Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-9pm4c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T07:53:02.127Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Childhood in Captivity: Bioarchaeological Evidence from a Late Colonial Sugar Plantation in Central Peru

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2022

Claire Maass Open the ORCID record for Claire Maass [Opens in a new window]
Claire Maass*
Affiliation:
Postdoctoral Research Associate, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, HI, USA
*
(claire.maass@sna-intl.com, corresponding author)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Children and childhood have emerged as important topics for understanding the history of African slavery in the Americas. In historical archaeology, analyses of subadult skeletal remains have provided valuable information about the biological and social conditions of captivity, yet children are infrequently the primary subjects of study in African diaspora bioarchaeology. Recent bioarchaeological research at Hacienda La Quebrada, a late colonial sugar plantation in central Peru, brings new data to bear on these subjects. Excavations at the cemetery for the plantation's enslaved African and Afro-descendant population recovered 158 subadults ranging from newborns to 20 years old, who represented 64% of the burial sample. Paleodemographic data and skeletal indicators of stress indicate that enslaved children were disproportionately affected by the conditions of life at Hacienda La Quebrada, particularly because of insufficient diets and susceptibility to infection and disease. Although these results are specific to the context of plantation slavery in Peru's coastal sugar economy, they contribute new information about the history of African slavery in Peru and about the study of childhood in conditions of captivity and colonialism in the Spanish Americas more broadly.

La infancia y la niñez han surgido como temáticas importantes para comprender la historia de la esclavitud Africana en las américas. En la arqueología histórica, los análisis de restos óseos humanos han proporcionado información valiosa sobre las condiciones biológicas y sociales de la esclavitud. Sin embargo, a pesar de estas contribuciones, existe poca investigación osteológica focalizada en los niños como sujetos principales en el estudio de la esclavitud y la diáspora Africana. Investigaciones recientes en la Hacienda La Quebrada, una finca azucarera de la época colonial tardía en el centro de Perú, aportan nuevos datos sobre estas problemáticas. Las excavaciones arqueológicas realizadas en el cementerio de Africanos y afrodescendientes esclavizados asociados a la hacienda tuvieron como resultado la recuperación de 158 individuos subadultos, incluyendo desde recién nacidos hasta adolescentes de 20 años, los que representan el 64 por ciento de la muestra total. Los datos paleodemográficos y las evidencias de estrés indican que los niños esclavizados fueron desproporcionadamente impactados por las condiciones de esclavitud en la Hacienda La Quebrada, particularmente como efecto de dietas insuficientes y susceptibilidad a infecciones y enfermedades. Aunque estos resultados son específicos al contexto de la esclavitud en fincas azucareras en la costa central del Perú, aportan nueva información sobre la historia de la esclavitud Africana en el Perú y el estudio de la infancia en condiciones de cautiverio y colonialismo en la América Española en general.

Keywords

historical archaeologybioarchaeologychildren and childhoodAfrican slaveryPeruarqueología históricaosteología humanala infancia y la niñezla esclavitud AfricanaPerú
Type
Article
Information
Latin American Antiquity , Volume 34 , Issue 1 , March 2023 , pp. 194 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Society for American Archaeology

