Horticulture at a Lapita Period Site in the Sigatoka Valley, Fiji

Rebecca Hazard* and John Dudgeon

The first Lapita settlers arrived at the archipelago of Fiji by at least 2900 to 3000 years BP, bringing with them an assortment of economically important plants and animals. While Lapita settlers are generally thought to have occupied coastal spaces exclusively, the research presented in this paper provides evidence for horticulture-related activity at an inland site in the Sigatoka Valley on the island of Viti Levu that suggests otherwise. The oldest known site in Fiji, Bourewa, is located just 25 km to the west of the mouth of the Sigatoka River, and the site that is the subject of this research, Qaraqara, is a mere 48 km upriver from that point. Major rivers like the Sigatoka are pieces of natural infrastructure that can provide not only for the subsistence needs of people but act as a means of transportation as well. We argue that some of the first Lapita settlers, who likely practiced foraging mixed with low levels of horticulture, moved inland almost immediately to begin cultivating introduced plants in the highly fertile alluvial soils of the Sigatoka Valley. Phytoliths belonging to the non-native introduced banana plant family (Musaceae spp.) have been recovered from terrestrial core sediments radiocarbon dated to approximately 3100 years BP. Their presence predates evidence for major deforestation and grassland intrusion that was likely a result of the overuse of slash-and-burn cultivation practices centuries later, suggesting that the first gardening activities were performed on a small scale with minimal environmental impact.