In 2006 Oscar Kightley, of ‘Naked Samoan’ fame, and New Zealand radio/TV host Nathan Rarere traced their ancestry via DNA to Taiwan. They made a trek and documentary about it titled ‘Made in Taiwan’.
Kightley and Rarere began their journey in New Zealand, where they took a DNA swab, and sent it to a lab in England. From New Zealand, they retraced the journey of their ancestors via the Cook Islands, and eventually back to Taidong (Taitung), Taiwan.
Related Video
Censors pulled the original video. This is a report about the documentary that can’t possibly restricted to New Zealand. If Youtube pulls it, I’ll upload it somewhere else.
Thousands of years ago during the era of “Hunters and Gatherers”, I read that there were at least 11 different tribes in Taiwan all speaking a different dialect. One of the people there during that era was the first Japanese known as the”Jomon.” Years after, they left Taiwan following land bridges to Okinawa and then to the southern island, Kyushu, Japan. The Jomons developed a distinct pottery design in a”rope patter” that distinguishes them. In the year 2010, archeologists found hidden in the mountain hillside the “rope” pattern pottery that is the same as those found in Kyushu Japan. The “Jomon” merged later with the Yayoi who came from Korea who came from Lake Baikal. Siberia. There Austronesian words in the Japanese language. I am a NIsei(Japanese American) who has followed my ancestral past. My DNA matches my findings. The language of the Yayoi is Altaic as is the Korean and the people from Lake Baikal and Siberia. Taiwan was formed by teutonic plate that was thrusted to the East, i.e., high mountains to the east and low lands to the west.
Hello Tad Kishi, Very interesting comment about land bridges between Taiwan and Okinawa. Also interesting is your mentioning of “Jomon”.
Have you ever read the research article “Ancient DNA Analysis of Palaeolithic Ryukyu Islanders” by Ken-ichi Shinoda and Noboru Adachi? In that particular research they extracted (ancient DNA) MtDNA from five individuals. Two MtDNA haplogroups found (MtDNA B4e and M7a) are believed to be linked to Southeast Asia.
There are also similar (if not identical) Tattoo motifs between Ryukyu islands, Philippines, Moluccas (spice Islands) and Roti / Lesser Sunda Islands (both Moluccas and Lesser Sunda Islands are located in the region what is known as Wallacea).
In other various research papers/articles MtDNA from Jomon and Ainu were compared. MtDNA (haplogroup) M; M7c was found among Ainu while MtDNA M7a was found in Hokkaido Jomon.
Also some Okinawan and Yaeyama words seem to be of Austronesian origin. Okinawan Examples:
Okinawa: “numin”, “numi” meaning “drink”; “iyu” meaning “fish”; “ki” meaning “tree”
Yaeyama: “numi”; “izu”, “iz3”; “ki”; “pi”, “p3” meaning “fire”
Austronesian: “inum”, “inumen” (drink); “ikan”, “ika”, “ihan”, “iha”, “iyan”, “iya” (fish); “kai” (tree); “api”, “afi” (fire)
It is a bit of a “non-talked about” secret that according to archeological digs on Taiwan, lif/culture/civilization has been found on Taiwan that pre-dates anything in China.
There has been tremendous pressure put upon academic publishers to downplay these finds.
Pressure coming from the PRC and its many long hands.
As the saying goes – “The TRUTH will out !”
Interesting post. The origin of the Polynesians is a much debated topic.
Taiwan takes a very important role since the Polynesian language is derived from Taiwanese (Formosan) Austronesian languages and through DNA.
Another important topic would be the Da’ai or Ta’ai (Ta’ay); the little black people who were encountered by the Saisiyat tribe deep in the mountains of Wufeng.
Other Taiwanese tribes have encountered the little black people too and later they even lived amongst them.
This implies that Taiwan was already settled by non-Austronesians.
Also of importance would be the cultivation of rice. The Da’ai taught the Saisiyat how to cultivate rice.
Rice cultivation was considered an Austronesian innovation or trait yet the Austronesian Saisiyat learend it from the little black people.