Oceania is conventionally defined in terms of the three major cultural divisions of the Pacific islanders: Polynesia, Micronesia, and Melanesia. The earliest European knowledge of Oceanic peoples is contained in the journals of Magellan's chronicler, Antonio Pigafetta, who in 1521 provides an account of the initial encounter with the inhabitants of an island that he called Los Ladrones, now identified as Guam. As with most contact narratives, the tale dwells upon visible details and practical difficulties, but it offers little insight into local life. And, as Andrew Sharp writes in his The Discovery of the Pacific Islands (2d ed., Oxford, 1962), much the same may be said of the journals of subsequent explorers such as Alvaro de Mendaña de Neira, Francis Drake, William Dampier, and Louis-Antoine de Bougainville. It is only toward the end of the eighteenth century that fuller accounts...