagahara was in Armenia.

However, these ideas did not catch on much not only because of the difficulty in distance and culture, but in the near complete lack of evidence mustered by proponents of a Japanese Caucasian race theory.

In comparison, the Nan'yo theory was logical and quite a bit of convincing evidence could be mustered up to support the idea. Nan'yo was more harmonious with the descriptions given in Japanese traditional origin texts. And the cultural milieu, especially with reference to rice culture was quite similar in a number of ways.

Rice was a key element in beliefs found in Japan and Okinawa concerning the 'divine visitor' as seen in the folklore of the Marebito and "Miroku's boat" (Maitreya's boat).

Especially in coastal regions of eastern Japan, special dances and songs were performed to drive away evil and welcome the cult-like cargo of Miroku's boat that was prophesied to bring enough rice to initiate the millenarian Miroku no yo "Age of Miroku." These beliefs appear linked with celebrations of the divine ancestors who first brought rice agriculture to Japanese shores from the South.

Just before and during the outbreak of World War II, the Japanese government began a huge campaign aimed at promoting Southeast Asia as the Japanese ancestral homeland. Attention was also focused on Micronesia, and the sentiments of Takano Rokuro, a Ministry of Welfare bureau chief, 'We are Nan'yojin (South Sea Islanders)," carried much weight among nationalists.

More than 7,000 books and articles were published on the subject of a Southeast Asian homeland in 1942 alone, and between 1942 and 1943 a series of government sponsored lectures brought the new ideas directly to the Japanese public.

Japanese capitalists were enthusiastic about promoting such ideology. Nan'yo Boeki (South Seas Trading Company) which dated back to early trade with the Spanish colony in the Philippines, and Nan'yo Kohatsu (South Seas Development Company) founded in 1921 were deeply involved in Japanese imperialistic ventures.

In 1943, under the guidance of Masao Oka, the Institute of Ethnology was opened dedicated to studying the cultures of Southeast Asia. Important researchers were sent into the field, for example, Tadao Kano became head of museums in the Philippines were he played an important role in saving historical artifacts from destruction during the war.

Reading the works of Yanagita Kunio and some of his followers, it is not difficult to believe that at least some Japanese did in fact believe that the expansion and development of the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere," was nothing less than the liberation of the original Japanese homeland.

Interestingly, the formation of the first Kamikaze Group was at East Mabalacat Airfield, between Mt. Arayat and Mt. Pinatubo. "Kamikaze" or "shin-pu" both represented by the same characters refer to the "Divine Wind," the typhoons that saved Japan from Mongol invasions. The Kamikaze storms helped develop the idea of Japan as Shinkoku "Divine Land," and it might be taken that the Kamikaze pilots of World War II believed they were also defending another divine land in addition to Japan -- the Nan'yo homeland of the South.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Clarke, Peter Bernard. Japanese New Religions, Routledge, 2000, p. 134.

Nakasone, Ronald Y. Okinawan Diaspora, University of Hawaii Press, 2002, 48-50, 57-60.

Oguma, Eji and David Askew. A genealogy of 'Japanese' self-images, Trans Pacific Press, 2002.

Yamashita, Shinji, Joseph Bosco and Jeremy Seymour Eades. The Making of Anthropology in East and Southeast Asia , Berghahn Books, 2004. See especially "Southeast Asia as Japan's Homeland" by Yamashita starting on pg. 104.