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Raʻiātea
Raiātea or Raiatea (Tahitian language, Tahitian: ''Raiātea'') is the second largest of the Society Islands, after Tahiti, in French Polynesia, in the Pacific Ocean, South Pacific Ocean. The island is widely regarded as the "centre" of the eastern islands in ancient Polynesia and it is likely that the organised migrations to the Hawaiian Islands, and other parts of East Polynesia started at Raiātea. A traditional name for the island is Hawaiki, Havai'i, homeland of the Māori people. Situated on the southeast coast is the historical Taputapuatea marae, which was established by 1000 CE. The site was the political and religious center of eastern Polynesia for several centuries, and was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2017 for its historical significance. The main township on Raiātea is Uturoa, the administrative centre for the Leeward Islands (Society Islands), Leeward Islands (French ''Îles Sous-le-vent''). There are also colleges which serve as the main ed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Cook
Captain (Royal Navy), Captain James Cook (7 November 1728 – 14 February 1779) was a British Royal Navy officer, explorer, and cartographer famous for his three voyages of exploration to the Pacific and Southern Oceans, conducted between 1768 and 1779. He completed the first recorded circumnavigation of the main islands of New Zealand and was the first known European to visit the eastern coastline of Australia and the Hawaiian Islands. Cook joined the British merchant navy as a teenager before enlisting in the Royal Navy in 1755. He served during the Seven Years' War, and subsequently surveyed and mapped much of the entrance to the St. Lawrence River during the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, siege of Quebec. In the 1760s, he mapped the coastline of Newfoundland (island), Newfoundland and made important astronomical observations which brought him to the attention of the Admiralty (United Kingdom), Admiralty and the Royal Society. This acclaim came at a crucial moment in Brit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marae Taputapuatea
A ' (in New Zealand Māori, Cook Islands Māori, Tahitian), ' (in Tongan), ' (in Marquesan) or ' (in Samoan) is a communal or sacred place that serves religious and social purposes in Polynesian societies. In all these languages, the term also means cleared and free of weeds or trees. generally consist of an area of cleared land roughly rectangular (the itself), bordered with stones or wooden posts (called ' in Tahitian and Cook Islands Māori) perhaps with ' (terraces) which were traditionally used for ceremonial purposes; and in some cases, such as Easter Island, a central stone ' or ''a'u'' is placed. In the Easter Island Rapa Nui culture, the term ''ahu'' or ''a'u'' has become a synonym for the whole marae complex. In some modern Polynesian societies, notably that of the Māori of New Zealand, the marae is still a vital part of everyday life. In tropical Polynesia, most marae were destroyed or abandoned with the arrival of Christianity in the 19th century, and some hav ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
French Polynesia
French Polynesia ( ; ; ) is an overseas collectivity of France and its sole #Governance, overseas country. It comprises 121 geographically dispersed islands and atolls stretching over more than in the Pacific Ocean, South Pacific Ocean. The total land area of French Polynesia is , with a population of 278,786 (Aug. 2022 census) of which at least 205,000 live in the Society Islands and the remaining population lives in the rest of the archipelago. French Polynesia is divided into five island groups: the Austral Islands; the Gambier Islands; the Marquesas Islands; the Society Islands (comprising the Leeward Islands (Society Islands), Leeward and Windward Islands (Society Islands), Windward Islands); and the Tuamotus. Among its 121 islands and atolls, 75 were inhabited at the 2017 census. Tahiti, which is in the Society Islands group, is the most populous island, being home to nearly 69% of the population of French Polynesia . Papeete, located on Tahiti, is the capital of French ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bora Bora
Bora Bora (French language, French: ''Bora-Bora''; Tahitian language, Tahitian: ''Pora Pora'') is an island group in the Leeward Islands (Society Islands), Leeward Islands in the Pacific Ocean, South Pacific. The Leeward Islands comprise the western part of the Society Islands of French Polynesia, which is an Overseas France, overseas collectivity of the France, French Republic in the Pacific Ocean. Bora Bora has a total land area of . The Bora Bora Island, main island, located about northwest of Papeete, is surrounded by a lagoon and a coral reef, barrier reef. In the center of the island are the remnants of an extinct volcano, rising to two peaks, Mount Pahia and Mount Otemanu; the highest point is at . Bora Bora is part of the Communes of France, Commune of Bora-Bora (commune), Bora-Bora, which also includes the atoll of Tūpai. The main languages spoken in Bora Bora are Tahitian language, Tahitian and French language, French. However, due to the high tourist population, many ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polynesians
Polynesians are an ethnolinguistic group comprising closely related ethnic groups native to Polynesia, which encompasses the islands within the Polynesian Triangle in the Pacific Ocean. They trace their early prehistoric origins to Island Southeast Asia and are part of the larger Austronesian ethnolinguistic group, with an Urheimat in Taiwan. They speak the Polynesian languages, a branch of the Oceanic subfamily within the Austronesian language family. The Indigenous Māori people form the largest Polynesian population, followed by Samoans, Native Hawaiians, Tahitians, Tongans, and Cook Islands Māori. , there were an estimated 2 million ethnic Polynesians (both full and part) worldwide. The vast majority either inhabit independent Polynesian nation-states (Samoa, Niue, Cook Islands, Tonga, and Tuvalu) or form minorities in countries such as Australia, Chile (Easter Island), New Zealand, France (French Polynesia and Wallis and Futuna), and the United States (Hawaii and Am ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Omai
