Mabuiag, also known as "Mabuyag" and natively "Mabuyaagi", formerly "Jervis Island") is one of the Torres Strait Islands in Queensland, Australia. Mabuiag is also a town and locality in the Torres Strait Island Region local government area. In the , the locality of Mabuiag Island had a population of 253 people.
Geography
The island is in the Bellevue Islands group, north of Thursday Island in the Napoleon Passage and Arnolds Passage of the Torres Strait. It has other traditional names as well, such as Gœmu (strictly speaking the name of the South-East part of Mabuiag).
This island is one of the Torres Strait Islands, originally named by Captain William Bligh, "Jervis Island", and so labelled on early English language maps.
History
Archaeological excavations have shown that people arrived on Mabuiag at least 7300 years ago. During this period, Islanders were able to survive by fishing and hunting dugong. The island continued to be occupied by small communities for the subsequent 5000 years, with pottery (usually associated with Melanesian peoples) found at two sites, Mui (East coast of Mabuiag) and Mask Cave (on adjacent islet, Pulu) dating from approximately 2000 years ago. The past 1000 years witnessed expansion in site use, including formation of multiple ethnographically-significant 'villages', including Gœmu, Wagedœgam and Dhabangay. During the past 400–500 years large, highly structured mounds of dugong bone, as well as shell and stone arrangements provide evidence for emerging totemic divisions
The "Footprints before me – Torres Strait Island Missions and Communities" webpage tells the following history of Mabuiag Island and the people living there.
Kala Lagaw Ya (more correctly Kalaw Lagaw Ya (KLY) and Gœmulgaw Ya) is one of the languages of the Torres Strait. Kalaw Lagaw Ya is the traditional language of the Western and Central islands of the Torres Strait. The Kalaw Lagaw Ya language region includes the torritory within the local government boundaries of the Torres Shire Council.
Kalaw Lagaw Ya, alt. Gœmulgaw Ya, is specifically the dialect of Mabuyaagi (Mabuiag) and Badhu (Badu), there not being a traditional name for the language as a whole. Kalaw Lagaw Ya is used in academic literature as a cover term for the whole language, and is one of the two indigenous languages of Torres Strait; in earlier works it was also called Mabuiag. The Gœmulgaw Ya region includes the island territory of Mabuiag within the local government boundaries of the Torres Shire Council and Mabuiag Island Council and by extension Badhu.
In 1606, Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands, along New Guinea's southern coast.
"The Mabuiag people had a reputation for hostility to outsiders until their acceptance of Christianity in the early 1870s. In 1877 the mission moved to Bau where the water supply was better. Later, the missionaries persuaded the people to join them at Bau, which became the main settlement. By 1898, Mabuiag people were labouring on pearling luggers for wages, while many followed work to Thursday Island and further to the mainland. An official presence on Mabuiag began during the mid-1920s when Queensland Government posted teachers there. An Island Industries Board store opened in 1946".
Mabuiag Island State School opened on 29 January 1985. On 1 January 2007, the school became the Maubuiag Island campus of Tagai State College, an amalgamation of 17 Torres Strait Island schools.
Demographics
In the , the locality of Mabuiag Island had a population of 210 people.
In the , the locality of Mabuiag Island had a population of 253 people.
Transportation
Mabuiag Island Airport is in the east of the island (). The runway at is only 390 metres long, making it the shortest in Australian for commercial services.
Amenities
The Torres Strait Islands Regional Council operates an Indigenous Knowledge Centre with public library facilities on Main Street, known as Ngalpun Ngulaygaw Lag Resource Centre 'Our Place of Learning'.
Education
Tagai State College has 17 campuses throughout the Torres Strait. Its Mabuiag Island campus (Mabuygiw Ngurpay Lag) provides primary (Early Childhood-6) education at School Street ().
There is no secondary school on the island. The nearest secondary school is Tagai State College on Thursday Island.