2. Genealogy of the “Negro Burial Ground”
Archaeology of Urban Bondage - The New York African Burial Ground - Augustin F.C. Holl
Augustin F.C. Holl [+]
Xiamen University, China
Description
Chapter 2 – Genealogy of the “Negro Burial Ground deals with the social and political circumstances of the “emergence” of the “Negro Burial Ground” as it was called in the 18th century, as well as its use and chronological evolution in the 17th and 18th century. Manumitted Africans were given farm lands 2 miles north of New Amsterdam fortified in order to create a buffer and advance warning system in the ongoing confrontations between Dutch settlers and local Native-Americans groups. The Dutch West Indies Chartered Company created the settlement and owned everything, including the captive enslaved Africans. Africans were part of the Europeans and settlers side of the equation and cultural differences set the stage for long and sustained confrontations between competing nationalities. French, British, and Dutch settlers were competing for access to trade with Native-American nations in the NE North America. Alliances were constantly shifting. For New Amsterdam, the Dutch offered a present considered as a gift by local Native-American leaders, allowing the former to settle and use the land – A collective property of the group -. The Dutch considered to have bought the land for their exclusive use as private property. “the Peach War” – September 15, 1655 – was one of the consequence of such a cultural misunderstanding. The methodology to be used in the organization of the archaeological record, interrogating the different clustering levels to be documented, is outlined in the presentation of the ‘research perspective’. The precise initial use of the African Burial is not known but range between 1640 to 1690. Three phases of the use of the cemetery were identified: The Early Sequence (1640/90-1740), Middle Sequence (1740-1780), and Late Sequence (1780-1796). Interestingly enough, burial orientation is a good indicator of inhumation seasons, allowing to single out different seasonal mortality peaks. Instead of dealing with the deceased of the African Burial Ground as a single population as done in the technical reports and all publications so far, this book investigates at the dynamics concealed in the archaeological record, at different time-scales. There are subtle variations that deserves to be brought to light and explained.