Did The Polynesians Discover America?

[Music] [Applause] [Music] this is the Pacific Ocean it covers over a third of the Earth's surface and as large and all the other land masses in the world combined this 160 million square kilometer expanse is dotted with thousands of tiny islands Captain Cook sailing around the region in the 17th century found them all inhabited and these people shared languages cultures and a love of navigation spread thousands of miles across open ocean the Polynesians are history's greatest navigators but could they have discovered the Americas before Columbus and how is the second most beautiful thing on earth the potato keyed to this story that's fine Oh [Music] Samoans Tahitians Tongans meri Hawaiians and many others live in the Polynesian triangle even though Polynesian elbow is probably a bit more accurate this triangle stretches from Hawaii in the north to New Zealand in the south and to Rapa Nui in the East the currently accepted origin of the Polynesians is the came out of Taiwan then moved through Southeast Asia and Melanesia into Polynesia around 3,000 to 1000 BC but the exact routes and dates are still debated the debate around the origins of the Polynesians was especially heated a few decades ago which prompted tour higher all to propose an interesting theory be incredibly named Thor Heyerdahl was a Norwegian adventurer in the mid 20th century he proposed that the polynesian origin lay in america rather than in asia his theory rested on the fact that the winds and currents made it easier to travel from east to west in the pacific polynesian experts informed her all that the linguistic genetic and archaeological evidence all pointed towards Asia and that he definitely should not build a raft and attempt to drift from Peru to Polynesia Thor built a raft and attempted to drift from Peru to Polynesia on the 28th of April 1947 after a harrowing 100 day journey he and his crew made landfall in Maori arif on the 7th of August proving that it was in fact possible who saw the drift from America to Polynesia all the other evidence still pointed towards Asia some years later Andrew sharp theorized that the Polynesians had settled all of their islands through accidental drift voyages hirable the sheriff's thesis came in the form of an emerging technology computers in 1973 Michael Evensen Jared Ward and John W Webb ran over thousand simulations of potential Polynesian drift voyages they prove that drifting was near impossible none of these simulated voyages managed to reach Hawaii this meant one thing the Polynesians intended to land and settle where they did so intentional sailing is the only way Polynesians could have spread out then how on earth did they do it the journey out of Asia happened in small boats and outrigger canoes which are canoes with a second smaller hole for increased stability for crossing the massive distances in remote Oceania something new was needed enter the double-hulled canoe in which the outrigger was replaced by a second similarly sized hole a wooden deck was then constructed between the holes to allow the canoes to carry more crew and supplies these holes were heated or gate of massive tree trunks using tools called pads or constructed from planks attached with coconut fiber ropes and sealed with sap from the breadfruit tree I think it's now time to consider the coconut the ship sails coconut leaves the 300 meters of rope on board coconut fibers the drinks coconut water no coconut no voyaging this simple crop was essential now coconuts and canoes are impressive but how do they discover and remember the locations of hundreds of remote islands without a compass or written language the exact designs of the canoes the locations of the islands and the secrets of navigation were entirely passed down through oral tradition usually some in order to find a direction in the endless ocean Polynesian navigators had to maintain a constant mental map of where they were in relation to the stars in the sky this star compass divided the sky into 32 houses by watching these stars along with the rising and Setting Sun the navigators could maintain their course with certainty and if the stars couldn't be seen a navigator would read the ocean the way in which an ocean swell rocked the boat indicated where they were and if they could orient their ship with the desired ocean swell and they knew exactly where they were gonna go following the flight paths of nesting birds watching for clouds over islands and we're looking for the reflections of lagoons and the clouds a navigator could figure out if the land was nearby finally they used the survival sailing strategy which is where Thor comes back into the mix as shown earlier the currents and winds made it easier to drift from America the Oceania now this doesn't prove that the Americans set up Polynesia though it instead shows us how Polynesians felt safe sailing off into the unknown they could sail against this current for as long as they could in search of land and if none could be found before supplies ran out then they allowed the currents to bring them back and much quicker pace these theories and discoveries were all tested in 1976 by a nineteen metre long replica of the ancient Polynesian voyaging canoe named the Hokulea at the time indigenous Pacific