Editing Lucayan people (section)

== History ==

=== Connections ===
The Lucayans were part of a larger Taíno population in the [[Greater Antilles]]. The Lucayans, along with the Taínos in [[Jamaica]], most of Cuba and parts of western Hispaniola have been classified as part of a Sub-Taíno, Western Taíno or Ciboney Taíno cultural and language group. Keegan describes any distinctions between Lucayans and Classical Taínos of Hispaniola and eastern Cuba as largely arbitrary. The Lucayans lived in smaller political units, simple [[chiefdom]]s, compared to the more elaborate political structures in Hispaniola, and their language and culture showed differences, but they remained Taínos, although a "hinterland" of the wider Taíno world. The Lucayans were connected to a Caribbean-wide trade network. Columbus observed trade carried between Long Island and Cuba by dugout canoe. A piece of [[jadeite]] found on San Salvador Island appears to have originated in [[Guatemala]], based on a [[trace element]] analysis.{{Sfnm|1a1=Granberry|1a2=Vescelius|1y=2004|1pp=14, 38, 43|2a1=Keegan|2y=1992|2pp=104, 162, 203}}

=== Appearance ===
Columbus thought the Lucayans resembled the [[Guanches|Guanche]] of the [[Canary Islands]], in part because they were intermediate in skin color between Europeans and Africans. He described the Lucayans as handsome, graceful, well-proportioned, gentle, generous and peaceful, and customarily going almost completely naked.{{Citation needed|date=June 2023}}<!-- This is supported by one of the three sources cited at the bottom of the paragraph. I don't have any of them at hand right now (I don't know how long it will take me to get back my copies of Albury and Craton), but I remember writing this paragraph, and everything I included came from one of those three books. User:Donald Albury --> [[Peter Martyr d'Anghiera]] said that the Lucayan women were so beautiful that men from "other countries" moved to the islands to be near them. Women past puberty wore a small skirt of cotton, and the men might wear a loincloth made of plaited leaves or cotton.{{Sfnm|Albury|1975|1pp=14–16|Craton|1986|2pp=17, 18, 20–21|Sauer|1966|3pp=31–32}}

Some people wore head bands, waist bands, feathers, bones and ear and nose jewelry on occasion. They were often tattooed and usually applied paint to their bodies and/or faces. They also practiced [[head flattening]]. Their hair was black and straight, and they kept it cut short except for a few hairs in back which were never cut. Columbus reported seeing scars on the bodies of some of the men, which were explained to him as resulting from attempts by people from other islands to capture them.{{Sfnm|Albury|1975|1pp=14–16|Craton|1986|2pp=17, 18, 20–21|Sauer|1966|3pp=31–32}}

=== 1492 Lucayan–Spanish encounter ===
In 1492 [[Christopher Columbus]] sailed from Spain with three ships, seeking a direct route to Asia. On October 12, 1492 Columbus reached an island in the Bahamas, an event long regarded as the 'discovery' of America. This first island to be visited by Columbus was called [[Guanahani]] by the Lucayans, and San Salvador by the Spanish. The identity of the first American landfall by Columbus remains contested, but many authors accept [[Samuel E. Morison]]'s identification of what was later called Watling (or Watling's) Island as Columbus' San Salvador. The former Watling Island was officially renamed [[San Salvador Island|San Salvador]] in 1925. [[Luis Marden]]'s identification of Samaná Key as Guanahani is the strongest contender with the former Watling Island theory. Columbus visited several other islands in the Bahamas hunting for gold before sailing on to Cuba.{{Sfnm|Albury|1975|1pp=21–33|Craton|1986|2pp=28–37|Keegan|1992|3pp=175–187|Sauer|1966|4pp=24–25}}

Columbus spent a few days visiting other islands in the vicinity: Santa María de la Concepción, Fernandina, and Saomete. Lucayans on San Salvador had told Columbus that he could find a "king" who had a lot of gold at the village of ''Samaot'', also spelled ''Samoet'', ''Saomete'' or ''Saometo''. Taíno chiefs and villages often shared a name. Keegan suggests that the confusion of spellings was due to grammatically differing forms of the name for the chief and for the village or island, or was simply due to Columbus's difficulty with the Lucayan language.{{Sfn|Keegan|1992|pp=187–201}}

Columbus spent three days sailing back and forth along the shore of an island seeking Samaot. At one point he sought to reach Samaot by sailing eastward, but the water was too shallow, and he felt that sailing around the island was "a very long way". Keegan interprets this description to fit the Acklins/Crooked Islands group, with a ship in the west side being able to see the western shore of Acklins Island across the very shallow waters of the Bight of Acklins, where there was a village that stretched about {{convert|6|km|mi}} along the shore.{{Sfn|Keegan|1992|pp=187–201}}

[[Amerigo Vespucci]] spent almost four months in the Bahamas in 1499 to 1500. His log of that time is vague, perhaps because he was trespassing on Columbus's discoveries, which at the time remained under Columbus. There may have been other unrecorded Spanish landfalls in the Bahamas, shipwrecks and slaving expeditions. Maps published between 1500 and 1508 appear to show details of the Bahamas, Cuba and the North American mainland that were not officially reported until later. European [[Artifact (archaeology)|artifacts]] of the period have been found on San Salvador, the Caicos Islands, Long Island, Little Exuma, Acklins Island, [[Conception Island, Bahamas|Conception Island]] and Samaná Cay. Such finds, however, do not prove that Spaniards visited those islands, as trade among Lucayans could have distributed the artifacts.{{Sfn|Keegan|1992|pp=202–203, 207, 212–213}}

=== Slavery and genocide ===
Columbus kidnapped several Lucayans on San Salvador and Santa María de la Concepción. Two fled, but Columbus took some Lucayans back to Spain at the end of his first voyage. Vespucci took 232 Lucayans to Spain as slaves in 1500. Spanish exploitation of the labor of the natives of Hispaniola rapidly reduced that population, leading the Governor of Hispaniola to complain to the Spanish crown. After Columbus's death, [[Ferdinand II of Aragon]] ordered in 1509 that Indians be imported from nearby islands to make up the population losses in Hispaniola, and the Spanish began capturing Lucayans in the Bahamas for use as laborers in Hispaniola.{{Sfn|Sauer|1966|p=160}}

At first the Lucayans sold for no more than four [[Doubloon|gold pesos]] in Hispaniola, but when it was realized that the Lucayans were practiced at diving for [[conch]]s, the price rose to 100 to 150 gold pesos and the Lucayans were sent to the Isle of [[Cubagua]] as [[Pearl diving|pearl divers]]. Within two years the southern Bahamas were largely depopulated. The Spanish may have carried away as many as 40,000 Lucayans by 1513.{{Sfn|Sauer|1966|p=160}}

[[Carl O. Sauer]] described [[Juan Ponce de León#First voyage to Florida|Ponce de León's 1513 expedition]] in which he encountered Florida as simply "an extension of slave hunting beyond the empty islands."{{Sfn|Sauer|1966|p=160}} When the Spanish decided to traffic the remaining Lucayans to Hispaniola in 1520, they could find only eleven in all of the Bahamas. Thereafter the Bahamas remained uninhabited for 130 years.{{Sfnm|Albury|1975|1pp=34–37|Craton|1986|2p=37–39|Keegan|1992|3pp=212–213, 220–223|Sauer|1966|4pp=159–160, 191}}