Why has the assumption been that people from the Americas went to the islands? There is so very little evidence for South American sailing abilities. The use of the sail emerges in South America very very close to the time of the Spanish arrival. Images of boats that I'm aware of, in the time frame discussed, don't show any sails.

It is much more likely that contact occurred the other way. The sailing abilities of the Polynesian people is extremely well documented, they already made some fantastic discoveries that probably took a generational effort. The only physical evidence that South Americans sailed to any islands that I know of are the flute and pottery shards found on the Galápagos and those dates are also late and could easily have been post conquest.

There's an excellent discussion of these finds, and the interpretation of them, starting on page 96 of "Prehistory in the Pacific Islands" by John E. Terrell. that pulls heavily on a paper called "Demographic models and island colonisation in the Pacific" by Stephen Black in the New Zealand Journal of Archaeology.

I'll also remind the board that the Kon Tiki had to be towed away from the coast.

Kat

Ma'at Moderator

Founder and Director of The Hall of Ma'at

Contributing author to Archaeological Fantasies:
How pseudoarchaeology misrepresents the past and misleads the public
"If you panic, you're lost" -- W. T. 'Watertight' Southard



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/13/2020 12:01PM by Katherine Reece.