Meals Among the Taino

Did You Know - During first contact with Europeans, many Taino communities generally observed four meals a day including breakfast, an afternoon meal, an evening meal, and a night meal. Spanish chronicler, Bartolome De Las Casas noted that between the evening and night meal, some Taino took an emetic, and went to a nearby river to purge themselves. Following this they would devote their attention to the nightly meal as well as to dancing and refreshments. Christopher Columbus remarked on how Kasike (Chief) Guakanagariand his people washed their hands with certain herbs after they shared a meal together. - UCTP Taino News © 2012   

*Illustration by Modesto Garcia.

BOHIO is Taino

Did You Know: The word "Bohio" is the Taino language term for "home." Among rural communities in the Greater Antilles especially, the word bohio is still used today interchangeably with the word "casa" in Caribbean Spanish. When Columbus landed in the Dominican Republic in 1492 some of the Taino he met simply referred to their island paradise as “bohio” meaning their home. A typical community dwelling which varied in size, a bohio was made from local hardwood trees and usually retained a conical roof that was thatched with the Royal Palm. Early explorers were quite amazed that these seemingly simple round house structures could even withstand the intense tropical storms the Taino called "hurakan". - UCTP Taino News © 2010

Guaisa

DID YOU KNOW - In his diary written from a vessel moored off the coast of Hispanola, Columbus described the Taino Kasike (chieftains) wearing intricately carved, small sized mask or amulets around their necks. The Taino call these little mask pendants "Guaisa" and often they were inlaid with gold. Some contempoary Taino translate "guaisa" to mean "our face or "our seed". Guaisa could be fashioned out of clay, wood, bone, shell or even stone. - UCTP Taino News © 2008

Kanoa is Taino

Did You Know - The first Europeans to travel to the islands of the Caribbean were greatly impressed by the kanoa (canoe) or boats constructed and used daily by the Taino islanders.Christopher Columbus wrote, "On every island there are many canoes of a single piece of wood; and though narrow, yet in length and shape similar to our rowboats, but swifter in movement. They steer only by oars. Some of these boats are large, some small, some of medium size. Yet they row many of the larger row-boats with eighteen cross-benches, with which they cross to all those islands, which are innumerable, and with these feats they perform their trading, and carry on commerce among them. I saw some of these canoes which were carrying seventy and eighty rowers." The kanoa were made from very large trees that were hollowed out over some months. Reminiscent of similar craft in Polynesia, the largest recorded 16th century Taino kanoa were said to hold over 150 people, they were ornately carved, and were used to travel long distances between the Caribbean islands and even into Bahamas, Florida, mainland of South America, Mexico, and Central America. Kanoa - a Taino and Lokono Arawak language term - is still used in Latin American Spanish, and is the origin of the English word canoe. - UCTP Taino News © 2007