Arawak Peoples

Arawak Peoples

The Arawak people (from aru, the Lucayan word for cassava flour) are some of the indigenous peoples of the West Indies. The group belongs to the Arawakan language family. They were the natives whom Christopher Columbus encountered when he first arrived in the Americas in 1492. The Spanish described them as a peaceful primitive people.

The Arawak people include the Taíno, who occupied the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas (Lucayans); the Nepoya and Suppoya of Trinidad; the Lokono of Guyana; the Igneri, who were supposed to have preceded the Caribs in the Lesser Antilles; together with related groups (including the Lucayans) which lived along the eastern coast of South America, as far south as what is now Brazil.