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An Unusual Case? Hunter-Gatherer Adaptations to an Island

Environment: A Case Study from Okinawa JapanHiroto Takamiyaa

a Department of Cultural Studies, Sapporo University, Sapporo, Japan

To cite this Article Takamiya, Hiroto(2006) 'An Unusual Case? Hunter-Gatherer Adaptations to an Island Environment: ACase Study from Okinawa, Japan', The Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, 1: 1, 49 — 66

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Journal of Island & Coastal Archaeology, 1:49–66, 2006Copyright © 2006 Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 1556-4894 print / 1556-1828 onlineDOI:10.1080/15564890600585855

An Unusual Case?Hunter-Gatherer Adaptations to an IslandEnvironment: A Case Studyfrom Okinawa, Japan

Hiroto Takamiya Department of Cultural Studies, Sapporo University, Sapporo, Japan

ABSTRACT

Homo sapiens sapiens had spread into most diverse environmentsby the end of the Pleistocene, but many islands were not settled until the Holocene. One explanation is that because of space and

resource limitations in many island environments, it was difficult for hunter-gatherers to survive there. Although some islandswere colonized successfully by hunter-gatherers, agriculture mayhave been necessary to settle many islands permanently. Islands

successfully colonized by hunter-gatherers were large, close tocontinents or larger islands, or had abundant marine resources(especially large sea mammals), or a combination of theseelements.

Relatively small and remote, the Ryukyu Islands south of Japan, were not characterized by the conditions mentioned

above. The first humans who successfully colonized the Okinawa group of islands were “Late” Jomon people. In this paper, I examine subsistence strategies of prehistoric Okinawans using recent faunal and floral data, demonstrating that they lived onthe islands using a foraging-based economy. In the process, I explore the reasons hunter-gatherers were able successfully tocolonize Okinawa island environments for several thousand

years.

Keywords colonization, zooarchaeology, palaeoethnobotany, Okinawa, Japan, hunter-

gatherers

Received 29 August 2005; accepted 1 December 2005. Address correspondence to Hiroto Takamiya, 3-7 Nishioka, Toyohira-ku, Department of Cultural Studies,Sapporo University, Sapporo, Hokkaido 062-0035, Japan. E-mail: [email protected]

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Hiroto Takamiya

INTRODUCTION

Many islands were occupied by human

populations relatively recently. For in-stance, all colonized islands in Poly-nesia were settled by humans withinthe last 3,500 years (e.g., Kirch 1984,2000), the West Indies were first occu-pied about 4,000–5,000 years ago (seeKeegan and Diamond 1987; Kee-gan 1994), and the Mediterranean is-lands were settled largely during theHolocene. The Mediterranean case isparticularly interesting because Homo

sapiens sapiens clearly had the tech-nology to cross the water gap to theisland of Melos for obsidian during thelate Pleistocene, but humans do notappear to have colonized the islandsuntil much later (Cherry 1981, 1990,1992, 2004; Patton 1996). In contrast,the islands of Okinawa were occupiedduring the late Pleistocene and, although they were once believed to have beenoccupied continuously by humans, pale-odemographic studies suggest that “suc-cessful” island colonization (in termsof long-term reproductive success; seeKirch 1980:142; Mithen 1990:4) oc-curred only during the mid-Holocene(Takamiya 1996, 1997a, 1998a). Thus, itappears that only a few islands were suc-cessfully settled by Homo sapiens sapiens during the Pleistocene, including

western Melanesia (Spriggs 1996, 1997; White 2004), Cyprus (Cherry 2004), andCalifornia’s Channel Islands (Erlandsonet al. 2004).

Why were our ancestors unable tocolonize many islands successfully untilrecent times? It has been suggested thatagriculture was necessary to colonizesuccessfully many islands (Cherry 1981;Patton 1996). Many island environments

have limited natural resources, espe-cially terrestrial ones, and space for foraging activities to sustain human pop-ulation is also limited. As a result, many islands were in fact colonized success-

fully for the first time not by foragers,but by farmers. Cherry (1981) hypoth-esized that it was difficult for foragers

to colonize successfully Mediterraneanislands because of the lack of subsistenceresources. Many island cases seem tosupport Cherry’s hypothesis.

