My Indigenous New Guinean Civilization TL Brainstorm

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Looking at the geography of New Guinea, I'm struck by the extreme diversity, and the near impenetrability that emerges. It would be near impossible for a single state to really rule the island, at least not until a relatively late period.

A state unit would probably fairly regional, and extremely tailored to a specific sort of habitat.

It wouldn't so much colonize its neighbors, as foster the adaption analogues of its own way of life to other environments.

So the historical map and timeline of civilization would be quite complex, possibly with the evolution of or emergence of several polities/cultural complexes.

Transport would probably be a huge issue. One of the keys of any New Guinea polity is going to be construction, operation and maintenance of its transport networks - roads or rivers/portages.
 
Looking at the geography of New Guinea, I'm struck by the extreme diversity, and the near impenetrability that emerges. It would be near impossible for a single state to really rule the island, at least not until a relatively late period.

A state unit would probably fairly regional, and extremely tailored to a specific sort of habitat.

It wouldn't so much colonize its neighbors, as foster the adaption analogues of its own way of life to other environments.

So the historical map and timeline of civilization would be quite complex, possibly with the evolution of or emergence of several polities/cultural complexes.

Transport would probably be a huge issue. One of the keys of any New Guinea polity is going to be construction, operation and maintenance of its transport networks - roads or rivers/portages.
Interesting thoughts; perhaps a Mesoamerican-level diversity could emerge at first, due to the factors you mentioned?

However, note that the Central Andes are even more diverse than New Guinea (Peru and Ecuador are both megadiverse countries ecologically) and that Japan also has very rugged topography for the most part; in neither case though did the geography stop the political unification under the Inka or the Yamato.

I thus think an intermediate level of unification is most likely; perhaps similar to Classic Mesoamerica with Teotihuacan being the dominant polity but not the sole one, or similarly with Classical Greece or the Classic Maya - more or less one culture, script and language but numerous polities.

As for the location for the "mother culture", I am leaning towards somewhere along either the Fly or Sepik Rivers, both of which are navigable for much of their lengths. Also, I think, due to its OTL association with the rise of agriculture in New Guinea, the mother culture should speak a Trans-New Guinea Language.
 
I am myself a big fan of microlivestock, not the least because I am a pescetarian, and New Guinea has several potential candidates: Various insects, such as: Giant stick insects (in OTL eaten in many parts of the island) - apparently quite easy to care for; and sago grubs (a delicacy among many of the island's peoples).

Nanolivestock! Very cool! Sago grubs have terrific potential. If you can get them to eat something other than palm pulp. The trouble is that if the Sago Grubs are dependent upon palm trees, then your nanolivestock has a bottleneck - it can take fifteen years for a palm tree to grow until it becomes fodder for a Sago Grub. This means that you're really dependent on a slow growing plant. Perhaps a related species of grub or beetle eating something else, or an adaptation or diverged domesticated form which eats other plant material like a prepared mash.

Giant stick insects, I don't know too much about. They seem to be social however, and leaf based plant eaters. So you've got possibilities.

Other potential livestock could include freshwater fish such as barramundi, eel-tailed catfish, croakers and gobies; a wide array of marine fish and shellfish, including groupers and the giant clam;
You need to be careful with those. The trouble with aquaculture is that your fish are going to be shitting and pissing (evacuating) in the same water that they're swimming in. In the wild, no big deal, population densities are low, there's a multitude of species, and a fully diverse ecology and running water cleansing the system. An aquaculture system, on the other hand, goes for heavy population density, controlled areas, minimization of species, etc. - quite often the result is eventually a toxic soup for your aquaculture. Modern Salmon Farms for instance have a variety of problems, including parasites, not seen in wild salmon.

Some species are tolerant, Asian Carp, or European Trout were raised by the elite in local ponds and pools just to have fresh fish around. But on the whole, it wasn't cost effective. As a general rule, you'd need pretty special circumstances for successful aquaculture. It's self limiting.

Some of the same things apply to nanolivestock. A lot of insects require a certain amount of space, they may not tolerate density, and they'll end up living in their waste product. The best bets for nanolivestock are usually colonial insects.

and of course the dog.
Dogs are highly virtual critters, and pound for pound, some of the most powerful draft animals out there. But they're also expensive to keep, unless you've got a ready source of protein, or edible forage - rough fish, meat or meat scraps, etc. etc. The Inuit and other Arctic cultures could use the dog as a draft animal because of the ready availability of sea protein, migratory meat, and low population density.

Eventually, silk worms, chickens, giant water bugs .
Silk worms are quite interesting. They're really the other great Nanolivestock. Are you thinking an autonomous route of domestication?

