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17 - Swamp cultivators at Kuk, New Guinea

Early agriculture in the highlands of New Guinea

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2015

By
Tim Denham
Edited by
Graeme Barker  and
Candice Goucher
Graeme Barker
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Candice Goucher
Affiliation:
Washington State University
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Summary

Early agriculture in the New Guinea region lacks many of the oft-associated, socially transformative aspects documented elsewhere, including large-scale and hierarchical political units, urbanism and the so-called rise of civilization. Archaeology at Kuk Swamp was complemented by what was at the time an innovative range of approaches, including agronomy, the application of macrofossils and microfossils to archaeobotany and palaeoecology, thermo luminescence, ESR and radiocarbon dating, and a range of stratigraphic investigations. Indeed, burning during the Pleistocene has been recorded in all the major intervening inter-montane valleys along the highland spine of the island, Telefomin, Haeapugua and Wahgi valley. Various models have proposed how people's plant exploitation practices changed around the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. In general terms, these models focus upon how people increasingly began to manage the landscape and the edible plant resources contained within it.

Keywords

animal domesticationagriculture in Southwest Asiasedentism
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge World History , pp. 445 - 471
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2015

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References

Further reading

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