Samoa – the cradle of Polynesia and the first independent Pacific nation
The islands of Samoa were settled about 3,000 years ago by seafarers of the Lapita culture, and Samoa is often regarded as one of the cradles of Polynesian culture. Over the centuries a complex social order developed, the faʻa Samoa, based on extended families and their chiefs, the matai. Samoa maintained close contacts, and sometimes conflicts, with Tonga and Fiji.
The Dutch navigator Jacob Roggeveen was the first European to sight the islands in 1722. From the 1830s missionaries of the London Missionary Society spread Christianity, which became deeply rooted. In the late 19th century Germany, Britain and the United States competed for influence, and rivalries between Samoan chiefly factions led to civil wars. In 1899 the islands were divided: the western islands became a German colony, while the eastern islands became American Samoa.
In 1914, at the start of the First World War, New Zealand occupied Western Samoa and later administered it under a League of Nations mandate. The influenza epidemic of 1918, brought by a ship from New Zealand, killed a large part of the population. The Mau movement campaigned peacefully for self-government; in 1929 several of its members, including the chief Tupua Tamasese Lealofi III, were killed by police on "Black Saturday". On 1 January 1962 Western Samoa became the first Pacific island nation to gain independence, and in 1997 it changed its name to Samoa.
Today Samoa is shaped by the faʻa Samoa, strong churches and village life, and close ties with communities overseas.
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