October
28
/ 2019
Detection of scores of ancient ‘Star Mounds’ baffle archaeologists on Samoa. Samoa is in the South Pacific Ocean, and it has a tropical climate with thick rain forests and almost impassable volcanic ridges. In 1988 doctors T. L. Hunt and P. V. Kirch from the University of Washington published An Archaeological Survey of the Manu’s Islands detailing the extensive excavations in American Samoa which were carried out by the multi-institutional Polynesian Culture History Programme in the 1960s. The Manuʻa Islands Group of American Samoa consists of three main islands: Taʻu, Ofu and Olosega and it is here that in the 1960s a series of ancient man-made structures were discovered known as Tia Seu Lupe, or Star Mounds. This extensive project
