Binoka[a] (c. 1840 – 10 November 1891) was the third uea of Abemama, Aranuka, and Kuria in the Gilbert Islands. Born and raised in Abemama, Binoka inherited his father's autocratic position in his thirties. He openly traded with most European sailors and amassed a collection of foreign items, which he actively sought out. Copra was his main export, coveted by sly European merchants.
When other islands had succumbed to colonial influence, Binoka carefully guarded his realm's boundaries and exiled most foreigners who he felt overly cheated him or threatened his rule. Binoka let the Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson and his companions stay on Abemama for nine months, as Stevenson recounted in In The South Seas (1896).
Binoka was the last completely independent I-Kiribati ruler. In 1892 after his death, the Gilbert Islands was declared a British protectorate on Abemama. Most European writers characterized Binoka as a tyrannical, arrogant despot. When questioned decades afterward, some of his former subjects had a mostly positive view of Binoka. They also claimed that anecdotes of his cruelty were fictitious or exaggerated.[7]
- ^ Maude 1970, p. 203.
- ^ Maude 1970.
- ^ Crowley 1990.
- ^ Roberts 1953.
- ^ Stevenson 1986, Part V.
- ^ Stevenson 2016, p. vi.
- ^ McGregor, Ken (May 1970). "Cleaning Up The Memory of "Good" King Binoka". Pacific Islands Monthly. Vol. 41, no. 5. pp. 81, 83 – via Trove.
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