98 Fun Facts About Jamaica

Which two Caribbean islands are larger than Jamaica?

Cuba and Hispaniola are both bigger, but Jamaica sits on the main shipping lanes to the Panama Canal, which brings heavy container traffic to Kingston's port.

Jamaica's Taino name, Xaymaca, is often translated as what?

Land of wood and water is one reading of Xaymaca, with 'land of springs' another; the Taino who named the island died from disease and forced labour under Spain.

While stranded on Jamaica in 1504, Christopher Columbus won over the Taino by predicting what?

A lunar eclipse: Columbus foretold it from an almanac's tables, and the darkened moon won back the goodwill of the Taino his stranded crew depended on.

What did Christopher Columbus name Jamaica when he reached it on his second voyage?

Santiago: Columbus later returned on his fourth voyage and was stranded on the island for a year after beaching his damaged ships.

Which two commanders led the English invasion of Jamaica in 1655?

William Penn and Robert Venables took Jamaica in May 1655, and the Spanish settlers freed their slaves as they fled the island.

Which privateer, later Jamaica's lieutenant governor, made Port Royal his base?

Henry Morgan raided Spanish colonies and ships from Port Royal, yet King Charles II knighted him and sent him back to help govern Jamaica.

The free communities of escaped slaves who held out in Jamaica's mountainous interior were known as what?

Maroons won land and freedom in treaties of 1739 and 1740, but in return they agreed to help recapture runaway slaves.

Which ship's 1948 arrival in Britain, carrying hundreds of Jamaicans, gave its name to a generation of Caribbean migrants?

Empire Windrush: in 2018 the Windrush scandal revealed that some of that generation had been denied healthcare, work or housing and threatened with deportation.

Which system kept most of Jamaica's freed slaves working for former owners until 1838?

Apprenticeship lasted until full freedom in 1838; slave revolts such as Sam Sharpe's 1831 Christmas Rebellion had helped push Britain to abolish slavery.

The 1865 Morant Bay rebellion was led by which Baptist deacon, now a National Hero?

Paul Bogle, a Baptist deacon from Stony Gut, led the 1865 Morant Bay march; Governor Edward Eyre's brutal reprisals hanged him and got Eyre recalled.

In a 1961 referendum, Jamaicans voted to leave which political union?

The West Indies Federation, formed in 1958, lost Jamaica in that vote and was dissolved soon afterwards.

Who became Jamaica's first prime minister, at the age of 78?

Alexander Bustamante was detained by the colonial government in 1940, then founded the Jamaica Labour Party in 1943 and led it to independence.

Jamaica's national motto is what?

'Out of Many, One People', adopted at independence in 1962, nods to the island's African, European, Indian, Chinese and Lebanese roots.

The black on Jamaica's flag now stands for the people's strength and creativity, but what did it first represent?

Hardships: before the flag took its diagonal cross, Jamaica dropped a first design of stripes because it looked too much like Tanganyika's flag.

Jamaica's Blue Mountains, topped by the island's highest peak, give their name to which prized crop?

Coffee: in 2018 Japan's government declared 9 January Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee Day, marking the date of a big 1967 coffee shipment to Japan.

Which sand spit shelters Kingston Harbour and carries the road to the airport?

The Palisadoes ends at Port Royal, the old buccaneer town whose streets partly sank into the harbour in the 1692 earthquake.

Which former colonial seat was Jamaica's capital before Kingston took over in 1872?

Spanish Town lost the role to Kingston, a town laid out for survivors of the 1692 earthquake that wrecked Port Royal.

The main airport for tourists visiting Jamaica's north coast serves which city?

Montego Bay: after Hurricane Melissa hit in October 2025, its airport at first reopened only for relief flights.

Jamaica's national symbol, the red-billed streamertail hummingbird, is known locally by what nickname?

Doctor bird: the whirring sound adult males make in flight comes from a wing feather that bends with each downstroke.

Jamaica's national dish pairs salted codfish with which fruit?

Ackee and saltfish is the national dish; the ackee's Latin name, Blighia sapida, honours Captain Bligh, who took it to England in 1793, and unripe fruit is poisonous.

