In the 17th century, this street formed the northern border of the colony of New Amsterdam, which belonged to the Dutch, who had constructed a wall to protect themselves from the Lenape Indians and the British settlers. However, the name Wall Street does not refer to this wall, but to the first owner of Manhattan, a Walloon, who bought his lands and left them on the arrival of the Dutch. In Dutch, a Walloon was a ‘Waal’.
Today Wall Street is the name given to the entire neighbourhood, as well as the world's largest stock exchange in the, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and generally refers to the New York financial world.
