| The first settlement of Sahul may have begun around 60,000 years ago, based on archaeological dates from Australia. Settlement of New Guinea may have come later, though archaeological dates from eastern New Guinea and the Bismarcks foreshadow still older dates to be found in western New Guinea. A second wave of Holocene migrants from island Southeast Asia are recorded in the archaeological record, and their association with Austronesian speakers is linguistically reconstructed using the Comparative Method. These Austronesian peoples are thought to have dispersed from a homeland in Taiwan through the Philippines and western Micronesia, and farther into Melanesia.;In this study, I have expanded the definition of haplogroups P and Q using a gene tree approach. Expansion dates for P and Q generate comparable ages around 50,000 years old, while ages for P4 fall around 35,000 years ago and for Q2 (New Britain and Bougainville) fall around 29,000 years ago. The gene tree approach has also captured additional haplogroups for island Melanesia, some of which (e.g. haplogroup 7) may prove of ancient age. Additionally, a number of Holocene dated haplogroups in the Bismarcks have been identified as Asian in origin. Remnant singleton haplotypes are described with an eye to future research. Asian haplogroups include E1 and F1a. On Ontong Java, haplogroup M7c1c is interpreted as a Micronesian introduction. Expansion dates for haplogroups from the Solomons, Vanuatu and New Caledonia, and Ontong Java are consistent with archaeological times of settlement during the Lapita dispersal into Remote Oceania. Based on a macroanalysis some suggestions are presented as to the ultimate origins of haplogroups P, Q, and B4a beyond the general literature. |
