[custom_adv] Hispaniola is an island in the Caribbean island group known as the Greater Antilles. It is the second largest island in the Caribbean after Cuba, and the most populous island in the Caribbean; it is also the eleventh most populous island in the world. [custom_adv] The 76,192-square-kilometre (29,418 sq mi) island is divided between two separate, sovereign nations: the Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic (48,445 km2, 18,705 sq mi) to the east, and French/French Creole-speaking Haiti (27,750 km2, 10,710 sq mi) to the west. [custom_adv] The only other shared island in the Caribbean is Saint Martin, which is shared between France (Saint-Martin) and the Netherlands (Sint Maarten). [custom_adv] Hispaniola is the site of the first permanent European settlement in the Americas, founded by Christopher Columbus on his voyages in 1492 and 1493. [custom_adv] The island was called by various names by its native people, the Taíno Amerindians. No known Taíno texts exist, hence, historical evidence for those names comes to us through three European historians: the Italian Pietro Martyr d‘Anghiera, and the Spaniards Bartolomé de las Casas and Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo. [custom_adv] It is the second largest island in the Caribbean after Cuba, and the most populous island in the Caribbean; it is also the eleventh most populous island in the world. [custom_adv] The only other shared island in the Caribbean is Saint Martin, which is shared between France (Saint-Martin) and the Netherlands (Sint Maarten). [custom_adv] Christopher Columbus inadvertently landed on the island during his first voyage across the Atlantic in 1492, where his flagship, the Santa Maria, sank after running aground on December 25. [custom_adv] Hispaniola is the site of the first permanent European settlement in the Americas, founded by Christopher Columbus on his voyages in 1492 and 1493. [custom_adv] A contingent of men were left at an outpost christened La Navidad, on the north coast of present-day Puerto Plata. On his return the following year, Columbus quickly established a second compound farther east in present-day Dominican Republic, La Isabela after the destruction of La Navidad.
