Centuries before the Pacific was revealed to Europeans, flotillas of ves-sels carried thousands of men, women, and children, together with plants and animals, to virtually every island in a vast ocean that covers about one-third of the surface of the globe. They settled in homelands with con-siderable diversity, ranging from the high islands of Papua New Guinea to small volcanic peaks that rise from the deep seabed, and a myriad of coral atolls and reef islands.In recent times the islands of the Pacific have been grouped into twenty-two political entities. Ten are independent states, six are variously associ-ated with former colonial administrations, and six are politically parts of distant countries (France, three; United States, two; and New Zealand, one).