Tahiti (English: ; Tahitian: [taˈhiti, ˈthaiti]; French: [ta.iti]) is the largest island of the Windward group of the Society Islands in French Polynesia, an overseas collectivity of France. It is a tropical island located in the central part of the Pacific Ocean. Tahiti is composed of two roughly circular land masses joined by an isthmus: Tahiti Nui and Tahiti Iti. Both are the eroded remnants of now-extinct shield volcanoes. The terrain of Tahiti is mostly high and mountainous, with the beaches and coral reefs that surround the island supporting tourism and fishing industries.
Tahiti's population was 189,517 in 2017, making it by far the most populous island in French Polynesia and accounting for 68.7% of the collectivity's total population; the 2022 Census recorded a population of 191,779. Tahiti is the economic, cultural, and political centre of French Polynesia. The capital of French Polynesia, Papeʻete, is located on the northwest coast of Tahiti. The only international airport in the region, Faʻaʻā International Airport, is on Tahiti near Papeʻete.
Tahiti was originally settled by Polynesians between 900 and 1100 CE. Those of Polynesian heritage still represent about 70% of the island's population, with the rest made up of people of European, Chinese, and mixed heritage. The island was part of the Kingdom of Tahiti until its annexation by France in 1880, when it was proclaimed a colony of France, and the inhabitants became French citizens. French is the sole official language, although the Tahitian language (Reo Tahiti) is also widely spoken.
Nomenclature
Tahiti was called Otaheite in earlier European documents, which is a rendering of the Tahitian phrase ʻo Tahiti, and is typically pronounced [ʔotaˈhɛiti]. When early Europeans asked the name of the island, the reply was "'o Tahiti", meaning "it is Tahiti".
Geography, climate and vegetation
Tahiti is the highest and largest island in French Polynesia, and is close to Moʻorea island. It is located 4,400 kilometres (2,376 nautical miles) south of Hawaiʻi, 7,900 km (4,266 nmi) from Chile, 5,700 km (3,078 nmi) from Australia. The nearest major landmass is the North Island of New Zealand, approximately 3,800 kilometres (2,052 nautical miles) to the south-west.
The island is 45 km (28 mi) across at its widest point and covers an area of 1,045 km2 (403 sq mi). The highest peak is Mont Orohena (Mouʻa ʻOrohena) (2,241 m (7,352 ft)). Mount Roonui, or Mount Ronui (Mouʻa Rōnui), in the southeast rises to 1,332 m (4,370 ft). The island consists of two roughly round portions centered on volcanic mountains and connected by a short isthmus of Taravao.
The northwestern portion is known as Tahiti Nui ("big Tahiti"), while the much smaller southeastern portion is known as Tahiti Iti ("small Tahiti") or Taiʻarapū. Tahiti Nui is heavily populated along the coast, especially around the capital, Papeʻete.
The interior of Tahiti Nui is almost entirely uninhabited. Tahiti Iti has remained isolated, as its southeastern half (Te Pari) is accessible only to those traveling by boat or on foot. The rest of the island is encircled by a main road which cuts between the mountains and the sea. Tahiti's landscape features lush rainforests and many rivers and waterfalls, including the Papenoʻo on the north side and the Fautaua Falls near Papeʻete.
Geology
Tahiti consists of two overlapping, heavily eroded and now extinct shield volcanoes: Tahiti Nui (the bigger, northwestern part) and Tahiti Iti (the smaller, southeastern part). These volcanoes were active between 0.25 and 1.67 million years ago are associated with the same hotspot which is the source of the other Society Islands.
Climate
November to April is the wet season; the wettest month is January, with 340 millimetres (13 in) of rain in Papeʻete. August is the driest with 48 millimetres (1.9 in).
The average temperature ranges between 21 and 31 °C (70 and 88 °F), with little seasonal variation. The lowest and highest temperatures recorded in Papeʻete are 16 and 34 °C (61 and 93 °F), respectively.
