Islands in between : prehistory of the northeastern Indonesian archipelago

Abstract

The northeastern Indonesian archipelago occupies a strategic location against the southwestern rim of the Pacific. It has been suggested that it served as a 'stepping stone' region for the migrations of people from Asia to Australia and Oceania in prehistory. Nevertheless, only limited archaeological research has been conducted in this area to date. Recently, further archaeological survey and excavation has been carried out here by me, especially in the Talaud (North Sulawesi) and Sula Islands (North Moluccas), in order to generate new data. This thesis presents the results of that recent research. The excavated archaeological materials demonstrate that humans have occupied this region since Late Pleistocene, at least 30,000 years ago. The cultural materials excavated from younger sites witness the spread of Austronesian-speaking agricultural peoples, probably from Taiwan into the Pacific about 4,000 years ago, as also supported by linguistic reconstruction. As these new data are incorporated into the available corpus of research information, the cultural processes that took place in northeastern Indonesia can be reconstructed in the wider regional context of Island Southeast Asia and Western Melanesia. A firmer cultural sequence for this area can now be established. In this thesis, a model for initial Pleistocene human colonization in Wallacea and Oceania is suggested. Furthermore, an alternative explanation for the dispersal of the Austronesian-speaking populations is also proposed.