Guanches

The Guanche were the historic indigenous inhabitants of the Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean some 100 kilometres (60 mi) west of the North African coast. They spoke the Guanche language. Believed to have been related to Berber languages of North Africa, it became extinct in the 17th century after the islands were colonized.

It is believed that the Guanche may have arrived at the archipelago some time in the first millennium BC. The Guanche were the only indigenous people known to have lived in the Macaronesian archipelago region before the arrival of Europeans. There is no accepted evidence that the other Macaronesian archipelagos (the Cape Verde Islands, Madeira and the Azores) were inhabited.

After the Spanish conquest of the Canaries starting in the early 15th century, many natives were killed by the Spanish conquerors or died of disease during the social disruption. The remainder assimilated over time into the settler population and culture. Elements of their original culture survive within Canarian customs and traditions, such as Silbo (the whistled language of La Gomera Island), as well as some lexicon of Canarian Spanish. Some scholars have classified the destruction of the Guanche people and culture as an early example of colonial genocide.

In 2017, the first genome-wide data from the ethnic Guanche confirmed a North African origin. They were genetically most similar to ancient North African Berber peoples of the nearby African mainland.