| Description |
The voyaging knowledge and traditions of the Pacific islands are a rich and exceptional example of intangible cultural heritage. Covering one-third of the globe’s surface, the Pacific Ocean is home to numerous archipelagos that were settled as long as 40,000 years ago in the case of Papua New Guinea—a continental island in Melanesia, and as recent as 800 years ago, in some of the farthest flung archipelagos in Polynesia, which makes the Pacific the last region of the world to be settled by humans and the largest maritime diaspora in the world. Evidence points to the island archipelagos in Southeast Asia, including the continental island of Taiwan, as launching points for settling the remote Pacific Ocean, beyond Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, and the Solomon Islands, into what is today called Polynesia and Micronesia. Current thinking places Tonga, Samoa, and Fiji as the landing point for voyagers who came from Vanuatu in the Western Pacific about 3,500 years ago. |
