Yap (Yapese: Waqab, sometimes written as Wa'ab, Waab or Waqaab) traditionally refers to an island group located in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, a part of Yap State. The name "Yap" in recent years has come to also refer to the state within the Federated States of Micronesia, inclusive of the Yap Main Islands and its various outer islands, the Yap Neighboring Islands. For specifying the island group, the name Yap Main Islands is most exact.
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In this Dossier
Yap in the context of Philippine Sea
The Philippine Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean east of the Philippine Archipelago and the largest sea in the world, occupying an estimated surface area of 5 million square kilometers (2×10 sq mi). The Philippine Sea Plate forms the floor of the sea. Its western border is the first island chain to the west, comprising the Ryukyu Islands in the northwest and Taiwan in the west. Its southwestern border comprises the Philippine islands of Luzon, Catanduanes, Samar, Leyte, and Mindanao. Its northern border comprises the Japanese islands of Honshu, Shikoku and Kyūshū. Its eastern border is the second island chain to the east, comprising the Bonin Islands and Iwo Jima in the northeast, the Mariana Islands (including Guam, Saipan, and Tinian) in the due east, and Halmahera, Palau, Yap and Ulithi (of the Caroline Islands) in the southeast. Its southern border is Indonesia's Morotai Island.
The sea has a complex and diverse undersea relief. The floor is formed into a structural basin by a series of geologic faults and fracture zones. Island arcs, which are actually extended ridges protruding above the ocean surface due to plate tectonic activity in the area, enclose the Philippine Sea to the north, east and south. The Philippine archipelago, Ryukyu Islands, and the Marianas are examples. Another prominent feature of the Philippine Sea is the presence of deep sea trenches, among them the Philippine Trench and the Mariana Trench, containing the deepest point on the planet.
Yap in the context of Caroline Islands
The Caroline Islands (or the Carolines) are a widely scattered archipelago of tiny islands in the western Pacific Ocean, to the north of New Guinea. Politically, they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) in the central and eastern parts of the group, and Palau at the extreme western end. Historically, this area was also called Nuevas Filipinas or New Philippines, because they were part of the Spanish East Indies and were governed from Manila in the Philippines.
The Carolines are scattered across a distance of approximately 3,540 kilometres (1,910 nmi), from the westernmost island, Tobi, in Palau, to the easternmost island, Kosrae, a state of the FSM.
Yap in the context of Micronesians
The Micronesians or Micronesian peoples are various closely related ethnic groups native to Micronesia, a region of Oceania in the Pacific Ocean. They are a part of the Austronesian ethnolinguistic group, which has an Urheimat in Taiwan.
Ethno-linguistic groups classified as Micronesian include the Carolinians (Northern Mariana Islands), Chamorros (Guam & Northern Mariana Islands), Chuukese, Mortlockese, Namonuito, Paafang, Puluwat and Pollapese (Chuuk), I-Kiribati (Kiribati), Kosraeans (Kosrae), Marshallese (Marshall Islands), Nauruans (Nauru), Palauan, Sonsorolese, and Hatohobei (Palau), Pohnpeians, Pingelapese, Ngatikese, Mwokilese (Pohnpei), and Yapese, Ulithian, Woleian, Satawalese (Yap).
Yap in the context of Ulithi
Ulithi (Yapese: Wulthiy, Yulthiy, or Wugöy; pronounced roughly as YOU-li-thee) is an atoll in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, about 191 km (103 nmi) east of Yap, within Yap State.
Yap in the context of Yapese language
Yapese is an Austronesian language in the Oceanic branch spoken on the island of Yap, in the Federated States of Micronesia. It has been difficult to classify the language further, but Yapese may prove to be one of the Admiralty Islands languages. The Yapese language refers to the language spoken specifically on the Yap Main Islands, and does not include the Chuukic languages spoken in the Yap Neighboring Islands: Ulithian, Woleaian, and Satawalese (and to an extent, Nguluwan).
Yap in the context of Yap State
Yap State is one of the four states of the Federated States of Micronesia, located in the westernmost portion of the country. The state borders Palau to the southwest, Guam to the north, and Chuuk State to the east. According to the state's population census carried out in 2020, the total population is 11,577 residing across a total area of 119.54 sq km (46.15 sq mi), though a large majority of the area is water. The only town area in the state, Colonia, serves as the state capital.
What is now current-day Yap State and some parts of Chuuk State were the historical Yapese Empire, which at its peak, controlled 1,300 km of the western Pacific comprising all the inhabited islands and atolls between Yap and Chuuk. The rulers of the chiefdom of Gagil in Yap maintained sovereignty of these islands to the east and extracted resources and tribute, maintaining close economic and political relationships with the different island groups. After losing its influence and becoming incorporated territories of Spain, the German Empire, the Japanese Empire, and the United States through the UN-mandated Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (TTPI), Yap and the islands and atolls between Yap and Chuuk formed Yap State upon the founding of the FSM.
Yap in the context of Satawal
Satawal is a solitary coral atoll of one island with about 500 people on just over 1 km (0.39 sq mile) located in the Caroline Islands in the Pacific Ocean. It forms a legislative district in Yap State in the Federated States of Micronesia. Satawal is the easternmost island in the Yap island group and is located approximately 70 kilometers (43 mi) east of Lamotrek.