Necker Island - Definition

This article discusses the Hawaiian island known as Necker Island. There is also a "Necker Island" in the British Virgin Islands.

Necker Island (Hawaiian: Mokumanumanu) is a small uninhabited island in the Pacific Ocean, 13 km (8 miles) north of the Tropic of Cancer, located at 23°34'N 164°42'W. It is part of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, located 690 km (430 miles) northwest of Honolulu, and is now part of the Hawaiian Islands National Wildlife Refuge.

Necker Island is between 41 to 45 acres (170,000 to 180,000 m²) and is rocky with steep sides and very little soil. Few signs of long-term human habitation have been found However, the island contains 33 stone shrines and stone artifacts much like those found in the main Hawaiian Islands. Because of this, many anthropologists believe that the island was a ceremonial and religious site. Visits to the island are said to have started a few hundred years after the main Hawaiian Islands were inhabited, and ended a few hundred years before European contact.

French explorer Jean-François de La Pérouse discovered the island in 1786. Its highest elevation is 84 m (277 ft).

Sources

• "Necker Island." The Columbia Gazetteer of North America. Columbia University Press: 2000. [1] (http://www.bartleby.com/69/77/N01677.html)