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Incorporating research findings over the last twenty years, First Islanders examines the human prehistory of Island Southeast Asia. This fascinating story is explored from a broad swathe of multidisciplinary perspectives and pays close attention to migration in the period dating from 1.5 million years ago to the development of Indic kingdoms late in the first millennium CE.
List of contents
List of Figures and Plates xii
Invited Contributors xv
Acknowledgments xvi
1 Introducing First Islanders 1
This Book 3
A Note on Dating Terminology 7
A Note on Archaeological Terminology 7
Pronunciation and Place-names 9
Notes 9
References 10
2 Island Southeast Asia as a Canvas for Human Migration 11
The Shelves and Basins 12
Sundaland 15
Wallacea 15
Sahul 16
The Island Southeast Asian Environment 16
Climate 16
Landforms and Soils 18
The Floras of Island Southeast Asia 20
Faunal and Biogeographical Boundaries 21
The Cyclical Changes of the Pleistocene 22
The Pleistocene Epoch: Definition and Chronology 22
The Cycles of Glacials and Interglacials 23
World Sea Level Changes During the Pleistocene 23
The Consequences of Mid-latitude Glaciation 27
Notes 30
References 30
3 Homo erectus and Homo floresiensis: Archaic Hominins in Island Southeast Asia 34
Hominin Antecedents in Africa and Asia 35
Homo erectus in Java 38
Java - Pleistocene Mammals and Stratigraphy 39
Sangiran 41
Ngandong 43
When Did Hominins Arrive in Java? 44
The Evolution of Javan Homo erectus 46
An Invited Perspective by Colin Groves 46
The Dating of the Javan Hominins 47
The Homo erectus Cranium 49
The Homo erectus Mandible 50
Homo erectus Teeth 50
Homo erectus Postcranial Material 51
Evolution within Javan Homo erectus 52
The Philippines, Sulawesi, and Nusa Tenggara: Pleistocene Mammals and Stratigraphy 53
The Philippines 54
Sulawesi 54
Flores and Nusa Tenggara 55
Homo floresiensis (and Homo erectus?) in Flores 58
The Enigma of Homo floresiensis 60
An Invited Perspective by Debbie Argue 60
The Homo floresiensis Controversy 62
Was Homo floresiensis a Dwarfed Homo erectus? 64
Was Homo floresiensis Descended from a Separate
Early Hominin Lineage? 64
Cultural Evidence Related to Homo erectus and Homo floresiensis 65
Java and the Tools of Homo erectus 67
Flores and the Tools of Homo floresiensis 71
Retrospect 74
Notes 75
References 76
4 The Biological History of Homo sapiens in Island Southeast Asia 86
The First Homo sapiens in Southeast Asia 89
Early to Middle Holocene Skeletal Data from Island Southeast Asia 93
The Biological Arrival of an Asian Neolithic Population in Island Southeast Asia 94
The Significance of Skin Pigmentation in Equatorial Latitudes 97
The Biological History of Southeast Asian Populations from Late Pleistocene and Holocene Cemetery Data 98
An Invited Perspective by Hirofumi Matsumura, Marc Oxenham, Truman Simanjuntak, and Mariko Yamagata 98
Craniometric Analysis 99
Early Indigenous Hunter-gatherers 99
Neolithic Dispersal in Mainland Southeast Asia 103
Neolithic Dispersal in Island Southeast Asia 104
Conclusions 106
The Genetic History of Human Populations in Island Southeast Asia During the Late Pleistocene and Holocene 107
An Invited Perspective by Murray Cox 107
The Population History of Island Southeast Asia 117
Notes 119
References 120
5 Late Paleolithic Archaeology in Island Southeast Asia 131
Mainland Southeast Asia, Peninsular Malaysia, and Sumatra: The Hoa
About the author
Peter Bellwood is an Emeritus Professor at the Australian National University, which he joined in 1973, retiring in 2013. He has undertaken archaeological research in Polynesia and Island Southeast Asia and is currently involved in projects in Vietnam, Indonesia, and the Philippines. His most recent books include
The Global Prehistory of Human Migration (edited, Wiley Blackwell, 2015),
First Migrants (Wiley Blackwell, 2013),
Prehistory of the Indo-Malaysian Archipelago (3rd edition, 2007),
First Farmers (Wiley Blackwell, 2005), and
Southeast Asia: From Prehistory to History (co-edited, 2005). Peter Bellwood is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities and a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy.
Summary
Incorporating research findings over the last twenty years, First Islanders examines the human prehistory of Island Southeast Asia. This fascinating story is explored from a broad swathe of multidisciplinary perspectives and pays close attention to migration in the period dating from 1.
Report
"In First Islanders, Peter Bellwood -without doubt the leading authority on the archaeology and prehistory of Island Southeast Asia- offers up an engaging synthesis of the grand sweep of human history in this island world, from the arrival of early hominins one million years ago, through the development of agriculture and the Austronesian expansion, up to the early Metal Age. Bellwood brings the fascinating prehistory of this vast region to life as no other archaeologist can. First Islanders belongs on the bookshelf of every scholar of world prehistory." - Patrick V. Kirch , University of California Berkeley