Jamaican jerk seasoning's two key ingredients are Scotch bonnet peppers and which other flavouring?

Allspice, called pimento in Jamaica, got its English name because its berry seemed to combine the flavours of cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves.

Red Stripe lager is brewed by which Jamaican company?

Desnoes & Geddes began in 1918 when two shopkeepers combined their shops, selling soft drinks and imported liquor before they opened a brewery.

Jamaica's mining industry is built mainly on which mineral?

Bauxite, the ore refined into aluminium, helped fuel the economic boom Jamaica enjoyed in the years after independence.

The English-based creole spoken by most Jamaicans is called what?

Patois got its own New Testament from the Bible Society in 2012, though some Jamaicans argued that learning English should come first.

Rastafari, which emerged in Jamaica in the 1930s, reveres which Ethiopian emperor?

Haile Selassie held the title Ras Tafari before his 1930 coronation, and the movement that grew in Jamaica after it took its name from that title.

How did Jamaica honour Marcus Garvey, founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association?

First person named a National Hero: jailed and deported from the US in 1927, Garvey was reburied in Kingston's National Heroes Park in 1964.

The 1968 single 'Do the Reggay', the first hit to use the word reggae, was by which group?

Toots and the Maytals were led by Toots Hibbert, whose jail term for ganja possession inspired their hit '54-46 That's My Number'.

Bob Marley was born in 1945 in which Saint Ann Parish village, where he is also buried?

Nine Mile: Marley moved to Kingston as a boy and found fame there, but he was brought home to Nine Mile to be buried in a mausoleum.

Which Bob Marley album did Time magazine name the best album of the 20th century?

Exodus was recorded in London after Marley survived a 1976 shooting at home in Jamaica, and it stayed on the UK album chart for 56 straight weeks.

Bob Marley's first hit outside Jamaica, in 1975, was a live version of which song?

No Woman, No Cry was credited to Marley's friend Vincent Ford, and the royalties helped keep Ford's Trench Town soup kitchen running.

Usain Bolt's 100 m world record of 9.58 seconds was set in 2009 in which city?

Berlin: a year earlier in Beijing he had set a 9.69 world record despite easing up to celebrate before the finish line.

Usain Bolt was born in Sherwood Content, in which parish?

Trelawny: Bolt loved cricket first, until his cricket coach saw how fast he ran and urged him to try track and field.

Jamaica's bobsled team made its Winter Olympic debut in 1988 in which host city?

At Calgary 1988 the four-man sled crashed on its third run and did not finish; the story loosely inspired Disney's Cool Runnings (1993).

Jamaica's four-man bobsled finished 14th at Lillehammer 1994, ahead of which of these nations?

United States: its best sled led Jamaica by more than half a second after two runs, but Jamaica's faster final two runs overtook it.

Which Jamaican sprinter won the Olympic women's 100 m in both 2008 and 2012?

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce was so little known before Beijing that some wanted Veronica Campbell-Brown to take her 100 m place on Jamaica's team.

What is Ian Fleming's Jamaican estate, where he wrote every Bond novel, called?

Goldeneye was later bought by Island Records founder Chris Blackwell, who turned Fleming's old home into a resort.

Which Sean Connery Bond film was shot on location in Jamaica?

Dr. No: Ursula Andress's heavy accent meant her lines as Honey Ryder were dubbed by voice actress Nikki van der Zyl.

Which Jamaican-born nurse, turned down by the War Office, paid her own way to the Crimean War?

Mary Seacole went out onto the battlefield itself to tend wounded soldiers.

Dunn's River Falls, the climbable waterfall, lies beside which north-coast resort town?

Ocho Rios: guides often lead visitors up Dunn's River Falls in a hand-holding human chain, and the water runs straight into the sea.

Which rugged limestone region of western Jamaica is known for its conical hills and sinkholes?

Cockpit Country's steep hollows sheltered communities of escaped slaves, and colonial troops who pursued them into its hills were beaten back.

Besides India, which Asian country sent indentured labourers to work on Jamaica's plantations after emancipation?

China: when their contracts ended, some Chinese labourers opened small shops, and Chinese grocery stores spread across the island.

