Kon-Tiki was interesting, but I can't handle the implication of Heyerdahl's beliefs - that the Polynesian people, supreme sailors and navigators who travelled huge distances across the open ocean while Europeans were still hugging the coast, were somehow incapable of sailing to South America and back.
We know that there has been some contact between the Americas and Polynesia, for example, the staple food of the Maori of New Zealand was the kumara, a sweet potato, which are native to the Americas.
His main objection was based, I believe, on predominating currents and winds. However, in an El Nino year, the currents shift and winds shift, and there is evidence that Polynesian migrations eastward coincided with El Nino events.
Australians != Polynesians. Polynesian migrations are relatively recent, starting 3000BC ~ 1000BC from Taiwan. They got to New Zealand and Easter Island only about 1200 AD, which is only 300 years before Columbus. I don't recall any evidence that they sailed all the way to the Americas between 1200AD and 1500 AD, the time of Pizzaro's conquest of the Inca Empire.
Yeah, I'm well aware of that fact, on account of living in New Zealand. ;) I was directly responding to the person I, erm, directly responded to, who posted a link to Kon-Tiki.
> I don't recall any evidence that they sailed all the way to the Americas
We have obvious evidence of contact between Polynesia and South America before the 1200s, as the Maori arrived in NZ in the 13th century with a sweet potato, as I mentioned.
As for "all the way to the Americas", the distance from Rapanui/Easter Island to Chile is less than the distance from the Marquesas Islands to Hawaii (which was colonised in the 10th century), or from Tuabai / Tahiti / Cook Islands (whichever identity of 'Hawaiki' you prefer) to New Zealand.
So, we have evidence that Polynesians contacted the Americas sometime before the 13th century, and we have evidence that the Polynesians were capable of navigating distances greater than that from Easter Island to Chile in the 10th century.
I'm not aware of any evidence of any similar ocean-going prowess of South American natives, as such, Occam's Razor probably applies.
A. Polynesians are definitely not "first South Americans", regardless at which date the conjectured sweet potato journey happened. Simply because the other South Americans we know of arrived about 15,000 years ago, way before Polynesians even left Taiwan.
B. "The distance from Rapanui/Easter Island to Chile is less than the distance from the Marquesas Islands to Hawaii", true. But since Polynesians reached Easter Island only in the 1200s, their conjectured sweet potato journey must have been either post 1200s, or much longer than the journey from Easter Island.
As of the sweet potato, who knows how it got in Maori hands? Super alternative conjecture, maybe some people during the glacial age, beneficiary of low ocean levels, brought it to the islands, and Polynesians picked it up from there?
> Polynesians are definitely not "first South Americans"
Who are you correcting? Certainly not me. I'm discussing which side of the Pacific drove the pre-Columbian contact. The obvious answer is the "sea-faring people who colonised islands across the vast distances of the Pacific Ocean".
> "The distance from Rapanui/Easter Island to Chile is less than the distance from the Marquesas Islands to Hawaii", true. But since Polynesians reached Easter Island only in the 1200s, their conjectured sweet potato journey must have been either post 1200s, or much longer than the journey from Easter Island.
They only settled Easter Island in the 1200s. There is ample evidence of Polynesian temporary occupation of otherwise uninhabited islands, such as Raoul Island in the Kermadecs, New Zealand's sub-Antarctic islands (Campbell, Auckland in particular), and Norfolk Island. Polynesian colonisation was largely driven by population pressure, so it's quite likely that they had discovered Easter Island long before they decided to colonise it.
> Super alternative conjecture, maybe some people during the glacial age, beneficiary of low ocean levels, brought it to the islands, and Polynesians picked it up from there?
Occam's Razor definitely applies, especially when you'd have to drop the sea level by several kilometres to have a lower ocean level make any difference to travel to Polynesia from America. Highest mountain on earth is Mauna Loa, in Hawaii, 9km from bottom to top.
The title of this thread is "First South Americans Were Australian Aborigines", just making sure we are all aware that this sub conversation concerns a different population at a different time. Might as well throw in some Vikings ;)
Super interesting point about evidence of Polynesian travel in New Zealand. Now if there were some of that evidence with regard to South America, we'd be all clear. But there isn't as far as I know, which raises even more questions about the sweet potato conjecture.
With regard to the glacial maximum, nobody is claiming the oceans were plains to roam around. But a sea level 100 lower may uncover some new islands and make island hopping a whole lot easier. For example, Baral Guyot is a barely submerged island https://earthref.org/SC/SMNT-257S-0866W/ along the Sala y Gomez ridge and Nazca Ridge.
Obviously there is no archeological confirmation of the conjecture I made, but that leaves both conjectures in the same uncomfortable spot.
This places the sweet potato travel around 1000 AD, which matches pretty well our conversation, but it's definitely not evidence for "first americans".
It kind of makes you wonder if there was any contact between aboriginals and Maori. I was never taught anything at school, but the distances don't seem too far...?
There's evidence of Polynesian visitors to Norfolk Island, so it's entirely possible they went further afield, but in terms of the Maori doing it, it's less likely - once the archaic Maori arrived in New Zealand, and saw its abundant feathered protein, ample natural resources and space, their culture lost their ocean-going expertise reasonably quickly as it adapted to the very different environment of NZ - even when travelling between New Zealand's islands, Maori tended to use waka which were designed for lakes and rivers rather than the open ocean.
Which makes the journey of the Moriori's ancestors from New Zealand to the Chatham Islands in the 1500s even more amazing.
We know that there has been some contact between the Americas and Polynesia, for example, the staple food of the Maori of New Zealand was the kumara, a sweet potato, which are native to the Americas.
His main objection was based, I believe, on predominating currents and winds. However, in an El Nino year, the currents shift and winds shift, and there is evidence that Polynesian migrations eastward coincided with El Nino events.