History of Oceania - First Settlement

First Settlement

Australia was settled by the Indigenous Australians between 40,000 and 125,000 years ago. Oceania was first settled by Austronesians or Polynesian people at around 1800 B.c. in Fiji, then further colonized the rest of the islands by 1000 AD.

The Tu'i Tonga Empire was founded in the 10th century AD and expanded between 1200 and 1500. The Tu'i Kanokupolu is the title held by Tongan monarchs since 1600. George Tupou II of Tonga became the first king of Tonga in 1893.

From the 1850s Seru Epenisa Cakobau tried to unite the Fijian Islands, and became the first Tui Viti, or king of Fiji, a title which passed to the British Crown after 1874. The Great Council of Chiefs was established in Fiji in 1876.

Read more about this topic:  History Of Oceania

Famous quotes containing the word settlement:

    The Settlement ... is an experimental effort to aid in the solution of the social and industrial problems which are engendered by the modern conditions of life in a great city. It insists that these problems are not confined to any one portion of the city. It is an attempt to relieve, at the same time, the overaccumulation at one end of society and the destitution at the other ...
    Jane Addams (1860–1935)

    The difficult and risky task of meeting and mastering the new—whether it be the settlement of new lands or the initiation of new ways of life—is not undertaken by the vanguard of society but by its rear. It is the misfits, failures, fugitives, outcasts and their like who are among the first to grapple with the new.
    Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)