Kayoa

Kayoa
Native name:
Pulau Urimatiti
Geography
Coordinates00°4′N 127°25′E / 0.067°N 127.417°E / 0.067; 127.417
ArchipelagoMaluku Islands
Total islands66
Area179.97 km2 (69.49 sq mi)
Highest elevation422 m (1385 ft)
Highest pointMount Tigalalu
Administration
Indonesia
ProvinceNorth Maluku
Demographics
Population22,864 (mid 2022)
Pop. density127.0/km2 (328.9/sq mi)

Kayoa (also Kaioa), or in the native language Pulau Urimatiti, is a group of 66 islands, part of the Maluku Islands. It is located in South Halmahera Regency, part of North Maluku Province of Indonesia.

Geography

The Kayoa Islands are near the southern end of a chain of volcanic islands off the western coast of Halmaherato (Halmahera region), to the south of Makian and to the north of Bacan.[1] The 66 islands cover a land area of 179.97 km2. The main island is about 10 miles (16 km) long, about 9 miles (14.5 km) south of Makian with a line of hills along most of its length.[2] The group forms four districts within South Halmahera Regency, and it had a total population of 20,176 at the 2010 Census[3] and 23,111 at the 2020 Census.[4] The official estimate for mid 2022 was 22,864.[5]

The islands were for centuries the only place in the world where cloves were produced. Kayoa lies on the equator and is subject to regular heavy rain in the two monsoon seasons, which are December to March and June to July.[6]

The stratovolcano Mount Tigalalu lies at the western end of Kayoa, partly flanked by coral limestones.[7] However, Kayoa Island differs from its neighbours in being composed mainly of sedimentary rather than volcanic rock. Its western side consists of terraces of raised coral limestone with pumice and beach sand.[6]

Name of
District		 English
name		 Area
in
km2		 Pop'n
Census
2010		 Pop'n
Census
2020		 Pop'n
Estimate
mid 2022		 Admin
centre		 No.
of
villages		 Post
code
Kayoa 87.62 8,180 9,057 8,959 Guruapin 14 97780
Kayoa Barat West Kayoa 27.07 3,469 4,336 4,225 Busua 4 97781
Kayoa Selatan South Kayoa 26.06 5,856 6,822 6,825 Laluin 6 97780
Kayoa Utara North Kayoa 39.22 2,671 2,896 2,855 Laromabati 6 97781

Kayoa Barat District - comprising Mauri Island (Pulau Mauri) and 4 smaller islands - is actually closer to the Bacan Islands than to Kayoa Island. The rest of the archipelago comprises a number of groups and individual islands - the largest being Pulau Kayoa and Pulau Waidoba in the east, and Pulau Taneti in the southwest, with a number of smaller islands northwards from Taneti Island - including the Gora Ici Islands, Gunange, Laigoma, Siko and Gafi.

Villages

The four districts are sub-divided into thirty administrative villages (desa) as tabulated below:

Name of
District		 Name of
Island		 Kode
Wilayah		 Name of
desa		 Area
in
km2		 Pop'n
Estimate
mid 2023		 Post
code
Kayoa Siko 82.04.02.2004 Siko 4.50 410 97780
Gafi 82.04.02.2005 Gafi 1.30 309
Laigoma 82.04.02.2006 Laigoma 1.70 276
Taneti 82.04.02.2016 Ligua 13.00 137
82.04.02.2017 Kida 8.20 185
82.04.02.2018 Buli 14.10 382
Gora Ici Islands 82.04.02.2019 Talimau 1.70 801
Gunange 82.04.02.2020 Gunange 1.90 494
Gora Ici Islands 82.04.02.2021 Lelei 1.80 623
Kayoa 82.04.02.2022 Bajo 3.10 1,731
82.04.02.2023 Guruapin 26.40 2,336
82.04.02.2024 Karamat 4.20 389
Tawabi 82.04.02.2029 Tawabi 3.40 455
Gora Ici Islands 82.04.02.2030 Dorolamo 2.30 203
Kayoa Selatan Kayoa 82.04.12.2001 Ngute-Ngute 6.60 403 97780
Waidoba 82.04.12.2002 Laluin 2.50 2,628
Kayoa 82.04.12.2003 Posi-Posi 5.20 1,150
Waidoba 82.04.12.2004 Sagawele 5.70 919
82.04.12.2005 Orimakurunga 2.10 1,236
82.04.12.2006 Pasir Putih 3.80 353
Kayoa Utara Kayoa 82.04.13.2001 Modayama 3.50 893 97781
82.04.13.2002 Laromabati 14.00 900
82.04.13.2003 Gayap 10.20 596
82.04.13.2004 Ake Jailolo 6.40 330
82.04.13.2005 Wayasipang 2.50 3486
82.04.13.2006 Ngokonalako 2.60 499

