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Virgin Islands

The Virgin Islands, with the Puerto Rican territory in green, United States Virgin Islands in red, and British Virgin Islands in blue
Geography
Location	Caribbean Sea, Atlantic Ocean
Archipelago	Leeward Islands
United States
Insular area	United States Virgin Islands
Unincorporated territory	Puerto Rico
United Kingdom
Overseas territory	British Virgin Islands

The Virgin Islands are geologically and biogeographically the easternmost part of the Greater Antilles,^[1] the northern islands belonging to the Puerto Rican Bank and St. Croix being a displaced part of the same geologic structure. Politically, the British Virgin Islands have been governed as the western island group of the Leeward Islands, which are the northern part of the Lesser Antilles, and form the border between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The archipelago is separated from the true Lesser Antilles by the Anegada Passage and from the main island of Puerto Rico by the Virgin Passage.

The islands fall into three different political jurisdictions:

• 
  British Virgin Islands, a British overseas territory,


• 
  United States Virgin Islands, an unincorporated territory of the United States,


• 
  Spanish (or Puerto Rican) Virgin Islands, the easternmost islands of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, itself an unincorporated territory of the United States.

Etymology

The locations of the US and UK Virgin Islands

Rigobert Bonne: Map of the Virgin Islands, 1780

Christopher Columbus named the islands after Saint Ursula and the 11,000 Virgins (Spanish: Santa Úrsula y las Once Mil Vírgenes), shortened to the Virgins (las Vírgenes). The official name of the British territory is the Virgin Islands, and the official name of the U.S. territory is the Virgin Islands of the United States. In practice, the two island groups are almost universally referred to as the British Virgin Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

History

The Virgin Islands were originally inhabited by the Arawak, Carib, and Cermic, almost all of whom are thought to have perished during the colonial period due to enslavement, foreign disease, and mass extermination brought about by European colonists, as is the case in the rest of the Caribbean.^[2]

European colonists later settled here and established sugar plantations, at least one tobacco plantation, and purchased slaves acquired from Africa. The plantations are gone, but the descendants of the slaves remain the bulk of the population, sharing a common African-Caribbean heritage with the rest of the English-speaking Caribbean.

In 1916 and 1917, Denmark and the United States, respectively, ratified a treaty in which Denmark sold the Danish Virgin Islands to the United States for $25 million in gold.

In the 1990s, a Puerto Rican tourism campaign renamed the Passage Islands as the Spanish Virgin Islands,^{[citation needed]} though they are seldom^{[clarification needed]} identified as such on maps and atlases.^{[citation needed]} They are part of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, located east of the main island of Puerto Rico. They are closer to St. Thomas than St. Thomas is to St. Croix.

Traffic control

Motor vehicles are driven on the left-hand side of the road in both the British and the U.S. Virgin Islands, although the steering wheels on most cars are located on the left side (as is the norm for drive-on-the-right localities). In the Spanish Virgin Islands, vehicles are driven on the right-hand side of the road.

See also

• Culture of the Virgin Islands


• Music of the Virgin Islands


• Virgin Islands Creole


• Danish Virgin Islands


• Dutch Virgin Islands


• Virgin Islands patch reefs

References

Sources

• 
  Colin Thomas, J.; Allard, William Albert; Wolinsky, Cary (February 1981). "Paradise Comes of age: The U.S. Virgin Islands". National Geographic. 159 (2): 225–243.
  

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Virgin Islands.

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Virgin Islands.

• 
  Works related to Virgin Islands at Wikisource


• BVI.gov: British Virgin Islands government website


• U.S. Office of Insular Affairs.gov: United States Virgin Islands government website


• Digital Library of the Caribbean.edu: University of the Virgin Islands information

Coordinates: 18°5′37″N 64°49′49″W / 18.09361°N 64.83028°W / 18.09361; -64.83028