The largest of which was located in Kingston Settled in the Orinoco valley; 4. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Once the most numerous indigenous people of the Caribbean, the Taino may have numbered one or … They had long been on the defensive against the aggressive Carib people, who had conquered the Lesser Antilles to the east. They also had a complex social order, with a government of hereditary chiefs and subchiefs and classes of nobles, commoners, and slaves. Britannica Kids Holiday Bundle! The Indians that had been so kind where murdered , raped, beaten and starved to death. Besides seafood, the Tainos also ate small birds such as Parrots and water birds, iguanas, yellow snakes and Conies. Arawak Indians, who developed the Taino culture, had also settled there by 1000 ce. They also cultivated chili pepper, cassava, sweet potato, pumpkin, yampi, corn, arrowroot, coco, guava, star apple, pineapple and cashew. The Taínos were present throughout the Caribbean islands from approximately 1200 to 1500 A.D., and when Christopher Columbus arrived in the region, the Taínos were the indigenous group he encountered. They first arrived to Jamaica around A.D 650. The Tainos lived simple lives and were described as a quiet, peaceful group of people. At the time of European contact in the late 15th century, they were the principal inhabitants of most of Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola (the Dominican Republic and Haiti), and Puerto Rico. Within 40 years they were exterminated! By 1511, the Spanish crown insisted that the settlers enforce “encomienda” or the right to demand forced labor from Indian inhabitants. Because they did not have a written language, we cannot really know why the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean (like the Taino and the Caribs) migrated from the … There are competing theories as to what actually were the main push and pull factors that caused the Tainos to migrate from their original homelands in northern South America. Show: Questions Responses. They arrived in the Caribbean through the Venezuela-Trinidad gateway. Map of indigenous tribes in northern South America circa 1453 Taino men wore no clothes, but the women wore skimpy cotton aprons that covered them in front from the waist down to their knees, and both sexes appear to have enjoyed equal status in their society. The Taíno were an Arawak people who were the indigenous people of the Caribbean and Florida. What did the Tainos call Puerto Rico? 2. According to archaeologist Laura Del Olmo Frese, while the Taínos had their similarities, they also had their differences in art and governance. They had a limited knowledge of agriculture but grew such domesticated tropical crops as pineapples, cassava, and sweet potatoes and supplemented their diet with seafood. According to, Taíno reenactment show | © Christian Cordova / Flickr, Museum and Center for Humanistic Studies Dr. Josefina Camacho de la Nuez. Bammy or cassava bread was the staple of the Tainos. EUROPEANS. After a Taíno uprising in 1511, a second settlement, San Germán, was founded on the southwestern part of the island. Taíno Indians, a subgroup of the Arawakan Indians (a group of American Indians in northeastern South America), inhabited the Greater Antilles (comprising Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola [Haiti and the Dominican Republic], and Puerto Rico) in the Caribbean Sea at the time when Christopher Columbus' arrived to … Birds, lizards, and small animals were hunted for food, the only domesticated animals being dogs and, occasionally, parrots used to decoy wild birds within range of hunters. Initial Taino settlements were primarily along the coastal areas, allowing them to focus more on the sea rather than land. Houses were built of logs and poles with thatched roofs. The latter exhibits artifacts found specifically at Punta Candelero in Humacao, on Puerto Rico’s eastern coast. Religious life was under the scope of a shaman, and there was also a warrior class, above the general population. The Tainos settled mainly out the outskirts or the coastline of the Caribbean Islands, they also settled on hiltops or on highlands where they can spot intruders or their enemies such as the “Kalinagos” who often attacked their villages. There are perhaps no better places to explore how the Taínos lived in Puerto Rico than by visiting the Tibes Indigenous Ceremonial Center in Ponce and the Caguana Indigenous Ceremonial Park in Utuado. The Taino Settlement at Guayguata: Excavations in St. Mary Parish, Jamaica (BAR International Series) [Allsworth-Jones, Philip, Wesler, Kit W.] on Amazon.com. Christopher Columbus landed in Discovery Bay (formerly Dry Harbour) in 1494 and the place he returned to four years later, was established as Sevilla la Nueva (New Seville), the country’s first capital. Taino, Arawakan-speaking people who at the time of Christopher Columbus’s exploration inhabited what are now Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. After the conquistadors had arrived in the Caribbean, the Taíno people were heavily affected by the newcomers, and their numbers dwindled. They knew Jamaica as ‘Yamaye’, the land of springs. Both sexes painted themselves on special occasions, and they wore earrings, nose rings, and necklaces, which were sometimes made of gold. The clan-based Taino lived in small villages led by a cacique, or chief. Taino population at the time of Columbus’ arrival numbered about 100,000. The Tainos ultimately settled in the Greater Antilles and the Kalinagos settled on the smaller islands of the Lesser Antilles. Used the Orinoco river to travel via canoes to the GREATER ANTILLES (GA) -TAINO= good or noble settled in the GA because of wider settlement areas, hunting opportunities, greater scope for development (social, political, and religious), and higher organization. It was the Tainos who … Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree.... Recreation of a Taino village, Baconao Park, near Santiago de Cuba, Cuba. A favourite form of recreation was a ball game played on rectangular courts. The Taino also made pottery, baskets, and implements of stone and wood. 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