Radiocarbon Dating in Hawai'i

There have been changing views about initial Polynesian discovery and settlement of Hawaii, beginning with Abraham Fornander in the late 19th century and continuing through early archaeological investigations of the mid-20th century. There is no definitive date for the Polynesian discovery of Hawaii. Through the use of more advanced radiocarbon methods, taxonomic identification of samples, and stratigraphic archaeology, during the 2000s the consensus was established that the first arrived in Kauai sometime around 1000 AD, and in Oahu sometime between 1100 AD and 1200 AD. However, with more testing and refined samples, including chronologically tracing settlements in Society Islands and the Marquesas, two archipelagoes which have long been considered to be the immediate source regions for the first Polynesian voyagers to Hawaii, it has been concluded that the settlement of the Hawaiian Islands took place around 1219 to 1266 AD, with the paleo-environmental evidence of agriculture indicating the Ancient Hawaiian population to have peaked around 1450 AD around 140,000 to 200,000.

Polynesian oral traditions and genealogy studied extensively by director of the Bishop Museum in Honolulu, Abraham Fornander in the mid-1800s, relied on native Hawaiian texts suggested that by 1865 there had been 28 generations of Hawaiians by then. Chronologically that put the first voyages and settlement of the islands occurring around AD 965-1065. Subsequent director of the Bishop Museum, Te Rangi Hiroa postulated though that Menehune may have arrived as early as 450 AD. The next director Kenneth Emory, relying on linguistics and the oral traditions put the settlement around 1150 AD, suggesting that it could have been as early as 1000 AD. However, with the invention of radiocarbon dating Emory and his colleagues would later revisit their conclusions.

With the invention of radiocarbon dating archaeologists immediately scoured the islands in search of the earliest possible samples. One of the very first samples from the Pu‘u Ali‘i sand dune came suggested as early as 124±60 AD. Over the next ten years the early radiocarbon dating of Hawaiian samples started to return dates suggesting sometime first humans arrived sometime between 300 AD to 800 AD casting doubt on Pu‘u Ali‘i sand dune sample. Accordingly, it was retested with the help of a second lab and to their dismay could not be replicated and was instead revised to roughly 1000 to 1350 AD. However a sample from Waiahukini was interpreted as beginning around AD 750 which now formed the basis of a claimed first discovery. Testing continued at sites around Hawaii to find the earliest dates. At the same time of the research done by the Honolulu Museum, the University of Honolulu excavated several sites in O'ahu which would suggest dates of AD 600 to 1100. However these results did not match the archaeological results obtained from examining the spread of Polynesians from their homeland in Tahiti. Regardless by the close of the 1970s a model of Polynesian settlement chronology emerged suggesting multiple contacts with the island relying on the Pu‘u Ali‘i sand dune sample posited (although revised in 1969 as actually sometime between 1000 and 1350 AD) as supporting a possible earlier wave of settlement in 124 AD, with a long pause in between. For a time this Polynesian triangle became the "orthodox" scenario. By the 1990s with the advances in radiocarbon dating taking place and more samples tracking the spread across the Polynesian islands, including New Zealand archaeologists found significant support for a late colonization of the eastern Polynesian islands, suggesting Hawai'i, like New Zealand was colonized around 1000-1200 AD.

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