Antilles

Archipelago bordering the north and east of the Caribbean Sea

For other uses, see Antilles (disambiguation).

The West Indies (red), which includes the Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago.

The Antilles[1] is an archipelago bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the south and west, the Gulf of Mexico to the northwest, and the Atlantic Ocean to the north and east.

The Antillean islands are divided into two smaller groupings: the Greater Antilles and the Lesser Antilles. The Greater Antilles includes the Cayman Islands and larger islands of Cuba, Hispaniola (subdivided into the nations of the Dominican Republic and Haiti) and Navassa Island, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico. The Lesser Antilles contains the northerly Leeward Islands and the southeasterly Windward Islands as well as the Leeward Antilles just north of Venezuela. The Lucayan Archipelago (consisting of The Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands), though a part of the West Indies, is generally not included among the Antillean islands.[2]

Geographically, the Antillean islands are generally considered a subregion of North America. Culturally speaking, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico – and sometimes the whole of the Antilles – are included in Latin America, although some sources use the phrase "Latin America and the Caribbean" instead (see Latin America, "In Contemporary Usage").[3]

In terms of geology, the Greater Antilles are mostly made up of continental rock accreted on the North American Plate from relative movement of the Caribbean Plate. The Lesser Antilles are mostly young volcanic islands created by the Lesser Antilles subduction zone.

## Background[edit]

Map of Antilles / Caribbean in 1843

The word Antilles originated in the period before the European colonization of the Americas, Antilia being one of those mysterious lands which figured on the medieval charts, sometimes as an archipelago, sometimes as continuous land of greater or lesser extent, its location fluctuating in mid-ocean between the Canary Islands and India.[4]

After the 1492 arrival of Christopher Columbus's expedition in what was later called the West Indies, the European powers realized that the dispersed lands constituted an extensive archipelago in the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. The Antilles were called multiple names before their current name became the norm. Early Spanish visitors called them the Windward Islands (today having a narrower definition). They were also called the Forward Islands by 18th-century British.[5] Thereafter, the term Antilles was commonly assigned to the formation, and "Sea of the Antilles" became a common alternative name for the Caribbean Sea in various European languages.[citation needed]

## Countries and territories[edit]

Main article: List of Caribbean islands

NASA image of the Antilles

### Lucayan Archipelago[edit]

Main article: Lucayan Archipelago

* The Bahamas
* Turks and Caicos Islands (United Kingdom)

### Greater Antilles[edit]

Main article: Greater Antilles

* Cayman Islands (United Kingdom)
* Cuba
* Isle of Youth
* Hispaniola
* Haiti
* Dominican Republic
* Jamaica
* Puerto Rico (United States)

### Lesser Antilles[edit]

Main article: Lesser Antilles

Los Roques, Venezuela, Lesser Antilles

#### Leeward Antilles[edit]

Main article: Leeward Antilles

* Aruba (Kingdom of the Netherlands)
* Bonaire (Netherlands)
* Curaçao (Kingdom of the Netherlands)
* Federal Dependencies of Venezuela
* Aves Island
* Los Monjes Archipelago
* La Tortuga Island
* La Sola Island
* Los Testigos Islands
* Los Frailes Islands
* Patos Island
* Los Roques Archipelago
* Blanquilla Island
* Los Hermanos Archipelago
* Orchila Island
* Las Aves Archipelago
* Nueva Esparta State (Venezuela)
* Margarita Island
* Coche
* Cubagua

#### Leeward Islands[edit]

Main article: Leeward Islands

* Anguilla (United Kingdom)
* Antigua and Barbuda
* Antigua
* Barbuda
* Redonda
* British Virgin Islands (United Kingdom)
* Guadeloupe (France)
* Fort Napoléon, Les Saintes, GuadeloupeLa Désirade
* Les Saintes
* Marie-Galante
* Montserrat (United Kingdom)
* Saba (Netherlands)
* Saint Barthélemy (France)
* Saint Martin
* Collectivity of Saint Martin (France)
* Sint Maarten (Kingdom of the Netherlands)
* Saint Kitts and Nevis
* Saint Kitts
* Nevis
* Sint Eustatius (Netherlands)
* Spanish Virgin Islands (Puerto Rico)
* United States Virgin Islands (United States)
* Saint Croix
* Saint Thomas
* Saint John

