Among Polynesia's first pots

X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy and petrographic thin section microscopy are applied to a sample of anomalous appearing Lapita pottery sherds from Nukuleka, the earliest archaeological site in Polynesia. Both analyses indicate non-local origins for the ceramic vessels, suggesting they were brought on founding canoes. Mineral inclusions in ceramic tempers eliminate sources to the west of Tonga in eastern Melanesia; rather the temper source is most probably a dacitic high island from a distant island arc of central Melanesia. Polynesian origins and settlement are issues more complex than currently recognized by the orthodox progressive settlement model for Lapita expansion across Oceania.