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Nassau
KNOWLEDGE OF Nassau
The Nassau-Paradise Island of today: steel-drum music, take-it-easy attitude, to-die-for conch dishes cooked by both world-class chefs and the working folks the travelers, is a far cry from the Nassau that preceded it.
Like other areas of the Caribbean, it has a romantic history—both centuries-old and decades-old—of foreign intervention, foreign occupation, piracy, slavery and smuggling. But Nassau's rich history is really the history of the Bahamas as a whole: one of resilience, one of pride. It all culminated in 1973, when the islands gained their independence from England, although they remain a part of the British Commonwealth, not unlike Puerto Rico, remaining a part of the United States, but with autonomy.
Until 1492, when Columbus "discovered" America, Bahamians lived a life so uncomplicated and straightforward, relying for sustenance on the bountiful fish the sea virtually washed to their shores. Mix that with a healthy diet of fruits and berries, and you had an organic diet that some would consider oh-so-trendy in this, the third millennium. Theirs was a life, quite simply, that was quite simple.
But not all was idyllic for this island paradise.
Go back to 300 or 400 AD, which drawings and other artifacts indicate the Bahamians date back to. It was a life of living off the island land, and not much else. And it was a life destroyed when the Spanish decided they had found a slave-labor force easily put to work. This led to the near-depopulation of the islands, in the mid 1500s.
Now fast-forward to the early and mid 1600s, long after Columbus discovered the sun-drenched cays. English settlers in other Caribbean Islands realized that Nassau's proximity to the recently settled New World provided opportunities never before seen in terms of shipping and trade, as well as an escape from England's religious persecution.
However, the unfortunate time of piracy reared its ugly head around the same time, and lasted for more than a century. With numerous hiding places in the remote and densely vegetated islands, the buccaneers had found a crime-friendly place few of them could have dreamed. The proximity to mainland North America was the primary reason.
In 1756, the Seven Years War broke out and trade - not only illegal but legal, as well positively flourished. The war pitted France, Austria, Russia and Sweden against Great Britain, Prussia and Hanover. Issues were colonists from North America and India. The fighting led to prosperity in trading on Nassau. But peace, as it often does today, flattened the economy—black-market and otherwise—when it was achieved in 1763. Piracy again became the primary economic market for those who were successful at it, Blackbeard perhaps the most famous. For those who weren't, it was a life so tough and difficult.
Like other areas of the Caribbean, it has a romantic history—both centuries-old and decades-old—of foreign intervention, foreign occupation, piracy, slavery and smuggling. But Nassau's rich history is really the history of the Bahamas as a whole: one of resilience, one of pride. It all culminated in 1973, when the islands gained their independence from England, although they remain a part of the British Commonwealth, not unlike Puerto Rico, remaining a part of the United States, but with autonomy.
Until 1492, when Columbus "discovered" America, Bahamians lived a life so uncomplicated and straightforward, relying for sustenance on the bountiful fish the sea virtually washed to their shores. Mix that with a healthy diet of fruits and berries, and you had an organic diet that some would consider oh-so-trendy in this, the third millennium. Theirs was a life, quite simply, that was quite simple.
But not all was idyllic for this island paradise.
Go back to 300 or 400 AD, which drawings and other artifacts indicate the Bahamians date back to. It was a life of living off the island land, and not much else. And it was a life destroyed when the Spanish decided they had found a slave-labor force easily put to work. This led to the near-depopulation of the islands, in the mid 1500s.
Now fast-forward to the early and mid 1600s, long after Columbus discovered the sun-drenched cays. English settlers in other Caribbean Islands realized that Nassau's proximity to the recently settled New World provided opportunities never before seen in terms of shipping and trade, as well as an escape from England's religious persecution.
However, the unfortunate time of piracy reared its ugly head around the same time, and lasted for more than a century. With numerous hiding places in the remote and densely vegetated islands, the buccaneers had found a crime-friendly place few of them could have dreamed. The proximity to mainland North America was the primary reason.
In 1756, the Seven Years War broke out and trade - not only illegal but legal, as well positively flourished. The war pitted France, Austria, Russia and Sweden against Great Britain, Prussia and Hanover. Issues were colonists from North America and India. The fighting led to prosperity in trading on Nassau. But peace, as it often does today, flattened the economy—black-market and otherwise—when it was achieved in 1763. Piracy again became the primary economic market for those who were successful at it, Blackbeard perhaps the most famous. For those who weren't, it was a life so tough and difficult.
Chapi