historia: History of Tuvalu

Evidence: 100 • authority: 72

The first inhabitants of Tuvalu were Polynesians, so the origins of the people of Tuvalu can be traced to the spread of humans out of Southeast Asia, from Taiwan, via Melanesia and across the Pacific islands of Polynesia. Various names were given to individual islands by the captains and chartmakers on visiting European ships. In 1819 the island of Funafuti, was named Ellice Island; the name Ellice Islands was later applied to all nine islands, after the work of English hydrographer Alexander George Findlay. The United States claimed Funafuti, Nukufetau, Nukulaelae and Niulakita under the Guano Islands Act of 1856. This claim was renounced under the 1983 treaty of friendship between Tuvalu…

Evidence: 97 • authority: 72

Evidence: 73 • authority: 72

Tuvalu ( too-VAH-loo) is an archipelagic country in the Polynesian sub-region of Oceania in the Pacific Ocean, about midway between Hawaii and Australia. It lies east-northeast of the Santa Cruz Islands (which belong to Solomon Islands), northeast of Vanuatu, southeast of Nauru, south of Kiribati, west of Tokelau, northwest of Samoa and Wallis and Futuna, and north of Fiji. Tuvalu is composed of three reef islands and six atolls spread out between the latitude of 5° and 10° south and between the longitude of 176° and 180°. They lie west of the International Date Line. The 2022 census determined that Tuvalu had a population of 10,643, making it the 2nd least populated country in the United N…

Evidence: 64 • authority: 72

Evidence: 58 • authority: 72

Polynesia (UK: POL-in-EE-zee-ə, US: -⁠EE-zhə) is a subregion of Oceania, made up of more than 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are called Polynesians. They have many things in common, including linguistic relations, cultural practices, and traditional beliefs. The term Polynésie was first used in 1756 by the French writer Charles de Brosses, who originally applied it to all the islands of the Pacific. In 1831, Jules Dumont d'Urville proposed a narrower definition during a lecture at the Société de Géographie of Paris. By tradition, the islands located in the southern Pacific have also often been c…

Evidence: 54 • authority: 72

Polynesian navigation or Polynesian wayfinding was used for thousands of years to enable long voyages across thousands of kilometres of the open Pacific Ocean. Polynesians made contact with nearly every island within the vast Polynesian Triangle, using outrigger canoes or double-hulled canoes. The double-hulled canoes were two large hulls, equal in length, and lashed side by side. The space between the paralleled canoes allowed for storage of food, hunting materials, and nets when embarking on long voyages. Polynesian navigators used wayfinding techniques such as the navigation by the stars, and observations of birds, ocean swells, and wind patterns, and relied on a large body of knowledge…

Evidence: 54 • authority: 72

The Austronesian peoples, sometimes referred to as Austronesian-speaking peoples, are a large collection of peoples who speak Austronesian languages, having settled in Taiwan, maritime Southeast Asia, parts of mainland Southeast Asia, Micronesia, coastal New Guinea, Island Melanesia, Polynesia, and Madagascar. They also include indigenous ethnic minorities in Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand and Hainan. The nations and territories predominantly populated by Austronesian-speaking peoples are sometimes known collectively as Austronesia. The group originated from a prehistoric seaborne migration, known as the Austronesian expansion, from Taiwan, circa 3000 to 1500 BCE. Austronesians reache…

Evidence: 36 • authority: 80

Evidence: 36 • authority: 80

Evidence: 35 • authority: 80

Evidence: 35 • authority: 80

Evidence: 35 • authority: 80