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References Cited

Adams, Bradley, and Byrd, John (editors) 2014 Commingled Human Remains: Methods in Recovery, Analysis, and Identification. Academic Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Aguirre, Carlos 2005 Breve historia de la esclavitud en el Perú: Una herida que no deja de sangrar. Fondo Editorial del Congreso del Perú, Lima.Google Scholar
Arrelucea Barrantes, Maribel 2009 Replanteando la esclavitud: Estudios de etnicidad y género en Lima norbónica. Centro de Desarrollo Étnico, Lima.Google Scholar
Arrelucea Barrantes, Maribel, and Cosmalón, Jesús Aguilar (editors) 2015 La presencia afrodescendiente en el Perú: Siglos XVI-XX. Ministerio de Cultura, Lima.Google Scholar
Barrett, Autumn R. 2014 Childhood, Colonization, and Nation-Building in Virginia and New York. In Tracing Childhood: Bioarchaeological Investigations of Early Lives in Antiquity, edited by Thompson, Jennifer L., Alfonso-Durruty, Marta P., and Crandall, John J., pp. 159–182. University Press of Florida, Gainesville.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barrett, Autumn R., and Blakey, Michael L. 2011 Life Histories of Enslaved Africans in Colonial New York: A Bioarchaeological Study of the New York African Burial Ground. In Social Bioarchaeology, edited by Agarwal, Sabrina C. and Glencross, Bonnie A., pp. 212–251. John Wiley and Sons, Chichester, UK.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Battle-Baptiste, Whitney 2011 Black Feminist Archaeology. Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek, California.Google Scholar
Baxter, Jane Eva 2008 The Archaeology of Childhood. Annual Review of Anthropology 37:159–175.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beauchesne, Patrick, and Agarwal, Sabrina 2018 Children and Childhood in Bioarchaeology. University Press of Florida, Gainesville.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beust, Hugo, and Lessa, Andrea 2020 Infância antes do cativeiro: Hipoplasias lineares de esmalte e estresse biologico nos africanos enterrados no Cemiterio dos Pretos Novos, Rio de Janeiro. Revista do Museu de Arqueologia e Etnologia 35.Google Scholar
Blakey, Michael L., Leslie, Teresa E., and Reidy, Joseph P. 1994 Frequency and Chronological of Dental Enamel Hypoplasia in Enslaved African Americans: A Test of the Weaning Hypothesis. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 95:371–383.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blakey, Michael L., Mark E. Mack, Autumn R. Barret, Mahoney, Shannon S., and Goodman, Alan H. 2009 Childhood Health and Dental Development. In The Skeletal Biology of the New York African Burial Ground: Part 1, edited by Blakey, Michael L. and Rankin-Hill, Lesley M., pp. 143–156. Howard University Press, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Blakey, Michael L., and Rankin-Hill, Lesley M. (editors) 2009 The Skeletal Biology of the New York African Burial Ground: Part 1. Howard University Press, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Buikstra, Jane, and Ubelaker, Douglas 1994 Standards for Data Collection from Human Skeletal Remains: Proceedings of a Seminar at the Field Museum of Natural History. Arkansas Archaeological Survey Research, Fayetteville.Google Scholar
Bush, Barbara 2010 African Caribbean Slave Mothers and Children: Traumas of Dislocation and Enslavement across the Atlantic World. Caribbean Quarterly 56(1–2):69–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, Judith 1990 Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. Routledge, New York.Google Scholar
Butler, Judith 2004 Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence. London, Verso.Google Scholar
Campbell, Gwyn, Miers, Suzanne, and Miller, Joseph 2009 Children in Slavery through the Ages. Ohio University Press, Athens.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carrera, Laura Coy, and Rojas-Sepúlveda, Claudia. 2020 ¡Un, dos, tres por los niños escondidos en el pasado! hacia una bioarqueología de la infancia en Colombia. Revista Colombiana de Antropología 56(1):215–243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Corruccini, Robert, Handler, Jerome, and Jacobi, Keith 1985 Chronological Distribution of Enamel Hypoplasias and Weaning in a Caribbean Slave Population. Human Biology 57:669–711.Google Scholar
Corruccini, Robert, Jerome Handler, Robert Mutaw, and Lange, Frederick 1982 Osteology of a Slave Burial Population from Barbados, West Indies. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 59:443–459.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Corruccini, Robert, Jacobi, Keith, Handler, Jerome, and Aufderheide, Arthur 1987 Implications of Tooth Root Hypercementosis in a Barbados Slave Skeletal Collection. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 74:179–184.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crain, Christopher 2005 A Bioarchaeological Investigation of Two Unmarked Graveyards in Bridgetown, Barbados. Master's thesis, Department of Anthropology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo.Google Scholar
Crespo, Edwin, and Muñoz Guevara, Luz Verónica 2009 Voces desde la tumba: Estudio bioarqueológico de dos atrio cementerios de finales del siglo 18 en la isla de Puerto Rico. In VI encuentro de investigadores de arqueología y etnohistoria, pp. 20–29. Publicación Ocasional de la División de Arqueología del Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, San Juan, Puerto Rico.Google Scholar
