1 
80 
EXTENT OF THE CARIB TRIBE. 
inhabitants of the Caribbee Islands ; others have traced in it 
some resemblance to the ancient idiom of Cuba, or to those 
of the Arowaks, and the Apalachites in Florida : but these 
hypotheses are all founded on a very imperfect knowledge of 
the idioms which it has been attempted to compare one with, 
another. 
Tlie Spanish writers of the sixteenth century inform ua 
that the Carib nations then extended over eighteen or nine- 
teen degrees of latitude, from the Virgin Islands east of 
Porto Rico, to the mouths of the Amazon. Another pro- 
longation toward the west, along the coast-chain of Santa 
Marta and Venezuela, appears less certain. G-omara, how- 
ever, and the most ancient historians, give the name of 
Caribana, not, as it has since been applied, to the country 
between tlie sources of the Orinoco and the mountains of 
French Guiana,* but to the marshy plains between the 
mouths of the Eio Atrato and the Rio Sinn. I have visited 
those coasts in going from the Havannah to Porto Bello ; 
and I there learned, that the cape which bounds the gulf of 
Darien or Uraba on the cast, still bears the name of Punta 
Caribana. An opinion heretofore prevailed pretty generally, 
that the Caribs of the West India Islands derived their 
origin, and even their name, from these warlike people of 
Darien. “From the eastern shore springs Cape Uraba, 
which the natives call Caribana, whence the Caribs of the 
island are said to have received tl ' isent name.”t Thus 
Anghiera expresses himself 
“ Oceanica.” He 
had been told by a nephew of Amerigo Vespucci, that 
thence, as far as the snowy mountains of St. Marta, all the 
natives were “egonere Caribium, vel Canibalium.” Ido 
not deny that Caribs may have had a settlement near the 
gulf of Darien, and that they may have been driven thither 
* This name is found in the map of Hondius, of 1599, which accom- 
panies the Latin edition of the narrative of Raleigh’s voyage. In the 
Dutch edition (Nimwe Caerle van het go%ulrycke landt Gniana), the 
Llanos of Caracas, between the mountains of Merida and the Rio Pao, 
bear the name of Caribana. We may remark here, what we observe so 
often in the history of geography, that the same denomination has spread 
by degrees from west to east. 
+ “ Inde Vrabam ab oricntali prehendit ora, quam appellant indigense 
Caribana, unde Caribes insulares originem habere nomenque retinen 
dicuntur.” 
