Comments on: Ancient Chilean Chicken May Not Be Of Polynesian Origin

By: Sergio

Sergio — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 00:26:06 +0000

Dear sirs,
while reading the history of “Hernan Cortes’s Conquest of Mexico” by Salvador de Madariaga, one of his soldiers Bernal Diaz del Castillo also a direct witness and chronicle writer mentions in different chapters and especially in the one dealing with Cortes’s landing on the a
American mainland on March 12, 1519 that while marching and exploring the new lands, moving from Tabasco to Tlaxcala, the people of these tribes fed the spaniards with corn, pork meat (Pecary?), deer and fowl. Among the fowl are mentioned Ducks (Muscovy or other?), Egrets, rarely Pigeons, Turkey, Quail and Chicken (mostly white feathered). Now what is the origin of these “Gallinas = Chicken” ? Even when Cortes arrives into Mexico, people living along the roads and in the countryside are describred having around their houses plenty of these “gallinas”. Years later, already on the Pacific Ocean shore, Cortes sends a sailship full of food and other warring provisions to Pizarro in Peru who apparentely was needing such a support. This way some Chicken may have travelled from Central America to Peru and later down to Chile, but this happened very close to mid 1500. It doesn’t seem that via Polinesia the small Silky White Japanese polidactilous chicken came to America to be eaten by its indigenous population and help restore energies to the Spanish conquerors. Quite a curiosity that I would like to have it more clear.
Sergio Corbet MSc Agriculturalist.

By: Katherine

Katherine — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 23:06:19 +0000

Pizarro also said (or the chroniclers to be exact) that they found sheep, but they were llamas. They said they found peacocks, but they were turkeys. The Spanish put the wrong names on animals quite a lot. The “chicken” seen by the Spanish could have easily been a different sort of fowl. It could have been a grouse or a quail for example.

The researchers identified a particular haplotype present in Easter Island/Polynesian chickens which is not present in Chile chickens.

Let’s look at exactly what the researchers wrote:

“The position of the single Chilean pre-
Columbian chicken sequence within the worldwide distributed
haplotype 8 removes any genetic support for a Polynesian
introduction of this haplotype to South America.”

That’s pretty clear…. “removes any genetic support for a Polynesian introduction” ..

The paper also puts a lot of doubt on the chicken bones that were found (which amount to a total of 5 birds IIRC) even being Pre-Columbian. Richard did not mention this but the C14 results were not adjusted for marine carbon. Which would place the bones in a much later time frame, and into the Post-Columbian period.

I suggest anyone interested in this debate read the paper for themselves. Here is the abstract:

“European chickens were introduced into the American continents
by the Spanish after their arrival in the 15th century. However,
there is ongoing debate as to the presence of pre-Columbian
chickens among Amerindians in South America, particularly in
relation to Chilean breeds such as the Araucana and Passion Fowl.
To understand the origin of these populations, we have generated
partial mitochondrial DNA control region sequences from 41 native
Chilean specimens and compared them with a previously generated
database of 1,000 domestic chicken sequences from across
the world as well as published Chilean and Polynesian ancient DNA
sequences. The modern Chilean sequences cluster closely with
haplotypes predominantly distributed among European, Indian
subcontinental, and Southeast Asian chickens, consistent with a
European genetic origin. A published, apparently pre-Columbian,
Chilean specimen and six pre-European Polynesian specimens also
cluster with the same European/Indian subcontinental/Southeast
Asian sequences, providing no support for a Polynesian introduction
of chickens to South America. In contrast, sequences from two
archaeological sites on Easter Island group with an uncommon
haplogroup from Indonesia, Japan, and China and may represent
a genetic signature of an early Polynesian dispersal. Modeling of
the potential marine carbon contribution to the Chilean archaeological
specimen casts further doubt on claims for pre-Columbian
chickens, and definitive proof will require further analyses of
ancient DNA sequences and radiocarbon and stable isotope data
from archaeological excavations within both Chile and Polynesia.”

Indo-European and Asian origins for Chilean
and Pacific chickens revealed by mtDNA

By: Richard

Richard — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 12:29:52 +0000

There are a couple of problems with this paper, too. The authors point out that a unique haplotype has only been found in ancient bones from Easter Island, but not from Chile and not from Polynesian Islands west of Easter, either. They’ve been apparently swamped by newer arrivals.

This ‘swamping’ may just as well have happened in Chile. A lot more chickens came with Europeans than ever could have been introduced by Easter Islanders, and there’s been 500 years of interbreeding since.

The same swamping could have ‘finished’ the Araucana-type chicken, with blue eggshells and no rumps in Polynesia. You could hardly find archaeological remains of blue eggsells or absent rumps.

On their carbon-dating points, the authors are not quite being fair when they say that the Chilean chicken bones dated to Cal AD 1304–1424, are only 70 years pre-Columbian, by taking the latest carbon date, and the earliest possible European contact date.

If you take the mid-point carbon date 1364, and the earliest European arrival on the Western coast, Pizarro 1532, then they’re 170 years earlier.

Incidentally, Pizarro found chickens in Peru when he arrived. Atahualpa, the emperor he defeated, means chicken in Quechua.

I don’t think this disproves anything.