The Louisiade Archipelago is a string of ten larger volcanic islands frequently fringed by coral reefs, and 90 smaller coral islands in

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i ...

. It is located 200 km southeast of

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . Located in Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Australia by the wide Torr ...

, stretching over more than and spread over an ocean area of between the Solomon Sea to the north and the Coral Sea to the south. The aggregate land area of the islands is about , with Vanatinai (Tagula) being the largest. Rogeia,

Samarai Samarai is an island and former administrative capital in Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea. The island is historically significant as the site of a trading port and stop-over between Australia and East Asia. Samarai town was established on ...

and Sariba lie closest to New Guinea, while

Misima Misima (formerly called St. Aignan) is a High island, volcanic island in the northwest of Louisiade Archipelago within Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea. History Misima Island was inhabited by Austronesian peoples, Austronesians sinc ...

, Vanatinai, and Rossel islands lie further east.

History

The islands were discovered by a Spanish expedition led by Luis Váez de Torres in 1606, that was part of the Fernandez de Quiros fleet which had sailed from South America in search of Australia. The Torres expedition visited various islands including

Basilaki Island Basilaki Island (Moresby Island) is an island in the Louisiade Archipelago in Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea. It is located at the eastern end of the New Guinea mainland. History First recorded sighting by Europeans was by the Spanish exp ...

, which he named ''San Buenaventura'' in July 1606. It is possible that Malay and Chinese sailors also visited the islands earlier. More than a century later, in 1768,

Louis Antoine de Bougainville Louis-Antoine, Comte de Bougainville (, , ; 12 November 1729 – August 1811) was a French admiral and explorer. A contemporary of the British explorer James Cook, he took part in the Seven Years' War in North America and the American Revolutio ...

visited the islands and named them for

Louis XV Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (french: le Bien-Aimé), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reached ...

, the king of

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. Visits were also paid by Admiral

Bruni d'Entrecasteaux Antoine Raymond Joseph de Bruni, chevalier d'Entrecasteaux () (8 November 1737 – 21 July 1793) was a French naval officer, explorer and colonial governor. He is perhaps best known for his exploration of the Australian coast in 1792, while ...

in 1793 and Captain Owen Stanley in 1849. The 1942

Battle of Coral Sea The Battle of the Coral Sea, from 4 to 8 May 1942, was a major naval battle between the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) and naval and air forces of the United States and Australia. Taking place in the Pacific Theatre of World War II, the battl ...

was fought nearby, after Japanese occupation in the same year. The Deboyne Islands were the site of the 1942 Raids on Deboyne.

Rain forests

The islands have a moist tropical climate, and are largely covered with

tropical moist broadleaf forests Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests (TSMF), also known as tropical moist forest, is a subtropical and tropical forest habitat type defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Description TSMF is generally found in large, discont ...

. The Louisiade Archipelago rain forests form a distinct

ecoregion An ecoregion (ecological region) or ecozone (ecological zone) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of ...

, and are home to a number of

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...

species, including several endemic

trees In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, including only woody plants with secondary growth, plants that are u ...

(in genera '' Pandanus,

Diospyros ''Diospyros'' is a genus of over 700 species of deciduous and evergreen trees and shrubs. The majority are native to the tropics, with only a few species extending into temperate regions. Individual species valued for their hard, heavy, dark tim ...

,'' and ''

Hopea ''Hopea'' is a genus of plants in the family Dipterocarpaceae. The genus was named after John Hope, 1725–1786, the first Regius Keeper of the Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh. It contains some 113 species, distributed from Sri Lanka and south ...

''), as well as five endemic

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-frog" ''Triadobatrachus'' is ...

species, two endemic lizard species, and five endemic

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweig ...

species.

Government

The archipelago is divided into the Local Level Government (LLG) areas Bwanabwana Rural (western part, with Basilaki), Louisiade Rural (central part, with

), and Yaleyamba (eastern part, with Rossell and Vanatinai islands). The LLG areas are part of Samarai-Murua District of Milne Bay. The seat of the Louisiade Rural LLG is Bwagaoia on Misima Island, the population center of the archipelago. The seat of the Yaleyamba is changed every couple of years between Rambuso and Jingo (Rossell). The seat of the Bwanabwana was

from the Louisiade archipelago, but was recently transferred to the mainland of Papua New Guinea to the city of

Alotau Alotau is the capital of Milne Bay Province, in the south-east of Papua New Guinea. It is located on the northern shore of Milne Bay. The town is located within Alotau Urban LLG. Alotau is also the annual forum for Australian and Papua New Guine ...

Islands

The Louisiade Archipelago consists of the following island groups and islands:

References

External links

* *
Milne Bay Province Polling list with place names (2007)

Louisiades.net: Information and advice for yachts and travellers visiting the Louisiade Archipelago islands
{{authority control Archipelagoes of the Pacific Ocean Archipelagoes of Papua New Guinea Australasian ecoregions Ecoregions of Papua New Guinea .01 Lists of islands of Papua New Guinea Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests Volcanoes of Papua New Guinea