Washington, Sept 28 : Early Polynesians sailed thousands of miles for exploration and trade, analysis of early stone woodworking tools by a team of Australian researchers from the University of Queensland has revealed.

They say the study confirms traditional tales of vast ocean voyages and hints that a trading network existed between Hawaii and Tahiti as early as a thousand years ago.

The work also bolsters research suggesting that the Polynesians were skilful sailors who rapidly expanded across the Pacific, and journeyed as far as South America by the 1400s AD, a century before Columbus, they add.

Kenneth Collerson and Marshall Weisler studied 19 adzes – bladed tools used to shape wood – that were collected early last century from nine islands in the Tuamotu Group, which is located more than 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometres) southeast of Tahiti in eastern Polynesia.

The adzes are made of basalt, a volcanic rock not found naturally on the Tuamotus, confirming they must have arrived with pre-European explorers or traders.

By comparing the trace elements and isotopes in the tools with basalt sources throughout the Pacific, the scientists were able to trace the artefacts to islands such as Pitcairn and the Marquesas.

But it was an adze known only as C7727 – collected from the tiny atoll of Napuka – that gave the scientists their greatest surprise. C7727 was hewn from a fine-grained basalt known as hawaiite. The stone is unique to the Hawaiian island Kaho'olawe, located some 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometres) to the northwest of Napuka.

“Until our discovery, there was no object found in southeast Polynesia that we could link back to a source in Hawaii. That's the real magic of this discovery,” said Collerson.

Collerson said the findings corroborate Hawaiian oral tradition that recounts canoe journeys over the vast southeastern Pacific.

“This 4,000-kilometre [2,500-mile] journey now stands as the longest uninterrupted maritime voyage in human prehistory,” he said.

He said the find also coincides with a “pulse of migration into southeast Polynesia about 900 AD.

The study appears in this week's issue of the journal Science, reports National Geographic. (With inputs from ANI)