ABSTRACT
The Neolithic of island Southeast Asia south of Luzon (see Oxenham et al., this volume, for the dating of the Neolithic in Luzon), Philippines (c.1,500-500 bce), witnessed significant transformation in societies and landscapes. By the end of this period and the start of the Metal Age (post-500 bce), communities across the region exhibit greater integration with respect to networks of exchange of biological commodities, including wild tropical plant and animal products, and exotic material ornaments of glass and metal (Bellina and Glover 2004). Fuelled by these economic stimuli and powered by the technological innovation of iron tools enabling agricultural intensification (Bellwood 1997), population densities across the region reached a critical mass. Metal Age burial sites are not only increasingly common (Bellwood 1997), but environmental signatures of anthropogenic landscape transformations are recurrent, sustained, and more apparent in the palaeoenvironmental record (Hunt and Rushworth 2005). While contact and movement of people, material culture, and ideas may be demonstrated and/or inferred during the Neolithic, the intensity and frequency of these interactions have been difficult to document in practice.
