Lapita before Lapita
The Early Story of the Meyer/O’Reilly Watom Island Archaeological Collection
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 9075259 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Emilie Dotte-Sarout (0000-0003-1413-9655, Australian National University, corresponding author), Hilary Howes (0000-0002-4437-7884, Australian National University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 54 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 354-378 |
| Publication date | 2019-07-03 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Pacific History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0022-3344 • E-ISSN: 1469-9605 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/00223344.2018.1561254 |
| OpenAlex | W2914424525 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 4 |
Seventeen years before the first excavation at the archaeological site of Lapita (New Caledonia) in 1952, two men of the cloth met and exchanged artefacts, notes and ideas to produce some of the earliest analyses of what later became known as Lapita pottery. Otto Meyer (1877–1937), a Sacred Heart Missionary stationed on Watom Island, described chance finds of ‘prehistoric pottery’ in 1909, following these with more systematic excavations. Patrick O’Reilly (1900–88), a Marist Father associated with the Musée de l’Homme in Paris, drew on Meyer’s work, his own extensive bibliographical knowledge and his observations during a one-year mission in the region in 1934–5 to present part of the collection in France, laying the ground for further theories. The publication, interpretation and curation of the Meyer/O’Reilly collection represents an exemplary journey through the history of Pacific archaeology and the emergence of the Lapita paradigm. We consider the context of Meyer’s encounter with O’Reilly, the ideas both men advanced in analysing the collection and the site, and how these resonated during the development of Pacific and Lapita archaeology throughout the first half of the 20th century
Archaeology · Context (archaeology) · Excavation · Interpretation (philosophy) · Pottery · Prehistory · Australian Indigenous Culture and History · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · History · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies · Philosophy
How Dare Our ‘Prehistoric’ Have a Prehistory of Their Own?! The interplay of historical and biographical contexts in early French archaeology of the Pacific
Introduction
Le peuplement de la Nouvelle-Calédonie. Couches ethniques et couches culturelles
Observations on the Cultural History of New Caledonia and the New Hebrides
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,4 |
| Citation span | 2021 - 2022 (2) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |