OCEANIA. -
I. GEOGRAPHY
In a broad sense, this name refers to the Australian continent and the insular world that accompanies it, including the scattered islands in the Pacific Ocean south of the Tropic of Cancer (i.e., an emerged area of just under 9 million sq. km., with 12.5 million inhabitants); in the strict sense, it refers only to the insular world, which covers about 1¼ million sq. km., with 3½ million inhabitants. Here, Oceania is considered in this second and more restricted sense (see also: AUSTRALIA).The western limit of Oceania can be fixed by a line that, starting from the Arafura Sea, passes between the Aru and Kei Islands, excludes the Moluccas and the Philippines, and continuing roughly along the 130th meridian E. Greenwich, crosses the Tropic of Cancer to include the entire Hawaiian archipelago. From here, in a southeasterly direction, the line cuts across the ocean to reach, beyond the Tropic of Capricorn, Sala y Gomez and Easter Islands, and then runs southward to reach Macquarie Island, New Zealand with its physical dependencies, and finally crosses the Coral Sea and the Torres Strait. In this way, the extreme points of Oceania are: 30° 30' N. (Ganges Island) = 35° S. (Macquarie Islands); 120° E. (Spice Islands, west of Misool) = 105° 30' W. Greenwich (Sala y Gomez Islands). The distances resulting from this (which exceed 85° of latitude and 125° of longitude), however, while they may give an idea of the great dispersion of the islands of Oceania, should not make us forget that the majority of them lie south of the Equator and are grouped into archipelagos, and that these become less frequent as one moves from west to east.
The traditional subdivision speaks of: 1) Melanesia (Islands of the Negroes), or Macronesia (Large islands), for the islands that encircle Australia to the northeast from New Guinea to New Caledonia and Fiji, where there are mountainous territories inhabited by Melanesians or Papuans; 2) Micronesia (Small islands) for the archipelagos that extend
The population (4.3 million inhabitants) is very unevenly distributed: about 1.9/10 are concentrated in New Zealand (more than 2/5), New Guinea (over 1/3), and Hawaii. On the small islands, densities are always modest (9.1 per sq. km. in American Samoa); the exceptions correspond to the few cases where mineral resources are exploited (phosphates, gold: in Nauru, the density exceeds 160 inhabitants per sq. km.). The indigenous people form almost the entire population; all of them probably derived from a primitive Transmanoid type, but then differentiated into several groups and usually divided into three branches: Papuans, Melanesians, and Polynesians. Of these, the first two, living in the western islands, are characterized by dolichocephaly, average stature, brown complexion, black spiral hair, and broad, flat noses, while the Polynesians, settled in the distant eastern archipelagos, have lighter skin, taller stature, and smooth, wavy hair. Contact with Europeans, which became intense only after the beginning of the 19th century, has reduced the number of indigenous people, aggravating, with the recent immigration of colored elements (mostly Asians), the labor shortage that has hindered and continues to hinder the rational development of Oceania's resources. These, moreover, especially in the subsoil, are still far from being fully known. Furthermore, economic and civil development presents, as is natural, great differences from place to place: on the larger islands, for example, the contrast is evident between the rapid and brilliant development achieved by New Zealand and the still primitive state of New Guinea, which is also much larger and richer (nor are the reasons for this delay merely climatic). The exploitation of Oceania's insular world, which began with logging, whaling, and sealing, has since focused on agriculture, where, alongside native plants (tropical fruits), the number of those introduced from other regions has grown (rice, cocoa, coffee, cotton, citrus fruits, etc.), although the cost of transportation, necessitated by the great distances, has hindered efficient commercial expansion.
