During his second voyage, Christopher Columbus discovered the island and named it Santa María la Redonda. However, since Redonda was a small island measuring just 3 km², it was of no interest to the colonial powers, so much so that for centuries it served as a refuge for pirates.  At the end of the 19th century, the British decided to annex Redonda to exploit the phosphate deposits present and produced by the birds that populated Redonda. From then on, Redonda followed the fortunes of the British Empire first and then the State of Antigua and Barbuda. Mining on the island continued until the early 1900s, when the mining company operating on the island decided to abandon it, leaving Redonda to its former solitude.  Unfortunately, during the mining of Redonda, animals such as rats and goats were introduced, destroying the island's ecosystem. In 2020, a major environmental restoration project eliminated the goats through a capture and relocation program, allowing native fauna to reclaim their territory, especially the "Redonda ameiva," a black lizard about 15 centimeters long. The Environmental Awareness Group (EAG) oversaw and coordinated the restoration project, thanks in part to numerous donations, including anonymous donations from the entourage of King José Juan I, who closely monitored the work of countless volunteers.

The Kingdom of Redonda is a micronation in an uninhabited island in the Antilles archipelago, a dependency of the small Caribbean state of Antigua and Barbuda. The history of this particular kingdom begins in 1880, when a banker of Irish origin and resident in Montserrat, Matthew Dowdy Shiell, had his son Matthew Phipps Shiell crowned with the title of King Felipe following a ceremony officiated by the bishop of Antigua. To day the last King of Redonda, a kingdom based on literary culture, is Giuseppe G. Garbarino under the name of Josè Juan I, who succeeded Giancarlo Ezio Noferi di Montedoglio in 2019.