Preface

Acknowledgements

List of Figures and Tables

Part I HISTORICAL VIEWS

From Mendana to Riesenfeld: Early Accounts of and Speculation on Taro Irrigation in the Asia-Pacific Area

Matthew Spriggs

Vernacular Names for Taro in the Indo-Pacific Region: Implications for Centres of Diversification and Spread

Roger M. Blench

Yu Jing (The Book of Taro)

Shengzheng Huang (Translated by Jee Yan Chu; introduced by P. J. Matthews)

Part II EASTERN PACIFIC

The Taro Wars of the Austral Islands, East Polynesia

Robert Bollt

Wet Taro Cultivation on Atolls: A Techno-cultural Paradox?

Jean-Michel Chazine

Taro Irrigation and Primary State Formation in Hawai'i

Timothy Earle

Small Valley Irrigated Taro Agriculture in the Hawaiian Islands: An Extension of the 'Wet and Dry' Hypothesis

Mark D. McCoy and Michael W. Graves

Approaches to Dating Wetland Agricultural Features: An Example from Wailau Valley, Moloka'i Island, Hawai'i

Windy K. McElroy

Fluctuation in Colocasia Cultivation and Landesque Capital in Navosa, Viti Levu, Fiji

Trevor King

Part III WESTERN PACIFIC

'Certainly the Most Technically Complex Pondfield Irrigation Within Melanesia': Wet Taro Field Systems of New Caledonia

Christophe Sand

Produce to Exchange: The Taro Water-Gardens on Vanua Lava (Vanuatu), a Social and Sustainable Place

Sophie Caillon

Taro Culture in Western Santo, Vanuatu

Annie Walter and Fabienne Tzerikiantz

Irrigated Taro, Malaria and the Expansion of Chiefdoms: Ruta in New Georgia, Solomon Islands

Tim Bayliss-Smith and Edvard Hviding

The Decline of Taro and Taro Irrigation in Papua New Guinea

R. Michael Bourke

Part IV SOUTHEAST ASIA

Recovering, Analysing and Identifying Colocasia esculenta and Dioscorea spp. from Archaeological Contexts in Timor-Leste

Nuno Vasco Oliveira

Taro Before Rice Terraces: Implications of Radiocarbon Determinations, Ethnohistoric Reconstructions, and Ethnography in Dating the Ifugao Terraces

Stephen B. Acabado

Ethnobotany and Ecology of Wild Taro (Colocasia esculenta) in the Philippines: Implications for Domestication and Dispersal

P. J. Matthews, E. M.G. Agoo, D. N. Tandang and D.A. Madulid

CONCLUSION

Irrigated Taro in the Indo-Pacific: Multiple Perspectives

Matthew Spriggs and Peter J. Matthews

Index

List of Contributors