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Abstract Drawing from colonial documents and archaeological evidence, this article challenges our conceptions of the Maroon colonial social category. The article focuses on Maroon testimonies recorded by colonial officials and the archaeological record of a Maroon group that settled Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de los Morenos de Amapa, from 18th-century Spanish colonial Mexico. By reconstructing how Maroons practised and altered Spanish colonial social and geographic landscapes, this article demonstrates that Maroons were not constrained to the ‘inaccessible’ areas that colonial officials attached them to and that present-day studies of Maroons have habituated. Amapa's absent archaeological record and the complaints waged against the Maroons concerning the absence of civility in the newly established town also challenge straightforward notions of Maroons and space.
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Woody Resources as a Medium for Colonial Engagement: Explaining the Artifactual and Architectural Record at La Soye, Dominica
Wood and other tree byproducts were significant commodities in contexts of early colonial economies, but few archaeological studies focus on these resources. This article presents historical and archaeological evidence of the exploitation of woody resources for the purpose of naval stores and export at the site of La Soye, Dominica, Eastern Caribbean, beginning in the 1580s and continuing until the first quarter of the eighteenth century. This research highlights the importance of wood and woody resources in early colonial encounters and economic relationships, and the role of Indigenous knowledge in facilitating an increasingly complex global economy.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2150876
- PAR ID:
- 10572094
- Publisher / Repository:
- Instituto Panamericano de Geografía e Historia
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Revista de Arqueología Americana
- Issue:
- 41
- ISSN:
- 0188-3631
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 245 to 265
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.35424/rearam.i41.4865