There are several exceptions.Hunter-gatherers successfully occupiedislands including the Aleutians (Yesner 1981), the California Channel Islands(Erlandson 1994; Erlandson et al. 2004;Kennett and Clifford 2004; Porcasi andFujita 2000), Great Britain (Darvill 1987),and Japan (Habu 2004; see also Crawford2006). These exceptions suggest thatisland environments can be successfully occupied by hunter-gatherers under certain conditions. These conditionsinclude islands that are large, locatednear continents or larger islands, or

where large sea mammals are abundant.In many cases, a combination of theseconditions may have facilitated humanforagers’ successfully colonizing islands.

The islands of the central Ryukyus(Figure 1; also for site locations) aresmall and located near neither a largecontinental landmass nor another largeisland. No large sea mammals appear to have been consistently available. Inshort, none of the conditions mentionedabove are true for the islands of the Ok-inawa group. Yet many scholars believe

that these islands were settled contin-uously by hunter-gatherers during pre-historic times until ca. AD 1100, whenremains of cultigens begin to appear inthe archaeological record. Agriculturemay have been practiced slightly earlier on the Ryukyus, but some speculate thatthe islands were occupied continuously by hunter-gatherers for several thousand

years prior to the introduction of agri-

culture. Based on archaeological datafrom around the world, however, I havehypothesized that the initial successfulcolonizers of the Okinawa group may have been farmers (Takamiya 1993).

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Hunter-Gatherer Adaptations in Okinawa

Figure 1. Map of the Okinawa Islands and sites mentioned in the text (drafted by S. Fitzpatrick).

JOURNAL OF ISLAND & COASTAL ARCHAEOLOGY 51

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Hiroto Takamiya

Were they farmers or foragers? Thisquestion is worth examining becauseit may provide new perspectives on

the colonization of islands by humanpopulations. For the last 10 years or so, plant remains have been recoveredfrom Okinawan sites using flotationtechniques, providing the opportunity to test my hypothesis.

In this paper, I present faunal andnew floral data to examine the methodof subsistence economy of the initialsuccessful colonizers of Okinawa andtheir descendants. In the process, Iexplore whether these colonizing pop-ulations were foragers or farmers, andthen discuss the subsistence strategiesnecessary for the successful colonizationof the Ryukyu Islands. First, however, Idiscuss the nature of prehistoric hunter-gatherer adaptations to island environ-ments around the world.

ISLAND COLONIZATION: ACOMPARATIVE FRAMEWORK

As mentioned earlier, only a handful of islands were successfully colonized by hunter-gatherers. These islands are large,close to continents or large islands, rich in marine resources, or possess somecombination of these factors. Cyprushas a land area of more than 9250

km2 and is located in close proximity to the European continent. The islandsof New Britain and New Ireland are37810 km2 and 8650 km2 in size, respec-tively. The smaller Guadalcanal (6500km2 ) and Buka (492 km2 ) were settledby humans during the late Pleistocene,but they were connected as Greater Bougainville (ca. 46400 km2 ) during thisepoch (Spriggs 1997). The Pleistocene

colonization of these islands is probably best explained by the size of the islandsduring the last glacial of this epoch and the translocation of plants (Spriggs1997) and animals (White 2004).

California’s Channel Islands aresmall (from 37 km2 to 242 km2;Erlandson et al. 2004), but close to

the continental mainland (Arnold 2001;Erlandson et al. 2004; Porcasi and Fujita2000). Pleistocene occupation of theChannel Islands was facilitated by theshort distance between the mainlandand the islands, which are also charac-terized by abundant marine resourcesincluding large sea mammals (Erlandsonet al. 2004; Porcasi and Fujita 2000).Kodiak Island has an area of 9293 km2,is only 50 km from mainland Alaska,and is rich in sea mammals and other marine resources (Fitzhugh 2003). Mostof the Aleutian Islands are relatively small (the largest is Unimak at 4119km2 ), but the eastern islands are closeto the continent and all are rich in seamammals and other marine resources(Yesner 1981).

Hunter-gatherers also settled Luzon(Ogawa 2000), one of the largest is-lands in the Philippines with an areaof 104688 km2. Most of the smaller Philippine islands are situated relatively close to Luzon and exchange systemsdeveloped with farmers may also havecontributed to the survival of forager populations (Bailey et al. 1989; Ogawa2000).

