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- The first inhabitants of Jamaica probably came from islands to the east in two waves of migration. About 600 ce the culture known as the “Redware people” arrived; little is known of them, however, beyond the red pottery they left. They were followed about 800 by the Arawakan -speaking Taino, who eventually settled throughout the island.
www.britannica.com/place/Jamaica/History
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Jamaica became a haven of privateers, buccaneers, and occasionally outright pirates: Christopher Myngs, Edward Mansvelt, and most famously, Henry Morgan. England gained formal possession of Jamaica from Spain in 1670 through the Treaty of Madrid.
The original inhabitants of Jamaica are believed to be the Arawaks, also called Tainos. They came from South America 2,500 years ago and named the island Xaymaca, which meant “land of wood and water”. The Arawaks were a mild and simple people by nature.
The History of Jamaica. The Spanish were the first to bring sugarcane and slavery to the island. They ruled the land for a century and a half until they were defeated by the English in 1655. Slavery and sugar cultivation became Jamaica’s main trade, making the English planters incredibly wealthy.
- The Tainos
- The Spanish
- The English
- The Africans
- The Maroons
- Abolishment of Slavery
- Our National Heroes
- The People That Came
- Emancipation & Independence
Jamaica's first people were the Taínos, who came to the island from the northern coast of South America and settled in Jamaica around 600 AD. They spoke a dialect of Arawakan and named the island, "Xaymaca", meaning “land of wood and water”. This gentle tribe eventually succumbed to disease and harsh living conditions imposed by the Spanish soon af...
Having heard Cubans describe Xaymaca as “the land of blessed gold”, the Spanish sailed to the island in search of riches but soon discovered there was none. The beauty of the island, however, captivated Spanish explorer, Christopher Columbus, who noted in his logs, “the fairest island that eyes have beheld: mountains and the land seems to touch the...
During the early days of English colonization in Jamaica, lawless buccaneers plundered ships along the Spanish Main and transported their wealth from their ill-gotten gains to Port Royal, originally a Taíno fishing camp. Under their rule, the town grew rapidly, in little over a decade, to become known as one of the “richest and wickedest cities in ...
Under the English, sugarcane became the main crop for the island and the industry rapidly grew, with over 400 sugar estates established by 1739. To fill the need for cheap labour, colonialists entered into the slave trade to ship West Africans to the West Indies to be sold to planters who forced them to work on these sugar plantations as slaves und...
When the English arrived, the Spaniards fled to the neighboring islands and their freed slaves escaped into the mountains and formed their own independent groups, called the Maroons. The Maroonswere in time joined by other slaves who escaped from the English. For a long time, they fought against the English who sought to re-enslave them. So success...
Slavery was abolished in 1834. In the economic chaos that followed emancipation, one event stood out: the Morant Bay Rebellion of 1865. The uprising was led by a black Baptist deacon named Paul Bogle and was supported by a wealthy Kingston businessman, George William Gordon. Both were executed and are now among Jamaica’s national heroes.
Jamaica's freedom fighters, black nationalists and civil rights activists, who fought for our freedom and civil liberties, helped to pave the way for our national development. They are celebrated on National Heroes Day, every third Monday in October. Monuments to all Jamaican heroes can be viewed in the National Heroes Park in Kingstonwhere the Jam...
In the years that followed, much of modern Jamaica was forged. Migrants from India and China came as indentured workers for sugar estates and rapidly moved to become merchants and shopkeepers. Soon Jewish settlers came to Jamaica, followed by migrant traders from the Middle East. All together these groups created the diverse people of Jamaica today...
After almost 250 years of rebellion and resistance, emancipation from slavery was finally won on August 1, 1838. Today, Jamaicans continue to celebrate Emancipation Day every August 1st. After more than 300 years of British colonial rule, Jamaica became a sovereign nation on August 6, 1962 which saw the unfurling of the national flag of Jamaica in ...
How well do you know the history of the Jamaican people? With independence in 1962, came Jamaica’s national motto – “out of many one people” which reflects our rich heritage drawn from the Tainos, Spanish, Portuguese, Africans, British, Indians, and Chinese.
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Mar 5, 1999 · By the 19th century, it was the English Crown’s most profitable Caribbean colony, with a population of about 300,000 African slaves to 20,000 whites. The island also had a population of mulattos–born to white men and slave women–and Maroons, the descendants of freed slaves.
Jamaica, the Caribbean’s third-largest island, was visited by Christopher Columbus in 1494 on his second voyage to the New World. When the Spanish arrived later, they were welcomed by the Arawaks, inventors of the hammock. In return, the Indians were executed or taken as slaves.
