ABSTRACT
Chickens (Gallus gallus) are the most commonly utilized domestic animal on earth providing ready protein in the form of meat and eggs. In addition, feathers are used for a variety of objects including personal adornment (Crawford 1984). In 2012, the Food and Agricultural Organisation estimates over 59 billion chickens were slaughtered and more than 66 million tons of eggs were laid around the world (FAO 2014). There are many theories about where the chicken was domesticated and which species contributed to the modern domestic form (Crawford 1990; Serjeantson 2009). Regardless of which of these hypotheses is eventually best supported by archaeological and molecular evidence, domestic chickens were dispersed across the world with migrating populations and, most relevant to this discussion, were domesticated in or dispersed to island Southeast Asia and then to the Pacific. The dispersal of chicken stocks to Remote Oceania approximately 1,000 bce can then be viewed in the context of global pulses of chicken dispersals from domestication centres.
