Tahiti is the largest island in the Windward group of French Polynesia, located in the archipelago of Society Islands in the southern Pacific Ocean. The island had a population of 178,133 inhabitants according to the August 2007 census.^[1] This makes it the most populous island ofFrench Polynesia, with 68.6% of the total population. The capital is Papeete, on the northwest coast. Tahiti has also been known as O’tahiti.

Tahiti is estimated to have been settled between AD 300 and 800 by Polynesians, although some estimates place the date earlier. The fertile soil combined with fishingprovided food.

Although the first European sighting of the islands was by a Spanish ship in 1606, Spain made no effort to trade with or colonise the island. Samuel Wallis, an English sea captain, sighted Tahiti on 18 June, 1767, and is considered the first European visitor. The relaxed and contented nature of the people and the characterisation of the island as a paradise impressed early Europeans, planting the seed for a romanticisation by the West that endures to this day.

Wallis was followed in April 1768 by the French explorer Louis-Antoine de Bougainville, completing the first French circumnavigation. Bougainville made Tahiti famous in Europe when he published Voyage autour du monde. He described the island as an earthly paradise where men and women live happily in innocence, away from the corruption of civilization. His account illustrated the concept of the noble savage, and influenced utopian thoughts of philosophers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau before the French Revolution.

In April 1769 Captain James Cook visited the island on secret orders from the Lords of the Admiralty to view the Transit of Venus on 2 June. He set up camp at Matavai Bay and stayed on until 9 August. The population was estimated to be 50,000 including all the nearby islands in the chain. After Cook, European ships landed with greater frequency. The best-known was HMS Bounty, whose crew mutinied after leaving Tahiti in 1789. The European influence disrupted traditional society, bringing prostitution, venereal disease, alcohol, and Christianity. The London Missionary Society, founded in 1810, instructed its Tahitian missionaries to intervene in what they saw as wretched conditions and demonic influence. Introduced diseases including typhus, influenza and smallpox killed so many Tahitians that by 1797, the population was only 16,000. Later it was to drop as low as 6,000.

In 1839 the island was visited by the United States Exploring Expedition; one of its members, Alfred Thomas Agate, produced a number of sketches of Tahitian life, some of which were later published in the United States. In the same year, between the 15th and 19th November, it was visited byHMS Beagle on her circumnavigation, captained by Robert FitzRoy and carrying Charles Darwin as a passenger.

In 1842, a European crisis involving Morocco escalated between France and Great Britain when Admiral Dupetit Thouars, acting independently of the French government, convinced Tahiti’s Queen Pomare IV to accept a French protectorate. George Pritchard, a Birmingham-born missionary and acting British Consul, had been away at the time. However he returned to work towards indoctrinating the locals against the Roman Catholic French. In November 1843, Dupetit-Thouars (again on his own initiative) landed sailors on the island, annexing it to France. He then threw Pritchard into prison, subsequently sending him back to Britain.

News of Tahiti reached Europe in early 1844. The French statesman François Guizot, supported by King Louis-Philippe of France, had denounced annexation of the island. However, war between the French and the Tahitians continued until 1847. The island remained a French protectorate until June 29, 1880, when King Pomare V (1842–1891) was forced to cede the sovereignty of Tahiti and its dependencies to France. He was given the titular position of Officer of the Orders of the Legion of Honour and Agricultural Merit of France. In 1946, Tahiti and the whole of French Polynesia became a Territoire d’outre-mer (French overseas territory). Tahitians were granted French citizenship, a right that had been campaigned for by nationalist leader Marcel Pouvana’a A Oopa for many years.  In 2003, French Polynesia’s status was changed to that of Collectivité d’outre-mer(French overseas community).

French painter Paul Gauguin lived on Tahiti in the 1890s and painted many Tahitian subjects. Papeari has a small Gauguin museum.

During the First World War, the Papeete region of the island was attacked by two German warships. A French gunboat was sunk in the harbor and the two German warships bombarded the colony.

Tahiti is more than just place to have a few beautiful sommer beach hot days.. Tahiti is a nice place with a lot of historycal stuff and places to see. You have to go there to see it.. and than you’l know why is Tahiti great place for a vacation.

Sources: 1, 2