Geography
Aruba is the smallest of the Netherlands
Windward Islands (180 km2). Its capital is Oranjestad.
Map of Aruba, click for a large version.
History
Around 1000
members of the Caiquetio tribe of the Arawak Indians sailed
from Venezuela and inhabited the island. In 1499 Alonso de Ojeda
claimed
the island for Spain, but in the first half of 1636 the WIC
occupied it.
Initially Aruba was not particularly important to
the Company.
The governor had only a very small number of soldiers at
his disposal (4-20); the rest of the population consisted of Spanish-speaking
Indians who kept goats and sheep. The Company’s main
interest on the island was horse-breeding.
From 1804-1806 Aruba
was alternately
in Dutch, English and Venezuelan hands; in 1806 it fell under
English rule. In 1816 the English gave the island back to
the Netherlands,
and from that time onwards it was a Dutch colony. In the
19th century gold and phosphate were found on Aruba in 1824 and
1879 respectively
and mined until World War I.
On 15 December 1954 it was laid
down in the Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands that from
then on the Netherlands,
the Netherlands
Antilles and Surinam would jointly constitute the Kingdom
of the Netherlands, as equal administrative units. Surinam became
independent
in 1975. In 1986 Aruba was granted a 'status aparte',
i.e. the island seceded from the Netherlands Antilles and
became an autonomous country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Information about the other islands
|
E-mail
