Dominica's Heritage

Tabery: (C) A former sugar and lime estate on the east coast near to La Plaine owned from the early 19th century by the Bertrand family and in the 20th century by the Winston and Potter families. It covered an area of 1,200 acres that extended up the Tabery River valley and along the seashore at Bout Sable beach. It gets its name from the Carib word for a house, Taboui. In the years just before emancipation Tabery was worked by 160 slaves and produced 87,000 lbs of sugar and 3,000 gallons of rum. The estate gradually went into decline and the ruins of the old sugar factory lie in bush near to the present main road.

Tablette: (F) A local sweet usually made of grated coconut boiled in sugar that hardens when cooled. Some boiled in brown sugar are caramel in colour while others boiled in white sugar are often coloured pink or green with vegetable dye. From the French, tablette, for 'cake, slab'.

Tache: (F) A large, round, copper or iron pot used from the 18th century to boil sugar-cane juice during the heating process that crystallized it into sugar. A series of taches stood in a row over a furnace and the thickening boiling juice was ladled from one tache to the other. Later, when the sugar industry declined, these were also used to boil lime juice, to concentrate it, and as a 'platin' for making cassava flour (farine). A Tache is also called 'cappa' in Dominica even if made of iron. From old French: 'plate of iron'.

Taffia: (F) An old French name for fermented cane juice used in the making of rum. The colour is a slightly cloudy brown. In the hills behind Capuchin flows the Taffia River, which was given this name by the French because the water, although quite clean, is always the colour of taffia. This is because it flows through volcanic clay that is part of the crater of the Morne Aux Diable volcano in an area called Soufriere. It appears on the earliest detailed map of the island by Thomas Jefferys, 1768, as "Taffia or Rum River". The Taffia River is the source of water for the village of Capuchin and it ends in a waterfall that cascades over a cliff directly into the sea. The track leading from Capuchin to Pennville crosses the river near Seaman Estate.

Tamarind: (E) These trees come from India and were introduced to Dominica during the 18th century. The trees have a dense dark green rounded crown and are long lived. Brown uneven pods, about three inches long, are usually seen hanging from the tree. The pulp that surrounds the seeds has a tart but good flavour. This is eaten raw or is made into juice. A sugared sweet of rolled pulp called "Tamarind Balls" is also popular. The pulp used to be exported in large quantities in the 19th century as an ingredient for sauces and preserves. In the late 18th century an avenue of Tamarind trees was planted all along the seafront of Goodwill Estate, from the Roseau River mouth to Fond Cole to protect the shoreline. About nine of them still survive and they are over 200 years old.

Tan, Bois Tan: (F) (Picramnia antidesmoides) This is a small shrubby tree. The leaves, when moistened and rubbed on an article to be coloured, yields a mauve dye. This dye is used by Carib artisans to colour the roots of the lianas called mibi (Anthurium palmatum or Monstera pertusa) used in making a type of round spiral Carib basket. Not to be confused with another tree also called Bios Tan and Moricypre (Byresonima spicata).

Tannia: (C) (Xanthosoma spp.) A starchy root tuber native to tropical America cultivated in Dominica since pre-Columbian times and which was probably brought to Dominica from the mainland by the early indigenous farmers. The word, tannia, that we use today, comes from the Carib name for it: taia. The French called it Chou Caraibe. It is one of the staple starchy foods of the island. The Caribs also cooked the heart of the tannia leaves as is done in the case of Dasheen. Some botanists mention a red-ribbed leaf variety, "chou poivre", whose juice the Caribs rubbed on themselves as a charm when going to war. Also called by some "chou fwedi" it is made into a tea used against chills.

Tarreau: (C) A community and cliff along the west coast. The name comes from: tuerou, the Carib word for the White-Tailed Tropic Bird (Phaethon lepturus), a seabird which nests in holes high up on the face of this cliff. The birds nest mainly between December and June, but are most active there in April and May when feeding their young. This bird also gave its name to a small fishing and farming community that grew up in the nearby valley during colonial times. Before Rodney's Rock was given its name in the 1780s, that headland was known as Pointe Tarreau. From the early 1900s a road was constructed along the beach at the base of the Tarreau Cliff and since that time successive governments have wasted millions of pounds and dollars fighting with the sea, rather than going the old way up and along the top of the cliff. However millions have just recently been wasted doing this as well for the aborted Electricity Power Plant.