History
Early settling of Tahiti
The first Tahitians arrived from Western Polynesia into the Society Islands sometime after 900 CE; some studies have proposed slightly later dates, ∼1025–1120 CE. Linguistic, biological and archaeological evidence supports a long migration from Southeast Asia via the Fijian, Samoan and Tongan Archipelagos using outrigger canoes that were up to twenty or thirty metres long and could transport families as well as domestic animals.
Civilization before the arrival of the Europeans
Before the arrival of the Europeans, the island was divided into territories, each dominated by a single clan. The most important clans were the closely related Teva i Uta (Teva of the Interior) and the Teva i Tai (Teva of the Sea) whose combined territory extended from the peninsula in the south of Tahiti Nui.
Clan leadership consisted of a chief (ariʻi rahi), nobles (ariʻi), and under-chiefs (ʻĪatoʻai). The ariʻi were also the religious leaders, revered for the mana (spiritual power) they inherited as descendants of the gods. As symbols of their power, they wore belts of red feathers. Nonetheless, to exercise their political power, councils or general assemblies composed of the ariʻi and the ʻĪatoʻai had to be called, especially in case of war.
The chief's spiritual power was also limited; each clan's practice was organized around their marae (stone temple) and its priests.
First European visits
The first European to arrive at Tahiti may have been the Spanish explorer Juan Fernández during his 1576–1577 expedition. Alternatively, Portuguese navigator Pedro Fernandes de Queirós, serving the Spanish Crown in an expedition to Terra Australis, was perhaps the first European to see Tahiti. He sighted an inhabited island on 10 February 1606. However, it has been suggested that he actually saw the island of Rekareka to the southeast of Tahiti. Hence, although the Spanish and Portuguese made contact with nearby islands, they may not have arrived at Tahiti.
The next stage of European visits to the region came during the period of intense Anglo-French rivalry that filled the twelve years between the Seven Years' War and the American Revolutionary War. The first of these visits, and perhaps the first European visit to Tahiti, was under the command of Captain Samuel Wallis. While circumnavigating the globe in HMS Dolphin, they sighted the island on 18 June 1767. Then they harbored in Matavai Bay between the chiefdom Pare-Arue (governed by Tu (Tu-nui-e-aʻa-i-te-Atua) and his regent Tutaha) and the chiefdom Haʻapape, governed by Amo and his wife "Oberea" (Purea). The initially friendly encounter turned tense as islanders grew suspicious and sought control of the Dolphin, leading to a week of skirmishes that culminated in violence, but to avert all-out war after a British show of force, Oberea laid down peace offerings leading to cordial relations.
On 2 April 1768, the expedition of Louis-Antoine de Bougainville, aboard Boudeuse and Etoile on the first French circumnavigation, sighted Tahiti. On 5 April, they anchored off Hitiaʻa O Te Ra and were welcomed by its chief Reti. Tutaha also visited Bougainville. Bougainville stayed about ten days.
By 12 April 1769, Captain James Cook had arrived in Tahiti's Matavai Bay on a scientific mission with astronomy, botany, and artistic details. On 14 April Cook met Tutaha and Tepau and the next day he picked the site for a fortified camp at Point Venus for Charles Green's observatory. Botanist Joseph Banks and artist Sydney Parkinson, along with Cook, gathered valuable information on fauna and flora as well as on native society, language and customs, including the proper name of the island. Cook also met many island chiefs. Cook and Endeavour left Tahiti on 13 July 1769. Cook estimated the population to be 200,000, including all the nearby islands in the chain. This estimate was reduced to 35,000 by Cook's contemporary, anthropologist and Tahiti expert Douglas L. Oliver.
The Viceroy of Peru, Manuel de Amat y Juniet, under order of the Spanish Crown, organized an expedition to colonize the island in 1772. He would ultimately send three expeditions aboard the ship Aguila, the first two under the command of navigator Domingo de Bonechea. Four Tahitians, Pautu, Tipitipia, Heiao, and Tetuanui, accompanied Bonechea back to Peru in early 1773 after the first Aguila expedition.
