Late Holocene potting traditions in the far western Pacific: Evidence from the Raja Ampat Islands, 3500–1000 BP

Abstract

The question of where Lapita groups derived from, immediately prior to their appearance in the Bismarck Archipelago, is a perennial one; it is a question that remains largely unaddressed owing to a dearth of research in West Papua.This chapter describes two pottery sequences from Waigeo Island in the Raja Ampat group, off the Bird's Head of New Guinea.Mololo Cave preserves pottery from 3100-2700 years ago and possibly 3800-3500 years ago.Some of the sherds are red-slipped and incised, with similarities to Island Southeast Asian Neolithic ceramics, while other sherds share morphological similarities with Lapita plainware.However, intricate decorations like dentate stamping and lime infilling, characteristic of the earliest Island Southeast Asian and Lapita ceramics, are absent.Manwen Bokor Cave preserves pottery from 1300-1000 years ago, with fewer instances of red slip, but more intricate decorations including circle stamping, impression and incision.These later ceramics share affinities with pottery from eastern Wallacea and northern New Guinea, showing a more restricted sphere of influence later in time; that is, there was a process of network contraction and regionalisation between c. 3500 and 1000 BP.

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