#### Windward Islands[edit]

Main article: Windward Islands

* Dominica
* Grenada
* Martinique (France)
* Saint Lucia
* Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

### Other islands[edit]

* Barbados
* Trinidad and Tobago
* Tobago
* Trinidad

## See also[edit]

* Antillia

## References[edit]

1. ^ (/ænˈtɪliːz/; Antillean Creole: Antiy; Spanish: Antillas; French: Antilles; Dutch: Antillen; Haitian Creole: Antiy; Papiamento: Antiyas; Jamaican Patois: Antiliiz)
2. ^ Some sources, such as Encarta in Spanish, include the Bahamas in the Antilles. [1] Archived 2009-10-04 at the Wayback Machine (in Spanish). Archived 2009-10-31.
3. ^ "85.04.04: The Geophysics and Cultural Aspects of the Greater Antilles". teachersinstitute.yale.edu. Archived from the original on 2018-03-23. Retrieved 2017-11-21.
4. ^ One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Antilles". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 2 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 126.
5. ^ Kitchin, Thomas (1778). The Present State of the West-Indies: Containing an Accurate Description of What Parts Are Possessed by the Several Powers in Europe. London: R. Baldwin. p. 5\. Archived from the original on 2015-02-21. Retrieved 2013-08-30.

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Caribbean

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West
Indies|

| Antilles|

| Greater
Antilles|

* Cayman Islands
* Cuba
* Jamaica
* Navassa Island
* Puerto Rico

| Hispaniola|

* Dominican Republic
* Haiti

|

Lesser
Antilles|

| Leeward
Islands|

* Anguilla
* Antigua and Barbuda
* Guadeloupe
* La Désirade
* Les Saintes
* Marie-Galante
* Montserrat
* Saba^*
* Saint Barthélemy
* Saint Kitts and Nevis
* Sint Eustatius^*

| Saint Martin^|

* Collectivity of Saint Martin
* Sint Maarten

|

Virgin Islands|

* British Virgin Islands
* U.S. Virgin Islands

Southern
Caribbean|

| Leeward
Antilles|

* Insular Venezuela
* Federal Dependencies
* Nueva Esparta

| ABC islands|

* Aruba
* Bonaire*
* Curaçao

|

Windward
Islands|

* Dominica
* Grenada
* Carriacou and Petite Martinique
* Martinique
* Saint Lucia
* Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

* Barbados†
* Trinidad and Tobago†

Lucayan
Archipelago|

* Bahamas
* Turks and Caicos Islands

Caribbean
Sea|

* Aves Island
* San Andrés and Providencia
* Bajo Nuevo Bank~
* Serranilla Bank~

Caribbean
continental
zone|

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| Central America|

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|

South America|

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|

The Guianas|

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* Tigri Areaǂ
* Suriname

N.B.: Territories in italics are parts of transregional sovereign states or non-sovereign dependencies.

^These three form the SSS islands that with the ABC islands comprise the Dutch Caribbean, of which *the BES islands are not direct Kingdom constituents but subsumed with the country of the Netherlands.

†Physiographically, these continental islands are not part of the volcanic Windward Islands arc, although sometimes grouped with them culturally and politically.

ǂDisputed territories administered by Guyana. ~Disputed territories administered by Colombia.

#Bermuda is an isolated North Atlantic oceanic island, physiographically not part of the Lucayan Archipelago, Antilles, Caribbean Sea nor North American continental nor South American continental islands. It is grouped with the Northern American region, but occasionally also with the Caribbean region culturally.

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