![]() One of the oldest written references to the island is in the archives of the main public city registry of Caracas, Venezuela. Throughout the 16th century, they ruled Curaçao as an insular part of the province of Venezuela, governing it from the mainland before gradually abandoning it as colonization of the continent progressed. The Spanish settled on the island in 1527. Starting in 1499, Curaçao served as a bridge for the Spanish exploration and conquest of territories in northern South America. In 1515, almost all of the 2,000 Caquetios living there were also transported to Hispaniola as slaves. ![]() The Spaniards enslaved most of the Caquetios(Arawak) for forced labour in their Hispaniola colony, but paid little attention to the island itself. The first Europeans recorded as seeing the island were members of a Spanish expedition under the leadership of Alonso de Ojeda in 1499. Their ancestors had migrated to the island from the mainland of South America, probably hundreds of years before Europeans first arrived. The original inhabitants of Curaçao were the Arawak and Caquetio Amerindians. From then on, the Portuguese allegedly referred to the island as Ilha da Curação (Island of Healing) or the Spanish as Isla de la Curación. When their ship returned, some had recovered, probably after eating vitamin C-rich fruit there. Ī persistent but undocumented story claims the following: in the 16th and 17th centuries-the early years of European exploration-when sailors on long voyages got scurvy from lack of vitamin C, sick Portuguese or Spanish sailors were left on the island now known as Curaçao. On a map created by Hieronymus Cock in 1562 in Antwerp, the island was called Qúracao. By the 17th century, it appeared on most maps as Curaçao or Curazao. įrom 1525, the island was featured on Spanish maps as Curaçote, Curasaote, Curasaore, and even Curacaute. Early Spanish accounts support this theory, referring to the indigenous peoples as Indios Curaçaos. One explanation for the island's name is that Curaçao was the autonym by which its indigenous peoples identified themselves. Curaçao has a population of 158,665 (January 2019 est.), with an area of 444 km 2 (171 sq mi) its capital is Willemstad. It includes the main island of Curaçao and the much smaller, uninhabited island of Klein Curaçao ("Little Curaçao"). Ĭuraçao was formerly part of the Curaçao and Dependencies colony from 1815 to 1954 and later the Netherlands Antilles from 1954 to 2010, as Island Territory of Curaçao (Dutch: Eilandgebied Curaçao, Papiamento: Teritorio Insular di Kòrsou), and is now formally called the Country of Curaçao. It is the largest of the ABC islands in both area and population as well as the largest of the Dutch Caribbean. Collectively, Curaçao, Aruba, and other Dutch islands in the Caribbean are often called the Dutch Caribbean. Together with Aruba and Bonaire, it forms the ABC islands. It is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Curaçao ( / ˈ k( j) ʊər ə ˌ s oʊ, - ˌ s aʊ, ˌ k( j) ʊər ə ˈ s oʊ, - ˈ s aʊ/ KURE-ə-soh, -sow, - SOH, - SOW Dutch: ( listen) Papiamento: Kòrsou, ), officially the Country of Curaçao ( Dutch: Land Curaçao Papiamento: Pais Kòrsou), is a Lesser Antilles island country in the southern Caribbean Sea and the Dutch Caribbean region, about 65 km (40 mi) north of the Venezuela coast.
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