Taylor, Douglas Macrae: (1901-1980) Linguist and anthropologist considered to be the most respected and prolific academic to be associated with Dominica. Born in Yorkshire, U.K., he was a graduate of St. Peter's College, University of Cambridge, where he studied modern languages. He became the world authority on the Island-Carib culture and a distinguished pioneer of Caribbean linguistics. His major works were "The Caribs of Dominica" (1938), "Ethnobotany of the Island Caribs" with W.H. Hodge (1957) and "Languages of the West Indies"(1977), just three of some 70 publications on Dominica alone, that included monographs and articles. Douglas Taylor first came to Dominica in 1930, residing permanently from 1938. Shortly after his arrival here he was accused of fomenting trouble in the Carib Reserve by the British Administrator, E.C. Eliot, and of encouraging the "Carib War" of September 1930, charges that Taylor strongly denied. His first marriage, to an American, ended in divorce and he then married Martina Benjamin, a Carib woman of Bataca, with whom he had several children. He spent most of his time researching and writing at his home at Magua, Bellevue Chopin, between his occasional teaching assignments at the universities of Yale and Oxford. In 1979, a year before his death, he was awarded an honourary doctorate by the University of the West Indies, which he received at the Cave Hill Campus, Barbados. He left Dominica after the destruction of Hurricane David and died in England in 1980.

Tea: (E) A British visitor to Dominica may be perplexed by our use of the word "tea". It does not merely refer to an infusion made of dried leaves imported from the Asia. That in Dominica is "green tea". Here, there are many other types of tea: "Cocoa Tea", made of roasted, pounded and grated cocoa beans, and any number of particular "bush teas". The latter is any infusion of herbs, including in certain cases their roots and/or flowers known to cure particular ailments or give relief. There are "hot teas" and "cooling teas". "Tea" also often refers to the first meal of the day, rather than the word "breakfast". This comes from the days of the plantation when "tea" was taken at sunrise before going to work and another "tea" was taken in the middle of the morning.

Temple: (E) An estate situated between Eden and Woodford Hill that was named in the 1770s after its first English owner William Temple. It was originally 196 acres in size, but by the mid 19th century was absorbed into Woodford Hill, then owned by Charles Leatham. In the 20th century Temple was part of a group of northern estates owned by Estates Investment Trust of Dominica and then by Captain Stebbings, whose widow sold it to Frobel Laville who some years later gave it to his eldest daughter at her wedding. In the 1970s the government of Dominica under Premier Patrick John compulsorily acquired the estate along with part of Woodford Hill as part of a scheme planned in conjunction with Attorney General Leo Austin and self-confessed Barbadian gun runner Sydney Burnette Alleyne to use as part of a proposed jet airport and offshore services centre. The plan never materialized, but government still owns the land, part of which has been donated for the establishment of a Seventh Day Adventist School.

Tete Chien: (F) (Boa constrictor nebulous) A robust brown snake with darker blotches on its skin forming a sinuous pattern along the entire body. It grows up to 3 meters long. Its French Creole name comes from the dog-like shape of its head. It is widespread from the dry coastal zone and cultivated areas through to the rain forest. Frequently encountered on country roads during the night or on land recently cleared for cultivation where it warms itself in the sun. It is particularly fond of stony areas where it can warm itself on rocks and secure itself beneath ledges. When mating, Tete Chiens gather in a "cavalage", or snake pit, writhing over each other, often a dozen at a time. The snake features prominently in Carib legends as in the case of the "L'escalier Tete Chien" at Sinekou and the "Pagua Rock" near Antrisle. It is generally harmless but is widely feared and is often killed by humans. It feeds on rodents and forest wildlife and domestic chickens.

Tete Morne: (F) A community in the heights of Grand Bay, meaning literally "at the head of the mountain". Situated on the ridge that separates the Grand Bay valley from the Soufriere valley, it is at the end of the motorable road. A walking trail continues from Tete Morne down into Soufriere, while another leads from Tete Morne south along the ridge to Palmiste Estate and then down into Bois Cotlette Estate, part of the old trails connecting settlements in the south of Dominica.

