[11][22] Shortly thereafter the English pirate Walter Raleigh arrived in Trinidad on 22 March 1595 in search of the long-rumoured "El Dorado" ("City of Gold") supposedly located in South America.

[22] He attacked San José, captured and interrogated Antonio de Berrío, and obtained much information from him and from the Cacique Topiawari; Raleigh then went on his way, and Spanish authority was restored.

[27] A plantation economy developed based on the production of sugar, indigo and rum, worked by large numbers of African slaves who soon came to vastly outnumber the European colonists.

[28][27] Large numbers of forts were constructed as Tobago became a source of contention between France, Netherlands and Britain, with the island changing hands some 31 times prior to 1814, a situation exacerbated by widespread piracy.

[22] As a result, continuing Spanish slave-raiding, and the devastating impact of introduced disease to which they had no immunity, the native population was virtually wiped out by the end of the following century.

[32] However the Spanish never made any concerted effort to colonise the islands; Trinidad in this period was still mostly forest, populated by a few Spaniards with a handful of slaves and a few thousand Indigenous people.

During that period of upheaval, French planters with their slaves, free coloureds and mulattos from the neighbouring islands of Martinique, Saint Lucia, Grenada, Guadeloupe and Dominica migrated to Trinidad, where they established an agriculture-based economy (sugar and cocoa).

English, Scots, Irish, German and Italian families arrived, as well as some free blacks known as "Merikins" who had fought for Britain in the War of 1812 and were granted land in southern Trinidad.

[11][54][55] In 1903, a protest against the introduction of new water rates in Port of Spain erupted into rioting; 18 people were shot dead, and the Red House (the government headquarters) was damaged by fire.

The Americans vastly improved the infrastructure on Trinidad and provided many locals with well-paying jobs; however, the social effects of having so many young soldiers stationed on the island, as well as their often unconcealed racial prejudice, caused resentment.

Some army leaders who were sympathetic to the Black Power movement, notably Raffique Shah and Rex Lassalle, attempted to mutiny; however, this was quashed by the Trinidad and Tobago Coast Guard.

[70][64] Robinson was unable to hold together the fragile NAR coalition, and his economic reforms, such as the implementation of an International Monetary Fund Structural Adjustment Program and devaluation of currency led to social unrest.

[77][78] In August 2020, the governing People's National Movement won general election, earning the incumbent Prime Minister Keith Rowley a second term in office.

[80] Trinidad and Tobago is situated between 10° 2' and 11° 12' N latitude and 60° 30' and 61° 56' W longitude, with the Caribbean Sea to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, and the Gulf of Paria to the west.

It is located in the far south-east of the Caribbean region, with the island of Trinidad being just 11 kilometres (6 nmi) off the coast of Venezuela in mainland South America across the Columbus Channel.

South of this, the Central Range fold and thrust belt consists of Cretaceous and Eocene sedimentary rocks, with Miocene formations along the southern and eastern flanks.

In the Northern Range of Trinidad, the climate is often cooler than that of the sweltering heat of the plains below, due to constant cloud and mist cover, and heavy rains in the mountains.

[11][90] The larger reptiles present include 5 species of marine turtles known to nest on the islands' beaches, the green anaconda, the Boa constrictor and the spectacled caiman.

[102] Threats to the country's biodiversity include over-hunting and poaching (see Hunting#Trinidad and Tobago), habitat loss and fragmentation (particularly due to forest fires and land clearance for quarrying, agriculture, squatting, housing and industrial development and road construction), water pollution, and introduction of invasive species and pathogens.

[citation needed] As a member of CARICOM, Trinidad and Tobago strongly backed efforts by the United States to bring political stability to Haiti, contributing personnel to the Multinational Force in 1994.

Indo-Trinidadian and Tobagonians make up the country's largest ethnic group (approximately 35.4%);[16] they are primarily the descendants of indentured workers from India,[122] brought to replace freed African slaves who refused to continue working on the sugar plantations.

Children with satisfactory grades may opt to continue high school for a further two-year period, leading to the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examinations (CAPE), the equivalent of GCE A levels.

Both the Government and the private sector also provide financial assistance in the form of academic scholarships to gifted or needy students for study at local, regional or international universities.

[16] Trinidad and Tobago, in an effort to undergo economic transformation through diversification,[16] formed InvesTT in 2012 to serve as the country's sole investment promotion agency.

After an additional cash injection of US$50 million, the Trinidad and Tobago government acquired the Jamaican airline Air Jamaica on 1 May 2010, with a 6–12-month transition period to follow.

[173] Trinidad and Tobago is the region's leading exporter of oil and gas but imports of fossil fuels provided over 90% of the energy consumed by its CARICOM neighbours in 2008.

[174] Trinidad and Tobago has a diverse culture with African, Indian, Creole, European, Chinese, Indigenous, Latin American, and Arab influences, reflecting the various communities who have migrated to the islands over the centuries.

Other notable writers include Michael Anthony, Neil Bissoondath, Vahni Capildeo, Merle Hodge, C. L. R. James, Earl Lovelace, Rabindranath Maharaj, Kenneth Ramchand and Samuel Selvon.

The most established is the St Andrews Golf Club, Maraval in Trinidad (commonly referred to as Moka), and there is a newer course at Trincity, near Piarco Airport called Millennium Lakes.

Introduced in 2006. the fraternity made consistent strides in having more members a part of the TTDBF (Trinidad and Tobago Dragonboat Federation) as well as performing on an international level such as the 10th IDBF World Nations Dragon Boat Championships in Tampa, Florida in the US in 2011.