Isle d'Hayti, old Haiti Island and the History behind the name change

Isle d'Hayti, old Haiti Island and the History behind the name change

Here is a very old map of of Isle D'Hayti or Haiti Island as she was called before Isle de St Domingue during colonization and Hispaniola much later. Read this and learn.

A little bit of History about Isle D'Hayti or Haiti Island:

When Christopher Columbus arrived and took possession of the island in 1492, he named it Insula Hispana in Latin and La Isla Española in Spanish, with both meaning "the Spanish island".

Of course, Columbus the colonizer was Spanish!

Bartolomé de las Casas, Spanish colonist who was the only acting historian in the island back in the 16th-century shortened the name"La Isla Española" to simply "Española".

Peter Martyr d'Anghiera, Italian-born historian known by many names, was the first writer to use the word "Hispaniola" to refer to Isle D'Hayti or Haiti Island in his accounts of the island he wrote in Latin.

When Anghiera's work started being translated to Frencn and English, the name "Hispaniola" stuck.

How did the name Hispaniola became the permanent name of the Island?

Read this from Wikipedia:

In 1918, the United States occupation government, led by Harry Shepard Knapp, obliged the use of the name Hispaniola on the island, and recommended the use of that name to the National Geographic Society.

And the rest is history!

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