{"product_id":"the-lapita-peoples-ancestors-of-the-oceanic-world-the-peoples-of-southeast-asia-and-the-pacific-9781577180364","title":"The Lapita Peoples: Ancestors of the Oceanic World (The Peoples of South-East Asia and the Pacific)","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis is the first account of the Lapita peoples  the common ancestor of the Polynesians  Micronesians  and Austronesian-speaking Melanesians who over the last 4000 years colonized the islands of the Pacific  including New Zealand and territories as far afield as Fiji and Hawaii. Its purpose is to provide answers to some of the most puzzling archaeological and anthropological questions: who were the Lapita peoples? what was their history? how were they able to travel such great distances? and why did they do so? Recent discoveries (several by the author of this book) have begun at last to yield a coherent picture of these elusive peoples.  Professor Kirch takes the reader back many thousands of years to the earliest evidence of the Lapita peoples. He describes the research itself and conveys the excitement of the first discoveries of Lapita settlements  tools and pottery. He then traces the remarkable cultural development and spread of the Lapita peoples across the unoccupied islands of Eastern Melanesia  Micronesia and Western Polynesia. He shows how they became the progenitors of the Polynesian and Austronesian-speaking Melanesian peoples.  The author describes Lapita sites  communities and landscapes  the development of their decorated ceramics  and their shell-tool industry. He reveals the means by which they accomplished such prodigious voyages and explains why they undertook them. He illustrates his account with specially drawn maps and with a wide range of photographs  many published for the first time. Drawing on the latest research in archaeology  anthropology  biology and linguistics  and written in clear  non-specialized language  this is an outstanding book of great importance to the history of South-East Asia and the Pacific.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":67661054804021,"sku":"ByrdShop_1577180364","price":37.41,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9781577180364.jpg?v=1792074428","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/the-lapita-peoples-ancestors-of-the-oceanic-world-the-peoples-of-southeast-asia-and-the-pacific-9781577180364","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}