According to Keegan and Diamond(1987), several of the Caribbean islands

in the Greater Antilles were settled by prehistoric hunter-gatherers who main-tained this way of life until Spanish contact (see also Hofman and Hoogland2003; Keegan 1994). The Lesser Antilles(the largest of which is Guadeloupe,

with an area of only 1786 km2 ) may have been used as migration routes tothe Greater Antilles, but apparently werenever settled permanently by hunter-

gatherers. Keegan and Diamond (1987)argued that the Greater Antilles werelarge enough to support a permanenthunter-gatherer population, while theLesser Antilles were not.

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Table 1. Cultural Chronology of Prehistoric Okinawa (the Central Ryukyus).

Okinawa Paleolithic

Scheme I Scheme II Uncalibrated

14C dates (RYBP) Mainland Japan

Shell midden Jomon Jomon

Incipient

Initial Initial 6,670 ± 140 Initial

6,450 ± 140

Early 4,880 ± 130 Early

Middle Middle

Early Late 3,370 ± 80 Late

3,600 ± 80

Middle Final Final

Late Yayoi-Heian

Early Yayoi

Late Kofun-Historic

Gusuku Gusuku Historic

14C dating after Takamiya (1994).

The human history of these islandssuggests that most islands where hunter-gatherers settled are nearly 10000 km2

or greater in size, or that the smallislands colonized were close to a con-tinent and/or rich in large sea mam-mals and other marine resources. Whileit is not possible to review all thecases, I suspect most islands suc-cessfully colonized by hunter-gatherers

are characterized by these conditions. Additional supporting examples areTasmania (Jones 1977) and Alaska’s

Alexander Archipelago (Moss 2004).The only exception I could find is ManusIsland in the Bismarck Archipelago dur-ing the Pleistocene (Spriggs 1997; White2004). The island today is 1639 km2

in size and situated several hundredkilometers from New Guinea and New

Ireland. According to Spriggs (1997),the island was much larger near theend of the Pleistocene, however, and itshunter-gatherers might have husbanded

Canarium. Even Manus Island may havebeen abandoned between 12000 BP and10000 BP (Spriggs 1997:63).

Finally, the above observations in-dicate the possible uniqueness of theRyukyu Islands, which consist of smalland relatively remote islands. Thelargest, the main island of Okinawa, hasan area of about 1200 km2. Unlike other small islands successfully colonized by

prehistoric hunter-gatherers, the islandsof Okinawa are not particularly rich inlarge sea mammals. Therefore, a closer examination of prehistoric subsistenceon Okinawa is worthwhile.

AN OKINAWA CASE STUDY

The chronology of the Okinawa regionis typically subdivided by archaeologists

into several major periods beginning with the Paleolithic (Table 1). Someresearchers prefer Scheme I, but I usethe terms in Scheme II, with which most


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Hiroto Takamiya

readers will be more familiar. Table 1also provides a comparison with thegeneral chronology of mainland Japan

except Hokkaido.For decades, it has generally beenaccepted that humans continuously oc-cupied the Okinawa group since thePaleolithic. However, it now appearslikely that human groups either left theregion or became extinct by the endof the Pleistocene. Humans attemptedin vain to re-colonize the islands duringthe Initial and Early Jomon periods, butonly during the later part of the Middleand Late Jomon period did the firstsuccessful colonization of the islandsoccur (Takamiya 1996, 1997a). I havetermed this point the “Late” Jomon torepresent the first period of successfulcolonization (Takamiya 1993).

Okinawa Subsistence: Late Jomon to

Yayoi-Heian. How were humans ableto colonize Okinawa during the Late

Jomon period, and was colonizationbased on a farming or foraging strategy?If they were farmers, this fact wouldbe extremely important for Japaneseprehistory, as it would be the first goodevidence for food production in thearchipelago. If foragers, it would providea rare case of a prehistoric foragingadaptation to an island environment.To identify the subsistence economy

of prehistoric peoples, I review thefaunal remains recovered from archae-ological sites, and then discuss the latestevidence for plant use to help estab-lish whether foraging or farming wasprevalent.

Faunal Remains. Early on, Oki-nawan archaeologists realized the im-portance of analyzing faunal remains

to understand paleodiet. Faunal analysishas been carried out intensively for the last 30 years at various sites (e.g.,Okinawa Prefecture Board of Education

Table 2 . Late Jomon Faunal Remains.

