Tainos

Who are the Taino? The Taino (pronounced Tah-EE-no) were the first "American" Indigenous Peoples encountered by Christopher Columbus and other Europeans in the Caribbean Islands in 1492. The Taino are also the first Indigenous Peoples to be referred to as "Indians" (Indios) in the Western Hemisphere. The traditional territories of the Taino extended throughout the Greater Antilles, the Bahamas, and even the Southern tip of Florida. The word "Taino" means "good people" in their ancient language. A major part of their ancestral lineage comes from South America. These ancestors traveled up the islands of the Lesser Antilles and settled eventually in the islands of the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas. Another part of the ancestral Taino lineage comes from Central America and or Mexico. Taino culture was not entirely homogeneous but some of the most elaborate expressions of the culture was found in the Dominican Republic/Haiti and in Puerto Rico. While Taino people could generally communicate in a common language across the islands, there were some dialect differences. Descendants of these peoples still live throughout the Caribbean and beyond. What was the environment like? The Caribbean island homelands of the Taino were formed by volcanoes and the movement of tectonic plates. Numerous mountains resulted in rivers which the Taino depended on to sustain life. Caves were also common land structures. The majority of these islands were covered by tropical rain forests. The islands were devoid of large mammals but iguana and other small animals were transported to the islands by floating bogs from the mainlands or by human intervention. Many varieties of birds, reptiles, small mammals, and insects are found on the islands, some unique to certain islands. The Koki, a small tree frog, is very common in Boriken (Puerto Rico) for example and has a very distinctive chirp. How did the Taino live? Taino communities varied greatly in size. It was estimated