Taino
The Taíno were an indigenous people of the Caribbean.[2] At the time of European contact in the late fifteenth century, they were the principal inhabitants of most of what is now Cuba, Hispaniola, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, and the northern Lesser Antilles. The Taíno were the first New World peoples encountered by Christopher Columbus during his 1492 voyage. They spoke the Taíno language, a division of the Arawakan language group.[3] Many Puerto Ricans, Cubans and Dominicans have Taíno mtDNA, showing they are descendants through the direct female lines.[4][5]
Several peoples currently identify as Taíno or Taíno descendants. Most notably, some Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, and Cubans, both on the Caribbean islands themselves and on the United States mainland identify themselves with this group.[6] However, it is controversial whether Taíno culture has actually survived, or whether it gradually blended into a shared cultural identity which is descended from African, Spanish, and Taíno cultures but which can no longer be truly identified with the historic Taíno culture.[6] Some scholars, such as Jalil Sued Badillo, an ethnohistorian at the University of Puerto Rico, assert that although the official Spanish histories speak of the disappearance of the Taíno as an ethnic identification, many survivors left descendants – usually by intermarrying with other ethnic groups.[citation needed] Recent research reveals a high percentage of mixed ancestry in the populations of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.
The ancestors of the Taíno originated on the South American continent. The Taíno culture as documented developed on the Caribbean islands. Taíno groups came into conflict with the Island Caribs of the southern Lesser Antilles. At the time of European contact, the Taíno were divided into several groups. Western Taíno groups included the Lucayan of the Bahamas, the Ciboney of central Cuba, and the inhabitants of Jamaica. The Classic Taíno lived in Hispaniola and Puerto Rico, while the Eastern Taíno lived in the northern islands of the Lesser Antilles.[citation needed]
At the time of Columbus' arrival in 1492, there were five Taíno chiefdoms in Hispaniola, each led by a principal cacique (chief), to whom tribute was paid. The Taíno name for Hispaniola was Ayiti ("land of high mountains"), which was the source of the name Haiti, the independent republic established by slaves and free people of color on the island after becoming independent from France in a violent revolution. Cuba was divided into 29 chiefdoms. Their names were the origin of numerous modern cities, such as Havana, Batabanó, Camagüey, Jarabacoa, Baracoa, and Bayamo.[7] Taíno communities ranged from small settlements to larger centers of up to 3,000 people. They may have numbered in total 2 million at the time of contact,[3] and almost 3 million at the end of the 15th century.[8] The figures are debated, and a 2020 genetic analysis estimated the population of Hispaniola at the time to be no more than a few tens of thousands of people.[9][10]
Columbus was surprised by the civility of the Taíno people. He said, "They will give all that they do possess for anything that is given to them, exchanging things even for bits of broken crockery," he noted upon meeting them in the Bahamas in 1492. "They were very well built, with very handsome bodies and very good faces... They do not carry arms or know them... They should be good servants."[8]
The Spanish conquered various Taíno chiefdoms during the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century. According to some contemporary scholars such as Andrés Reséndez, warfare and harsh enslavement by the colonists decimated the population.[11][12] Men were forced to work on colonial plantations and gold mines[where?], as a result, there were no Taíno left to cultivate their own crops and feed their population.[8] Since the late 20th century, most scholars believe that infectious diseases that had long been endemic among the Europeans from the Old World caused the majority of deaths, as these were new to the Native Americans and they had no acquired immunity to them. They suffered very high mortality from the new diseases. For instance, a smallpox epidemic in Hispaniola in 1518–1519 killed almost 90% of the surviving Taíno.[13][14]
The remaining Taíno intermarried with Europeans and Africans, and became incorporated into the Spanish colonies. The Taíno were considered extinct as a people at the end of the century. But, since about 1840, activists have worked to create a quasi-indigenous Taíno identity in rural areas of Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico. In the 1960s this trend accelerated among Puerto Rican communities in the mainland United States, at a time of rising activism by African Americans and Native Americans of mainland tribes.[15]