Spain, the Netherlands, England, and France were, in chronological order, the first to set foot on the insular territories of Oceania; but toward the end of the last century, Germany (1884: Bismarck Archipelago, Solomon Islands, Northeast New Guinea; 1888: Nauru; 1898: Mariana Islands; 1899: Caroline Islands) and the United States (1898: Hawaii and Guam; 1899: Samoa) also entered the scene, while Spain abandoned its positions (after the unfortunate war against the United States, concluded with the Treaty of Paris on December 10, 1898); finally, the place of defeated Germany in World War I was taken by Japan (mandate over the Mariana Islands, excluding Guam, the Caroline Islands, the Marshall Islands, and Palau with Yap), which was itself later removed in favor of the United States after World War II. Currently, with the greater and better part of British possessions passed to the two Dominions of Australia and New Zealand, the United States has secured a position that, without being able to be defined as privileged, nonetheless clearly balances the influence of all other powers. With a good half of New Guinea (the only part of the Dutch East Indies remaining outside the Indonesian Union), the Netherlands retains an excellent position in Oceania, one more favorable to further development (agricultural, mining, and industrial) than that of France and perhaps even that of England, now reduced to the possession of only the central archipelagos. The French Establishments in Oceania include the archipelagos—altogether about a hundred islands—farthest east in Polynesia, between 8° and 28° S. approx., namely (proceeding from north to south): the Marquesas Islands (1,271 sq. km.), the Tuamotu or Puamotu, or Low Islands (the most scattered and numerous of the archipelagos; 885 sq. km.); the Society Islands (1,647 sq. km.), which include Tahiti (1,042 sq. km.) that alone accounts for about half the population of all the Establishments; the Tubuai or Austral Islands, the Gambier Islands, Rapa, and Motu One. Altogether, 3,998 sq. km. and 56,000 inhabitants, mostly Maori with nuclei of French, Chinese, and Indochinese. The seat of the governor of the Colony is in Papeete, on the island of Tahiti.
.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
- 21
- 22
- 23
- 24
- 25
- 26
- 27
- 28
- 29
- 30
- 31
- 32
- 33
- 34
- 35
- 36
- 37
- 38
- 39
- 40
- 41
- 42
- 43
- 44
- 45
- 46
- 47
- 48
- 49
- 50
- 51
- 52
- 53
- 54
- 55
- 56
- 57
- 58
- 59
- 60
- 61
- 62
- 63
- 64
- 65
- 66
- 67
- 68
- 69
- 70
- 71
- 72
- 73
- 74
- 75
- 76
- 77
- 78
- 79
- 80
- 81
- 82
- 83
- 84
- 85
- 86
- 87
- 88
- 89
- 90
- 91
- 92
- 93
- 94
- 95
- 96
- 97
- 98
- 99
- 100
53 OCEANIA 54
In the following table, which organizes Oceania's insular world according to current political jurisdictions, trust territories are marked with an asterisk. Due to space limitations, it is not possible to list the names of all the islands included in the various administrative units; therefore, the names of the smaller islands, to which the abbreviation dp (= dependencies) refers, have been omitted.
POLITICAL DIVISION OF OCEANIA (1952)
| | Area in km² | Population |
|---|---|---|
| Islands and Territories | | |
| Territory of Papua | 234,490 | 304,000 |
| Norfolk Island | 39 | 1,000 |
| * Territory of New Guinea | 240,870 | 1,007,000 |
| * Nauru Island | 22 | 3,000 |
| AUSTRALIAN OCEANIA | 475,421 | 1,315,000 |
| New Zealand | 267,821 | 1,873,000 |
| Campbell, Auckland, and Dependencies | 793 | 5 |
| Cook, Niue, Kermadec, and Tokelau Islands | 559 | 20,450 |
| * Western Samoa | 2,934 | 73,000 |
| NEW ZEALAND OCEANIA | 272,089 | 1,966,455 |
| Guam | 534 | 58,754 |
| American Samoa and Dependencies | 197 | 18,000 |
| Hawaiian Islands | 16,661 | 503,000 |
| Wake, Howland, Baker, and Jarvis Islands | 14 | 30 |
| * Mariana Islands | 639 | 46,650 |
| * Caroline Islands | 636 | 39,000 |
| * Palau Islands | 478 | 17,800 |
| * Yap Islands | 226 | 6,650 |
| * Marshall Islands | 170 | 9,958 |
| U.S. OCEANIA | 19,555 | 699,842 |
| Fiji and Rotuma Islands | 18,344 | 278,000 |
| Gilbert, Ellice, and Dependencies | 971 | 35,600 |
| Solomon Islands | 30,300 | 95,000 |
| Pitcairn and Dependencies | 39 | — |
| Tonga Islands | 697 | 46,000 |
| Starbuck, Malden, Caroline, Flint, and Vostok Islands | 42 | — |
| BRITISH OCEANIA | 50,393 | 454,600 |
| New Caledonia and Dependencies | 18,653 | 61,250 |
| French Settlements in Oceania | 3,998 | 55,500 |
| Clipperton Island | 2 | — |
| FRENCH OCEANIA | 22,653 | 116,750 |
| New Hebrides | 14,762 | 50,000 |
| ANGLO-FRENCH CONDOMINIUM | 14,762 | 50,000 |
| New Guinea and Dependencies | 416,000 | 200,000 |
| DUTCH OCEANIA | 416,000 | 200,000 |
| Bonin and Vulcano Islands | 106 | 4,750 |
| Minamitori Islands | 10 | ? |
| JAPANESE OCEANIA | 116 | 4,750 |
| Easter Island | 120 | 250 |
| Sala y Gomez Islands | 0.1 | — |
| CHILEAN OCEANIA | 120 | 250 |
| OCEANIA | 1,271,151 | 4,797,647 |
II. EVANGELIZATION
The first Catholic mission in Oceania, after various unsuccessful earlier attempts, began in the 17th century, when the Jesuits from the Philippines undertook the conversion of the Mariana Islands. From 1668 to 1672, the Jesuit Diego Luis Sanvitores succeeded in establishing a flourishing mission there, and in 1672 he died a martyr. Although by 1682 twelve other Jesuits suffered martyrdom, they managed to maintain the mission in the Marianas until the suppression of the Society. It was later continued by the Augustinian Recollects (1768–1889) and subsequently by Capuchins and Jesuits. Other attempts to establish missions in Oceania failed, such as those of the Jesuits at the beginning of the 18th century in the Palau and Caroline Islands, where the famous Father Juan Antonio Cantova labored, and those of the Franciscans in Tahiti from 1772 to 1775.It was only in the 19th century that systematic missionary activity was undertaken by Catholics throughout Oceania. The Protestants, however, had already been working there with good results since the late 18th century.