Languages and archaeology

There are two native languages on Kayoa island, as well as Indonesian. The language named West Makian, spoken by about 12,000 people in Kayoa and its outlying islands, is one of the North Halmahera languages, which appear to fall within the West Papuan family.[8] The language named Taba or East Makian is one of the Austronesian languages.[9]

Archaeological evidence shows a foraging culture on Kayoa before around 3,500 years ago, changing at that time to an agricultural way of life with animals including pigs and dogs, red-slipped pottery, shell bracelets and beads, and polished stone tools such as adzes. This change shows the arrival on Kayoa of a new culture by 1500 BC.[10][11] From 2,000 years ago the islands started to trade spices to India and beyond.[10] Chinese copper money is found in jar burials of between 2,000 and 1,000 years ago in the Uattamdi cave shelter on Kayoa, implying that trade in cloves began early on the island. With the jars are glass beads, pieces of bronze and iron, and large shells from the coral reef. One of the burial vessels has rectangular and triangular patterns like those found at Leang Buidane but not on nearby islands.[6]

Natural history

"Moluccan Beetles"

Naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace visited Kayoa, as described in his 1869 book The Malay Archipelago.[12] He records that

The next day (October 16th [1858]) I went beyond the swamp, and found a place where a new clearing was being made in the virgin forest... I have never in my life seen beetles so abundant as they were on this spot. Some dozen species of good-sized golden Buprestidae, green rose-chafers (Lomaptera), and long-horned weevils (Anthribidae) were so abundant that they rose up in swarms as I walked along, filling the air with a loud buzzing hum. Along with these, several fine Longicorns were almost equally common, forming such an assemblage as for once to realize that idea of tropical luxuriance which one obtains by looking over the drawers of a well-filled cabinet... It was a glorious spot, and one which will always live in my memory as exhibiting the insect-life of the tropics in unexampled luxuriance.

— Wallace[13]

References

  1. ^ "Kayoa". GetaMap.net. Retrieved 22 March 2013.
  2. ^ Anon (1916). Publications of the United States Hydrographic Office. Hydrographic Office. p. 91.
  3. ^ Biro Pusat Statistik, Jakarta, 2011.
  4. ^ Badan Pusat Statistik, Jakarta, 2021.
  5. ^ Badan Pusat Statistik, Jakarta, 2023.
  6. ^ a b c Peregrine, Peter Neal; Ember, Melvin, eds. (2001). "Uattamdi". Encyclopedia of Prehistory. Vol. 3: East Asia and Oceania. Springer. ISBN 0306462575.
  7. ^ "Tigalalu". Global Volcanism Program. Smithsonian Institution. Archived from the original on 20 February 2013. Retrieved 22 March 2013.
  8. ^ Watuseke, F.S. (September 1976). "LinguisticsWest Makian, a Language of the North-Halmahéra Group of the West-Irian Phylum". Anthropological Linguistics. 18 (6): 274–285. JSTOR 30027583.
  9. ^ Bowden, John; Hajek, John (June 1996). "Phonetic Representation Illustrations of the IPA: Taba". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 26 (1): 55–57. doi:10.1017/S0025100300005326. S2CID 249406196.
  10. ^ a b Bellwood, Peter (1997). "The archaeology of Papuan and Austronesian prehistory in the Northern Moluccas, Eastern Indonesia". In Blench, Roger; Spriggs, Matthew (eds.). Archaeology and Language II: Archaeological Data and Linguistic Hypotheses. Psychology Press. pp. 128–129. ISBN 9780415117616.
  11. ^ Ooi, Keat Gin (2004). Southeast Asia: A Historical Encyclopedia, from Angkor Wat to East Timor, Volume 1. ABC-CLIO. p. 954. ISBN 9781576077702. Retrieved 23 March 2013.
  12. ^ Wallace, 1869. Volume 2, Chapter 23. pp. 28–33.
  13. ^ Wallace, 1869. Volume 2, pp. 31–32.

Bibliography