The capital city is Basseterre, located on the larger island of Saint Kitts. Basseterre is also the main port for both passenger entry (via cruise ships) and cargo. The smaller island of Nevis lies approximately 3 km (2 mi) to the southeast of Saint Kitts, across a shallow channel called The Narrows.
Saint Kitts was named Liamuiga, which roughly translates as 'fertile land', by the Kalinago, who originally inhabited the island. The name is preserved via St. Kitts's tallest peak, Mount Liamuiga. Nevis's pre-Columbian name was Oualie, meaning "land of beautiful waters".
It is thought that Christopher Columbus, the first European to see the islands in 1493, named the larger island San Cristóbal, after Saint Christopher, his patron saint, and that of travelers. New studies suggest that Columbus named the island Sant Yago (Saint James) and that the name San Cristóbal was in fact given by Columbus to the island now known as Saba, 32 km (20 mi) northwest. It seems that San Cristóbal came to be applied to the island of St. Kitts only as a result of a mapping error. No matter the origin of the name, the island was well documented as San Cristóbal by the 17th century. The first English colonists kept the English translation of this name and dubbed it St. Christopher's Island. In the 17th century, a common nickname for Christopher was Kit(t); hence, the island came to be informally referred to as Saint Kitt's Island, later further shortened to Saint Kitts.
Columbus gave Nevis the name San Martín. The current name Nevis is derived from the Spanish name Nuestra Señora de las Nieves, meaning 'Our Lady of the Snows'. It is not known who chose this name for the island, but it is a reference to the story of a 4th-century Catholic miracle: a summertime snowfall on the Esquiline Hill in Rome. It is thought that the white clouds which usually wreathe the top of Nevis Peak reminded someone of the story of a miraculous snowfall in a hot climate. The island of Nevis, upon first British settlement, was referred to as Dulcina, a name meaning 'sweet one' in Spanish. Eventually, the original Spanish name was restored and used in the shortened form, Nevis.
Today the Constitution refers to the state as both Saint Kitts and Nevis and Saint Christopher and Nevis, but the former is the one most commonly used, however, the latter is generally used for diplomatic relations.
Christopher Columbus, the first European to reach the island, named it after St. Vincent of Saragossa, whose feast day it was on the day Columbus first saw it (January 22, 1498). The name of the Grenadines refers to the Spanish city of Granada, but to differentiate it from the island of the same name, the diminutive was used. Before the arrival of the Spaniards, the Carib natives who inhabited the island of St. Vincent called it Youloumain, in honor of Youlouca, the spirit of the rainbows, who they believed inhabited the island.