Ref ID:	31736
Ref Type:	Journal Article
Authors:	Amesbury, J. R. Moore, D. R. Hunter-Anderson, R. L.
Title:	Cultural adaptations and late Holocene sea level change in the Marianas: recent excavations at Chalan Piao, Saipan, Micronesia
Date:	1996
Source:	Bulletin of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association
Notes:	Proceedings of the 15th Congress of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association Chiang Mai, Thailand 5 to 12 January 1994
Abstract:	Recent salvage excavations at Chalan Piao, Saipan (a Pre-Latte site) are reported. Chalan Piao was one of the earliest settlements in the Marianas, first occupied c. 1731-1226 BC. The physical setting then was a shallow marine embayment with sand bars upon which people were encamped. The area eventually became a sandy beach with a brackish marsh behind it and the Pre-Latte deposits were buried by more recent prehistoric deposits of the Latte Phase. A wide range of artifacts (redware pottery, Conus shell beads and other ornaments/valuables and stone tools) was retrieved from the Pre-Latte layer. From the lower to upper parts of this layer the ceramic decorations and vessel forms become simpler shell ornaments/valuables (rings, circlets, bracelets) decline in frequency and beads decline in average size. These changes may reflect directional social processes related to environmental changes enabling larger populations to live in the islands specifically, an increase in strand areas useful for planting and collecting. Marine shell evidence of inshore habitat change, related to seaward progradation, from Chalan Piao and other sites in southwestern Saipan during the prehistoric period is presented.
Date Created:	10/19/2003
Volume:	15
Page Start:	53
Page End:	69