The Antilles are an archipelago bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the south and
west, the Gulf of Mexico to the northwest, and the Atlantic Ocean to the
north and east. The Antillean islands are divided into two smaller groupings:
the Greater Antilles, which includes the larger islands of Cuba, Jamaica, Puerto
Rico, Hispaniola and the Cayman Islands; and the Lesser Antilles, which contains
the northerly Leeward Islands, the southeasterly Windward Islands, and the
Leeward Antilles just north of Venezuela. The Lucayan Archipelago,
though part of the West Indies, are generally not included among the
Antillean islands. Geographically, the Antillean islands
are generally considered a subregion of North America. Culturally speaking,
Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico – and sometimes the whole of the
Antilles – are included in Latin America, although some sources avoid
this socio-economic oversimplification by using the phrase "Latin America and
the Caribbean" instead. In terms of geology, the Greater Antilles are made
up of continental rock, as distinct from the Lesser Antilles, which are mostly
young volcanic or coral islands. Background
The word Antilles originated in the period before the European conquest of
the New World, Antilia being one of those mysterious lands which figured on
the medieval charts, sometimes as an archipelago, sometimes as continuous
land of greater or lesser extent, its location fluctuating in mid-ocean
between the Canary Islands and India. After the 1492 arrival of Christopher
Columbus's expedition in what was later called the West Indies, the European
powers realized that the dispersed lands constituted an extensive archipelago
inhabiting the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. The Antilles were called
multiple names before their current name became the norm. Early Spanish visitors
called them the Windward Islands. They were also called the Forward Islands by
18th century British. Thereafter, the term Antilles was commonly assigned to
the formation, and "Sea of the Antilles" became a common alternative name for the
Caribbean Sea in various European languages.
Demographics The Antilles were described in 1778 by
Thomas Kitchin as once being called the Caribbee Isles in homage to the Carib
people who were the islands' first inhabitants.
Nations and territories = Lucayan Archipelago =
Bahamas Turks and Caicos Islands
= Greater Antilles = Cuba
Hispaniola Haiti
Dominican Republic Jamaica
Puerto Rico Cayman Islands
= Lesser Antilles = Anguilla
Antigua and Barbuda Antigua
Barbuda Redonda
Aruba Barbados
Bonaire British Virgin Islands
Curaçao Dominica
Grenada Guadeloupe
La Désirade Marie-Galante
Les Saintes Martinique
Montserrat Saba
Saint Barthélemy Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Kitts Nevis
Saint Lucia Saint Martin
Saint Martin Sint Maarten
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Sint Eustatius
Trinidad and Tobago Tobago
Trinidad U.S. Virgin Islands
Saint Croix Saint Thomas
Saint John Federal Dependencies of Venezuela
Los Roques Archipelago La Orchila
La Tortuga La Blanquilla
Margarita Island Coche
Cubagua Other islands
See also Antillia
Footnotes References
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain:
Chisholm, Hugh, ed.. "Antilles". Encyclopædia Britannica. Cambridge
University Press.