Transition from hunting and gathering to food production on the Ryukyu archipelago, Japan

Summary

It has been suggested that in order for Homo sapiens to colonize islands, because of their size, food production is necessary. Indeed most islands were successfully colonized by farmers. However, some islands were colonized by hunter-gatherers. These islands are characterized by 1) large in area, 2) closely located from continent or large island, 3) sea mammals more or less constantly available, 4) translocation of edible plant and/or animal resources from the mother land or 5) combination of 1) to 4).

Recent archaeological studies have revealed that islands of the Ryukyu archipelago, especially, Amami and Okinawa archipelagos do not possess any of the above mentioned features but successfully colonized by hunter-gatherers. In this region, like other regions of the world, archaeologists have been interested in the transition from hunting and gathering to food production. Accordingly, several hypotheses have been proposed. Intensive paleoethnobotanical studies together with latest C14 dates have revealed when the transition actually took place.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

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