344
19 Correlation of Significant Voyaging Activity with Rare Extreme Climate Events
Line. This is not surprising given the evidence presented in Chapter 12 for the
drought-driven history of tropical Polynesia and of the west coast of North America
during the Medieval Climatic Optimum. Long-distance oceanic migrations spanning this global warm period, from the southern migrations to Hawaii in 1096 to the
last migration to New Zealand on the cusp of the Little Ice Age, appear to have been
triggered either directly by El Niño-driven drought within tropical Polynesia or by
the demographic stress and conflicts it engendered. The combination of necessity
and opportunity clearly drove long-distance migration in this global warm period,
as it appears to have done in earlier warm periods. The pattern of migrations tied to
global warmth Lamb claims is universal, whether the migrations are land-based or
oceanic.
Drought-driven long-distance migrations in the Medieval Climatic Optimum
from Eastern Polynesia to Hawaii and to New Zealand involved far more that the
ferrying of tribal groups to new lands. The seizure of territories by immigrants and
their imposition of their own cultural prerogatives and even, as in the case of Toi
(see Chapter 16), the imposition of their language on indigenous peoples sometimes
had far-reaching consequences. For example, the introduction of the kumara by
Hoaki and Taukata and by other medieval migrants from tropical Polynesia to New
Zealand, as we saw in Part II, significantly affected demographic outcomes in that
country. The unusually warm conditions of the Medieval Climatic Optimum both
assisted migrants’ passage to New Zealand and enabled them to establish kumara
once they had arrived. Ultimately it was because horticulture, mostly based on the
kumara, so strongly affected survival in New Zealand during the Little Ice Age that
horticulturally skilled Eastern Polynesian medieval migrants and their descendants
eventually gained an unusual degree of ascendancy over the indigenous peoples who
so vastly outnumbered them at the time of their arrival.
The Heke, the last migration fleet to reach New Zealand, also had a substantial effect on the history of the country, partly because it was such a carefully
planned and successful migration. Far from being a “myth”, a pakeha construct,
it was solidly rooted in a traditional Polynesian pattern whereby a substantial group
of people and their complex ark of resources were translocated to another island
or archipelago by a fleet of canoes. In the Little Ice Age, clarity of purpose, adaptability, the urge to create a new world, sometimes after facing defeat in the old,
gave the Heke migrants a psychological edge over the populous, demographically
declining tangata whenua. With ceilings of sustainability already breached in many
tribal areas, the energy of the new migrants could be seen in their adaptation of the
kumara to grow in conditions outside its natural ambit. Lifting tubers annually so
they could be protected from frost and replanted in the spring, they turned a tropical perennial into an annual food source that, in the optimal growing areas in the
north of the North Island, was able to provide some insurance against starvation following a devastating loss of biota. El Niño-induced famine had been commonplace
in tropical Polynesia probably since the birth of Hema in AD 903. The medieval
migrants used horticulture in New Zealand, as they had done in Eastern Polynesia,
to fight starvation. Their success in New Zealand can be seen as a product of their
long experience in dealing with starvation and stress in the tropics, the conditions
19 Correlation of Significant Voyaging Activity with Rare Extreme Climate Events
Line. This is not surprising given the evidence presented in Chapter 12 for the
drought-driven history of tropical Polynesia and of the west coast of North America
during the Medieval Climatic Optimum. Long-distance oceanic migrations spanning this global warm period, from the southern migrations to Hawaii in 1096 to the
last migration to New Zealand on the cusp of the Little Ice Age, appear to have been
triggered either directly by El Niño-driven drought within tropical Polynesia or by
the demographic stress and conflicts it engendered. The combination of necessity
and opportunity clearly drove long-distance migration in this global warm period,
as it appears to have done in earlier warm periods. The pattern of migrations tied to
global warmth Lamb claims is universal, whether the migrations are land-based or
oceanic.
Drought-driven long-distance migrations in the Medieval Climatic Optimum
from Eastern Polynesia to Hawaii and to New Zealand involved far more that the
ferrying of tribal groups to new lands. The seizure of territories by immigrants and
their imposition of their own cultural prerogatives and even, as in the case of Toi
(see Chapter 16), the imposition of their language on indigenous peoples sometimes
had far-reaching consequences. For example, the introduction of the kumara by
Hoaki and Taukata and by other medieval migrants from tropical Polynesia to New
Zealand, as we saw in Part II, significantly affected demographic outcomes in that
country. The unusually warm conditions of the Medieval Climatic Optimum both
assisted migrants’ passage to New Zealand and enabled them to establish kumara
once they had arrived. Ultimately it was because horticulture, mostly based on the
kumara, so strongly affected survival in New Zealand during the Little Ice Age that
horticulturally skilled Eastern Polynesian medieval migrants and their descendants
eventually gained an unusual degree of ascendancy over the indigenous peoples who
so vastly outnumbered them at the time of their arrival.
The Heke, the last migration fleet to reach New Zealand, also had a substantial effect on the history of the country, partly because it was such a carefully
planned and successful migration. Far from being a “myth”, a pakeha construct,
it was solidly rooted in a traditional Polynesian pattern whereby a substantial group
of people and their complex ark of resources were translocated to another island
or archipelago by a fleet of canoes. In the Little Ice Age, clarity of purpose, adaptability, the urge to create a new world, sometimes after facing defeat in the old,
gave the Heke migrants a psychological edge over the populous, demographically
declining tangata whenua. With ceilings of sustainability already breached in many
tribal areas, the energy of the new migrants could be seen in their adaptation of the
kumara to grow in conditions outside its natural ambit. Lifting tubers annually so
they could be protected from frost and replanted in the spring, they turned a tropical perennial into an annual food source that, in the optimal growing areas in the
north of the North Island, was able to provide some insurance against starvation following a devastating loss of biota. El Niño-induced famine had been commonplace
in tropical Polynesia probably since the birth of Hema in AD 903. The medieval
migrants used horticulture in New Zealand, as they had done in Eastern Polynesia,
to fight starvation. Their success in New Zealand can be seen as a product of their
long experience in dealing with starvation and stress in the tropics, the conditions