Kalinago

Island Carib

Kalhíphona
Carib family (by John Gabriel Stedman 1818)
Total population
(3,000 )
Regions with significant populations
Dominica, formerly throughout the Lesser Antilles
Languages
English, Dominican Creole French, formerly Island Carib language
Related ethnic groups
Garifuna, Black Carib, Taíno

The Island Caribs, also known as the Kalinago or simply Caribs, are an indigenous people of the Lesser Antilles in the Caribbean. They may have descended from the Mainland Caribs (Kalina) of South America, but they spoke an unrelated language known as Island Carib.

At the time of Spanish contact, the Caribs were one of the dominant groups in the Caribbean, which owes its name to them. They lived throughout the Windward Islands, Dominica, and possibly the southern Leeward Islands. Historically it was thought their ancestors were mainland Caribs who conquered the islands from their previous inhabitants, known as the Igneri. However, linguistic and archaeological evidence disputes the notion of a mass emigration and conquest; the Island Carib language appears not to have been Cariban, but Arawakan like that of their neighbors, the Taíno. Irving Rouse and others suggest that a smaller group of mainland Caribs conquered the islands without displacing their inhabitants, eventually adopting the local language but retaining their traditions of a South American origin.

In the early colonial period, the Caribs had a reputation as warriors who raided neighboring islands. Early Europeans claimed that they practiced cannibalism – the word "cannibal" derives from a corruption of their name. Today, the Caribs and their descendants continue to live in the Antilles. The Garifuna or "Black Caribs," a group of mixed Carib and African ancestry, also live principally in Central America.

The Caribs are believed to have migrated from the Orinoco River area in South America to settle in the Caribbean islands about 1200 AD, according to carbon dating. Over the two centuries leading up to Christopher Columbus' arrival in the Caribbean archipelago in 1492, the Caribs mostly displaced the Maipurean-speaking Taínos by warfare, extermination, and assimilation. The Taíno had settled the island chains earlier in history, migrating from the mainland.