Thaly, Daniel: (1879-1950) Physician, poet, ornithologist and museum curator. Best known as a poet, he is the most neglected of Dominica's writers, because all of his works remain in French and since he studied and worked in Martinique, and we do not care, that French department has claimed him as their own. As in the rest of the French Antilles his work is studied and written about as a pioneer of Antillian self-awareness in literature. Born in Dominica on 2 December 1879, (his mother was a Bellot) he was educated at the Lycee St. Pierre in Martinique and studied medicine at Toulouse, France until 1905 when he returned to the Antilles. For years he was archivist at the Schoelcher Library in Fort-de-France, before returning to Dominica. Between 1899 and 1932 he published ten volumes of poetry and contributed to Parisian magazines and, later, in English, to the Canada-West Indies Magazine. Many of his poems have loving references to Dominica's beauty, particularly in "L'ile bleue" (the blue island). He was a keen bird watcher, providing an early record of many of the island's birds. He was curator of the Victoria Museum in Roseau and owned Hertford Estate, popularly called Jimmit on the west coast. He lived in Roseau, where the Wesley High School now stands, and where he died on 1 October 1950.

Thibaud: (F) This fishing and farming village is on the north coast near to Vieille Case. It appears on the earliest detailed map of the island by Thomas Jefferys, 1768. It is named after an early French settler Louis Thibaud (spelt in the early British texts as Teaubaud) who obtained ten acres from the Caribs in the early 18th century. The community is connected to two bays, one of which, Sandwich Bay, is named after the Fourth Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792). He was a member of the Board of Trade in England, later to become the Colonial Office, at the time that Dominica was ceded to Britain by the Treaty of Paris in 1763. The other bay is the beaching place for the fishing boats of Thibaud. The school playing field was the site of an Amerindian village. During the post-emancipation period the village grew as labourers from the estates of Moor Park and Blenheim settled there.

Titiri: (C) The Carib name we still use today for one type of Goby fish (Sicydium punctatum). Adult females lay eggs up the rivers in nests that are excavated in loose gravel by the males who also provide most of the parental care for the eggs. When the minute larvae hatch from the eggs they make their way down to the sea by a combination of river flow and cycles of downward sinking and upward swimming. Once out in the open sea, their post-larval growth quickens. Here they spend most of their time before returning to migrate up the rivers. Swarms of millions of Titiwi arrive at the river mouths, particularly along the west coast, to begin making their way up river to their mating and nesting places. Although Titiwi go from the sea into the rivers throughout the year, the highest yields are usually from September, peaking in November. The migrations occur regularly and reliably on the fourth day after the Moon's last quarter. At this stage they are only about 22 mm long and their colour darkens immediately on their arrival into fresh river water. Once in the river they move powerfully up streams over rocks, through rapids and up waterfalls. On reaching up river they mate and nest and the whole cycle starts all over again. Titiwi travel in such a mass that they are caught in baskets, fine nets and sacks at the mouths of the rivers. The most popular culinary preparation is to fry them in batter as "Titiwi Accras".

Ti Tou Gorge: (F) A narrow gorge in the heights of the Roseau River near Laudat that became a source of water for hydro-electricity from the early 1950s and a tourist attraction during the late 20th century. The name comes for the French Creole for "little hole" or opening. The gorge is formed by the action of water coming from the Freshwater Lake, which over thousands of years has cut its way through the thick layers of volcanic ash that compacted after the eruptions of Morne Macacque (Micotrin). This form of rock is called "welded tuff". As the water cut its way through this, it carved out pools and waterfalls over and around harder rocks lodged in the tuff. At the end of the gorge the water continued down river to cascade over the higher of the two Trafalgar Falls. When CDC was constructing the first hydro scheme in the 1950s, the mouth of the gorge was dammed so as to divert the water into canals and pipes. This raised the level of the water in the gorge so that it became a popular experience to swim up the gorge and it is now one of Dominica's tourist attractions.

Tobacco: (C) The tobacco plant (Nicotiana tabacum) is a native of the Caribbean and tropical America. The indigenous people of Dominica used the leaves in a number of ways. It was dried, shredded and inhaled as powder, blown on ailing infants by midwives, pressed and drunk as juice, chewed and used as magic charms and rolled and smoked as cigars. After Columbus' visits to the region, smoking, using pipes or cigars quickly became the fashion in Europe. The Caribs of Dominica developed a trade in tobacco with English and French mariners mainly at the Grand Anse anchorage, today's Portsmouth. They exchanged tobacco for iron axes, knives, mirrors, scissors and other trade goods. When French colonization began, tobacco, (Tabac Payie) production was the biggest trade item before coffee, sugar and rum took its place. In the 20th century, J.A.S. Garraway & Co. resurrected the tobacco industry, planting and processing its own crop at Hillsborough and in Roseau. Up to the 1960s, Hillsborough cigars were a high quality export and Hillsborough cigarettes took over the local market. Today, although the cigarettes are still produced, all the tobacco to make them is imported.

