Prehistoric Melanesian Exchange and Interaction: Recent Evidence from the Northern Solomon Islands

RECONSTRUCTION OF PREHISTORIC exchange systems in Island Melanesia is becoming increasingly possible as archaeological activity continues to expand our knowledge of areas formerly labeled terra incognita. The Solomon Islands represent such an area, although much of the archipelago remains little known or unknown archaeologically. The objective of this paper is to examine recent evidence for past exchange and interaction within the Solomon Islands and between the Solomon Islands and Bismarck Archipelago to the north from the perspective of Buka Island, located at the northern end of the Solomon Islands (Fig. 1). Buka is presently part of the North Solomons Province of Papua New Guinea, which also includes the large island of Bougainville and a number of smaller islands. At the time of European contact, Buka was the southern terminus of an exchange network that moved goods through the Green (Nissan, Pinipel) and Feni Islands to New Ireland in the Bismarck Archipelago. The archaeological evidence from Buka for prehistoric exchange reveals a dynamic, shifting configuration with considerable variation over the more than twenty-eight thousand years of Buka prehistory. Following a brief summary of past archaeological research in the Solomon Islands, evidence from Buka for exchange and interaction will be discussed within a temporal framework subdivided into three consecutive periods: Preceramic, Lapita, and Post-Lapita. These periods are examined in relation to one another.