Dec 22, 2023

Sidestep: Pacific NW comparisons

Firstly I'm not referring to Maori who came from Polynesia, I am referring to those here before Maori as evidenced by many artifacts. But we would like to draw your attention to some very early stone clubs found in the Yakima Valley not far from Seattle in Oregon. These belong to what is often represented as the Pacific Northwest area. And we have done comparisons before.

It has been suggested recently that despite the old accepted migration patterns based on current climate and ocean patterns, that expansion across the Pacific was done via Melanesia, Fiji, and east, south and north from there as per below.

However, evidence is piling up that South American and California have links too. It seems it wasn't just from Oceania that travel occured, it was to it as well. Regardless we are still only interested in those here before the Polynesian migrations to NZ. Below are two pictures of small weapons from Yakima Valley.

Now these below are very early clubs found in Otago, prior to Ngai Tahu and prior to Kati Mamoe, they are Waitaha. There is nothing else like them in all of NZ.