Trinidad and Tobago summary

Written and fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Below is the article summary. For the full article, see Trinidad and Tobago.

National anthem of Trinidad and Tobago

The instrumental version of the national anthem of Trinidad and Tobago.

Trinidad and Tobago , officially Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, Island country, West Indies. The islands of Trinidad and Tobago—the two southernmost links in the Antilles island chain—lie northeast of Venezuela and northwest of Guyana. Area: 1,980 sq mi (5,128 sq km). Population: (2024 est.) 1,368,000. Capital: Port of Spain. The people are mainly of South Asian or African ancestry. Language: English (official). Religions: Christianity (Protestant, Roman Catholic), Hinduism, Islam. Currency: Trinidad and Tobago dollar. The islands are mostly flat or rolling, with narrow belts of mountainous highlands and luxuriant rain forests. The Caroni Swamp, an important bird sanctuary on Trinidad, supports flamingo, egret, and scarlet ibis populations. The country has large reserves of petroleum and natural gas, as well as one of the world’s largest supplies of natural asphalt. Other industries include agriculture, fishing, and tourism. Chief crops include sugarcane, citrus fruits, cocoa, and coffee. It is a republic with two legislative houses; its head of state is the president, and the head of government is the prime minister. When Christopher Columbus visited Trinidad in 1498, it was inhabited mostly by Arawak Indians, though there were probably some Carib speakers as well; Caribs inhabited Tobago. The islands were settled by the Spanish in the 16th century. In the 17th–18th centuries African slaves were imported for plantation labour to replace the original Indian population, which had been decimated by the impact of slavery and diseases introduced by the Europeans. Trinidad was surrendered to the British in 1797. The British attempted to settle Tobago in 1721, but the French captured the island in 1781 and transformed it into a sugar-producing colony. The British acquired it in 1802. After slavery ended in the islands (1834–38), immigrants from India were brought in to work the plantations. Trinidad and Tobago were administratively combined in 1889. Granted limited self-government in 1925, the islands became an independent state within the Commonwealth in 1962 and a republic in 1976. There occurred some political unrest and in 1990 a failed Muslim-fundamentalist coup against the government.

Commonwealth Summary

Commonwealth, a free association of sovereign states comprising the United Kingdom and a number of its former dependencies who have chosen to maintain ties of friendship and practical cooperation and who acknowledge the British monarch as symbolic head of their association. The Commonwealth was an

Caribbean Sea Summary

Caribbean Sea, suboceanic basin of the western Atlantic Ocean, lying between latitudes 9° and 22° N and longitudes 89° and 60° W. It is approximately 1,063,000 square miles (2,753,000 square km) in extent. To the south it is bounded by the coasts of Venezuela, Colombia, and Panama; to the west by

West Indies Summary

West Indies, crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles (3,200 km) long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north. From the peninsula of Florida on the mainland of the United States, the islands stretch

Atlantic Ocean, with depth contours and submarine features

Atlantic Ocean Summary

Atlantic Ocean, body of salt water covering approximately one-fifth of Earth’s surface and separating the continents of Europe and Africa to the east from those of North and South America to the west. The ocean’s name, derived from Greek mythology, means the “Sea of Atlas.” It is second in size to