Which city municipality did Jamaica create in 2003?

Portmore, across the harbour from Kingston in St Catherine parish, became a municipality with its own council in 2003.

At the 1978 One Love Peace Concert, Bob Marley joined the hands of which two rivals?

Michael Manley and Edward Seaga stood hand in hand with Marley, yet the concert did little to stop the political violence that raged until the 1980 election.

What do Rastafari call their natural, mostly plant-based way of eating?

Ital food avoids additives, and many Rastafari cook it without salt and skip pork, following their reading of biblical food laws.

Which Jamaican novelist won the 2015 Man Booker Prize for A Brief History of Seven Killings?

Marlon James had seen his first novel, John Crow's Devil, rejected dozens of times before it was published, and he became the first Jamaican to win the Booker.

Which reggae singer starred as a musician turned outlaw in the 1970s film The Harder They Come?

Jimmy Cliff played Ivanhoe Martin, a character based on Rhyging, a real Jamaican outlaw of the 1940s.

Which 1964 ska single by Jamaican teenager Millie Small reached number two on both sides of the Atlantic?

My Boy Lollipop: Chris Blackwell became Millie Small's manager and moved her to London, where she recorded it.

Which Jamaican prime minister died of natural causes within two months of taking office in 1967?

Donald Sangster died after just 48 days as prime minister, though he had already run the government for years while his ailing predecessor was sidelined.

Ian Fleming, writing in Jamaica, took the name James Bond from the author of a field guide to what?

Birds of the West Indies sat on Fleming's shelf: a keen birdwatcher, he borrowed its author's name because it sounded as ordinary as possible.

Which staple crop did Captain Bligh ship from Tahiti to Jamaica in 1793 to feed the enslaved?

Breadfruit was also the cargo on Bligh's first attempt, which ended in the mutiny on the Bounty; his second voyage finally delivered the plants.

Usain Bolt spent eight weeks of 2018 on trial with an Australian club in which sport?

Soccer nearly became his second career: he scored twice in a friendly for the Central Coast Mariners, then left and declared his sporting life over.

Which animal was shipped from India to Jamaica in 1872 to hunt the rats plaguing its sugar plantations?

Mongoose numbers took off from just nine animals, and their offspring were later shipped on to cane fields on other islands.

In rice and peas, the coconut-rich Sunday staple of Jamaica, the 'peas' are usually which pulse?

Kidney beans are known as red peas on the island; at Christmas many cooks swap in gungo peas, the local name for pigeon peas.

Which 1993 Disney comedy starring John Candy is loosely based on Jamaica's first Olympic bobsled team?

Cool Runnings reportedly got John Candy only because he insisted on playing the coach and took a pay cut; the studio had wanted Kurt Russell.

Anansi, the West African trickster of Jamaican folk tales, usually appears as which creature?

Spider is what Anansi's name means in the Akan language of Ghana, where the tales took shape before crossing the Atlantic with enslaved Africans.

Inspired by its bobsledders, Jamaica formed a team in 2005 for which other unlikely cold-weather sport?

Dog sledding reached the island through a tour operator who began with nine rescued strays; singer Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville became the main sponsor.

Which Hollywood swashbuckler washed up at Port Antonio, Jamaica, in the 1940s and made bamboo rafting fashionable?

Errol Flynn arrived when his yacht Zaca was driven ashore in bad weather; he stayed, buying Navy Island and a coconut plantation nearby.

Which reptile stands on a log at the crest of Jamaica's coat of arms, first granted in 1661?

A crocodile has topped the arms since colonial days, and the real animal lives on in the island's coastal swamps and brackish rivers.

Which resort town at Jamaica's far western tip is famed for Seven Mile Beach and its West End cliffs?

Negril's famous beach is really two bays, Long Bay and Bloody Bay; its name is thought to shorten the Spanish Negrillo, 'little black one'.

What makes the water of Jamaica's Luminous Lagoon light up around boats and swimmers at night?

Glowing microbes thrive where the Martha Brae River meets the sea, and they flash only when something disturbs the water.

In Jamaican folklore, a duppy that comes out to trouble people at night is what kind of being?

