By interpolating DNA analyses and linguistic analyses, we are turning the history of mankind upside down!
The Many Peoples of the South Atlantic Coast series
by Richard L. Thornton, Architect & City Planner
In 2022, 2023 and 2024, Don Yates took DNA samples of Uchee (Yuchi) descendants, whose ancestors lived along the Savannah River. He determined that their ancestors, who sailed to the Americas were Austronesians. They were a people originally living in Taiwan. Some Austronesians intermarried with Melanesians to become Polynesians.
The Uchees told the colonists in Savannah that their ancestors sailed across the Atlantic from the home of the sun.
Don’s genetic discovery really caught my attention, because I inherited Polynesian genes from both my mother and my real father. I looked around the landscape and found a Polynesian word. Wassaw is the Samoan and Fijian word for ocean and one of the tribal names in the lower Southeast. Don is sending me an Austronesian dictionary so I will probably be able to find more.,
I looked into a Samoan dictionary and found that Savainu was the word for people from the largest island in Samoa.
I ordered a reprint of a 19th century book about the Native Americans around Savanah. The first page I came to said that Savana was the Uchee name for their language and Savanu was their ethnic name.
The Uchee also settled in Southern Mexico. The “Olmec Heads” look just like Samoans.
The Americas Revealed 
Thank you for doing this. I’m not aware of much research before now into the genetics of the Southeast’s early inhabitants. I always thought the name Savannah came from the grassy savannas in Africa. Seems the Americas were peopled by many human groups before the Europeans “discovered” it.
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I was always suspicious that this river might have some other origin for its name, because the original name for the tribe there was Savanu. However, until Don Yated discovered that the Uchee’s were actually Austronesians, I never considered looking at languages in the western Pacific islands.
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