Cook returned to Tahiti between 15 August and 1 September 1773. Greeted by the chiefs, Cook anchored in Vaitepiha Bay before returning to Point Venus. Cook left Tahiti on 14 May 1774.
Pautu and Tetuanui returned to Tahiti with Bonechea aboard Aguila on 14 November 1774; Tipitipia and Heiao had died. Bonechea died on 26 January 1775 in Tahiti and was buried near the mission he had established at Tautira Bay. Lt Tomas Gayangos took over command and set sail for Peru on 27 January, leaving the Fathers Geronimo Clota and Narciso Gonzalez and the sailors Maximo Rodriguez and Francisco Perez in charge of the mission. On the third Aguila expedition, under Don Cayetano de Langara, the mission on Tahiti was abandoned on 12 November 1775, when the Fathers successfully begged to be taken back to Lima.
During his final visit in 1777, Cook first moored in Vaitepiha Bay. From there, he reunited with many Tahitian clans and established a British presence on the remains of the Spanish mission. On 29 September 1777 Cook sailed for Papetoʻai Bay on Moʻorea.
British influence and the rise of the Pōmare
Mutineers of the Bounty
On 26 October 1788, HMS Bounty, under the command of Captain William Bligh, landed in Tahiti with the mission of carrying Tahitian breadfruit trees (Tahitian: ʻuru) to the Caribbean. Sir Joseph Banks, the botanist from James Cook's first expedition, had concluded that this plant would be ideal to feed the enslaved Africans working in the Caribbean plantations at very little cost. The crew remained in Tahiti for about 5 months, the time needed to transplant the trees' seedlings. Three weeks after leaving Tahiti, on 28 April 1789, the crew mutinied on the initiative of Fletcher Christian. The mutineers seized the ship and set the captain and most of those members of the crew who remained loyal to him adrift in a ship's boat. A group of mutineers then went back to settle in Tahiti, after which the Bounty, under Christian, sailed to Pitcairn Island.
Although various explorers had refused to get involved in tribal conflicts, the mutineers from the Bounty offered their services as mercenaries and furnished arms to the family, which became the Pōmare Dynasty. The chief Tū knew how to use their presence in the harbours favoured by sailors to his advantage. As a result of his alliance with the mutineers, he succeeded in considerably increasing his supremacy over the island of Tahiti.
In about 1790, the ambitious chief Tū took the title of king and gave himself the name Pōmare. Captain Bligh explains that this name was a homage to his eldest daughter Teriʻinavahoroa, who had died of tuberculosis, "an illness that made her cough (mare) a lot, especially at night (pō)". Thus, he became Pōmare I, founding the Pōmare Dynasty, and his lineage would be the first to unify Tahiti from 1788 to 1791. He and his descendants founded and expanded Tahitian influence to all of the lands that now constitute modern French Polynesia.
In 1791, HMS Pandora under Captain Edward Edwards called at Tahiti and took custody of fourteen of the mutineers. Four were drowned in the sinking of Pandora on her homeward voyage, three were hanged, four were acquitted, and three were pardoned.
Landings of the whalers
In the 1790s, whalers began landing at Tahiti during their hunting expeditions in the southern hemisphere. The arrival of these whalers, later joined by merchants from the penal colonies in Australia, marked the first major upheaval of traditional Tahitian society. The crews introduced alcohol, arms, and infectious diseases to the island. These commercial interactions with Westerners had catastrophic consequences for the Tahitian population, which shrank rapidly, ravaged by diseases and other cultural factors. During the first decade of the 19th century, the Tahitian population dropped from 16,000 to 8,000–9,000; the French census in 1854 counted a population just under 6,000.
Arrival of the missionaries
On 5 March 1797, representatives of the London Missionary Society landed at Matavai Bay (Mahina) on board Duff, with the intention of converting the pagan native populations to Christianity. The arrival of these missionaries marked a turning point for the island of Tahiti, with a lasting impact on local culture.