Scientific

Name

Common English

Name

Japanese

Name

Chondrichthyes shark same-moku

Lamniformes

Osteichthyes

Serranidae grouper hata-ka

Lutjanidae snapper fuedai-ka

Sparidae porgy tai-ka

Lethrinidae emperorfish fuefukidai-ka

Labridae wrass bera-ka

Scaridae parrotfish budai-kaDiodontidae porcupine fish harisenbon-ka

Reptilia

Testudinidae tortoise rikugame-ka

Cheloniidae turtle umigame-ka

Mammalia

Muridae mouse nezumi-ka

Delphinidae dolphin mairuka-ka

Canidae dog inu-ka

Dugongidae dugong jugon-ka

Suidae wild boar inoshishi-ka

1978, 1987). Commonly reported verte-brate taxa recovered from these sites arelisted in Table 2. The number of iden-tified specimens (NISP) for vertebrateremains reported often ranges from 100to 50,000. Numerous invertebrate re-

mains have also been identified, and itis not unusual for more than 100,000minimum number of individuals (MNI)from more than 100 discrete shellfish taxa to be identified.

These studies reveal no clear evi-dence for the presence of domesticatedanimals other than dogs at archaeologi-cal sites dating to the Late Jomon, Final

Jomon, and Yayoi-Heian periods (e.g.,

Takamiya 2005, forthcoming; Toizumi2003). Although Minagawa et al. (2005)argued that some bones identified asbeing those of “wild boar” may not be

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Hiroto Takamiya

and Nagarabaru Higashi shellmidden,dating between about AD 500 and

AD 700, also yielded only wild spec-

imens (Takamiya 1997b, 1998b, 2000,2003), suggesting that hunter-gathererssustained this way of life at least until

AD 500–700. Rice remains were re-covered from Nagarabaru Higashi, but

Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS)radiocarbon dating of rice grains them-selves suggest that they are “modern”(Kinoshita 2003). The earliest evidencefor cultigens, dated between about AD700 and AD 900 comes from the Nazak-ibaru site (Takamiya 2003, 2004, 2005),but this evidence may represent a failedattempt at agriculture as it does notseem to be followed by rapid populationgrowth.

The subsistence economy of theFinal Jomon is the least understood.Different settlement patterns, a decreasein the quantity of faunal remains, andan increase in stone axes and plant-processing tools compared with theLate Jomon have implied to some thatagriculture was practiced during theFinal Jomon period (Nitta 1982). Prior to 1992, several sites had yielded plantremains exclusively from wild species(e.g., Ginowan City Board of Education1991; Okinawa Prefecture Board of Edu-cation 1989). While there is a paucity of plant remains recovered from the Final

Jomon, I am studying archaeobotanicalsamples from the Final Jomon site of Sumiyoshi shell midden. My analysisis not yet complete, but the samplesanalyzed so far contain no cultigens. TheUeharanuribaru site yielded a featureinterpreted as agriculture-related by the excavator (Ginowan City Board of Education 1995), but this interpreta-tion remains controversial (Kishimoto,

personal communication 2005; Oki-nawa Prefectural Archaeological Center 2005; Shinzato, personal communica-tion 2005).

Based on studies to date, it appearsthat Final Jomon populations were likely to have been hunter-gatherers since the

Late Jomon, and most of the Yayoi-Heianpopulations (except the Nazakibaru peo-ple) were hunter-gatherers. Unlike thecase of New Zealand, where farmerscolonized uninhabited islands, encoun-tered cost-effective flightless birds inan environment unfavorable for agricul-ture, and became foragers, people inOkinawa struggled to survive in situ.Theoretically, it is difficult to imaginethat foragers (Late Jomon) became suc-cessful farmers (Final Jomon) and thenreturned to foraging (Yayoi-Heian) ina smaller island environment. I wouldargue that in the case of Okinawa, it washunter-gatherers, not agriculturists, whosuccessfully colonized the islands. They maintained this mode of subsistencefor at least the next 3,000 years. How

were they able to colonize and adaptsuccessfully to this environment withoutagriculture? An examination of faunalremains provides a clue to answer thisquestion.

SUCCESSFUL COLONIZATION BYFORAGERS

I have postulated that the timing of successful colonization to the central

Ryukyu Islands took place in what Iterm the “Late” Jomon Period (Takamiya1993). Initially, I hypothesized that thelikely reason that humans successfully colonized this island environment wasthat they were farmers (see Cherry 1981) or that they established subsis-tence strategies focused on nuts andcoral reef fishes (Takamiya 1993). Re-cent faunal and archaeobotanical evi-

dence does not support the farming hy-pothesis. Before examining the secondhypothesis, it is reasonable to explain

why I proposed it.

