On Using Pacific Shipping Records to Gain New insights into culture contact in Polynesia before 1840

Abstract

Pacific Island maritime history before 1840 is ripe for revolutionary new thinking. Shipping Arrivals and Departures lists (SADs) have been prepared for all the main Pacific Island ports, and lists of foreign visitors before 1840 at all the main island groups. New questions now can be asked that penetrate well beyond the metropolitan and colonial mindsets that have prevailed so far. In 1964, Dr John Cumpston had the foresight and the stamina to devise a now standard format for listing each and every shipping arrival and departure, vessel by vessel, visit by visit.1 This has proved to be a considerable legacy, as his pioneer work has sparked off research by many others who want to get beyond weak generalizations to look at the Pacific’s maritime past in real and quantitative terms.