History

During the age of colonization in the 16th century, Spain and Portigal conducted a series of expedition which encountered the then now islands of the country. The country's name is derived from two terms "Papua" and "New Guinea," the former is of Malayan origin and used to describe the frizzy hair of the island's inhabitants, while the second is the name coined by a Spanish explorer named Yñigo Ortiz de Retez who noted that the people living in the islands look like the ones in Guinea in Africa.

Papua New Guinea's northern part was colonized by the Germans in 1884 and named it as the German New Guinea. When World War I ended, the League of Nations gave Australia the authority to occupy and preside over the German New Guinea, while Papua remained a colony of Great Britain.

hen World War II came, Japanese forces occupied many portions of the country. Some of the bloodiest battles in World War II happened here, and today many historic sites of garrisons, fallen aircrafts and sunken ships are spread across the country. The two territories were combined after the Second World War, and they began to be called as "Papua New Guinea". The country was under Australia from then to 1975, the year when Australia finally granted the country its independence.