Places with Spanish Names inTrinidad

30/11/2010 17:54

The Spanish influence on Trinidad is not limited to parang. Many places around us are named are the Spanish colonizers of the island at that time. Some of these are:

San Fernando - In 1972 the then Governor, Jose Maria Chacon officially named it the town of San Fernando after King Ferdinand VI of Spain.

Santa Flora

Barataria

Mundo Nuevo (past Arima)

Vista Bella (near San Fernando)

San Rafael - This village was renamed San Rafael after after the church in the heart of the village. In San Rafael the Spanish worked at converting the early Amerindians to Christianity.

Rio Claro - An early Spanish surveyors named the village Rio Claro, which means "clear water". This was because Rio Claro lay near a tributary of the Ortoire River.

Sangre Grande - This means "Big Blood" because of of violent clashes between the colonists and the Amerindians.

El Dorado - in search of gold.

Sangre Chiquito - This is near to Sangre Grande which means "Little blood".

Palo Seco means dry stick.

Cedros - This village was named after the huge cedar trees that lined the bays along Trinidad's South-western peninsula. The Spanish name for cedars was cedros.

Las Cuevas

Manzanilla - This name camefrom Punta Manzanilla which means a "little block of land". It also means 'small apple' as many small apple like fruits are found along the beach. be careful though they are poisonous.

El Socorro

Cocos Bay - This is the long stretch of coconut plantations along Manzanilla called the "bay of coconuts". A ship laden with coconuts from Brazil was wrecked off the coast of Manzanilla in the 18th century. The coconuts floated ashore and sprouted along the beach which became home to a large coconut and copra (dry husk) industry.

Santa Cruz - This means "Holy Cross" was given to one of the five great valleys in the Northern Range.

San Juan - This was established by Don Jose Maria Chacon, our last Spanish Governor. It was named after John the Baptist.

Diego Martin - An early Spanish settler, Don Diego Martin, was one of the first Europeans to explore the Northwestern peninsula and discovered the cool Diego Martin river.

Santa Rosa

St.Joseph- This was originally known as San Jose de Oruna and was the first capital city in Trinidad named by the Spanish colonizers.

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I Love Parang Music

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Spanish heritage of Trinidad and Tobago

The Voyage Begins

14/11/2010 19:15

The voyage begins.pptx (812 kB)

Where did Parang originate?

Parang's root is basically Spanish with French and African influences. Our history as recorded, shows that in 1498 Christopher Columbus came to Trinidad. The Spanish settlers did not arrive until 1592, almost 200 years later.

As part of colonizing the island, the Spanish invited the French and other Europeans to settle and help to develop it. Many of these settlers came with their slaves as well as about 4000 free African slaves. They established cocoa and coffee plantations where many native Amerindians were slaves too. Within a short time the Amerindian population dwindled to a few hundred.

In this "New world" as the Spanish saw it, they sent many Catholic Priests who were in charge of various parts of the island where missions were set up to teach the natives Christianity. A criterion for placement was that the priest had to be a master of music and so taught many songs about the Bible in Spanish; the birth of Jesus being one. This influenced what is now known as parang music since the music is primarily about the birth of Jesus. The songs are about the nativity and are usually sung at Christmas time.

Another belief is that when the Venezuelans came to Trinidad to work on the cocoa plantations they also brought with them their culture of music and song. These workers called cocoa panyols entertained themselves with parang music as there was neither radio nor electricity.

African influence is attributed mainly to the zanza mbira drum which looks like the box bass drum. This drum along with other instruments we saw in the museum at Lopinot influenced the rhythm as we know it. In addition the singing voice added a peculiar timbre that is distinctly parang.

What is Parang?

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