Tobino: (C) The Carib name for a small settlement on the north coast between Thibaud and Vieille Case. It overlooks an important archaeological site where indigenous people once had their village centuries before Columbus.

Toli: (C) A Carib word used in Dominican Creole, mainly during childhood, for the penis. It comes from the Carib, touli, ("it pierces") and had a double meaning among the Caribs for penis as well as a torch or flambeau. The touli as flambeau, was made out of Bois Chandelle (Erithalis fruticosa) a very hard wood, which exudes gum and ignites very easily. It was made of chips of the wood tied together to a length of about one meter. This touli "pierces the dark". Words that included touli, toula or toullou all relate to piercing, entering or enlarging. Toulloua: "to dig". Toulouti: "to thicken to grow large". Toulacoua: "to slip in". Katoulatou: "It is swollen". Toullougouta: "to spill, to ejaculate". Touli is one of the many examples of word play and the method of word and idea construction found throughout the Carib/Arawakan language.

Toluman: (C) Arrowroot, grown by the Caribs as a source of starch obtained from the rhizome roots. The word, toluman, is applied to several species of rhizome of both the Cannaceae, the Canna family and the Marataceae, the arrowroot family. The tubers are grated and squeezed to produce a starch used mainly for feeding babies. It was used in magic and a poultice made of it, mixed with wild bees wax, was said to cure the effects of poisoned arrows, hence the English name, arrowroot.

Tosh: (A) A small round piece of padding made of a coil of cloth or dried banana leaves, which is put on top of the head to act as a pad when carrying heavy loads on the head. Associated with the verb -tuta, -tota: "to carry, pick up, load" in Kikongo, Ci-Luba and other Bantu languages common to West Africa.

Toubak (too-bac): (C) Truancy, to stay away, especially from school: "To make touback". From the Carib word toua (ba), to run away, to secrete oneself.

Toucari: (F) Le Trou Quarre was the French name for the sandy cove north of Douglas Bay where there is a church and small village. Today it is written as Toucari. It was the site of the establishment of the first Roman Catholic chapel in the north of Dominica by French missionaries early in the 18th century. In an advisory to British sailors it was noted as "the first bay of shelter for ships sailing from the north or east of the island." It is a fishing village, but is increasingly visited by tourists who enjoy its picturesque setting and sandy beach with offshore reefs for snorkelling and scuba diving. A sunken wreck off the bay is said to be a World War I German vessel, which is popular with divers.

Toutwell: (F) Zenaida Dove (Zenaida aurita) This dove is a common resident and breeder in dry forest along the west coast and littoral woodland along the east and north coasts. It is well known for its mournful call, a gentle cooing. It is reddish-brown with a whitish abdomen and rounded tail with white tips. It usually feeds on seeds on the ground, but sometimes takes seeds and fruit from trees. The breeding season is generally from February to June. Because of its ground feeding habits, traps of African and Carib origin, made out of twigs, are often set in little clearings to catch Toutwells.

Trafalgar: (E) A village in the Roseau Valley that takes its name from an estate in the area that was named after the Battle of Trafalgar. This famous naval engagement was fought between the British and French fleets off the coast of Spain in 1805. It resulted in a major British victory and many places around the British Empire were named "Trafalgar" in its honour. In Dominica, an English family called Keay owned this estate and named it Trafalgar. As was the custom here, the area of the estate house and the land around it became known in Creole as Kai Keay (Keay's House). But by the 20th century, with the Keays long since departed, the pronunciation became "Kai Cheay". This is still the Creole name for the village. In 1827 Trafalgar was worked by 26 slaves who produced 4,225 lbs. of coffee. After the coffee blight of the 1840s it switched to growing sugar. In these years following emancipation, workers on the estate got access to land upon which to build their huts and establish gardens. It was one of the main settlements in the vicinity of Roseau that supplied the capital with vegetables. A track through the village led to the nearby twin waterfalls, which were also given the name, Trafalgar. In 1954 the Commonwealth Development Corporation (CDC) constructed a power plant at the base of the Trafalgar cliffs, utilizing water piped from the Laudat area to power electric turbines. A motorable road was built to service this project at the same time making the falls more accessible to visitors. In the 1960s, Trafalgar village began to expand and became a popular centre of entertainment with the opening of two discotheques, the first of their type in Dominica: Laye ka Fete and the Manicou. Land at Lilly Valley nearby was opened up for a government housing scheme and the estate of Shawford was later subdivided for private housing. In the late 20th century Trafalgar was virtually becoming a suburb of Roseau. A number of guesthouses sprang up led by Papillotte Wilderness Retreat and Nature Sanctuary. The Trafalgar Falls have become an important visitor site particularly for cruise ship passengers and tourism related services have joined agriculture as the main income earner of the village.

