By Dr. Octavio Dilewis Ibarra-Tamayo
Cuba is located in the northern Caribbean at the confluence of the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean.
Cuba is south of the eastern United States and The Bahamas, west of the Turks and Caicos Islands and Haiti and east of Mexico. The Cayman Islands and Jamaica are to the south.
The national flower is the "flor de mariposa" Butterfly Flower) and the national bird is the Tocororo or Cuban Trogon.
Cuba is the most populous insular nation in the Caribbean. Its people, culture and customs draw from several sources including (very little) the aboriginal Taíno and Ciboney peoples, the period of Spanish colonialism, the introduction of African slaves, and its proximity to the United States.
The name "Cuba" comes from the Taíno language the exact meaning of which is unclear, but may be translated either "where fertile land is abundant" (cubao) or "great place" (coabana).
The island has a tropical climate that is moderated by the surrounding waters; however, the warm temperatures of the Caribbean Sea and the fact that the island of Cuba sits across the access to the Gulf of Mexico combine to make Cuba prone to frequent hurricanes.
Cuba's main island, at 766 miles (1,233 km) long, is the world's 17th largest.
The recorded history of Cuba began on October 12, 1492, when Christopher Columbus sighted the island during his first voyage of discovery and claimed it for Spain.
Columbus named the island Isla Juana in reference to Prince Juan, the heir apparent.
The island had been inhabited by Native American peoples known as the Taíno and Siboney whose ancestors had come from South America and possibly North and Central America in a complex series of migrations at least several centuries before, and perhaps 6,000 to 8,000 years ago.
The Taíno were farmers and the Siboney (far more commonly written Siboney in neo-Taino nations) were both farmers and hunter-gatherers; some have suggested that copper trade was significant and mainland artifacts have been found.
The coast of Cuba was fully mapped by Sebastián de Ocampo in 1511, and in that year the first Spanish settlement was founded by Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar at Baracoa.
Other towns including the future capital of the island San Cristobal de la Habana (founded in 1515) soon followed.
Within a century the approximately 100,000 indigenous people had all but disappeared as a distinct nation as a result of the combined effects of European-introduced disease, forced labor and other mistreatment, though aspects of the region's aboriginal heritage have survived.
Most scholars now believe that, among the various contributing factors, infectious disease was the overwhelming cause of the population decline of the indigenous people.
Main source: Wikipedia.
