Hunter-Gatherers in Southeast Asia: From Prehistory to the Present

Anatomically modern hunter-gatherers expanded from Africa into Southeast Asia at least 50,000 years ago, where they probably encountered and interacted with populations of Homo erectus and Homo floresiensis and the recently discovered Denisovans. Simulation studies suggest that these hunter-gatherers may well have followed a coastal route that ultimately led to the settlement of Sahul, while archaeology confirms that they also crossed significant seas and explored well into the interior. They also adapted to marked environmental changes that alternated between relatively cool and dry conditions and warmer, wetter interludes. During the former, the sea fell by up to 120 m below its present level, which opened up a vast low-lying area known as Sundaland. Three principal alignments can be identified: the first involved the occupation of rock shelters in upland regions, the second has identified settlement on broad riverine floodplains, and the last concentrated on the raised beaches formed from about five millennia ago when the sea level was elevated above its present position. This cultural sequence was dislocated about 4 kya when rice and millet farmers infiltrated the lowlands of Southeast Asia ultimately from the Yangtze River valley. It is suggested that this led to two forms of interaction. In the first, the indigenous hunter-gatherers integrated with intrusive Neolithic communities and, while losing their cultural identity, contributed their genes to the present population of Southeast Asia. In the second, hunter-gatherers withdrew to rainforest refugia and, through selective pressures inherent in such an environment, survived as the small-bodied, dark-skinned humans found to this day in the Philippines, Peninsular Malaysia and Thailand, and the Andaman Islands. Beyond the impact of expansive rice farmers in Melanesia and Australia, hunter-gatherers continued to dominate until they encountered European settlement

FIRST FARMERS IN MAINLAND SOUTHEAST ASIA

The domestication of rice and millet took in the Yangtze and Yellow River valleys. It is argued that the expansion of farming communities from these two regions reached mainland Southeast Asia from the late third millennium BC. The conjunction of new archaeological and bioanthropogical information, and the re-examination of older reports, is beginning to illuminate the interactions between the incoming farmers and long-established hunter gatherers. It is argued that there were several distinct expansionary routes. One followed the coast of Vietnam, others involved the courses of the Salween and Mekong rivers.This brought incoming farmers to a wide range of new habitats. Khok Phanom Di is a key site. Formerly located on the estuary of the Bang Pakong River, a new analysis of cranial and dental variables relate the inhabitants to expansionary farmers. Their adaptation to a marine estuarine habitat, however, made rice cultivation marginal at best, and the new settlers turned to hunting and gathering while maintaining a fully Neolithic material culture.

DATING THE BRONZE AGE OF SOUTHEAST ASIA. WHY DOES IT MATTER?

We have dated human bone, freshwater shell, charcoal and rice grains from key sites in mainland Southeast Asia in order to establish the chronological scaffolding for later prehistory (ca 2500 BC-AD 500). In a recent report on the metal remains from the site of Ban Chiang, however, this chronology has been challenged. Here, we respond to these claims and show that they are unfounded and misleading. We maintain the integrity of the Bayesian-modelled radiocarbon results that identify the arrival of the first rice and millet farmers in mainland Southeast Asia towards the end of the 3rd millennium BC, with the first evidence for the casting of bronze by about 1100 BC. Social change that followed the establishment of metallurgy was rapid and profound.

Brian Vincent (26 March 1938–30 March 2016)

Dr. Brian Vincent, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries (FSA), died in 2016 just a few days after his 78th birthday. Brian came to archaeology in 1975. After a successful career as a builder, he enrolled in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Otago for his B.A. His deep interest in the discipline led to his undertaking doctoral research at the Thai Bronze and Iron Age site of Ban Na Di, where he analyzed ceramic artifacts

THE CHRONOLOGY AND STATUS OF NON NOK THA, NORTHEAST THAILAND

  Excavations at Non Nok Tha, in Northeast Thailand in 1965-1968 revealed for the first time in Southeast Asia, a stratigraphic transition from the Neolithic into the Bronze Age. Based on conventional charcoal radiocarbon determinations, early reports identified fourth millennium bronze casting. The proposed length of the prehistoric sequence, and the division of the Neolithic to Bronze age mortuary sequence into at least 11 phases, has stimulated a series of social interpretations all of which have in common, a social order based on ascriptive ranking into at least two groups which saw increased hierarchical divisions emerge with the initial Bronze Age. This paper presents the results of a new dating initiative, based on the ultrafiltration of human bones. The results indicate that the initial Neolithic occupation took place during the 14th century BC. The earliest Bronze Age has been placed in the 10th centuries BC. These dates are virtually identical with those obtained for the sites of Ban Chiang and Ban Non Wat. Compared with the elite early Bronze Age graves of Ban Non Wat, Non Nok Tha burials display little evidence for significant divisions in society

An early hunter-gatherer site at Ban Non Wat, Northeast Thailand

The inland plains of Southeast Asia are a void in terms of early occupation by hunter gatherers. Two radiocarbon determinations from basal Ban Non Wat on the Khorat Plateau date a shell midden and possibly associated human and deer remains between 18000-20000 years ago

From Late Prehistory to the Foundation of Early States in Inland Southeast Asia: a Debate

Mortuary data from three Iron Age sites in Northeast Thailand and three in Northwest Cambodia are here reviewed for information on social formation on the cusp of early states. It has been suggested that the three Cambodian sites present evidence for a complex polity with three social tiers and that this contrasts with the lack of any evidence for equivalent complexity in the three communities in the upper Mun Valley of Northeast Thailand. This model is examined and queried on the basis of insufficient data for the Cambodian sites, and contestable statistical analysis. In its place, an alternative is presented, that identifies a critically important climatic deterioration causing increased aridity which stimulated the development of plough-based wet rice cultivation in irrigated permanent fields. In the upper Mun Valley of Northeast Thailand, this coincided with a swift rise in social elites, interred in lineage-based nuclei in which leading individuals were accompanied by unprecedented wealth. Within a century or two, some Iron Age settlements greatly expanded into regal centers documented through texts that mentioned the state of Sri Canasapura. This transition might also have occurred in Northwest Cambodia at the same time, but evidence for this is so far unconvincing

The excavation of Non Ban Jak, Northeast Thailand - A report on the first three seasons

Non Ban Jak is a large, moated site located in the upper Mun Valley, Northeast Thailand. Excavations over three seasons in 2011-4 have revealed a sequence of occupation that covers the final stage of the local Iron Age. The site is enclosed by two broad moats and banks, and comprises an eastern and a western mound separated by a lower intervening area. The first season opened an 8 by 8 m square on the eastern mound, while the second and third seasons uncovered part of the low terrain rising into the western mound, encompassing an area of 25 by 10 m. The former revealed a sequence of industrial, residential and mortuary activity that involved the construction of houses, kiln firing of ceramic vessels and the interment of the dead within residences. The latter involved four phases of a late Iron Age cemetery, which again incorporated house floors and wall foundations, as well as further evidence for ceramic manufacture. The excavation sheds light on a late Iron Age town occupied at the threshold of state formation