June 27, 2024
LiDAR reveals Samoan hierarchy
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Archaeologists are using aeroplane-mounted ranging lasers to get a glimpse of how hierarchical Samoan society may have been a thousand years ago.
University of Auckland, Associate Professor Ethan Cochrane says LiDAR – or light detection and ranging technology allows his team to peer through heavy jungle to spot ancient structures such as 800-year-old rock walls – which appear to enclose food growing areas.
He says a genetic study also showed a large Samoa population increase about that time – leading to the conclusion that hierachies developed as competition for food increased.
“And that of course would be no surprise to anyone today, in any iwi anywhere in Aotearoa or across the Pacific – that resources equal power. It did a thousand years ago, it did ten thousand years ago, and it does today,” Dr Cochrane says.
Local Samoan oral histories also seem to confirm that the rise of hierarchies began about the same period.