Re: Negau

> Only when it's based on unsustained nonsense. We have solid evidence

for the Middle East being the first cradle of grain-based agriculture
and no evidence for grain-based agriculture in the Far East until
much later.

Now that is unsustained. Check the archives for 'millet' and 'rice'. eg.

Rice, rye and millet came along thousands of years after agriculture in the Middle East

> We do have evidence of early sedentary agriculture in New Guinea
based on bananas, plantains, sago, possibly sugarcane (I read
something that claimed sugarcane originated there, but most of what
I've seen links it to Bangladesh and surrounding countries).

New Guinea is a refuge. If those guys have it, the victors would
certainly too.

In New Guinea, as I understand, they developed a sedentary culture in situ and were the first in East Asia to do so. It was definitely not a refuge and supported relatively dense populations. They reached a certain level where they acquired self-sufficiency and didn't need to go any further. I understand that the same thing happened in Amazonia, where they had pottery, yuca/mandioca/cazabe and other basic plants that were similar to plantains, in the sense that after you planted them, they grew on their own

> In much of the Old World, the idea of agriculture and metals

themselves, rather than the technologies, probably gave rise to
separate creations of technologies and domestications.

I wish I knew what that meant.

When intelligent people see something new, they can often figure it out on their own, in their own way, adapting it to their own environment, without having to take lessons. If someone saw or heard of plants being tended for maximum yield, they might try it on their own without guidance or gifts of seeds.

> Bronze and grain based agriculture were most certainly discovered

separately in the New World. The Peruvians discovered bronze
technology and it reached Mexico shortly before the Spaniards arrived.

So if Austronesians had those technologies, they could be carriers.
I've always been puzzled at the idea of the elder on Easter Island
telling the young folks: 'No, you can't go island-hoppping like we
did, cause then you'll hit a continent instead and that wouldn't be
island-hopping' .

Torsten

The Polynesians did not have bronze, so they weren't able to teach it to the Peruvians, who figured it out on their own. The Peruvians figured out gold and silver work thousands of years ago on their own as well (perhaps c. 3000 BCE?)

Gold and silver reached Meso-America c. 800-900 CE.

The Polynesians evidently did leave chickens in Peru c. 1400. The Polynesians seem to have gotten sweet potatoes indirectly from the Peruvians. Polynesian languages usually have a word similar to Runasimi kumara, but it seems it spread after the Spaniards took it to the Phillipines , although this raises the question why the Spaniards didn't use camote, since trade with the Phillipines was through Mexico, not Peru