The pattern of settlement that is believed to have occurred is that the Polynesians spread out from the Samoan Islands into the Tuvaluan atolls, with Tuvalu providing a stepping stone to migration into the Polynesian Outlier communities in Melanesia and Micronesia. Possible evidence of fire in the Caves of Nanumanga may indicate human occupation thousands of years before that. Eight of the nine islands of Tuvalu were inhabited thus the name, Tuvalu, means 'eight standing together' in Tuvaluan (compare to *walo meaning 'eight' in Proto-Austronesian). ĭuring pre-European-contact times there was frequent canoe voyaging between the islands, as Polynesian navigation skills are recognised to have allowed deliberate journeys on double-hulled sailing canoes or outrigger canoes. There is evidence for a dual genetic origin of Pacific Islanders in Asia and Melanesia, which results from an analysis of Y chromosome (NRY) and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) markers there is also evidence that Fiji playing a pivotal role in west-to-east expansion within Polynesia. Tuvaluans are a Polynesian people, with the origins of the people of Tuvalu addressed in the theories regarding migration into the Pacific that began about 3000 years ago. Ī man from the Nukufetau atoll, 1841, drawn by Alfred Agate The Tuvalu National Library and Archives holds 'vital documentation on the cultural, social and political heritage of Tuvalu', including surviving records from the colonial administration, as well as Tuvalu government archives. On 5 September 2000, Tuvalu became the 189th member of the United Nations.

Tuvalu became fully independent within the Commonwealth on 1 October 1978. The Colony of Tuvalu came into existence on 1 October 1975. In 1974, the Ellice Islanders voted for separate British dependency status as Tuvalu, separating from the Gilbert Islands which became Kiribati upon independence. This claim was renounced under the 1983 treaty of friendship between Tuvalu and the United States. The United States claimed Funafuti, Nukufetau, Nukulaelae and Niulakita under the Guano Islands Act of 1856. The Ellice Islands were administered as British protectorate by a Resident Commissioner from 1892 to 1916 as part of the British Western Pacific Territories (BWPT), and then as part of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony from 1916 to 1976. Each of the Ellice Islands was declared a British Protectorate by Captain Gibson of HMS Curacoa, between 9 and 16 October 1892. The Ellice Islands came under Great Britain's sphere of influence in the late 19th century as the result of a treaty between Great Britain and Germany relating to the demarcation of the spheres of influence in the Pacific Ocean. In 1819 the island of Funafuti, was named Ellice's Island the name Ellice was applied to all nine islands, after the work of English hydrographer Alexander George Findlay. Various names were given to individual islands by the captains and chartmakers on visiting European ships. The first inhabitants of Tuvalu were Polynesians, so the origins of the people of Tuvalu can be traced to the spread of humans out of Southeast Asia, from Taiwan, via Melanesia and across the Pacific islands of Polynesia.

Dauntless fishing report