History › Middle ages
Polynesian settlement of the Pacific
Hawaii and Rapa Nui c. 1000–1200; New Zealand c. 1280· Event· Americas & Oceania
Mostly agreedGood evidence; some details, dates or numbers uncertain.
Over centuries, Polynesian navigators in double-hulled canoes found and settled almost every habitable island in the vast Pacific.
See it on the History map →What happened
Their ancestors, Austronesian-speaking farmers from around Taiwan, reached Tonga and Samoa by about 800 BC. After a long pause, a burst of voyages around AD 1000–1300 settled a triangle of islands from Hawaii to Rapa Nui (Easter Island) to New Zealand, each side about 7,000 km (4,300 miles). New Zealand was the last large land settled by humans. Navigators steered by stars, swells and birds, carrying taro, breadfruit, pigs, dogs and chickens.
Why it matters
It was the greatest feat of open-ocean exploration before modern times, achieved without compasses, charts or metal tools.
How we know
Radiocarbon dates from early settlement sites; DNA from people, rats and chickens tracing the route; related languages; modern canoe voyages, like Hōkūleʻa's 1976 trip from Hawaii to Tahiti using traditional navigation.
Still debated
Exactly when each island was first reached, why long voyaging largely stopped after about 1400, and how much contact Polynesians had with South America remain debated.
Connections (2)
▸Settlement of Australia was an early sea crossing, long before Polynesian settlement of the PacificMostly agreed
The connection
Reaching Australia required crossing at least 70 km (45 miles) of open sea from Southeast Asia, humanity's earliest known long sea voyage. Polynesians made far longer crossings tens of thousands of years later. They were largely a different people: mainly descendants of Austronesians who left Taiwan about 5,000 years ago, though they mixed with Papuans along the way.
When and how
Island Southeast Asia and New Guinea: first crossings by about 50,000 years ago; the Austronesian expansion through the same islands from about 3000 BC.
How sure are we?
Sites in Australia and New Guinea dated to 50,000 or more years ago; DNA showing Polynesians carry mostly Austronesian and some Papuan ancestry.
Debates and open questions
The link is one of seafaring ability, not direct descent. How the first Australians crossed, by raft or canoe, and whether on purpose, is unknown.
▸Polynesian settlement of the Pacific likely reached South America before Columbus's voyage to the AmericasDebated
The connection
Polynesians, master navigators, settled the remote Pacific between about 1000 and 1300. The sweet potato, a South American plant, was growing in Polynesia long before 1492, and a 2020 genetic study found Native American ancestry in Polynesians dating to about 1150–1230. This points to contact with South America centuries before Columbus, probably by Polynesian voyagers who sailed there and back.
When and how
Eastern Pacific, around AD 1150–1230; the earliest genetic signal is in the Marquesas, linked to peoples of today's Colombia and Ecuador.
How sure are we?
Charred sweet potato in the Cook Islands dated to about AD 1000, and the 2020 DNA study of over 800 people published in Nature.
Debates and open questions
Who made the trip is unclear: Polynesians to South America and back, or South Americans drifting west. A few scientists argue sweet potatoes spread naturally by floating seed.