Paper short abstract:

New pottery unearthed from the open air site of Dair, 50km west of the capital, Dili, accounts for pre-European exchange networks extending to the Majapahit period and possible older.

Paper long abstract:

Dair is today a small fishermen village located on the northwest coast of Timor-Leste. Archaeological excavations in Dair begun in 2009 and since then, a significant amount of decorated and undecorated earthenware, together with Chinese and Dutch ware, glass and metal, was found. Despite the fact that no radiometric dates are yet available, much of the pottery found seems to pre-date the arrival of the first Europeans, with some clearly relating to the Majapahit kingdom. Here we report new findings from Dair, suggesting that pre-European exchange networks extending to the Majapahit period and possible older existed in Timor long before the first Europeans set foot on the island.