156
9 Exploration Strategies, Settlement Sequence and the Evolution of Canoe Design
with the largest land areas (Madagascar, New Zealand, Island Melanesia, Western
Polynesia and Hawaii, possibly in that order). It seems that after AD 76 when foreign traders moved into the Spice Island region, more distant oceanic migrations
were made by defeated tribes following their loss of land in the Spice Islands. This
is the pattern described in traditional accounts. The long maritime, oceanographic,
horticultural and economic history of the Spice Island archipelago can be seen to
have powerfully affected the colonizing history of the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
Spice trading and the conflict it generated can be seen as a central factor driving that
history, as indeed some would argue it drove later global maritime history. Without
its Spice Island base being taken into account, the colonizing history of Polynesia
is less coherent, logical and predictable and is significantly diminished. Without
its Spice Island base, the focus of Polynesian migration history moves instead,
as it has done for the last 50 years, to the so-called Lapita peoples’ settlement of
Island Melanesia and Western Polynesia and to the later struggle to settle the small
archipelagoes of Eastern Polynesia from Western Polynesia. With this focus, the
remarkable oceanic explorations and colonizations of both first- and second-wave
Spice Island mariners have been lost to sight, though, as we have argued, they are
central to an understanding of the history of Spice Island migrations in both oceans
and especially central to an understanding of the settlement history of the Pacific.
9.7 Migrations Within and from Eastern Polynesia: Evolution
in Sailing Strategies and Canoe Design
The commonly presented map of Polynesia with New Zealand isolated at the bottom
apex of the vast Polynesian triangle has fuelled the belief that because New Zealand
is so far from Eastern Polynesia and hard to reach, it must have been the last land
in the Pacific to be settled. New Zealand is not regarded as being close to New
Caledonia (a neighbour so close that, as we have commented, its distance from New
Zealand is little greater than the length of New Zealand itself north to south). Rather
it is linked with Hawaii and Easter Island, the other two apices of the Polynesian triangle. The early archaeological finds in all three are seen as technologically archaic
not because of antiquity but by virtue of remoteness, for Polynesian migrations have
been seen as logically sequential, west to east, nearest to most remote.
Ben Finney has shown that tacking against the wind quadruples distances as the
bird flies: “To make good one nautical mile against the true wind . . . a Polynesian
double canoe must tack 3.9 miles” [2]. This emphasizes the difficulties involved in
sailing against the trade winds and associated currents in a west–east colonization
of the southern Pacific. But it has little application to the early route south, recorded
in tradition, following the powerful East Australian Current to New Zealand. With
a strong northerly – and especially a long-lasting El Niño northerly – behind it, a
canoe would have fast sailing to New Zealand on this shorter route. The first New
Zealanders almost certainly reached New Zealand in Halmaherian double-masted
double-outriggers. These would have had the sailing advantage for which they had
9 Exploration Strategies, Settlement Sequence and the Evolution of Canoe Design
with the largest land areas (Madagascar, New Zealand, Island Melanesia, Western
Polynesia and Hawaii, possibly in that order). It seems that after AD 76 when foreign traders moved into the Spice Island region, more distant oceanic migrations
were made by defeated tribes following their loss of land in the Spice Islands. This
is the pattern described in traditional accounts. The long maritime, oceanographic,
horticultural and economic history of the Spice Island archipelago can be seen to
have powerfully affected the colonizing history of the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
Spice trading and the conflict it generated can be seen as a central factor driving that
history, as indeed some would argue it drove later global maritime history. Without
its Spice Island base being taken into account, the colonizing history of Polynesia
is less coherent, logical and predictable and is significantly diminished. Without
its Spice Island base, the focus of Polynesian migration history moves instead,
as it has done for the last 50 years, to the so-called Lapita peoples’ settlement of
Island Melanesia and Western Polynesia and to the later struggle to settle the small
archipelagoes of Eastern Polynesia from Western Polynesia. With this focus, the
remarkable oceanic explorations and colonizations of both first- and second-wave
Spice Island mariners have been lost to sight, though, as we have argued, they are
central to an understanding of the history of Spice Island migrations in both oceans
and especially central to an understanding of the settlement history of the Pacific.
9.7 Migrations Within and from Eastern Polynesia: Evolution
in Sailing Strategies and Canoe Design
The commonly presented map of Polynesia with New Zealand isolated at the bottom
apex of the vast Polynesian triangle has fuelled the belief that because New Zealand
is so far from Eastern Polynesia and hard to reach, it must have been the last land
in the Pacific to be settled. New Zealand is not regarded as being close to New
Caledonia (a neighbour so close that, as we have commented, its distance from New
Zealand is little greater than the length of New Zealand itself north to south). Rather
it is linked with Hawaii and Easter Island, the other two apices of the Polynesian triangle. The early archaeological finds in all three are seen as technologically archaic
not because of antiquity but by virtue of remoteness, for Polynesian migrations have
been seen as logically sequential, west to east, nearest to most remote.
Ben Finney has shown that tacking against the wind quadruples distances as the
bird flies: “To make good one nautical mile against the true wind . . . a Polynesian
double canoe must tack 3.9 miles” [2]. This emphasizes the difficulties involved in
sailing against the trade winds and associated currents in a west–east colonization
of the southern Pacific. But it has little application to the early route south, recorded
in tradition, following the powerful East Australian Current to New Zealand. With
a strong northerly – and especially a long-lasting El Niño northerly – behind it, a
canoe would have fast sailing to New Zealand on this shorter route. The first New
Zealanders almost certainly reached New Zealand in Halmaherian double-masted
double-outriggers. These would have had the sailing advantage for which they had