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| República de Cuba
Republic of Cuba
|
|
|
Motto: Patria o Muerte (Spanish)
"Fatherland or Death" a |
Anthem: La Bayamesa ("The Bayamo Song")
|
|
|
Capital
(and largest city) |
Havana
 23°8′N, 82°23′W |
| Official languages |
Spanish |
| Ethnic groups |
65.05% European (Spanish, some French, Italian, Portuguese).
10.08% African.
23.84% Mulatto.
1.03% Chinese |
| Demonym |
Cuban |
| Government |
Socialist Republicb |
| - |
President |
Raúl Castro |
| - |
First Vice President |
José Ramón Machado Ventura |
| Independence |
from Spain |
| - |
Declaredc |
October 10, 1868 |
| - |
Republic declared |
May 20, 1902
from United States |
| - |
Cuban Revolution |
January 1, 1959 |
| Area |
| - |
Total |
110,861 km² (105th)
42,803 sq mi |
| - |
Water (%) |
negligible |
| Population |
| - |
2007 estimate |
11,394,043[1] (73rd) |
| - |
2002 census |
11,177,743 |
| - |
Density |
102/km² (97th)
264/sq mi |
| GDP (PPP) |
2006 estimate |
| - |
Total |
$46.22 billion (2006 est.)[2] (not ranked) |
| - |
Per capita |
$4,500 (2007 est.)[2] (not ranked) |
| HDI (2007) |
0.838[3] (high) (51st) |
| Currency |
Cuban peso (CUP)
Convertible peso d (CUC) |
| Time zone |
EST (UTC-5) |
| - |
Summer (DST) |
(Starts March 11; ends November 4) (UTC-4) |
| Internet TLD |
.cu |
| Calling code |
+53 |
a As shown on the obverse of the 1992 coin[4]
(Note that the Spanish word "Patria" is feminine and is translated into
English as either "Cradle" or "Place of Birth" or "Homeland".)
bThe Constitution of Cuba states that "Cuba
is an independent and sovereign socialist state [Article 1] and that
the name of the Cuban state is Republic of Cuba [Article 2]."[5]
The usage "socialist republic" to describe the style of government of
Cuba is nearly uniform, though forms of government have no universally
agreed typology. For example, Atlapedia[6] describes it as "Unitary Socialist Republic"; Encyclopædia Britannica[7] omits the word "unitary", as do most sources.
c At the start of the Ten Years' War.
d From 1993 to 2004 the U.S. dollar was used in addition to the peso until the dollar was replaced by the convertible peso. |
The Republic of Cuba (IPA: /ˈkjuːbə/, Spanish: Cuba (help·info) or República de Cuba (help·info) Spanish pronunciation: [reˈpuβlika ðe ˈkuβa]), consists of the island of Cuba (the largest and second-most populous island of the Greater Antilles), Isla de la Juventud and several adjacent small islands. Cuba is located in the northern Caribbean at the confluence of the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean. Cuba is south of the eastern United States and The Bahamas, west of the Turks and Caicos Islands and Haiti and east of Mexico. The Cayman Islands and Jamaica are to the south. The national flower is Hedychium coronarium J. Koenig, most often known as "flor de mariposa" (Butterfly Flower) and the national bird is "Tocororo" or Cuban Trogon from the family of Trogonidae.[8]
Cuba is the most populous insular nation in the Caribbean. Its people, culture and customs draw from several sources including the aboriginal Taíno and Ciboney peoples, the period of Spanish colonialism, the introduction of African slaves,
and its proximity to the United States. The name "Cuba" comes from the
Taíno language the exact meaning of which is unclear, but may be
translated either "where fertile land is abundant" (cubao[9]) or "great place" (coabana[10]). The island has a tropical climate
that is moderated by the surrounding waters; however, the warm
temperatures of the Caribbean Sea and the fact that the island of Cuba
sits across the access to the Gulf of Mexico combine to make Cuba prone
to frequent hurricanes. Cuba's main island, at 766 miles (1,233 km) long, is the world's 17th largest.
History
The first voyage of Columbus
-
The recorded history of Cuba began on 12 October 1492, when Christopher Columbus sighted the island during his first voyage of discovery and claimed it for Spain.[11] Columbus named the island Isla Juana in reference to Prince Juan, the heir apparent.[12] The island had been inhabited by Native American peoples known as the Taíno and Ciboney whose ancestors had come from South America and possibly North and Central America in a complex series of migrations at least several centuries before, and perhaps 6,000 to 8,000 years ago.[13] The Taíno were farmers and the Ciboney (far more commonly written Siboney in neo-Taino nations) were both farmers and hunter-gatherers; some have suggested that copper trade was significant and mainland artifacts[14] have been found.