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Many anthropological studies indi-cate that selection of food items isdetermined by an assessment of cost-

benefit, risk, and reliability (Bettinger 1980, 1991; Earle 1980; Jochim 1976;Keene 1981; Kelly 1995; Meehan 1977;O’Connell and Hawkes 1981; Smith 1981; Smith and Winterhalder 1981;

Winterhalder 2001). In other words,hunter-gatherers tend to obtain satisfac-tory output with the lowest possibleinput; they tend to avoid food items thatinvolve higher risk, even if these foodsare considered more desirable. Peopletend to focus on items that are less vari-able and more predictable. Therefore,it is expected that the initial successfulsettlers of the island foraged for foodscharacterized by one or a combinationof these three factors.

Among naturally available food re-sources, early Okinawan settlers may have utilized coral reef resources andnuts first. As Perlman (1980:271–273)and Yesner (1980) suggested, many marine environments—and coral reefsspecifically (e.g., Okinawa)—are highly productive. Perlman (1980:277) alsonoted that return rates for many aquaticresources (shellfish/fish) are relatively high, concluding that “populations op-timizing meat protein or calories shouldconcentrate on aquatic resources.” Theislands of Okinawa are surrounded by

an extensive coral reef environment. AsPearson (1981:14) stressed, Okinawa’sreefs “are exceedingly rich; the CentralRyukyus lie within the zone of therichest and most diverse coral reefs inthe world.”

Nonetheless, marine resources alone were probably an inadequate sourceof calories on Okinawa. Yesner (1980)noted that marine resources in both

high- and low-latitude areas are produc-tive, but the latter may provide insuffi-cient calories because of a lack of largesea mammals. Along some lower-latitude

coastlines, humans typically need plantfoods to complement protein-rich ma-rine resources (Erlandson 1988; Yesner

1980). Thus, plant foods must havebeen a significant dietary contribution inprehistoric Okinawa. Among those plantfoods available, nuts may have playedan important role (Pearson 1981). They are relatively predictable, easy to collect,and produce high caloric returns, andso must have been a “logical selection”(Harris 1977:206). Based on these ar-guments, aquatic resources (especially from coral reef environments) and nutsmay have been the initial contributorsto the subsistence of early Okinawan for-agers. Archaeobotanical remains seem tosupport the idea that nuts were impor-tant to the prehistoric diet (Oomatsu andTsuji 1999; Takamiya 1993, 1999b).

Data on vertebrate remains fromOkinawan sites are usually reported

with only the taxa and MNI identified.Taxa listed in Table 2 are commonly reported, but no significant quantitativedifference is observed between sites or periods. Using NISP values rather thanMNI, I analyzed faunal remains at theclass level with NISP samples numberingmore than 1,000. The four shellmiddensites, Kogachibaru (Okinawa PrefectureBoard of Education 1987), Kigahama(Okinawa Prefecture Board of Educa-tion 1978), Chiarabaru (Gushikawa City

Board of Education 1986), and Furuza-mami Locality II (Okinawa PrefectureBoard of Education 1982) yielded from3,890 to 51,637 NISP samples (Figure 2).

Bony fish (Osteichthyes) wereranked first at all four sites, with afrequency of between 70% and 90%(mean = 80%). The difference betweenthis first-ranked faunal class and thesecond ranked class was at least 40% at

the Chiarabaru shell midden and morethan 80% at the Furuzamami II shellmidden. Furthermore, nearly all Oste-ichthyes remains in the region consisted


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Hiroto Takamiya

Figure 2. Late Jomon vertebrate utilization (NISP > 1,000).

of coral reef fishes such as parrotfishes(Scaridae) and wrasses (Labridae). Aspredicted, the Late Jomon populationsseem to have obtained their proteinprimarily from coral reef environments.NISP counts provide some informationabout earlier periods as well.

The only Initial/Early Jomon site inthis region with a reasonable number of faunal remains is the Noguni B site(Okinawa Prefecture Board of Education1984). The site is well known because ithas yielded the earliest pottery on theisland and the remains of at least 600

wild boar (MNI). The site report does notprovide NISP values for mammals, butother classes are reported. Therefore,the analysis was conducted using MNIfor mammals and NISP for the other classes. The Oike site (Toshima VillageBoard of Education 1994), contempo-

rary with Noguni B, has also yieldedfaunal remains with NISP of more than1,000. Although the site is located onTakara Island, roughly 350 km north of Naha City, the faunal remains fromthis site are included in my analysis(Figure 3).