Treaty: During the colonial period the fate of Dominica was determined by a number of treaties agreed upon by the European powers, chiefly the British and the French, at different times in her history. Names were given to these treaties depending on where they were negotiated and signed. Islands such as Dominica were pawns in a game for international power and they were used like pieces of a chess game to further the fortunes of whichever nation had the upper hand around the negotiation table. This was based on military victories scored during wars between the two nations.

Treaty of Aix-La-Chapelle: This treaty declared that Dominica would remain neutral and be left to the Caribs forever and would not be contested over by the British and French. It was signed in the French city of Aix-La-Chapelle on 7 October 1748. It confirmed agreements of 1660 and 1668; the latter of which stated: "The island of Dominica shall remain in the state in which it now is and shall be inhabited by the savages to which it has been left, so that neither of the two nations may place her under possession." But even while the treaty was being signed there were already French settlers established on the island. In the years that followed, the British accused the French of breaking the terms of the treaty and used this as an excuse to attack and capture the island in 1761.

Treaty of Paris: This was the treaty that formally ceded Dominica to the British. It was signed in Paris on 10 February 1763 at the end of "The Seven Years War". During the war, which had been fought in Canada, India, the Mediterranean, and the West Indies, the British captured Dominica in a battle at Roseau on 6 June 1761. Article Nine of the treaty legitimised British ownership by European diplomatic convention and surveyors were sent out, land was sold, large numbers of slaves were imported and the classic 18th century plantation system was established.

Treaty of Versailles: This was the treaty that returned Dominica to the British after five years of French occupation (1778 -1783). It was signed in the Palace of Versailles 3 September 1783. It was part of the arrangements ending the American War of Independence, because France had joined the war on the side of the American colonists against the British. During the war, the French captured Dominica on 7 September 1778 and had hoped to hold onto it. But on 12 April 1782, Admiral Rodney defeated the French at the Battle of The Saintes. This victory gave the British the upper hand to demand Dominica back and the treaty confirmed this. The French tried to capture the island on two other occasions, in 1795 and 1805, but were unsuccessful and the island remained British until 1978.

Trembleur: (F) (Cinclocerthia ruficauda) A brown bird with dark reddish-olive upper parts about 23-26 cm in length with a long bill and yellow iris. It trembles and bobs, hopping from branch to branch, a characteristic from which it got its name. It lives mainly in the wet forests, although it occurs in secondary forests and drier woodlands. It nests in a cavity in a tree or builds a domed nest of grass with a side entrance. It breeds in March and April and lays two to three greenish-blue eggs.

Trois Pitons, Morne: (F) The second highest mountain on Dominica rising to 4,600 feet. It was named by the French for its three prominent peaks, which are best seen from the sea off the west coast. In fact, the summit is made up of several other lesser peaks all of which are the remains of individual volcanic cones that together comprise the entire massif. Recent volcanic assessment has suggested that Morne Micotrin (Macaque), to the south, may also be part of the Trois Pitons volcanic system. It is one of the seven live volcanic centers on Dominica. In 1918 there was a dispute between visiting British geographers over an altitude reading that Trois Pitons was in fact the island's highest mountain, but the traditional recorded height continued to be accepted. The massif is made up mainly of pyroclastic deposits and fragments of collapsed domes. It is an area of extremely high rainfall and is largely covered by elfin woodland and montane forest, with some rainforest at lower elevations. In 1975 the mountain formed the centrepiece of the Morne Trois Pitons National Park, which was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1997.

