Taíno genocide
| Taíno genocide | |
|---|---|
A 16th-century illustration by Flemish Protestant Theodor de Bry for Bartolomé de las Casas' Brevísima relación de la destrucción de las Indias, depicting Spanish torture and murder of Indigenous peoples during the conquest of Hispaniola. | |
| Location | West Indies |
| Date | 1493–1550 |
| Target | Taíno |
Attack type | Genocide, mass murder, forced displacement, ethnic cleansing, slavery, starvation, collective punishment, torture, genocidal rape, forced conversion, cultural genocide |
| Deaths | 8,000 to 900,000 Between 80% and 90% of the Taíno population died in the first 30 years. |
| Perpetrators | Spanish Empire |
| Motive | Settler colonialism Spanish imperialism Religious discrimination Eurocentrism Proto-racism Colorism Lookism |
| Part of a series on |
| Genocide of indigenous peoples |
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The Taíno genocide was committed against the Taíno Indigenous people by the Spanish during their colonization of the Caribbean during the 16th century. The population of the Taíno before the arrival of the Spanish Empire on the island of Quisqueya or Ayití in 1492, which Christopher Columbus named Hispaniola (present-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic), is estimated to be between 10,000 and 1,000,000. Following the deposition of the last Taíno chief in 1504, the Spanish began subjecting the local population to slavery, massacres and other forms of violence. By 1514, the Taíno population had reportedly been reduced to about 32,000 people, by 1565 to 200, and by 1802 they were officially declared extinct by Spanish colonial authorities. However, mixed-race and other Taíno descendants continue to live, and their disappearance from records may be more the result of colonial classification practices than evidence of true extinction.