In contrast to the Late Jomon pop-ulation, Initial/Early Jomon populationsat Oike and Noguni B seem to havepreferred mammals, consuming lesser amounts of coral reef fish and reptiles. AtNoguni B, more than 95% of the faunalremains consist of mammals, almost allof which are wild boar. Wild boars,unlike coral reef fishes, are neither pre-dictable nor stable, but are instead arisky resource item on Okinawa. Eventoday, hunters are sometimes killed or severely injured by wild boar attacks.This suggests that the Initial/Early Jomon

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Figure 3. Initial/Early Jomon vertebrate utilization (NISP > 1,000).

Figure 4. Vertebrate utilization: Initial/Early vs. Late Jomon.


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Hiroto Takamiya

population did not possess the mosteffective subsistence strategy in thistype of environment. Figure 4 compares

the results of the faunal analysis of theInitial/Early period with that of the Late Jomon period. The inhabitants of theformer may not have had an adequatetechnological repertoire to exploit effec-tively coral reef habitats. Alternatively,due to sea-level fluctuations during thistime, stable coral reefs may not havebeen available or easily accessible—these are research questions to be ex-plored in the future.

Analysis of shellfish remains also provides compelling results. Six Late Jomonsites have yielded more than 100 mol-lusk species, with a total MNI of between4,000 and 198,000. They are Kigahama(Okinawa Prefecture Board of Education1978), the Furuzamami I and II localities(Okinawa Prefecture Board of Educa-tion 1982), Chiarabaru (Gushikawa City Board of Education 1986), Kogachibaru(Okinawa Prefecture Board of Education1987), and Hyakuna No. 2 (OkinawaPrefecture Board of Education 1981). Tounderstand shellfish-exploitation strate-gies during this period, two assump-tions were made. First, although hunter-gatherers may have known of many edible plant and animal species in their environment, they tended to concen-trate on several major species (Lee

1968; O’Connell and Hawkes 1981; Winterhalder 2001). This strategy hadcertain evolutionary ecological advan-tages (Smith and Winterhalder 1981;

Winterhalder 2001). While more than100 species were identified at each site,the top 10 ranked species were con-sidered the most important resourcesfor site inhabitants. The result of thisexercise did not produce a clear pattern

for this period, however, which leadsto a second assumption. If species A is ranked in the top 10 and also foundin at least half of the sites (i.e., at least

three sites for Late Jomon), then species A was an important dietary resourceduring this time. This is a “ubiquitous”

approach often adopted by paleoeth-nobotanists (e.g., Popper 1988).Six species are most common at the

six Late Jomon sites. They include Mar- marstomata argyrostoma (mediumgastropod), Conomurex luhuanus(medium gastropod), Atactodea striata(medium bivalve), Lunella coronata

granulata (medium gastropod), The- liostyla albicilla (small gastropod), andGafrarium tumidum (small bivalve).The first three species are also found atsites during the Final Jomon and Early

Yayoi-Heian periods and are considered“core” species (e.g., Takamiya 2005,forthcoming). The rest seem characteris-tic of the Late Jomon mollusk-gatheringstrategy. These species are small (with an average weight of shell around 4.4g; Table 3) and can be easily and safely collected, even by children.

Mollusk procurement during the Ini-tial/Early Jomon at Noguni B (OkinawaPrefecture Board of Education 1984)included three core species and no Late

Jomon species (Table 3). Instead, twolarge shellfish species, Tectus maximusand Lunatica marmorata, are present,the former of which weighs approxi-mately 30 g on average (Okinawa Prefec-ture Board of Education 1982). Large T.

maximus tend to be distributed on thesea slope of coral reefs, a risky habitatfrom which to collect food. Kurozumi(1988) suggested that these shellfish might have been collected primarily by males.

Lunatica marmorata weighs atleast 400 g (Okinawa Prefecture Boardof Education 1982). Furthermore, it in-habits depths of about 10 to 15 m

(Okutani and Soyama 1987). Shellfish remains from the Oike site (Toshima Vil-lage Board of Education 1994) includedtwo core species ( M. argyrostoma

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Table 3 . Average Individual Shell Weight of the Important Mollusk Speciesfrom the Furuzamami and Tokijinbaru Sites.