Mai ( 1753–1779), also known as Omai in Europe, was a young Ra'iatean man who became the first Pacific Islander to visit England, and the second to visit Europe, after Ahutoru who was brought to Paris by Bougainville in 1768. Life Mai, born 1751, described himself as a ''hoa'', or 'attendant upon the king', the son of a Ra'iatea landowner. His father was killed by Puni's Bora boran warriors. Fleeing to Tahiti, Ma'i was wounded in the encounter with the ''Dolphin'' in 1767. Mai then became an apprentice to a priest. Returning to Ra'iatea, he was captured and taken to Borabora. Narrowly escaping death there, he escaped to Huahine. Mai met Samuel Wallis in 1767 and Captain James Cook in 1769 in Tahiti. In August 1773 he embarked from Huahine on the British ship , commanded by Tobias Furneaux, which had previously touched at Tahiti as part of Cook's second voyage of discovery in the Pacific. Mai travelled to Europe on ''Adventure'', arriving at London in October ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Second Voyage Of James Cook
The second voyage of James Cook, from 1772 to 1775, commissioned by the British government with advice from the Royal Society, was designed to circumnavigate the globe as far south as possible to finally determine whether there was any great southern landmass, or '' Terra Australis''. On his first voyage, Cook had demonstrated by circumnavigating New Zealand that it was not attached to a larger landmass to the south, and he charted almost the entire eastern coastline of mainland Australia, yet ''Terra Australis'' was believed to lie further south. Alexander Dalrymple and others of the Royal Society still believed that this massive southern continent should exist. After a delay brought about by the botanist Joseph Banks' unreasonable demands, the ships '' Resolution'' and ''Adventure'' were fitted for the voyage and set sail for the Antarctic in July 1772. On 17 January 1773, ''Resolution'' was the first ship to venture south of the Antarctic Circle, which she did twice more ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
First Voyage Of James Cook
The first voyage of James Cook was a combined Royal Navy and Royal Society expedition to the south Pacific Ocean aboard HMS Endeavour, HMS ''Endeavour'', from 1768 to 1771. The aims were to observe the 1769 transit of Venus from Tahiti and to seek evidence of the postulated ''Terra Australis, Terra Australis Incognita'' or "undiscovered southern land". It was the first of three voyages of which James Cook was the commander. The voyage was commissioned by George III, King George III and commanded by Lieutenant Cook, a junior naval officer with good skills in cartography and mathematics. Departing from Plymouth Dockyard in August 1768, the expedition crossed the Atlantic, rounded Cape Horn and reached Tahiti in April 1769, before the expected 1769 transit of Venus observed from Tahiti, transit on 3 June. After the observation, Cook stopped at the nearby islands of Huahine, Bora Bora, Borabora and Raiatea to claim them for Great Britain before sailing into the largely uncharted oc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tupaia (navigator)
Tupaia (also spelled Tupaea or Tupia; 1725 – 20 December 1770) was a Tahitian Polynesian navigator and '' arioi'' (a kind of priest), originally from the island of Ra'iatea in the Pacific Islands group known to Europeans as the Society Islands. His remarkable navigational skills and Pacific geographical knowledge were used by Lt. James Cook, R.N. when he took him aboard HMS ''Endeavour'' as guide on its voyage of exploration to '' Terra Australis Incognita''. Tupaia travelled with Cook to New Zealand, acting as the expedition's navigator to the Polynesian Māori, and Australia. He died in December 1770 from a shipborne illness contracted when ''Endeavour'' was docked in Batavia for repairs ahead of its return journey to England. Early life Tupaia was born at Ha'amanino Harbour on Ra'iatea around 1725 and became a leading ''ariori'' priest for the Taputapuatea marae. Tupaia was trained in the ''fare-'ai-ra'a-'upu'', or schools of learning, about the origin of the cosmos, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Natural History Museum, London
The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum (London), Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. The Natural History Museum's main frontage, however, is on Cromwell Road. The museum is home to life and earth science specimens comprising some 80 million items within five main collections: botany, entomology, mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology. The museum is a centre of research specialising in Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, identification and conservation. Given the age of the institution, many of the collections have great historical as well as scientific value, such as specimens collected by Charles Darwin. The museum is particularly famous for its exhibition of dinosaur skeletons and ornate architecture—sometimes dubbed a ''cathedral of nature''—both exemplified by the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Raiatea Starling
The Raiatea starling, formerly known as the bay thrush, bay starling, or the mysterious bird of Ulieta, is an extinct bird species of uncertain taxonomic relationships that once lived on the island of Raiatea (formerly known as Ulietea, hence the specific epithet ''ulietensis''), the second largest of the Society Islands in French Polynesia. Taxonomy The species is known only from a 1774 watercolour painting of the lost type specimen, contemporary descriptions, and a few brief field notes. The artist was Georg Forster, who accompanied his father Johann Reinhold Forster as naturalists on James Cook's second voyage to the Pacific in HMS ''Resolution'', which visited Raiatea in May and June 1774. The painting, now held by the British Natural History Museum, is annotated "Raiatea, female, June 1, 1774", and depicts the specimen obtained by the Forsters which entered the collection of Sir Joseph Banks and later disappeared.Greenway (1967). The specimen was also described as the "ba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
