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The initiation in 1985 of intensive survey
by the University of Oregon for the Historic Preservation Office, American
Samoa, marked the beginning of a new and long overdue effort to systematically
inventory archaeological sites. This project and others done since
provide some of our most detailed evidence of early Samoan settlement distributions.
The archaeological site survey and site inventory in selected land areas
offered a basis for identifying site distributions and defining occupational
density patterns; both are essential for understanding earlier Samoan residential,
economic, and political arrangements and for conservation and management
plans to be developed by the Historic Preservation Program. Other
projects, also done in 1985 on Tutuila, by Helen Leach and Dan Witter on
the Tataga Matau Quarry site, Richard Gould on selected village sites,
and by Joe Kennedy on coastal Leone, also contribute significantly to our
understanding of facets of early Samoan life. Since that fieldwork
was done, Jeff Clark has done considerable research in eastern Tutuila
and his reports provide detailed assessment of early Samoan settlement.
He also provides new data on early Samoa ceramics from Aua and new details
about inland or ridgetop architectural features. Kirch and Hunt have
recovered early pottery and a long sequence from the To'aga Site in the
Manu'a Islands. More recently, field work by Epifania Suafo'a, a
University of Oregon graduate student, has provided extensive collections
of prehistoric pottery from Malaeimi on Tutuila. This research is
still underway.
The University of Oregon Tutuila Project was
designed to carry out intensive survey in selected land areas, such as
valley systems and other discrete settlement units. Site mapping,
surface artifact collecting, and test excavations were done to more fully
document the remains of past occupation within these settlement areas.
The main focus of the work has been in western Tutuila, and intensive work
was done first in Maloata Valley.
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