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3,000 Years Ago in Australia & Oceania

The double-hulled canoe came into use. The double hulled canoe allowed the Lapita people, the ancestors of the Polynesians, to go on long distance ocean travel, of up to 600 km in one voyage. Based on the finds of obsidian tools, Lapita traders covered routes more than 2700 km long.

Around 2500 years ago there were important changes in the Fiji islands. The Lapita people on Fiji included both Polynesians and Melanesians (see 4000 years ago). The decorative Lapita pottery disappears and is replaced by a plainer, more functional form of pottery. There is evidence of more crop growing. The Polynesians had arrived first and settled on the coast as fisher folk, while the later arriving Melanesians moved inland as farmers. The inland settlers, however, eventually drove out the coastal dwellers. Most of the Polynesians fled Fiji and moved on to Tonga. Tongatapu is the oldest known Polynesian settlement on Tonga island.

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