culture was near extinction especially in places like Hawaii there were less than a dozen master navigators left none of them in Polynesia the people behind who Kalia wanted the sail in the traditional Polynesian way to do that they had to reach out to Ma Pa like a master navigator from SATA while in Micronesia Mel was passionate about preserving his culture and making sure it survived into the modern day he agreed to come aboard and navigate for the Hawaiians they sailed from Hawaii 4226 kilometers to Tahiti using only traditional methods upon their arrival the crew of the Hokulea were greeted in Tahiti Harbor by over half the island's population 17,000 people gathered in that Harbor to watch their culture undergo a rebirth the culture of polynesian wayfinding taught dead for centuries have been reawakened for the tiny crew aboard the Hokulea soon the Hokulea would go on more voyages to new zealand to Rapa Nui and even complete a circumnavigation of the world along with igniting a cultural renaissance in the Pacific these voyages along with Mel's navigational knowledge proved that the ancient Polynesians were capable of long-distance voyaging using their own methods the advances in our knowledge at the Polynesian navigation along with archaeology and experimental archaeology at the Hokulea flipped tour higher odds theory on its head it now seems more likely that the Polynesians were the ones that reached America and this is where the potato enters our story the sweet potato is an American crop going back thousands of years it would not be introduced to Eurasia until after the voyages of Columbus but it had been central to the Polynesian diet from much longer the discovery and dating of carbonized sweet potato tubers on the Southern Cross islands are evidence that the sweet potato was in Polynesia no later than the end of the 14th century AD which is before European contact there are also samples of sweet potatoes radiocarbon dated to the pre-contact period in Hawaii and New Zealand so given that the Polynesians reached Rapa Nui and the during the period between 980 and 1180 they were undergoing rapid expansion it isn't too far-fetched to assume that they may have reached Peru traded with the natives there and then brought back some of those crops especially after Thor proved how easy it was to return from Peru to Polynesia along with his physical evidence there is also some linguistic evidence the word for sweet potato in Quechua is Kumar across Polynesia the word for sweet potato is oddly similar with kumara and Kamala being the most common the bottle gourd a vital part of Uruguayan and Argentinian life also seems to have made its way across the Pacific and into Polynesian life pre European contact together with this physical and linguistic evidence there is also a tiny amount of genetic evidence authors of a genetic study published in the journal Current Biology found that it wasn't only Polynesians that inhabited Rapa Nui anis a foe Milus penis a geneticist at the Center for geo genetics at the University of Copenhagen stated we found evidence of gene flow between this population and the Native American populations suggesting an ancient ocean migration route between Polynesia and the Americas genetic data from 27 of the islands Polynesian inhabitants showed interbreeding with South American natives somewhere between 1,300 and 1500 the growing consensus among experts on Polynesia is that they contacted Americans before Columbus they had the technology the ability and the will to cross the Pacific would ease right now all we're waiting for is incontrovertible evidence to appear because even the potato isn't enough to absolutely prove contact however the story of the Polynesians is an incredible one they powered by the human spirit for discovery and adventure populated over 1,000 islands and created earth's largest nation covering some forty-one million square kilometers of ocean during a period for European and Asian sailors were hugging the coastlines when Captain Cook first entered their realm he asked how shall we account for this nation spreading itself so far over the vast ocean a hard work of Mel the Polynesians and an array of scientists and archaeologists has in recent years answered this question and it's only a matter of time until the American question is answered as well thank you for watching this video it is part of the fantastic operation Odysseus collaboration please follow the link in the description to check out the entire playlist and you can continue off in this video and watch the videos by history with hilbert brandon f and mr. b which will be covering a similar time period enjoy [Music] [Music]

Channel: Cogito

Views: 352,003

Keywords: polynesian, polynesian history, polynesian history documentary, christopher columbus, history channel, what is buddhism, polynesian history and origin, polynesian history timeline, hawaiian history documentary, thor heyerdahl, thor heyerdahl kon tiki documentary, did polynesians discover america, did polynesian explorers discover america, did polynesians reach america, mau piailug, mau piailug documentary, mau piailug star compass, hokulea, hokulea voyage around the world

Id: R913npL7Cg8

Length: 12min 55sec (775 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 24 2018