Kayoa Island is near the southern end of a chain of volcanic islands off the western coast of Halmaherato, to the south of Makian and to the north of Bacan. The main island is about 10 miles long, about 9 miles south of Makian with a line of hills along most of its length. The group forms four districts within South Halmahera Regency, and had a total population of 20,176 at the 2010 Census. The islands were for centuries the only place in the world where cloves were produced. Kayoa lies on the equator and is subject to regular heavy rain in the two monsoon seasons, which are December to March and June to July. The stratovolcanoMount Tigalalu lies at the western end of Kayoa, partly flanked by coral limestones. However, Kayoa island differs from its neighbours in being composed mainly of sedimentary rather than volcanic rock. Its western side consists of terraces of raised coral limestone with pumice and beach sand.
Languages and archaeology
There are two native languages on Kayoa island, as well as Indonesian. The language named West Makian, spoken by 5,000 people in Kayoa and its outlying islands, is one of the North Halmahera languages, which appear to fall within the West Papuan family. The language named Taba or East Makian is one of the Austronesian languages. Archaeological evidence shows a foraging culture on Kayoa before around 3,500 years ago, changing at that time to an agricultural way of life with animals including pigs and dogs, red-slipped pottery, shell bracelets and beads, and polished stone tools such as adzes. This change shows the arrival on Kayoa of a new culture by 1500 BC. From 2,000 years ago the islands started to trade spices to India and beyond. Chinese copper money is found in jar burials of between 2,000 and 1,000 years ago in the Uattamdi cave shelter on Kayoa, implying that trade in cloves began early on the island. With the jars are glass beads, pieces of bronze and iron, and large shells from the coral reef. One of the burial vessels has rectangular and triangular patterns like those found at Leang Buidane but not on nearby islands.
Natural history
Naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace visited Kayoa, as described in his 1869 book The Malay Archipelago. He records that
