ABSTRACT
Micronesia began to be peopled earlier than other parts of Remote Oceania, but the origins of its inhabitants remain unclear. We generated genome-wide data from 164 ancient and 112 modern individuals. Analysis reveals five migratory streams into Micronesia. Three are East Asian related, one is Polynesian, and a fifth is a Papuan source related to mainland New Guineans that is different from the New Britain-related Papuan source for southwest Pacific populations but is similarly derived from male migrants ~2500 to 2000 years ago. People of the Mariana Archipelago may derive all of their precolonial ancestry from East Asian sources, making them the only Remote Oceanians without Papuan ancestry. Female-inherited mitochondrial DNA was highly differentiated across early Remote Oceanian communities but homogeneous within, implying matrilocal practices whereby women almost never raised their children in communities different from the ones in which they grew up.
Subject(s)
DNA, Ancient , DNA, Mitochondrial , Human Migration , Asian People/genetics , Child , DNA, Mitochondrial/genetics , Female , History, Ancient , Human Migration/history , Humans , Male , Micronesia , OceaniaABSTRACT
[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0039171.].
ABSTRACT
Data from morphology, linguistics, history, and archaeology have all been used to trace the dispersal of chickens from Asian domestication centers to their current global distribution. Each provides a unique perspective which can aid in the reconstruction of prehistory. This study expands on previous investigations by adding a temporal component from ancient DNA and, in some cases, direct dating of bones of individual chickens from a variety of sites in Europe, the Pacific, and the Americas. The results from the ancient DNA analyses of forty-eight archaeologically derived chicken bones provide support for archaeological hypotheses about the prehistoric human transport of chickens. Haplogroup E mtDNA signatures have been amplified from directly dated samples originating in Europe at 1000 B.P. and in the Pacific at 3000 B.P. indicating multiple prehistoric dispersals from a single Asian centre. These two dispersal pathways converged in the Americas where chickens were introduced both by Polynesians and later by Europeans. The results of this study also highlight the inappropriate application of the small stretch of D-loop, traditionally amplified for use in phylogenetic studies, to understanding discrete episodes of chicken translocation in the past. The results of this study lead to the proposal of four hypotheses which will require further scrutiny and rigorous future testing.
Subject(s)
Chickens/genetics , DNA, Mitochondrial/genetics , Fossils , Haplotypes/genetics , Animals , HumansSubject(s)
Chickens/genetics , DNA, Mitochondrial/genetics , Isotopes , Radiometric Dating , Animals , Chile , Diet , Europe , History, 15th Century , History, Medieval , Humans , PolynesiaABSTRACT
Two issues long debated among Pacific and American prehistorians are (i) whether there was a pre-Columbian introduction of chicken (Gallus gallus) to the Americas and (ii) whether Polynesian contact with South America might be identified archaeologically, through the recovery of remains of unquestionable Polynesian origin. We present a radiocarbon date and an ancient DNA sequence from a single chicken bone recovered from the archaeological site of El Arenal-1, on the Arauco Peninsula, Chile. These results not only provide firm evidence for the pre-Columbian introduction of chickens to the Americas, but strongly suggest that it was a Polynesian introduction.