Furuzamami (g) Tokijinbaru (g) Average (g)

(A) (B) (A +B)/2

Core species

M. argyrostoma 20.6 37.9 29.3

C. luhuanus 15.1 17.1 16.1

A. striata 2.1 1.2 1.6

Average 15.7

Late Jomon species

L. coronata granulata 1.6 N/A 1.6

T. albicilla 1.8 2.4 2.1

G. tumidum 14.8 4.4 9.6 Average 4.4

Data from Okinawa Prefecture Board of Education (1982), Nakijin Village Board of Education (1977).

and C. luhuanus ) and, again, no Late Jomon shellfish species were within themost abundant 10 species. Instead, twolarge species ( Tridacna maxima and L.marmorata ) were found. T. maxima

weighs approximately 220 g, and whileit can be found on the lagoon floor,extracting it is difficult even with irontools because it becomes embedded inthe coral rock matrix (Kurozumi, per-sonal communication 1995). This factsuggests that Initial/Early Jomon shell-fish procurement was riskier and morecostly than that of the Late Jomon.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

Many archaeologists and anthropolo-gists in Japan, and in particular Okinawa,readily accept that the islands were suc-cessfully colonized by hunter-gatherersfrom ca. 32000 to 18000 BP by people

who maintained foraging economies un-til just before the Gusuku period (ca. AD1100–1400). A continuous human pres-

ence on Okinawa since the Pleistocenehas been questioned by recent studies,but any sustained presence of hunter-gatherer populations on these small and

remote islands would be unusual in thecontext of island colonization world-

wide. Many islands were colonized by farmers rather than foragers during theHolocene. There are exceptions such

as when the island is large, in closeproximity to a continent or larger island,or provides rich marine resources, espe-cially large sea mammals. The islands of Okinawa do not satisfy these conditions.

Why were prehistoric peoples ableto occupy the Ryukyu Islands whenthey did and what was the subsistenceeconomy of the initial successful col-onizers of the islands? A review of

island colonization around the worldsuggests that food production was nec-essary to colonize many small islands likeOkinawa. Faunal remains from Late

Jomon, Final Jomon, and the Yayoi-Heian sites, however, contain no un-equivocal evidence of domesticatedanimals except for dogs. Systematic re-covery and analysis of plant remainssupports the idea that prehistoric people

were gatherers of wild plants. At theMebaru site, independent analyses by Oomatsu and Tsuji (1999) and Takamiya(1999b) revealed that the Late Jomon


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Hiroto Takamiya

population gathered wild plants, prob-ably focusing on carbohydrate-rich nutsas an important source of calories. Thus,

the islands were successfully colonizedby foragers rather than farmers. Plant re-mains collected from other pre-Gusukusites indicate that this mode of subsis-tence continued for at least 3,000 years(Takamiya 2004, 2005).

Detailed analysis of Late Jomon fau-nal remains suggests that fishes fromcoral reef environments were the mostimportant protein resource during thisperiod. Coral reef fishes are the mostcost efficient to procure in the area.In contrast, Initial/Early Jomon peopleeither concentrated heavily on wildboar or focused on wild boar, reptile,and coral reef fishes. The vertebrate-procurement system utilized during thisperiod appears to have been much less efficient compared with that of the Late Jomon. In terms of mollusks,Late Jomon populations as opposed tothe Initial/Early Jomon people, seem tohave selected the least-cost species.

When combined with evidence for theharvesting of wild plant foods, these fau-nal data suggest that the central RyukyuIslands were first successfully colonizedby humans when they established themost efficient subsistence strategy for this particular environment. This conclu-sion suggests that foragers can success-

fully settle small islands such as Okinawa when coral reef fish and shellfish areabundant enough to supply the proteinneeds of a human population and where

wild plant foods, most likely nuts, canprovide a complementary source of car-bohydrates and calories.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many scholars from Okinawa and Japan collected and analyzed faunal

remains used in this study and as-

sisted my own efforts to collect data. As the research progressed, they also gave me up-to-date information that

facilitated my analyses of the material. I cannot list them individually,but sincerely appreciate their support.

I particularly thank T. Kurozumi,Y. Kishimoto, and T. Shinzato, whoclarified various questions I had re-

garding Okinawan subsistence. Boband Pattie Rechtman, Scott Fitzpatrick,and Jon Erlandson all read earlier drafts of the paper and mademany useful editorial suggestions. Twoanonymous reviewers also graciouslyread this paper and provided valuablecomments that greatly improved itsoverall content and interpretation.

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