3.10 The Early Settlement of Micronesia
59
settlement in Micronesia. We discuss the possibility of related spice trading with
Japan and consider the possibility that Spice Islanders may have established a very
early Spice Island colony in southern Japan. These possibilities are very much in
keeping with the logic of Spice Island maritime history as we have portrayed it.
They emphasize both the importance of spice trading and the central place that the
WPWP played in that history.
Just how important a role the WPWP played, not only in the Spice Islanders’
development of maritime skills and technologies but also ultimately in their exploration and colonization of the Pacific and southern Indian Oceans, will become clear
in subsequent chapters. Here we draw attention to the simple possibility that Spice
Island traders may have exploited the southern extension of the Kuro Shio Current,
which appeared between 7,000 and 5,000 years ago within the WPWP, in order to
establish spice trading with Japan and to set up an early spice-trading colony or base
there. This possibility is more fully explored in Chapter 5. We suggest that they may
have established early settlements in Micronesia as rest and supply stations for this
trading route.
The doubling of size of the WPWP as a result of the global warmth of the
Holocene, its anomalously high SSTs caused by volcanic heating, the consequent
southerly extension of the Kuro Shio Current and the persisting economic motivation of spice trading all support the possibility that the first major WPWP current
to be exploited for oceanic trading by the Spice Islanders was that part of the Kuro
Shio Current flowing through Micronesia to Japan. The strongest evidence for this
is a very early first settlement date for Micronesia. Palaeo-environmental evidence
suggests that the island of Ngerekebesang in Palau may have been first settled about
5,700 years ago [29]. It is probably no coincidence that the dating for this matches
the estimates for the volcanic heating of the WPWP between 7,000 and 5,000 years
ago, creating SSTs possibly as high as 35 ◦ C.
Given powerful economic motivation for establishing spice trading with Japan
and perhaps through Japan with coastal China, it is perhaps not surprising to find
the earliest date for the first settlement of western Micronesia predates the colonization of the Bismarcks and Solomons, Island Melanesia and Western Polynesia
by at least two millennia. The extraordinarily warm temperatures in the volcanically heated WPWP at this time made long-distance voyaging to and through
Micronesia feasible. It is probably not coincidental that Palau, only about 900 km
from the Spice Islands, is a natural stopping place en route to Japan through
Micronesia.
Japan would have been an obvious market for spices and may even have acted as
a base for supplying spices to a wider Asian market. Chinese traditional medicine
appears already at this date to have been sophisticated: the presence of acupuncture
tattoos on the famous 5,000-year-old “Ice Man” found in the Italian Alps suggests
the diffusion to Europe already by this date of a complex Chinese medical system.
Korea and Japan today preserve and practise ancient medical systems related to
and probably derived from ancient Chinese medicine. The usefulness of the clove
as a local anaesthetic and aphrodisiac, and the cinnamon and clove as antiseptics,
suggests a wider market for spices than as a condiment and supports the possibility of a medical market for spices in Asia 5,000 years old. Just as the earliest
59
settlement in Micronesia. We discuss the possibility of related spice trading with
Japan and consider the possibility that Spice Islanders may have established a very
early Spice Island colony in southern Japan. These possibilities are very much in
keeping with the logic of Spice Island maritime history as we have portrayed it.
They emphasize both the importance of spice trading and the central place that the
WPWP played in that history.
Just how important a role the WPWP played, not only in the Spice Islanders’
development of maritime skills and technologies but also ultimately in their exploration and colonization of the Pacific and southern Indian Oceans, will become clear
in subsequent chapters. Here we draw attention to the simple possibility that Spice
Island traders may have exploited the southern extension of the Kuro Shio Current,
which appeared between 7,000 and 5,000 years ago within the WPWP, in order to
establish spice trading with Japan and to set up an early spice-trading colony or base
there. This possibility is more fully explored in Chapter 5. We suggest that they may
have established early settlements in Micronesia as rest and supply stations for this
trading route.
The doubling of size of the WPWP as a result of the global warmth of the
Holocene, its anomalously high SSTs caused by volcanic heating, the consequent
southerly extension of the Kuro Shio Current and the persisting economic motivation of spice trading all support the possibility that the first major WPWP current
to be exploited for oceanic trading by the Spice Islanders was that part of the Kuro
Shio Current flowing through Micronesia to Japan. The strongest evidence for this
is a very early first settlement date for Micronesia. Palaeo-environmental evidence
suggests that the island of Ngerekebesang in Palau may have been first settled about
5,700 years ago [29]. It is probably no coincidence that the dating for this matches
the estimates for the volcanic heating of the WPWP between 7,000 and 5,000 years
ago, creating SSTs possibly as high as 35 ◦ C.
Given powerful economic motivation for establishing spice trading with Japan
and perhaps through Japan with coastal China, it is perhaps not surprising to find
the earliest date for the first settlement of western Micronesia predates the colonization of the Bismarcks and Solomons, Island Melanesia and Western Polynesia
by at least two millennia. The extraordinarily warm temperatures in the volcanically heated WPWP at this time made long-distance voyaging to and through
Micronesia feasible. It is probably not coincidental that Palau, only about 900 km
from the Spice Islands, is a natural stopping place en route to Japan through
Micronesia.
Japan would have been an obvious market for spices and may even have acted as
a base for supplying spices to a wider Asian market. Chinese traditional medicine
appears already at this date to have been sophisticated: the presence of acupuncture
tattoos on the famous 5,000-year-old “Ice Man” found in the Italian Alps suggests
the diffusion to Europe already by this date of a complex Chinese medical system.
Korea and Japan today preserve and practise ancient medical systems related to
and probably derived from ancient Chinese medicine. The usefulness of the clove
as a local anaesthetic and aphrodisiac, and the cinnamon and clove as antiseptics,
suggests a wider market for spices than as a condiment and supports the possibility of a medical market for spices in Asia 5,000 years old. Just as the earliest