Straddling the 180 degree meridian, Taveuni, the third largest of the Fiji islands, is known as the "Garden Island" as a result of its rich volcanic soils.  The massive, elongated basaltic shield volcano rises to 1241 m and is dotted by approximately 150 volcanic cones along a NE-SW rift that extends the length of the 40-km-long island.  A few cones in the central part of the volcano occur to the west of the axial rift zone.  At least 58 eruptions have occurred on Taveuni since the first known human settlements of the Fiji Islands about 950-750 BC; all of these eruptions affected the southern two-thirds of the island.  A period of voluminous eruptions between about 300 and 500 AD caused abandonment of the southern part the island of Taveuni until about 1100 AD.  The latest known eruption produced a lava flow at the southern tip of the island sometime between about 1450-1650 AD.