Taino / Arawak
Origins / Location : Northern South America, Amazon Basin or the Orinoco Valley in Venezuela.
Names : Borinquen (for the Taíno of Puerto Rico) and Lucayo (for the Taíno of the Bahamas).
Languages : Arowak, Aruák / Lokono (Lokono Dian, literally "people's talk" by its speakers),
Religion : A polytheistic system focused on the worship of spiritual beings called zemis,
Arawak people gathered for an audience with the Dutch Governor in Paramaribo, Suriname, 1880 Collectie Wereldmuseum (v/h Tropenmuseum), part of the National Museum of World Cultures.
Arawak Indians, British Guiana (now Guyana), in South America. From On Land and Sea – on Green and River a book by Henry W Case.
Modern-day Arawak children enrolled in a turtle conservation program. (Photo by P.H.C. Pritchard)
"An Indigenous woman (likely Luisa Gainsa) and child near Baracoa, Cuba, 1919. The story of eastern Cuba's Indigenous communities is increasingly coming to light as researchers uncover historical records and archeological data to document the survival and adaptations of the island's Indigenous peoples." (Photo by Mark Raymond Harrington)
"This 1892 portrait is of a man who identified himself as a descendent of Jamaica's indigenous peoples. It was taken near Pedro Bluffs, an area of the island where researchers from the Smithsonian's Caribbean Indigenous Legacies Project (the precursor to the exhibition) spoke to contemporary Jamaican families, who identified themselves as descendants of the island's Arawak-speaking peoples." (Photo, National Anthropological Archives, SI)
Two Arawakan men dancing.
"Taínos travelling in a canoe. From Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés, La historica general de las Indias, Seville, Cromberger, 1535."
Taino Mother & Daughter Outside of their Bohio 1900s
Identified by the archaeological remains of the Bohio.
Cheverez Family Elder Making Taino Pottery-1980s
Arnaldo Rivera (Joseph's Father) on the far left at a Taino gathering in El Yunque Puerto Rico 1950's
Joseph Amahura RiverWind Teaching Taino Survival in the 1990's
Gathering The People with the Guamo