In 1827, the first missionaries of the Society of the Sacred Hearts (Picpus) arrived on the Hawaiian Islands. In 1829, the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide established the Apostolic Prefecture of the Islands of the South Sea or Great Ocean, comprising the territories “between the Equator and the Antarctic Pole and between Easter Island and New Zealand,” and entrusted it to the priest Henri de Solages. In 1832, two Apostolic Vicariates were erected: that of “Polynesia or Eastern Oceania,” entrusted to the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts, and that of “Polynesia or Western Oceania,” entrusted in 1835 to the Society of Mary (Marists).
In Eastern Oceania, severe persecutions and the expulsion of missionaries from the Sandwich Islands, the center of the mission, hindered effective work until 1839, when a treaty with France secured Catholics freedom of action. Meanwhile, the Picpusians, starting from Chile, had established themselves in the Gambier Islands in 1834, converting nearly the entire population, and from 1836 had begun the mission in Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands. In 1844, the Sandwich Islands were elevated to an Apostolic Vicariate (a diocese of Honolulu in 1841), and the remaining part of Eastern Oceania was divided into two vicariates: the Marquesas and Tahiti.
In Western Oceania, Jean-Baptiste Pompallier was appointed the first Apostolic Vicar in 1836. He took up residence in New Zealand. During his journey in 1837, he left the Marists Pierre Marie Bataillon on Wallis Island and Pierre-Louis-Marie Chanel on Futuna. After initial difficulties, Wallis Island was converted in 1842 and became a model Catholic state. Father Chanel, however, suffered the hatred of the chief of Futuna and was martyred; but the successor to the king received baptism along with the majority of the people, so that Futuna was entirely Christianized by 1843. In 1842, the Vicariate of Central Oceania was separated from Western Oceania; from this, the other missions of the Marists in the region gradually emerged: New Caledonia in 1847, where they had already worked since 1843; the Navigators Archipelago in 1850, where they had begun evangelization in 1845; the New Hebrides, where systematic work began only in 1887, erected as a prefecture in 1901 and a vicariate in 1904.
From Western Oceania, later reduced to New Zealand and the Kermadec Islands and divided in 1848 into the dioceses of Auckland and Port Nicholson (New Zealand), two vicariates were separated in 1842: those of Melanesia and Micronesia, also entrusted to the Marists. In less than three years, in their attempts to establish the mission, two bishops, four priests, and a brother lost their lives to murder or fever, and only on the small Woodlark and Roti Islands did the Marists manage to establish themselves. In 1852, the Seminary of the Foreign Missions of Milan undertook the mission, but withdrew in 1885 after Father Giovanni Mazzucconi was slaughtered. In 1881, Melanesia and Micronesia were entrusted to the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart. Monsignor Enrico Verjus began the mission in New Guinea; here, as well as in New Britain (or New Pomerania) and the Gilbert Islands, they managed to establish themselves. Part of New Guinea passed to the Divine Word Missionaries in 1896. In the Solomon Islands, the Marist Fathers began the mission in 1898.
Despite difficulties arising from primitive populations, some still cannibalistic, and from political upheavals and wars, the mission in Oceania achieved good results. By 1950, Oceania was divided into 1 diocese, 18 Apostolic Vicariates, and 1 Apostolic Prefecture.