A ghost, and usually a spiteful one: the best-known duppies include the Rolling Calf, a creature wrapped in chains, and the three-footed horse.

Jamaica's Reggae Boyz made their World Cup debut in 1998, beating Japan in which host country?

France staged the tournament, and in Lyon Theodore Whitmore scored both goals in the 2–1 win over Japan, Jamaica's first victory at the finals.

Jamaica's Sunshine Girls, world championship hosts in 1971 and 2003, play which sport?

Netball put the island on the world stage early: the Sunshine Girls played at the very first world championship in 1963.

Which Kingston-born pioneer, host of a famous Bronx party in 1973, is often called the father of hip hop?

DJ Kool Herc grew up hearing Kingston's sound systems and their toasting deejays, then carried the idea to New York when his family emigrated in 1967.

Which all-inclusive resort chain did Jamaican Gordon 'Butch' Stewart launch from one old hotel in 1981?

Sandals began when Stewart, who had no hotel experience, bought a tired beachfront property; three years later it added what it bills as the Caribbean's first swim-up bar.

Ting, the tart Jamaican soda sold in green bottles since 1976, is flavoured with which citrus?

Grapefruit pulp leaves a little sediment in every bottle of Ting, and mixing the soda with citrus vodka gives a drink known as Ving.

Which pirate was hanged at Port Royal, Jamaica, in 1720 after sailing with Anne Bonny and Mary Read?

Calico Jack, really John Rackham, was caught by a former privateer just two months after stealing a sloop from Nassau; the famous nickname was probably a later invention.

Which Kingston-born centre became an eleven-time NBA All-Star with the New York Knicks?

Patrick Ewing was born the day before Jamaica became independent and first played basketball only after his family moved to Massachusetts in 1975.

Mannish water, a Jamaican soup said to be served to a groom on his wedding night, is made from which animal?

Goat parts of every kind go into the pot with yam, bananas and dumplings, and the soup is a fixture at big parties and stage shows too.

Bammy, the Jamaican flatbread handed down from the Taino, is traditionally made from which root crop?

Cassava bammy is usually cut into wedges, soaked in coconut milk and fried until golden, then served with fish.

Devon House, built in 1881 by Jamaica's first millionaire of colour, gives its name to a shop selling what?

Ice cream is sold on the grounds of the restored house, whose builder George Stiebel made his fortune in Venezuela before returning home.

At Easter, Jamaicans traditionally eat slices of dark spiced bun together with a slice of what?

Cheese on bun grew out of the English hot cross bun, which on the island turned into a loaf darkened with molasses.

Which fruit appears five times on the red cross at the centre of Jamaica's coat of arms?

Pineapple was already being grown by the island's Taino when Europeans arrived, and five golden ones have sat on the arms since the 1661 grant.

Irish moss, a thick Jamaican drink marketed as an aphrodisiac, is made from what main ingredient?

Seaweed gives the drink its thick texture; the red algae is said to have reached the coast with Irish indentured servants, hence the name.

Which faith has a Kingston house of worship whose sand floor recalls secret prayer under the Inquisition?

Judaism arrived with Sephardic settlers in the 1600s; their Shaare Shalom synagogue, rebuilt in 1912 after an earthquake, keeps the custom of sand that once muffled prayers.

Which red-headed scavenger of the Americas do Jamaicans know as the 'John crow'?

Turkey vulture is the name used elsewhere, for a bare red head like a wild turkey's; the Jamaican name was later given to a mountain range in the island's east.

Jamaica's rainforests are the only home of the Western Hemisphere's largest species of which insect?

Butterfly fans know it as the Homerus swallowtail, named after the Greek poet Homer; females, the larger sex, can reach a wingspan of 15 cm.

Which Jamaican folk music, played on banjo and rumba box, predates ska and is often mistaken for calypso?

Mento was the first Jamaican music to be recorded commercially, and its bass line comes from the rumba box, a giant thumb piano the player sits on.

Which plant do Jamaica's Rastafari regard as a sacrament, smoked at gatherings known as groundations?

Cannabis, known locally as ganja, was long illegal for everyone on the island; a 2015 change in the law finally let Rastafari use it for religious purposes.