The first years proved hard work for the missionaries, despite their association with Pōmare, whose importance they were aware of thanks to the reports of earlier sailors. In 1803, upon the death of Pōmare I, his son Vairaʻatoa succeeded him and took the title of Pōmare II. He increasingly aligned himself with the missionaries, and from 1803, they taught him to read and the Gospels. Furthermore, the missionaries encouraged his wish to conquer his opponents, so that they would have to deal with only a single political contact, enabling them to spread Christianity across a unified country. The conversion of Pōmare II to Protestantism in 1812 marks, moreover, the point when Protestantism truly took off on the island.
In about 1810, Pōmare II married Teremoʻemoʻe, daughter of the chief of Raiatea, to ally himself with the chiefdoms of the Leeward Islands. On 12 November 1815, thanks to these alliances, Pōmare II won a decisive battle at Feʻi Pī (Punaʻauia), notably against Opuhara, the chief of the powerful clan of Teva. This victory allowed Pōmare II to be styled Ariʻi Rahi, or the king of Tahiti. It was the first time that Tahiti had been united under the control of a single family. This marked the end of Tahitian feudalism and the military aristocracy, which were replaced by an absolute monarchy. At the same time, Protestantism quickly spread under Pōmare II's support and supplanted traditional beliefs. In 1816, the London Missionary Society sent John Williams as a missionary and teacher, and starting in 1817, the Gospels were translated into Tahitian (Reo Maohi) and taught in the religious schools. In 1818, the minister William Pascoe Crook founded the city of Papeʻete, which became the capital of the island.
In 1819, Pōmare II, encouraged by the missionaries, introduced the first Tahitian legal code, known as the Pōmare Legal Code, which consists of nineteen laws. The missionaries and Pōmare II thus imposed a ban on nudity (obliging them to wear clothes covering their whole body), banned dances and chants (described as immodest), tattoos, and costumes made of flowers.
In the 1820s, the entire population of Tahiti converted to Protestantism. Duperrey, who berthed in Tahiti in May 1823, attests to the change in Tahitian society in a letter dated 15 May 1823: "The missionaries of the Royal Society of London have totally changed the morals and customs of the inhabitants. Idolatry no longer exists among them, and they generally profess the Christian religion. The women no longer come aboard the vessel, and even when we meet them on land, they are extremely reserved. (...) The bloody wars that these people used to carry out and human sacrifices have no longer taken place since 1816."
When Pōmare II died on 7 December 1821, his son, Pōmare III, was only eighteen months old. His uncle and the religious people therefore supported the regency, until 2 May 1824, the date on which the missionaries conducted his coronation, a ceremony unprecedented in Tahiti. Taking advantage of the weakness of the Pōmare, local chiefs won back some of their power and took the hereditary title of Tavana (from the English word "governor"). The missionaries also took advantage of the situation to change the way power was structured and to make the Tahitian monarchy more closely resemble the English model of a constitutional monarchy. They therefore created the Tahitian Legislative Assembly, which first sat on 23 February 1824.
In 1827, the young Pōmare III suddenly died, and it was his half-sister, ʻAimata, aged thirteen, who took the title of Pōmare IV. The Birmingham-born missionary George Pritchard, who was the acting British consul, became her main adviser and sought to interest her in the kingdom's affairs. Still, the authority of the queen, who was certainly less charismatic than her father, was challenged by the chiefs, who had won back an important part of their prerogatives since the death of Pōmare II. The power of the Pōmare had become more symbolic than real; time and time again, Queen Pōmare, Protestant and anglophile, sought in vain the protection of England.
In November 1835, Charles Darwin visited Tahiti aboard HMS Beagle on its circumnavigation, captained by Robert FitzRoy. He was impressed by what he perceived as the positive influence the missionaries had on the population's sobriety and moral character. Darwin praised the scenery, but was not flattering towards Tahiti's queen Pōmare IV. Captain Fitzroy negotiated payment of compensation for an attack on an English ship by Tahitians, which had taken place in 1833.
In Sept. 1839, the island was visited by the United States Exploring Expedition. One of its members, Alfred Thomas Agate, produced several sketches of Tahitian life, some of which were later published in the United States.
