France's most remote territory — three kingdoms, 15 ancient fortresses, and almost no other tourists
Wallis Island (Uvea) is the main island of Wallis and Futuna, a French collectivity of three inhabited islands in the central Pacific that almost no tourist visits — there are no hotels in the conventional sense, just a few guesthouses, one runway, and the most intact pre-European Polynesian fortified landscape anywhere in the Pacific. The island has fifteen ancient stone fortresses (tia ele'ele), a lake that formed inside a volcanic crater, and a working monarchy that holds more day-to-day authority than the French prefect. The Wallisian and Futunan languages are endangered; the culture is n…
The Wallisian people (Uveans) built a sophisticated fortified kingdom between roughly 1400 and 1800 CE — the tia ele'ele stone fortresses are among the most complete pre-European defensive structures in Polynesia. British whalers 'discovered' the island in 1767 (Samuel Wallis, same voyage as Tahiti); the French established a protectorate in 1842, converting the entire population to Catholicism within a decade. Unlike most Pacific territories, French administration here largely deferred to the three traditional kingdoms (Uvea, Sigave, Alo), which retain real authority over land and customary l…