The Book of Banaba: From the Maude and Gimble Papers, and Published Works. This item is unavailable.The Book of Banaba: From the Maude and Gimble Papers, and Published Works

When the Banabans had to leave their ancestral homeland as a result of the devastation caused by the phosphate mining industry they settled on the island of Rabi in Fiji.

Unfortunately the traumatic upheavals which the community has been through since the beginning of the century, and particularly since the Japanese occupation, have resulted in an understandable loss of confidence and a questioning of their identity and future. The Rabi born, in particular, have little conception of their rich historical heritage and former culture.

This book, therefore, has been prepared to provide the present and future generations of Rabi islanders with all that has been recorded of their former way of life on Banaba from the time their forbears first settled it over a thousand years ago and created a prosperous, self-supporting and happy society numbering several thousand.

The work will be of interest as well to a wider readership since it is the first to detail the settlement of an isolated Pacific Island, the development on it over the centuries of a community superbly integrated into its unique environment, and its final reluctant abandonment owing to external pressures beyond their control.