Giant Water Bugs? As I understand it, they're predators, which is usually a pretty black mark for a number of reasons. They're unlikely to tolerate being raised in density, and density is always an issue for any domesticate. In the wild, they're most likely prone to giving each other space - basically each to their own feeding/mating territory. Put a lot of predator insects in unnatural density, you may find them eating or damaging each other. Also, if they're used to low density, you may find that domestication densities will infect each other with diseases and parasites, resulting in the loss of whole crops. Finally, what are you going to feed them? From the sound of it, they're Apex insect predators, known to kill baby turtles and water snakes. So they're not cheap dates.

Interesting to see what you do with that.

and of course large domestic mammals, most likely water buffalo and pigs - at least at first, would become included in this livestock package
Water Buffalo domestication seems to date back about 5000 years, and emerges in India and China, spreading from there. Not sure when it would have made it into the Indonesian archipelago. However, we can assume that domesticated water buffalo are part of the package of an Austronesian agricultural complex. Your New Guinea civilization will encounter domesticated Water Buffalo late, on its extreme fringes, and as part of a rival culture.

Of course, they might domesticate it themselves - two independent water buffalo domestications make a third independent event quite plausible.

But then, the question is, where do you get your Water Buffalo? Odds seem remote that they might have gotten to New Guineau. The Anoa of Sulawesi seems to be a dwarf form of Water Buffalo, which indicates that some of them may have done some island hopping across the Wallace line during the glacial periods.

But a lot of my admittedly brief surveys suggest that the Post-Wallace Water Buffalo populations are either domesticates, or domesticates gone feral. Tough.

You can, of course, POD an introduction of Water Buffalo into Sahul, or New Guinea. As I've noted, Stegodons might be slightly more probable.

If you don't, then your New Guinea population has to expand outwards and westward into the Indonesian Islands, possibly as far as Borneo. And Domestication has to take place on outer fringes, and be imported.

As for pigs, not to sure about them, but I assume that there's a fair bit of literature about the proliferation of pigs and chickens. These seem to be part of the Austronesian package. I'm not sure if they proliferated in Indonesia before that before that.

Possibly an Austronesian Interchange is going to be a big part of your timeline.

Anyway, it would be fascinating to see a civilization or an agricultural complex working itself out with a large nanolivestock component, so I'm quite interested in seeing where you go with that.
 
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Just a couple of thoughts -

First - on Elephants/Stegodonts - one big disadvantage of an Elephant/Stegodont economy in comparison to a fast breeder livestock economy is going to be in meat.

Basically a fast breeder - water buffalo, pigs, cattle, horses, etc., are growing through their working life fast enough, and producing enough surplus animals fast enough, that they're injecting a fair bit of meat into the culture. Yes, water buffalo are used for work, but every year the old ones, or the surplus ones are harvested for meat.

With elephants/stegodonts.... well, it'll take sixty or seventy years for one to get old enough that it's no longer useful for work and is harvested for meat, leather and bone, and they're not breeding fast enough to produce a disposeable surplus.

You'll probably see elephant meat consumed, but it's probably going to be on rare, formal and ceremonial occasions, and accompanied by a lot of pomp and circumstance, mysticism, etc.

Which may mean that your society might have a particularly strong motivation to invest in microlivestock or nanolivestock to ensure regular protein.

Even if they eventually acquire water buffalo, there may be an inbuilt cultural bias, by that time, against eating labour domesticates.
 
A final, very wild thought - primates.

Assuming your New Guinea civilization manages to get off its island and explore some of the neighboring coasts, it may encounter and retrieve primates.

Monkeys, Gibbons, possibly even Orangutangs. I wouldn't bet money on domestication possibities. But these animals are exotic enough, and some of them may be opportunistic enough to be transferred and establish on New Guinea.

Or if you want a mind blowing possibility... Homo Florensis. Flores isn't too too far away. And Homo Florensis became extinct as recently as 12,000 years ago. They may well have overlapped with modern humans on Flores. It's just barely within the hypothetical window of your New Guinea civilization.

Possibility for transference? Feral populations of Florensis in New Guinea? Possible domestication?

You asked for brainstorming.
 
Any thoughts, questions, ideas or comments? :)

Can I suggest you read/watch Guns, Germs and Steel. The reason why I point out this read is:

1 - it's a bloody good read; and,
2 - the Author postulated his theories based on a PNG native asking the question: "why do you have so much cargo and we have none?" - or in other words "why are you rich, but we're poor?"

So, from that perspective you may find a lot of 'butterflies' are needed to overcome the 'Guns, Germs and Steel' barriers to civilisation and make PNG a dominant power in the south pacific.
 
Silk worms are quite interesting. They're really the other great Nanolivestock. Are you thinking an autonomous route of domestication?