The coast of Cuba was fully mapped by Sebastián de Ocampo in 1511, and in that year the first Spanish settlement was founded by Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar at Baracoa. Other towns including the future capital of the island San Cristobal de la Habana
(founded in 1515) soon followed. The Spanish, as they did throughout
the Americas, oppressed and enslaved the approximately 100,000
indigenous people that resisted conversion to Christianity on the
island. Within a century they had all but disappeared as a distinct
nation as a result of the combined effects of European-introduced
disease, forced labor and other mistreatment, though aspects of the
region's aboriginal heritage have survived. Most scholars now believe that, among the various contributing factors, infectious disease was the overwhelming cause of the population decline of the indigenous people.[15][16]
Colonial Cuba
Cuba was in Spanish possession for almost 400 years (circa 1511-1898). Its economy was based on plantation agriculture, mining and the export of sugar, coffee and tobacco to Europe and later to North America. Havana was seized by the British in 1762, but restored to Spain the following year. The Spanish population was boosted by settlers leaving Haiti when that territory was ceded to France. As in other parts of the Spanish Empire,
the small land-owning elite of Spanish-descended settlers held social
and economic power, supported by a population of Spaniards born on the
island and called Criollos by the Iberian born Spaniards, other Europeans and African-descended slaves.
In the 1820s, when the other parts of Spain's empire in Latin
America rebelled and formed independent states, Cuba remained loyal,
although there was some agitation for independence. Due to Cuba's
loyalty to the Spanish government, the Spanish Crown gave the following
motto to the island government "La Siempre Fidelisima Isla" (The Always
Most Faithful Island). This was partly because the prosperity of Cuban
settlers depended on trade with Europe, partly through fears of a slave rebellion
(as had happened in Haiti) if the Spanish withdrew, and partly because
the Cubans feared the rising power of the United States more than they
disliked Spanish rule.
An additional factor was the continuous migration of Spaniards to
Cuba from all social strata, a trend that had ceased in other Spanish
possessions decades earlier and which contributed to the slow
development of a Cuban national identity. Pirates were also still a
problem and defense against them depended heavily on the presence of
Spanish troops.[17]
Cuba's proximity to the U.S. has been a powerful influence on its
history. Throughout the 19th century, Southern politicians in the U.S.
plotted the island's annexation as a means of strengthening the
pro-slavery forces in the U.S., and there was usually a party in Cuba
which supported such a policy. In 1848 a pro-annexation rebellion was
defeated and there were several attempts by annexation forces to invade
the island from Florida. There were also regular proposals in the U.S. to buy Cuba from Spain. During the summer of 1848 President James K. Polk quietly authorized his ambassador to Spain, Romulus Mitchell Saunders,
to negotiate the purchase of Cuba and offer Spain up to $100 million.
While an astonishing sum at the time for one territory, trade in sugar
and molasses from Cuba exceeded $18,000,000 in 1838 alone.[18] Spain, however, refused to consider ceding one of its last possessions in the Americas.
After the American Civil War
apparently ended the threat of pro-slavery annexation, agitation for
Cuban independence from Spain revived, leading to a rebellion in 1868
led by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes,
a wealthy lawyer landowner from Oriente province who freed his slaves,
proclaimed a war and was named president of the Cuban Republic-in-arms.
This resulted in a prolonged conflict known as the Ten Years' War
between pro-independence forces and the Spanish army, allied with local
supporters. There was much sympathy in the U.S. for the independence
cause, but the U.S. declined to intervene militarily or to recognize
the legitimacy of the Cuban government in arms, even though many
European and Latin American nations had done so.[19] In 1878 the Pact of Zanjón ended the conflict, with Spain promising greater autonomy to Cuba.
The island was exhausted after this long conflict and
pro-independence agitation temporarily died down. There was also a
prevalent fear that if the Spanish withdrew or if there was further
civil strife, the increasingly expansionist U.S. would step in and
annex the island. In 1879-1880, Cuban patriot Calixto Garcia attempted
to start another war, known in Cuban history as the Little War, but received little support.[20]
Partly in response to U.S. pressure, slavery was abolished in 1886,
although the African-descended minority remained socially and
economically oppressed, despite formal civic equality granted in 1893.
During this period rural poverty in Spain
Classical
from 
