The name Lesser Antilles is given to a long arc of small islands in the West Indies. These islands in the Caribbean Sea extend in a north-south direction from the Virgin Islands to Trinidad and then in an east-west direction from Margarita to Aruba off the northern coast of Venezuela.
During early Spanish colonization, around the late 15th century, the north-south portion of the Lesser Antilles was divided into two groups. The French, Dutch, and British eventually adopted this division. The names of the groups are Windward and Leeward, reflecting the importance to the region of the prevailing easterly trade winds. The Windward Islands are those ranging south from Dominica to Grenada; the Leeward Islands are those that arc generally westerly from Guadeloupe to the Virgin Islands. The east-west chain of islands close to the South American coast, sometimes called the Leeward Antilles, is arid because the trade winds drop their moisture on the Windward group.