The silkworm is native from China, right? You will need someway to bring it to NG. If you are thinking in the silkworms to get silk as an autonomus way, you will need mulberry trees (the silkworms eat mulberry leafes), or just domesticate the silkworms using another trees.
 
The silkworm is native from China, right? You will need someway to bring it to NG. If you are thinking in the silkworms to get silk as an autonomus way, you will need mulberry trees (the silkworms eat mulberry leafes), or just domesticate the silkworms using another trees.


Good point. The wild silkmoth is native to central asia, from Japan, to Korea to inland china. It doesn't get anywhere near Southeast Asia or New Guinea.

It seems unlikely that this would be a cultural transmission. For much of its history, Silk was only available in China. Even after it was widely traded, the Chinese maintained a monopoly. New Guinea probably would not acquire silk or silkworms through acquisition until at least the Common Era (CE).

On the other hand, if this is a culture which domesticates a variety of nanolivestock, it's possible that it might independently originate silk or pseudo-silk fabricks.
 
There are many other insects that produce silk (silverfish, webspinners, some crickets, among others without counting the spiders), not as the silkworm, i think its going to be a very long domestication process, but if it succeeds its going to be a unique mark of the NG civilization.

Yes, its a very hard sell..
 
Generally, unique events are considered harder to replicate.

Look at it this way - Agriculture was independently developed at least eight times. Copper working perhaps a dozen times. Bronze or Iron at least three or four occasions each. Draft labour domesticates perhaps a dozen times worldwide. Different species of Camel were independently domesticated twice, and the Water Buffalo was independently domesticated twice.

So, it's not impossible, and quite likely, that an Agricultural civilization can emerge, that it will domesticate whatever draft animals might be available, that certain animals and plants seem more amenable to domestication, and that some form of metallurgy up to bronze or iron working could emerge. These things happen over and over when the conditions are right.

On the other hand, Gunpowder was only ever invented once in history, although the components have been well known to a number of cultures.

Silk? The product of only a single domestication event. This implies it is extremely unlikely to replicate.

On the other hand, beekeeping seems to have emerged at least three, maybe five times in human history. So nanolivestock aren't necessarily an impossibility or fluke.

A culture which innovates heavily in nanolivestock and ends up cultivating multiple insect species on a large scale might have a lot easier time making the leap to silk, or pseudosilk. After all, textiles are another one of those multiple independent inventions.
 
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Good point. The wild silkmoth is native to central asia, from Japan, to Korea to inland china. It doesn't get anywhere near Southeast Asia or New Guinea.

It seems unlikely that this would be a cultural transmission. For much of its history, Silk was only available in China. Even after it was widely traded, the Chinese maintained a monopoly. New Guinea probably would not acquire silk or silkworms through acquisition until at least the Common Era (CE).

EDIT: It appears they do weave, but only baskets and not cloth, which is a very different process.
On the other hand, if this is a culture which domesticates a variety of nanolivestock, it's possible that it might independently originate silk or pseudo-silk fabricks.
Silk is only useful if the culture already has the technology to spin thread and weave cloth. AFAIK, none of the current cultures on the island did before outside contact.
Silk? The product of only a single domestication event. This implies it is extremely unlikely to replicate.
There are several semi-domesticated silk producing moths, mostly in South and Southeast Asia.
 
Silk is only useful if the culture already has the technology to spin thread and weave cloth. AFAIK, none of the current cultures on the island did before outside contact.

Agreed. The culture would have to master textiles before it could diversify its nanodomesticates to silk. So likely a more complex process.

On the other hand, as I've said, textiles are one of those technologies that seem to occur repeatedly, so it's not out of the question that a New Guinea civilization could find its way to that.

In any event, as entertaining as all this, and as much as I'm intrigued by the prospect of a megadomesticate based culture, or a nanodomesticate based culture, I don't think this brainstorming will actually go anywhere. Actually doing something like this tends to be a huge commitment. I'm not sure that commitment can or will be made.
 
Arafuran Civilization - If the Sahul shelf had remained exposed during the holocene

Hallo Peoples!

I have been developing the idea of a civilization on the Sahul shelf. Here's the idea:

Instead of keeping the world in an ice age, I want to raise the Sahul continent by 110 meters such that it can be exposed during the holocene. The exposed Sahul shelf would provide several things inducive of a large civilization: a large expanse of latitudinally oriented lowlands, a very large drainage basin, an ecotone similar to that of west Africa, and a good inventory of potential cereal crops (Australian millet, spinifex, pigwig, prickly wattle, mulga, kurara, and bush bean), as well as sugarcane, bananas, taro, sago, and yam.

Furthermore, a project like creating a civilization on an exposed Sahul shelf would be almost completely open ended because it would be extremely culturally isolated.

I am thinking of making this collaborative so please chime in if you think you might be interested.
 
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