Turtles: Family Cheloniidae. Sea turtles are members of the ocean-living reptile family that frequent the coastal waters and shores of Dominica to feed and lay their eggs. Their numbers have been declining as hunting and raiding of eggs has increased. The different species of sea turtle were among the best loved of the mythological creatures of the indigenous people. In legends it transported their ancestors across the ocean, in some stories back to South America, and it sheltered them under its massive shell. The species that still frequent Dominica are the Green Turtle (Chelonia mydas); Hawksbill Turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata); and Loggerhead Turtle (Caretta caretta). Of the leathery sea turtles, family Dermochelydae, the Leatherback Turtle (Dermochelys coriacea) is also an occasional visitor. The sites for laying eggs are being reduced to fewer and fewer beaches. Long ago the beaches were less frequented by humans but now the turtles arrive to almost certain death. The large sandy beaches of the east coast are most frequented: Bout Sable at La Plaine, Rosalie and Castle Bruce. In the north at Londonderry, Woodford Hill, L'Anse Torti, Hodges, Pointe Baptiste, Hampstead and Batibou among them, and Toucari to Pointe Ronde on the west coast. They arrive to lay at night and unfortunately the marks of their tracks in the sand lead poachers directly to their eggs.

Tyne: (E) The steam vessel RMS Tyne operated between the Leeward Islands and around the coast of Dominica from April 1891 to about 1906. It was chartered from the Royal Mail Steamship Company and was subsidized by the government of the Leeward Islands of which Dominica was at the time a member. Its regular inter-island schedule greatly facilitated the movement of labour and produce between the islands. At Dominica it took mail, goods and passengers around the island, anchoring off places such as Rosalie, Saint Sauveur, Marigot, Woodford Hill and Portsmouth to take on produce, mainly cocoa, lime juice and rum for onward shipment from Roseau. It did this coastal run until being replaced by the RMS Yare, which was reserved specifically for the Dominica coastal service..

Vai-ki-vai: (F) Things that are done in a disorderly way; in an unplanned or haphazard manner; carelessly; shabbily. From the French: vaille que vaille, "at all costs, come what may".

Valley: (E) Dominica is a very mountainous island and thereby also an island of valleys. Several place names draw attention to this physical feature: Antrim Valley, Charlotte Valley, York Valley etc. In Creole the word "fond" is used in place of the English "valley" as in Grand Fond, Fond Zombie or Fond Miel. One valley however, which does not have a prefix in popular parlance is the Roseau Valley which is simply called "The Valley". It begins with Valley Road, leading eastward out of the capital and includes the villages of Laudat, Trafalgar, Wotton Waven and Morne Prosper. The use of the term was strengthened when new electoral constituencies were delineated in 1974 and the Roseau Valley constituency was created. The member elected here is popularly referred to as "the man from (or for) the Valley" most notably in the case of Henry George, DFP, 1980-1995.

Vanilla: (E) (Vanilla fragrans) A climbing orchid native to Mexico, but cultivated in the Caribbean, Java, Mauritius and other tropical regions for the seed pod, the vanilla bean, which yields vanilla extract. The green stem climbs by aerial rootlets and bears thick oblong leaves and clusters of large yellow-white flowers in February - March. The flowers have to be pollinated by hand because the insect that performs this naturally does not exist here. The pods are about 8 inches long with an aromatic pulp and small black seeds. They are picked green and then dried to prepare the extract. Dominica produced small quantities of vanilla from the 18th century, but the industry grew after the collapse of the lime boom in the 1920s, reaching its peak towards the end of World War II when shipments from Madagascar and the Far East to the US were disrupted. A Vanilla Growers Association was formed in the 1940s, but local setbacks, including a disastrous fire in which a whole season's crop was lost, and devious practices by some growers in substituting White Cedar (Powier) pods for vanilla beans, as well as international changes such as post-war shifts in trade and the invention of artificial vanilla essence, vanillin, killed the market. But by then farmers were shifting to their new hope: bananas!

Varé: (F) Fish known in English as Marlin and Swordfish (Makaira albida and Xyphias gladius). The sailfish (Istiophorus americanus) is also sometimes called a varé. These are large pelagic fish 20 to 100kg in weight. They are caught on a long line usually trolled behind a boat and are known for their speed, power and aggressiveness when being caught. The Creole name comes from "varé" or "spear" for the long pointed top jaw of the fish. This was often sawn off by fishermen and used as a file for woodwork or as a small grater. The pale flesh of these fish is firm and tasty.

Vauxhall: (E) A small estate up along the Melville Hall River in the north east of the island. It was named after an area in south London where a popular pleasure garden was located during the 18th century. A bridge in the area leading to farms on the south side of the Melville Hall River is called the Vauxhall Bridge.

