Archaeological record

Press, 26 July 1980, Page 17

Archaeological record

New Zealand Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 2, 1980. Edited by Dr G. Hamel. Published annually by the New Zealand Archaeological Association. 170 pp. $l2. (Reviewed by B. G. McFadgen) The "New Zealand Journal of Archaeology” has the object of publishing professional papers on all aspects of New Zealand and Pacific archaeology. This second issue contains eight papers on a range of topics which include social organisation and settlement patterns of the Ngai Tahu in the southern South Island, prehistoric hunting in subantarctic coastal areas, colonisation of Pacific Islands, a reinterpretation of the history of Oruarangi Pa on the Hauraki Plains, analysis of shell deposits at Oruarangi Pa, a description of an adze-making workshop in Southland/ methods of analysing shell middens, and the fertility of prehistoric New Zealanders. Like volume one, the papers are written principally for other workers in .the same, or closely related fields. While the technical language used may give some difficulty to the nonspecialist reader, the conclusions which some of them reach will be of general, interest. One such paper, By M. A. L. Phillips of the Canterbury Museum, deals with family size, a topic with which most people would be familiar, and it illustrates the type of. .information which today can be found from the detailed scientific study of human skeletal remains. Feipale pelvic bones show pits and grooves, the extent of which appear to be, related to the number of pregnancies. Women in prehistoric

Maori communities appear to have had their first child at about 18 or 19 years of age, to have had an average of about three children and a maximum of five, and to have stopped bearing children by about 35 years of age. The interval between births was three to four years. Such results contrast strongly with the often large Maori families of historic times. A second paper likely to appeal to a general reader because of its local interest, is the one on social organisation and settlement patterns of the Ngai Tahu, by A. J. Anderson of the Anthropology Department, Otago University. The paper uses historic records to infer social organisation, economy and settlement patterns of the Ngai Tahu living south of Lake Ellesmere between about A.D. 1810 and 1850. The southern Ngai Tahu appear to have been members of a stratified tribal society or chiefdom, an unusual type of society for a population with an economy .based on hunting, fishing and gathering in an area where food. resources -were not extraordinarily abundant. The author considers -several possible explanations including European influence, and concludes with the interesting hypothesis that the society was maintained by the organised collection and distribution of mutton birds from Foveaux Strait. The papers in tire journal demonstrate some of the wide range of techniques and disciplines used by the modern archaeologist to find out about the past, and a general reader who is prepared to persevere with the somewhat technical language will find something of interest. Copies of the journal are available from the Otago Museum.