TONGA - KINGDOM OF TONGA / Puleʻanga Fakatuʻi ʻo Tonga

Tonga (Tongan: Puleʻanga Fakatuʻi ʻo Tonga), officially named the Kingdom of Tonga, is a Polynesian sovereign state and archipelago comprising 169 islands, of which 36 are inhabited. The total surface area is about 750 square kilometres (290 sq mi) scattered over 700,000 square kilometres (270,000 sq mi) of the southern Pacific Ocean Its 169 islands, 36 of them inhabited, are divided into three main groups – Vava'u, Ha'apai, and Tongatapu – and cover an 800-kilometre (500-mile)-long north–south line. The largest island, Tongatapu, on which the capital city of Nukuʻalofa is located, covers 257 square kilometres (99 sq mi). Geologically the Tongan islands are of two types: most have a limestone base formed from uplifted coral formations; others consist of limestone overlaying a volcanic base. Tonga stretches across approximately 800 kilometres (500 mi) in a north–south line. It is surrounded by Fiji and Wallis and Futuna (France) to the northwest, Samoa to the northeast, Niue to the east (which is the nearest foreign territory), Kermadec (part of New Zealand) to the southwest, and New Caledonia (France) and Vanuatu to the farther west. It is about 1,800 kilometres (1,100 mi) from New Zealand's North Island.

From 1900 to 1970, Tonga had British protected state status, with the United Kingdom looking after its foreign affairs under a Treaty of Friendship. The country never relinquished its sovereignty to any foreign power. In 2010, Tonga took a decisive path towards becoming a constitutional monarchy rather than a traditional absolute kingdom, after legislative reforms passed a course for the first partial representative elections. In many Polynesian languages, including Tongan, the word tonga comes from fakatonga, which means "southwards", as the archipelago is the southernmost group of the islands of central Polynesia. The word tonga is cognate to the Hawaiian region of Kona, meaning leeward in the Hawaiian language. Tonga became known in the West as the "Friendly Islands" because of the congenial reception accorded to Captain James Cook on his first visit in 1773. He arrived at the time of the ʻinasi festival, the yearly donation of the First Fruits to the Tuʻi Tonga (the islands' paramount chief) and so received an invitation to the festivities. According to the writer William Mariner, the chiefs wanted to kill Cook during the gathering but could not agree on a plan.

The beginnings of the postal history of Tonga can be traced to the Wesleyan missionaries, who landed in the islands in 1826, and sent regular communications back to London and Sydney from the day of their arrival. The Tongan Post Office was established in 1887, but even before then postage stamps featuring the image of King George Tupou I were produced in New Zealand.

In 1963, Tonga issued the world's first self-adhesive stamps, an event which was celebrated by philatelists. The stamps were also circular in shape and printed on embossed gilt-foiled paper, thus matching the design of the coins being commemorated. Subsequent philatelic issues employed other off-beat designs – including stamps shaped like hearts, birds and fruit – and Tonga continued to issue self-adhesive stamps printed on paper. Although several of the stamps were too big for placement on conventional first-class mailing envelopes, Tonga's unusual postage stamps have become popular with philatelists around the world.

In April 2008, the Tongan government announced the Tongan Post Office would be corporatized. However, the Tongan Post Office was not included in the 2008 effort to privatize other agencies and departments run by the government. Tonga has issued stamps for Niuafoʻou since 1983.

he covers posted on August 29, 2016 and I received them on September 19, 2016.