Cushner, Nicholas 1975 Slave Mortality and Reproduction on Jesuit Haciendas in Colonial Peru. Hispanic American Historical Review 55:177–199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Delgado, Miguel 2019 Contribuciones actuales a la bioantropología LatinoAmericana y del Caribe. Jangwa Pana 18:358–362.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duane, Anna Mae 2017 Child Slavery before and after Emancipation: An Argument for Child-Centered Slavery Studies. Cambridge University Press, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Epperson, Terrence 2004 Critical Race Theory and the Archaeology of the African Diaspora. Historical Archaeology 38(1):101–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferreira, Lúcio Menezes 2015 Arqueología de la diáspora africana en Sudamérica: Desarrollo, problemáticas a perspectivas: Comentario. Revista de Arqueología Histórica Argentina y Latinoamericana 2(9):27–32.Google Scholar
Franklin, Maria 2001 A Black Feminist-Inspired Archaeology? Journal of Social Archaeology 1:108–125.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gero, Joan, and Conkey, Margaret 1991 Engendering Archaeology: Women and Prehistory. Blackwell, Oxford.Google Scholar
Gilchrist, Roberta 1991 Women's Archaeology? Political Feminism, Gender Theory, and Historical Revisionism. Antiquity 65:495–501.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gómez Acuña, Luis 2001 La esclavitud en el Perú colonial. Apuntes: Revista de Ciencias Sociales 48:29–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodman, Alan, and Rose, Jerome 1990 Assessment of Systemic Physiological Perturbations from Dental Enamel Hypoplasias and Associated Histological Structures. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology 33:59–110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodman, Alan, Brooke Thomas, R., Swedlund, Alan, and Armelagos, George 1988 Biocultural Perspectives on Stress in Prehistoric, Historical, and Contemporary Population Research. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology 31:169–202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halcrow, Siân, and Tayles, Nancy 2008 The Bioarchaeological Investigation of Childhood and Social Age: Problems and Prospects. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 15:190–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Handler, Jerome, and Corruccini, Robert 1983 Plantation Slave Life at Barbados: A Physical Anthropological Analysis. Journal of Interdisciplinary History 14:65–90.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Handler, Jerome, and Corruccini, Robert 1986 Weaning among West Indian Slaves: Historical and Bioanthropological Evidence from Barbados. William and Mary Quarterly 43:111–117.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hünefeldt, Christine 1988 Mujeres: Esclavitud, emociones y libertad: Lima 1800–1854. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, Lima.Google Scholar
Joyce, Rosemary 2000 Girling the Girl and Boying the Boy: The Production of Adulthood in Ancient Mesoamerica. World Archaeology 31:473–483.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
King, Wilma 2011 Stolen Childhood: Slave Youth in Nineteenth-Century America. Indiana University Press, Bloomington.Google Scholar
Klaus, Haagen, and Tam, Manuel 2009 Contact in the Andes: Bioarchaeology of Systemic Stress in Colonial Mórrope, Peru. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 138:356–368.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Laffoon, Jason, Espersen, Ryan, and Mickleburgh, Hayley 2018 The Life History of an Enslaved African: Multiple Isotope Evidence for Forced Childhood Migration from Africa to the Caribbean and Associated Dietary Change. Archaeometry 60:350–365.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Laffoon, Jason, Valcárcel Rojas, Roberto, and Hofman, Corinne 2013 Oxygen and Carbon Isotope Analysis of Human Dental Enamel from the Caribbean: Implications for Investigating Individual Origins. Archaeometry 55:742–765.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Larsen, Clark Spencer 1993 On the Frontier of Contact: Mission Bioarchaeology in La Florida. In The Spanish Missions of La Florida, edited by McEwan, Bonnie G., pp. 323–356. University Press of Florida, Gainesville.Google Scholar
Lewis, Mary 2007 The Bioarchaeology of Children: Perspectives from Biological and Forensic Anthropology. Cambridge University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Luna, Leandro H., Aranda, Claudia M., and Suby, Jorge A. (editors) 2014 Avances recientes de la bioarqueología latinoamericana. Grupo de Investigación en Bioarqueología, Buenos Aires.Google Scholar
Luna, Pablo 2017 El tránsito de la Buenamuerte por Lima: Auge y declive de una orden religiosa azucarera siglos XVIII-XIX. Biblioteca Indiana, Universidad de Navarra-Iberoamericana-Vervuet, Madrid.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maass, Claire, Vargas, Vanessa Salomón, and Santa Cruz Alcalá, José Luis 2019 El proyecto de investigación arqueológica La Quebrada para identificar la zona de entierros de los africanos y afrodescendientes esclavizados en la antigua Hacienda La Quebrada (1741-1849). Actas del V Congreso Nacional de Arqueología Volumen II. Ministerio de Cultura, Lima.Google Scholar
