Meanings of a Lapita Face: Materialized Social Memory in Ancient House Societies

This article proposes an interpretation of Lapita dentate-stamped pottery and its roles in social differentiation within a society that was constantly expanding to new islands. Lapita pottery is seen as an authentic item associated with founding ancestors; it expresses a house’s social, economic, political, and spiritual status, and generates power. The ceramic assemblages from Site 13A on New Caledonia are examined and compared with numerous ethnographic studies of Oceanic and Southeast Asian societies and their house/clan symbols. Lapita pottery and its social roles in Lapita societies are thus historically made and at the same time constitute history-in-the-making.