Vaval: (F) The spirit of Carnival, an effigy representing the spirit of Carnival. In the neighbouring French islands and in certain villages of Dominica revelers celebrate "Téwé Vaval" on the afternoon of Ash Wednesday, to symbolically bury or burn the spirit of Carnival. In the Carib Territory and at Dublanc, effigies of Vaval, made of old clothes, fiber stuffing and cloth or cardboard masks are paraded along the roadways and burned at sunset marking the end of revelry and the beginning of Lent. The practice dates from early Christian Europe and was brought to Dominica from the French islands where it is a very popular climax to the Carnival season.

Vep: (F) A free ride. The word comes from the Roman Catholic service of Vespers or Verpe at which a collection was not taken. The service was therefore "free". Anything obtained for free was then referred to as "a vep" in Creole.

Vert: (F) On such a forested island it is only natural that the French for "green" appears in some place names. However it usually refers to areas covered in patches of grass in the same way that the words savanne or paille are used. Examples are Morne Vert in the south between the Soufriere Valley and Grand Coulibri. Also Tapis Vert (green carpet) behind Salisbury and Grand Savanne.

Vernon, Admiral: A famous British admiral who visited Prince Rupert Bay with his fleet of ships in 1739 on his way to attack and capture the Spanish city of Porto Bello on the isthmus of Panama.

Vetiver: (F) (Vetiveria zizaniodes), A long-leafed grass, native to Asia and introduced to Dominica at the end of the 18th century. It came along with other plants including the breadfruit from the South Pacific, brought to the St. Vincent Botanic Gardens and then distributed to Dominica. The scented roots of the vetiver were dried and woven into small screens to perfume living quarters. The roots were also bundled to place in drawers and large Carib baskets for scenting linen and clothes. The Caribs bleached the leaves by boiling and sun dried them before splitting them in two for plaiting hats. The grass was also used as thatch. Vetiver mats were made by drying the leaves and then plaiting them into lengths. These were then coiled flat into decorative shapes and sewn together. In the 20th century a vetiver mat-making industry was developed by Belgian nuns through the establishment of the Convent Industrial School on Turkey Lane. A Vetiver mat was Dominica's wedding present to Princess Diana and Prince Charles in 1981. Vetiver was once widely used in agriculture to prevent soil erosion on hillsides. It was planted along contours as part of field maintenance and conservation, a practice that has foolishly been abandoned.

Vieille Case: (F) A village on the north coast situated on sloping land directly above ravines and sea cliffs created by volcanic outflows from the volcano of Morne Aux Diables. Due to its inaccessibility this area was still occupied by Caribs for over two hundred years after being sighted by Christopher Columbus. There are archaeological sites at Au Tou and Au Parc. The Carib name for the area is Itassi. The first recorded contact with the French was made between the Carib Chief Kalamiena of Itassi and Father Raymond Breton, a French Roman Catholic missionary of the Dominican Order then based in Guadeloupe. Breton lived among the Caribs of Itassi off and on from 1642 to 1648. Here in the chief's longhouse or karbay, he celebrated the first recorded Christian Mass with the inhabitants of Dominica in 1646. Through Chief Kalamiena and subsequent chiefs such as Le Baron, close French links were developed between the people of Itassi and the French in Basseterre, Guadeloupe. Two Carib men of Itassi were taken to France to train as priests; one died in France and the other returned but reverted to his former traditions. The contact with Guadeloupe encouraged settlers from poor white (petite blanc) families, who were being sidelined by the expansion of sugar industry in Guadeloupe, to come and settle among the Caribs. Most of the Caribs intermixed with these French smallholders and therefore many Vieille Case families have French and African as well as Carib ancestry.
They began to call the place Vieille Case apparently from the old Carib karbays that still stood there when the French arrived. Because of the steep jagged nature of the land, no large estates developed at Vieille Case even after the British took over Dominica in 1763. It remained a community of small holders, mainly peasant proprietors owning a few slaves to produce coffee. The tax records of 1827, for instance, show members of the Brumant families with 11, 14 and 15 slaves each and producing an average of 900 lbs of coffee a year. The four Royer holdings averaged 4 slaves each and Joseph Le Blanc had 7 slaves and Jean Baptiste Le Blanc had 9. However after the coffee blight of the 1840s, Vieille Case shifted to sugar. It was an isolated community well into the 1920s that had more contact with Mariegalante and Guadeloupe than it had with Roseau. The wider community is composed of many different zones such as Coton, Paille, Balthazar, En Bas and Au Tou among others. The church, run by the FMI fathers from 1872, was the focus of the community and the construction of the existing church began later in the 1870s. In the 1940s the Village Board system was introduced with much local opposition at first. Slowly by the mid-20th century a motorable road reached Vieille Case. Attention was drawn to the village from 1961, when one of its sons, Edward Oliver Le Blanc, became Chief Minister and later Premier of Dominica. Improved water systems, village roads, improved school buildings, a health clinic and electricity followed from the 1960s.