French protectorate and the end of the Pōmare kingdom
In 1836, the queen's advisor, Pritchard, had two French Catholic priests expelled: François Caret and Honoré Laval. As a result, in 1838, France sent Admiral Abel Aubert du Petit-Thouars to obtain reparations. Once his mission had been completed, Admiral Du Petit-Thouars sailed towards the Marquesas Islands, which he annexed in 1842. Also in 1842, tensions involving Morocco escalated between France and Great Britain, souring their relations. In August 1842, Admiral Du Petit-Thouars returned and landed in Tahiti. He then made friends with Tahitian chiefs who were hostile to the Pōmare family and favourable to a French protectorate. He had them sign a request for protection in the absence of their queen, then approached her and obliged her to ratify the terms of the protectorate treaty. The treaty had not even been ratified by France itself when Jacques-Antoine Moerenhout was named royal commissaire alongside Queen Pōmare.
Within the framework of this treaty, France recognised the sovereignty of the Tahitian state. The queen was responsible for internal affairs, while France would handle foreign relations, defend Tahiti, and maintain order on the island. Once the treaty was signed, a struggle for influence began between English Protestants and French Catholic representatives. During the first years of the Protectorate, the Protestants managed to retain a considerable hold over Tahitian society, thanks to their knowledge of the country and its language. George Pritchard had been away at the time. He returned, however, to work towards indoctrinating the locals against the Roman Catholic French.
Tahitian War of Independence (1844–47)
In 1843, the queen's Protestant advisor, Pritchard, persuaded her to display the Tahitian flag in place of the flag of the Protectorate. By way of reprisal, Admiral Dupetit-Thouars announced the annexation of the Kingdom of Pōmare on 6 November 1843 and set up the governor Armand Joseph Bruat there as the chief of the new colony. He threw Pritchard into prison and later sent him back to Britain. The annexation led to the queen's exile to the Leeward Islands, and after a period of troubles, a real Franco-Tahitian war began in March 1844. News of Tahiti reached Europe in early 1844. The French statesman François Guizot, supported by King Louis-Philippe of France, had denounced the annexation of the island.
The war ended in December 1846 in favour of the French. The queen returned from exile in 1847 and agreed to sign a new covenant, considerably reducing her powers, while increasing those of the commissaire. Thus, the French reigned over the Kingdom of Tahiti. In 1863, they put an end to the British influence and replaced the British Protestant Missions with the Société des missions évangéliques de Paris (Society of Evangelical Missions of Paris).
Later 19th century
During the same period, about a thousand Chinese, mainly Cantonese, were recruited at the request of a plantation owner in Tahiti, William Stewart, to work on the great cotton plantation at Atimaono. When the enterprise went bankrupt in 1873, some Chinese workers returned to their country, but many stayed in Tahiti and integrated into the local population.
In 1866, the district councils were formed and elected, and given the powers of the traditional hereditary chiefs. In the context of republican assimilation, these councils sought to protect the traditional way of life of local people, which was threatened by European influence.
In 1877, Queen Pōmare died after ruling for fifty years. Her son, Pōmare V, then succeeded her on the throne. The new king seemed little concerned with the affairs of the kingdom, and when, in 1880, the governor Henri Isidore Chessé, supported by the Tahitian chiefs, urged him to abdicate in favor of France, he accepted. On 29 June 1880, he ceded Tahiti to France along with the islands that were its dependencies. He was given the titular position of Officer of the Orders of the Legion of Honour and Agricultural Merit of France. Having become a colony, Tahiti thus lost all sovereignty. Tahiti was nevertheless a special colony, since all the subjects of the Kingdom of Pōmare would be given French citizenship. On 14 July 1881, among cries of "Vive la République!" the crowds celebrated the fact that Polynesia now belonged to France; this was the first celebration of the Tiurai (national and popular festival). In 1890, Papeʻete became a commune of the Republic of France.
The French painter Paul Gauguin lived on Tahiti in the 1890s and painted many Tahitian subjects. Papeari has a small Gauguin museum.