History of the Pitcairn Islands History of the Pitcairn Islands The history of the Pitcairn Islands begins with the colonization of the islands by Polynesians in the 11th century. The Polynesians established a culture that flourished for four centuries and then vanished. Pitcairn was settled again in 1790 by a group of British mutineers on HMS "Bounty" and Tahitians. When the "Bounty" mutineers arrived on Pitcairn, it was uninhabited. However, they found the remains of an earlier Polynesian culture that had since vanished. Archaeologists believe that Polynesians lived on the island from the 11th to the 15th century. These first Pitcairners seem to have operated
HMS Pandora (1779) Edward; Hamilton, George (1915). "Voyage of H. M. S. 'Pandora': Despatched to Arrest the Mutineers of the 'Bounty' in the South Seas, 1790- 1791". Francis Edwards, 1915 Gesner, Peter (2000) "HMS Pandora project - a report on stage 1: five seasons of excavation" "Memoirs of the Queensland Museum - Culture" Volume 2 part 1 pp1-52 Henderson, Graeme (2016) 'The loss of HMS Pandora in 1791' (Chapter 5) pp 67–80 in: "Swallowed by the Sea: the story of Australia's shipwrecks" Canberra: National Library of Australia, 2016. Rawson, Geoffrey (1963) "Pandora's last voyage." London: Longmans, c1963 Steptoe, Dayman (1998)"The human skeletal material