Which English playwright is buried at Firefly, his hilltop retreat on Jamaica's north coast?

Noël Coward named the estate for the insects that light up its warm evenings, and said it gave him time to read, write and think.

Which 'White Witch', said to have murdered three husbands, supposedly haunts Jamaica's Rose Hall Great House?

Annie Palmer's legend drives the night tours of the restored mansion, although a 2007 investigation concluded that the story was fictionalised.

At which Kingston cricket ground did Garfield Sobers hit 365 not out, a Test record for 36 years?

Sabina Park also saw the first triple century in Test cricket, when England's Andy Sandham made 325 there in 1930.

Which Kingston neighbourhood, home to the young Bob Marley, is called the birthplace of rocksteady?

Trench Town is usually said to be named not for a ditch but for Trench Pen, livestock land once held by a family called Trench.

Which 1988 hurricane's eye tracked the entire length of Jamaica from east to west?

Gilbert came ashore on the east coast as a major hurricane, and its 15-mile-wide eye then travelled along the whole island before gaining strength at sea.

Jamaica's national flower grows on which tree, whose wood is so dense that it sinks in water?

Lignum vitae, Latin for 'wood of life', earned its name from the medicinal resin, and its timber was long used for British police truncheons.

Which Jamaican reptile, believed extinct since 1948, was rediscovered alive in the Hellshire Hills in 1990?

An iguana chased into a hollow log by a hog hunter's hound proved the species had survived; a later study counted only about 50 animals.

Which British territory, known for offshore finance, was governed as a dependency of Jamaica until 1962?

The Cayman Islands chose to stay British when Jamaica went independent, becoming a separate Crown colony after 99 years tied to Kingston.

Which former RAF Spitfire pilot won Jamaica's first Olympic gold medal, in the 400 metres at London 1948?

Arthur Wint, known as the Gentle Giant, beat his own team-mate Herb McKenley to the line and went on to qualify in medicine.

Which Jamaican fast bowler became the first man to take 500 Test wickets, reaching the mark in 2001?

Courtney Walsh claimed his 500th victim by trapping South Africa's Jacques Kallis leg before in Trinidad, and finished with 519 wickets from 132 Tests.

Merlene Ottey won nine Olympic medals for Jamaica before sprinting for which European country from 2002?

Slovenia fielded her until she was 52, when she anchored its sprint relay team at the 2012 European Championships.

Which hibiscus relative, widely planted for reforestation and timber, is Jamaica's national tree?

Blue mahoe is named for the blue-green streaks that show in its wood once it is milled, although the tint tends to fade over the years.

Which river, reaching the sea at Carlisle Bay on the south coast, is the longest in Jamaica?

Rio Minho took the title from the Black River, long believed to be the longest, once it was measured at 92.8 km, almost 40 km more than its rival.

Seaford Town in western Jamaica was settled around 1835 by labourers recruited from which European country?

Germany supplied more than a thousand migrants after emancipation left planters short of workers, and Seaford Town earned the nickname German Town.

Which physician, whose collection founded the British Museum, is credited with devising chocolate milk in Jamaica?

Hans Sloane arrived in 1687 as the new governor's personal medic and reportedly found the local cocoa drink nauseating; he was probably not the first to add milk.

Which body created under the UN Law of the Sea treaty has its headquarters in Kingston, Jamaica?

The International Seabed Authority decides who may mine the deep ocean floor beyond national waters, and its members gather in Kingston for annual sessions.

Since a 1972 campaign, Jamaicans have traditionally spent the Labour Day public holiday doing what?

Community volunteer work replaced the rallies when the government recast the holiday around hands-on projects; the first national effort planted trees along a main road.

Jamaica's national costume, worn for dancing the quadrille, is made from which checked cotton cloth?

Bandana cloth, a bright madras plaid, makes the skirt and matching head tie, while male dancers wear a shirt of it with white trousers.

In 1966 Kingston became the first city outside the 'White Dominions' to host which multi-sport event?

The Commonwealth Games of 1966 were also the first to hold their opening ceremony in the evening, and badminton and shooting made their debuts there.