Curaçao is a Lesser Antilles island, a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in the southern Caribbean Sea, about 65 km (40 mi) north of the Venezuelan coast.
Curaçao has a population over 160,000 in an area of 444 km2 (171 sq mi), and its capital is Willemstad.
In the 16th and 17th centuries, sailors on long voyages would get scurvy from lack of vitamin C. According to some accounts, Portuguese sailors who were ill were left at the island. When their ship returned, they had recovered, likely cured from scurvy, probably after eating fruit with vitamin C. From then on the Portuguese referred to this as Ilha da Curação (Island of Healing). Another explanation is that it is derived from the Portuguese word for heart (coração), referring to the island as a centre in trade.
The original inhabitants of Curaçao were Arawak peoples.
The first Europeans recorded as seeing the island were members of a Spanish expedition in 1499.
In 1634, after the Netherlands achieved independence from Spain, Dutch colonists started to occupy the island.
Curaçao had been ignored by colonists, because it lacked gold deposits. However, the natural harbour of Willemstad proved to be an ideal spot for trade. Commerce and shipping—and piracy—became Curaçao's most important economic activities. In addition, in 1662, the Dutch West India Company made Curaçao a centre for the Atlantic slave trade, often bringing slaves here for sale elsewhere in the Caribbean and on the mainland of South America.
The first profitable industry established on Curaçao was salt mining. Many Dutch colonists alos grew affluent from the slave trade, and the city built impressive colonial buildings. Curaçao architecture blends Dutch and Spanish colonial styles. The wide range of historic buildings in and around Willemstad has resulted in the capital being designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, the island changed hands among the British, the French, and the Dutch several times. Stable Dutch rule returned in 1815 at the end of the Napoleonic wars.
The Dutch abolished slavery in 1863.
When oil was discovered in the Maracaibo Basin town of Mene Grande in 1914, the fortunes of the island were dramatically altered. In the early years, both Shell and Exxon held drilling concessions in Venezuela, which ensured a constant supply of crude oil to the refineries in Aruba and Curaçao.
In 1985, after a presence of 70 years, Royal Dutch Shell decided to end its activities on Curaçao.
Due to an economic slump in the late 1990s and early 2000s, emigration to the Netherlands has been high.
The dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles came into effect on 10 October 2010. Curaçao became a country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, with the Kingdom retaining responsibility for defence and foreign policy.
Historically, Dutch was not widely spoken on the island outside of colonial administration; its use increased in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Students on Curaçao, Aruba, and Bonaire were taught predominantly in Spanish until the late 19th century. Also, efforts were made to introduce bilingual popular education in Dutch and Papiamentu in the late 19th century.
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