| Abstract: |
Introduction: The traditional approach employed to describe the history and prehistory of the Mariana Islands has emphasized the cultural and linguistic homogeneity of the indigenous population, the Chamorros. Consequently, archaeologists have devoted little attention to spatial variabililty across the archipelago or to research domains that may articulate with such variability-for example, the exchange of commodities or social transactions and the extent of inter-community and inter-island interaction. Interestingly, this approach has produced an inconsistency between archaeological method and the study of culture history in Mariana Islands prehistory. For with few exceptions, artifacts recovered from archaeological sites have been treated as if they were produced and used within the confines of a single community. Yet at the same time, the material culture assemblage for each time period, spanning an array of communities, is thought to have been relatively homogeneous. Such a view can only be maintained by postulating high rates of prehistoric interaction coupled with low rates of exchange. This hypothesis has not been explicitly evaluated by Micronesian archaeologists, in terms of its methodological, theoretical, or substantive adequacy. The completion of a number of archaeological projects over the past 15 years in the Mariana Islands now makes it possible to ask, how homogeneous and similar are material culture assemblages across the archipelago at different points in time? Pottery lends itself well to this kind of questioning, because it occurs in large numbers at virtually all sites in the Mariana Islands, and its variability across a number of dimensions can be described. Traditionally in Micronesia pottery analyses have focused on the description of easily observed characteristics of sherds, such as temper inclusions or surface treatment. While such observations have proved useful and will continue to structure archaeological systematics in the Mariana Islands, other, less easily observed characteristics of pottery can also be of analytical use. In particular, the combination of compositional and traditional analyses of Micronesian pottery may prove to be a powerful tool in resolving alternative hypotheses regarding community interaction and exchange, as we hope to show here. Ultimately our goal is to link ceramic variation through time and space in the Mariana Islands to a more general model incorporating aspects of interaction, exchange, and social complexity. The evidence from our pottery analyses is congruent with hypotheses that link variability in inter-island interaction and exchange to (1) the varying conditions associated with first establishing human settlements under conditions oflow population density, and then to (2) the conditions that prevailed as the numbers and size of settlements increased and as the Chamorros became socially differentiated within and between communities and islands.
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