Avalon Region
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St. John's is the oldest English-founded settlement in North America.[1] Tradition declares that the city earned its name when explorer John Cabot became the first European to sail into the harbour, on June 24, 1497 — the feast day of Saint John the Baptist. However, the exact locations of Cabot's landfalls are disputed. A series of expeditions to St. John's by Portuguese in the Azores followed in the early 16th century, and by 1540 French, Spanish and Portuguese crossed the Atlantic annually to fish the waters off the Avalon Peninsula. In the Basque Country, it is a common belief that the name of St. John's was given by Basque fishermen because the bay of St. John's is very similar to the Bay of Pasaia in the Basque Country, where one of the fishing towns surrounding it, is also called St. John (in Spanish, San Juan).
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.