Kavalan

The Kavalan lived in communities along the rivers and coast of the Lányáng Plain in northeastern Taiwan. They fished, cultivated land and traded by sea, and their houses included raised structures suited to the wet lowlands. Their homeland was separated from the western plains by steep mountains. In 1796 the settler Wú Shā led an armed party into the plain and established a foothold near Wūshí Harbour. Further immigration brought increasing pressure on Kavalan land. As settlements expanded, Kavalan families moved within the plain and, in the nineteenth century, some began to seek homes farther south.