Orchid Island, known as Pongso no Tao by the indigenous Tao people, is a 45 km2 (17 sq mi) volcanic island located off the southeastern coast of Taiwan. The island and the nearby Lesser Orchid Island are governed by Taiwan as Lanyu Township in Taitung County, which is one of the county's two insular townships (the other being Lyudao Township). It is separated from the Batanes of the Philippines by the Bashi Channel of the Luzon Strait. It is considered a potential World Heritage Site.
Names Orchid Island is known by the Tao people indigenous to the island as Pongso no Tao ("island of human beings"). It was also known by the Tao as Ma'ataw ("floating in the sea") or Irala ("facing the mountain"); the latter being contrasted with the Tao name for the Taiwanese mainland – "Ilaod" ("toward the sea"). In the 17th century, it appeared on Japanese maps as "Tabako", a name borrowed into French and English as "Tabaco". It is still known by Filipinos as Botel Tobago, a name also formerly used in English. Lesser Orchid Island was similarly known as "Little Botel-Tobago". "Orchid Island" is a calque of the Chinese name, written 蘭嶼 in traditional characters, although strictly the second character means an islet rather than an island. The name honors the local Phalaenopsis orchids and was established by the Republic of China government in 1947. It is also sometimes known as Lanyu or Lan Yu, derived from Pinyin romanization of the name's Mandarin reading (Mandarin Chinese: 蘭嶼; pinyin: Lányǔ). It is also known in Taiwanese Hokkien Chinese: 蘭嶼; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lân-sū. The island had previously been known to the Chinese as "Redhead Island" (Mandarin Chinese: 紅頭嶼; pinyin: Hóngtóuyǔ; Taiwanese Hokkien Chinese: 紅頭嶼; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Âng-thâu-sū), referring to the island's northwestern mountain peaks, which resemble red human heads when illuminated by the setting sun. These characters were borrowed into Japanese as Kōtōsho during their rule of Taiwan.
History
Prehistory Based on genetic studies, Orchid Island was settled by the ancestors of the Tao people during the Austronesian Expansion (approximately 4000 BP). They maintained close contact through trade and intermarriage with the Ivatan people of the neighboring Batanes Islands of the Philippines until the beginning of the Colonial Era. These genetic studies are also attested by Tao oral history, which narrates that their ancestors originated from the Ivatan people of the Batanes islands.
Independence The island first appears on surviving charts in the 17th century, when it was noted by Japanese sailors. The island was independent from major powers, but had trade contacts with the Batanes islands. The island was visited by a surveying party from HMS Sylvia in 1867. In the early 1870s, William Campbell saw the island from aboard the Daphne, and wrote:
We had a very stormy passage, so much so, that my servant boy and the Chinese preacher (Chiu Paw-ha) who accompanied me, were dead sick during the seven days we were at sea. While laboring off the Island of Botel Tobago, our mainsail was torn in pieces; and, for several days, every other great sea we faced threatened to engulf us. I was sorry for the poor ship-hands, who had to work hard, and be content with mere snatches of time for food and sleep. It was only through repeated drenchings, and with firm holding on, that I succeeded in getting a good look at the land which came now and then into view. Every one was interested as we approached Botel Tobago. The last European visit to it was by a surveying party from H.M.S. Sylvia in 1867. It stands about twenty-six miles out from the south-eastern end of Formosa, is seven and a half miles long, and densely peopled by an aboriginal race. We saw their huts, and could make out rows of little canoes or rafts drawn up on the beach.
Imperial Japan During Japan's rule of Taiwan, the island was known by the name "Kōtō", the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese spelling 紅頭 ("red head"). The government at the time declared Kōtō Island to be an ethnological research area off-limits to the general public.
Republic of China After the Republic of China took over Taiwan, the island was administered as the Hong-tou-yu "township" of Taitung County after 19 January 1946 but the Japanese restrictions on visitors remained in effect. Because of these policies, the Tao continue to have the best-preserved traditions among the Taiwanese aborigines despite the end of the ban on settlement and tourism in 1967. Since 1967, schools have been built on the island and education in Mandarin is compulsory. Lesser Orchid Island has been used for target practice drills by the Republic of China Air Force. A nuclear-waste storage facility was built in 1982 without prior consultation with the island's inhabitants. Tao Aborigines have protested, and since the early 1990s demonstrated, their desire to rid their island of the "evil spirits" of nuclear waste. The plant receives nuclear waste from Taiwan's three nuclear power plants, all operated by the state utility Taipower. About 100,000 barrels of nuclear waste have been stored at the Lanyu complex. In 2002 and 2012, there were major protests from local residents, calling on Taipower to remove the waste from the island. In 2026, a group of Tao islanders voyaged to the Batanes islands in the Philippines in a bid to reconnect ties with the Ivatan people and revive the pre-colonial sea route between Orchid Island and the Batanes islands.
Geography
… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.
