Aruba, like neighboring Bonaire and Curaçao, was the home of the Arubaes - an Arawak tribe from the South American mainland. The first European to stumble upon Aruba was Alonso de Ojeda, a compatriot of Columbus, who claimed the island for Spain in 1499. The Spanish took little interest in Aruba, apart from shipping some of the Arawaks to work in mines on Hispaniola. Conflict in Europe between Spain and Holland resulted in the Dutch seizing the island in 1636, and the Dutch began to colonize Aruba at the end of the 17th century.

Poor soil and aridity saved the island from plantation economics and the slave trade. Instead the Dutch left the Arawaks to graze livestock on the parched landscape, using the island as a source of meat for other Dutch possessions in the Caribbean. The British arrived in 1805 during the Napoleonic Wars but sailed into the sunset in 1816. Less than a decade later, the first of Aruba's three economic booms took place when gold was discovered near Balashi. A flood of gold-hungry immigrants arrived from Europe and Venezuela, and mining continued right up until 1916.

When the mines became unproductive, Aruba turned to oil refining in a big way. In 1929 the world's largest refinery was built on the southeastern tip of the island. Things hummed along quite swimmingly until the 1940s, when Aruba began to resent playing second fiddle to Curaçao in the federation known as the Netherlands Antilles (then composed of Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao and Suriname). Calls for autonomy increased over the next 40 years, and in 1986 Aruba finally got its way and became an autonomous state within the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

The new level of independence came close on the heels of a severe economic downturn, prompted largely by the closure of Aruba's oil refinery. Having exhausted the real gold and refined the black gold, the Arubians turned to tourism to bankroll their future. Investment in the island's tourist infrastructure has been little short of phenomenal, and Aruba now boasts more than 6000 hotel rooms and almost a million visitors each year.

The refinery reopened in 1991, but tourism is now very much the mainstay of the island's economy. Despite the economic autonomy enabled by the tourist boom, plans for full independence in 1996 were shelved. The Dutch maintain responsibility for the island's foreign affairs and defense and continue to support Aruba's economy.

Arubans are gymnastic linguists, many of them speaking four languages: Dutch, English, Spanish and Papiamento, sometimes in the same conversation. Papiamento is a melodious language derived from every culture that has impacted on the region, including traces of Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, French and local Indian languages. It's spoken throughout the Netherlands Antilles but is more Spanish-based on Aruba, an indication of the island's closer ties with the South American mainland. Making an effort to use a few Papiamento words will delight your Aruban hosts. Bon bini (welcome) is the first Papiamento you'll come across. Another word you'll hear is dushi, which means sweet or lovely; women will hear it more than men.

The Arawak heritage is stronger on Aruba than on most Caribbean islands, though the indigenous language and culture did not last long into the 19th century. No full-blooded Indians remain, but the features of the islanders clearly indicate their genetic heritage. The majority of the population is descended from Arawak, Dutch and Spanish ancestors. Arawak petroglyphs can be seen in several parts of the island, including Fontein cave in the Arikok National Park, and an Indian village is still being excavated at Tanki Flip. Artifacts on view in Oranjestad's Archaeological Museum give clues to the customs of daily and ceremonial Arawak life: there are burial urns and a bone spatula thought to have been used as a vomiting stick to prepare men for ceremonies.

Arubans don't shy away from a party, and the music you'll hear on the island reflects this. The most popular styles are lyric-heavy calypso, beat-based soca and merengue and a local blend known as socarengue that's so sexy you'd expect to see hip-replacement specialists standing by to rescue bump'n'grind victims.