when did hawaiians settle in hawaii
However, Polynesians have a long storytelling tradition that includes tales of migratory travel between many of the main island groups--Samoa, Tahiti, etc. The Polynesian Triangle encompasses 16 million square miles of ocean, making Oceania the largest continent on earth. The first person of European descent to arrive in Hawaii was Captain James Cook, who came in 1778. Hawaiians had been living in the islands for more than 1500 years by the time he arrived.