Moorea, is a volcanic island in French Polynesia. It is one of the Windward Islands, a group that is part of the Society Islands, 17 kilometres (11 mi) northwest of Tahiti. The name comes from the Tahitian word Mo?ore?a, meaning "yellow lizard": Mo?o lizard Re?a (from re?are?a) yellow.[5] An older name for the island is ?Aimeho, sometimes spelled ?Aimeo or ?Eimeo (among other spellings that were used by early visitors before Tahitian spelling was standardized). Early Western colonists and voyagers also referred to Mo?orea as York Island or Santo Domingo.[6]The island is smaller and west of Tahiti, the largest in the Society Islands, but is close enough it can be seen from towns on the west side of that island such as Faa'a.HistoryMarae Ti?i-ruaPrehistoryAccording to recent archaeological evidence, the Society Islands were probably settled from Samoa and Tonga around 200 CE.[7]Nine tribal principalities emerged in the enclosed valleys, which in turn were subdivided into individual clans. The stratified society was characterized by a hierarchical leadership whose elite combined both political and religious power. The leading families of Mo?orea remained linked by marriage and kinship for centuries with those of the neighboring island of Tahiti. These connections led to important alliances, but at other times were also the source of bloody conflicts.[8]Intensive research on the Opunohu Valley, which continues to this day, initiated by Kenneth P. Emory in the 1920s and continued in the 1960s by archaeologist Roger C. Green of the University of Auckland, provides an exemplary picture of the evolution of Mo?orean society. The interaction between increasing population density and human modification of the environment resulted in major changes in the form of society.The so-called Pre-Atiro?o phase, prior to 1000 CE, is characterized by extensive clearing and cultivation of the valley slopes, which by the end of the period had led to erosion and the formation of alluvial soils. Society was not yet stratified, but was relatively homogeneous.[9]In the Atiro?o period (1000â1650 CE), artificial cultivation terraces were built on the slopes and simple stone buildings, such as the Marae Tapauru?uru. The remains of rectangular houses (fare haupape) and those with elongated oval floor plans (fare pote?e), reserved for the power elite, indicate a strictly stratified and hierarchical form of society.[10]The later Marama period (1650â1788 CE) is marked by the conquest of the Opunohu Valley by the chiefs (ariki) of the Marama tribe, originally settled on the coast, who succeeded in uniting all the other clans in the valley under their rule. In addition to a further increase in population, this phase also saw a lively construction activity of representative religious structures - large marae in the style of a step pyramid. Towards the end of this period, the Opunohu valley became a refuge for the Ariki who resisted European influence.[7]
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