Visou: (F) Freshly crushed sugar cane juice. This was widely used for sweetening beverages and many house yards had a small press so as to crush sugar cane for juice whenever necessary. On the plantations, such as Canefield, that produced sugar up to 1900, "visou" applied to the juice before it entered the boilers or "taches" where it was heated into syrup " siwo", for the making of sugar. The domestic visou press consisted of a thick post or even a live tree trunk with a hole cut through it. A wooden lever was placed into this hole and a stick of sugar cane was put across a wedge cut into the wood below the lever. When the lever was lowered onto the cane, the juice ran out down a spout and into a calabash or other container. A few of these presses are still in use in certain villages. Today there has been a resurgence of demand for visou as a cooling drink but it is now crushed in motorized crushers and is sold ice cold.

Viv: (F) A type of fish (Malacanthus plumieri), family Malacanthidae. They are brownish gray with a hint of green and their dorsal and anal fins run continuously along the body. They live along the coastline.

Vivanno: (C) Types of sea fish, Silk Snapper (Lutjanus vivanus), Red Snapper (Lutjanus campechanus). When Fr. Raymond Breton was compiling his Carib Dictionary in 1665, the Kallinago/Carib people pronounced the word Oua-ioua-nao. He noted: "this [fish] is red and it is larger than the largest carp, known as Sarde, and there are several kinds".

Viyo: (F) River snail, periwinkle: An edible freshwater snail that lives on stones mainly in the larger rivers of the island. Viyo is easily picked off the rocks and boiled before laboriously taking the meat out of each shell using a sharp point. Hundreds of viyo are required for an adequate meal. Men particularly, will go to all of this effort because of its reputation as an aphrodisiac. The movement of viyo snails over rocks provides a forewarning of river flooding. As they sense the water rising they move higher up the rocks and around the boulders away from the force of the oncoming water that they know will follow. Viyo are very susceptible to the effects of pollution and have been affected in many places near farmlands by the runoff of agricultural chemicals.

Volant: (F) Flying fish, Atlantic Flying fish (Cypselurus melanurus) is a member of the family Exocoetidae. This family consists of 2 groups, the flying fishes and the halfbeaks, which share several characteristics: a nearly cylindrical body, with pectoral fins located high on the sides, abdominal pelvic fins, and posteriorly placed dorsal and anal fins. The flying fishes differ in having greatly enlarged pectoral fins and elongated pelvic fins, while most halfbeaks have a very long lower jaw. Flying fishes do not really fly, but glide above the surface of the water on their pectoral fins. There are 23 species in American and Caribbean waters. The fish are caught by hook and line or if the schools of flying fish around a boat are very large fish can be caught by scooping them up with a 'kali' basket or net.

Vont Balla: (F) A large cave along the route of the old walking trail from Pont Cassé to Castle Bruce that is said to have been one of the hiding places of the maroon chief, Balla, in the 1780s. It is situated about a mile to the east of Pont Cassé and was used as a sheltering place for walkers caught on the track during heavy rain or at night.

Vonti Zara: (F) A large cave near Belles close to the junction of the Pagayer and Layou rivers that was a hiding place for maroons in the 18th and early 19th centuries and was used by "Dreads" during the 1970s. It may also have been a retreat for indigenous people before Columbus. Today the mouth of the cave is bushed up and it is the home of thousands of bats.

Vwel: (F) A sail, from the French, voile. Sails are no longer generally used on Dominican fishing boats. They were abandoned with the advent of outboard motors from the 1960s. The square sails previously used for canoes were made out of eight cotton flour bags sewn together. The square sail was hoisted on a round wood mast at the bow of the canoe. It was kept open by a "veg", usually a narrow bamboo pole, placed diagonally across the sail from the base of the mast to the outer tip of the "vwel". The sails for the "bot" or "bot Santwa" were triangular and consisted of a jib and mainsail in the European tradition.

Dominica Heritage