by RS Coolidge

Created on: January 21, 2009   Last Updated: January 27, 2009

If you are like most people and your vacation dreams focus on tropical getaways then the Solomon Islands may be perfect for you. This article will provide you with enough information to help you decide if the Solomon Islands is the place to be.

OVERVIEW

The Solomon Islands is a country in Melanesia. It is east of Papua New Guinea and northeast of Australia. Composed of nearly 1000 islands covering a land mass of 29,000 square kilometers, The Solomon islands hosts a population of only 550,000 people.

ANCIENT HISTORY

Papua speaking settlers began to arrive around 30,000 b.c. Austronesian speakers came around 4000 b.c bringing with them such cultural innovations as the outrigger canoe. Between 1200 b.c and 800 b.c, the ancestors of the Polynesians, the Lapita, arrived from the Bismarck Archipelago bringing with them ceramics.

MODERN HISTORY- COLONIALIZATION AND BEYOND

The first European to explore the islands was the Spanish navigator Alvaro de Mendanade Neira who arrived from Peru in 1567. Afterwards, The islands were not visited again for about 200 years. Missionaries began to arrive in the mid 1800's to spread Christianity but they were stymied in their efforts due to backlashes from the local population who were angry over brutal recruitment of labor for sugar plantations in Fiji and Queensland. The evils of the labor trade prompted the United Kingdom to declare a protectorate over the Southern Solomons in 1893. The end of forced labor made christianity more appealing to the inhabitants of the Islands. In 1898 and 1899 more islands were added to the British Protectorate. In 1900, the remainder of the Archipelago(with the exception of islands of Buka and Bougainsville) passed from German to British control.

The Solomon islands was the scene of some of the fiercest fighting of World War II. At the battle of Guadalcanal nearly 40,000 lives were lost. The Solomon islands served as a major staging area for the South Pacific war effort until the end of hostilities. After the war, Britain maintained control over the Solomon Islands until the islands gained independence in 1976.

Solomon's self governance has been marred by civil war and ethnic unrest. Most of the trouble has centered on the rocky relationship between the native Solomon population and settlers from the nearby island of Malaitia. Despite the signing of a cease fire between the warring factions and the 2003 introduction of a peacekeeping force from Australia, the Solomon Islands still suffers from sporadic

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