Harvard Review’s Thompson explores the history and mystery of Polynesian navigation
The islands of Polynesia stretch over thousands of miles of ocean, presenting a daunting barrier to ancient people before the invention of magnetic compasses and modern navigation equipment. Yet early Europeans exploring the Pacific found island after island full of people who shared similar customs and beliefs despite their far-flung distribution. They told tales of epic voyages of discovery and colonization, undertaken in ocean-going canoes, robust enough to make the trip but fragile enough to make some Western scholars doubt they could have made the crossing, preferring instead a narrative of accident and drift. Who the Polynesians were, where they came from, and how they navigated such formidable seas has puzzled explorers, missionaries, anthropologists, and archaeologists for centuries. In her book “Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia,” Harvard Review editor Christina Thompson examines what’s known about what might be humanity’s most epic migration, and what questions remain. She also explores the investigation itself,...