Maass, Claire, and Santa Cruz Alcalá, José Luis 2019 Perspectivas arqueológicas hacia la historia de la esclavitud en el Perú colonial. In Cultura Afroperuana: Encuentro de Investigadores 2018, pp. 22–36. Ministerio de Cultura, Lima.Google Scholar
Mantilla Oliveros, Johana Caterina 2016 Arqueología y comunidades negras en América del Sur: Problemas y perspectivas. Vestígios 10(1):16–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marzal, Manuel M. 2005 La evangelización de los negros americanos según el De instauranda aethiopum salute. In Esclavitud, economía y evangelización: Las haciendas jesuitas en la América virreinal, edited by Negro, Sandra and Marzal, Manuel M., pp. 19–42. Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima.Google Scholar
McCafferty, Geoffrey, and McCafferty, Sharisse 2006 Boys and Girls Interrupted: Mortuary Evidence of Children from Postclassic Cholula, Puebla. In The Social Experience of Childhood in Ancient Mesoamerica, edited by Ardren, Traci and Hutson, Scott, pp. 25–52. University Press of Colorado, Boulder.Google Scholar
McEwan, Bonnie G. 2001 The Spiritual Conquest of La Florida. American Anthropologist 103:633–644.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McKinley, Michelle 2016 Fractional Freedoms: Slavery, Intimacy, and Legal Mobilization in Colonial Lima, 1600–1700. Cambridge University Press, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morales Polar, María Ángela 2008 El espacio del esclavo negro en las haciendas del valle de Cañete, 1747–1821. Investigaciones Sociales 12:161–183.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Null, Christopher C., Blakey, Michael L., Shujaa, Kenya J., Rankin-Hill, Lesley M., and Carrington, S. H. H. 2009 Osteological Indicators of Infectious Disease and Nutritional Inadequacy. In The Skeletal Biology of the New York African Burial Ground: Part 1, edited by Blakey, Michael L. and Rankin-Hill, Lesley M., pp. 169–198. Howard University Press, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Ortner, Donald J. 2003 Identification of Pathological Conditions in Human Skeletal Remains. 2nd ed. Academic Press, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Pereira, Júlio César Medeiros Da Silva 2007 À flor da terra: O cemitério dos pretos novos no Rio de Janeiro. Garamond Iphan, Rio de Janeiro.Google Scholar
Perry, Megan 2006 Redefining Childhood through Bioarchaeology: Towards an Archaeological and Bioarchaeological Understanding of Children in Antiquity. In Children in Action: Perspectives on the Archaeology of Childhood Vol. 15, edited by Baxter, Jane Eva, pp. 89–114. Archaeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association. University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Premo, Bianca 2005 Children of the Father King: Youth, Authority, and Legal Minority in Colonial Lima. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill.Google Scholar
Price, T. Douglas, Tiesler, Vera, and Burton, James 2006 Early African Diaspora in Colonial Campeche, Mexico: Strontium Isotopic Evidence. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 130:485–490.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rathbun, Ted 1987 Health and Disease at a South Carolina Plantation: 1840–1870. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 74:239–253.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reyes Flores, Alejandro 1999 Esclavitud en el valle de Cañete siglo XVIII: Haciendas Casablanca y La Quebrada. Investigaciones Sociales 26(3):113–126.Google Scholar
Sacchi, Mariana 2010 Algunos apuntes sobre la arqueología de la infancia: Exploración de vías metodológicas para su definición. Antropología Experimental 10:281–292.Google Scholar
Sampeck, Kathryn, and Ferreira, Lucio Menezes 2020 Delineando la arqueología Afro-Latino-Americana. Vestígios 14(1):141–168.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schaefer, Maureen, Black, Sue, and Scheuer, Louise 2009 Juvenile Osteology: A Laboratory and Field Manual. Elsevier, New York.Google Scholar
Schroeder, Hannes, Tamsin O'Connell, Jane Evans, Shuler, Kristrina, and Hedges, Robert 2009 Trans-Atlantic Slavery: Isotopic Evidence for Forced Migration to Barbados. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 139:547–557.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shuler, Kristrina 2005 Nutritional Health of Enslaved Africans from Newton Plantation, Barbados: New Data. Journal of the Barbados Museum and Historical Society 51:166–175.Google Scholar
Shuler, Kristrina 2011 Life and Death on a Barbadian Sugar Plantation: Historic and Bioarchaeological Views of Infection and Mortality at Newton Plantation. International Journal of Osteoarchaeology 21:66–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith-Guzmán, Nicole, Rivera-Sandoval, Javier, Knipper, Corina, and Arias, Ginés Alberto Sánchez 2020 Intentional Dental Modification in Panamá: New Support for a Late Introduction of African Origin. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 60:101226.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sofaer Derevenski, Joanna 2000 Children and Material Culture. Blackwell, London.Google Scholar
Spector, Janet 1993 What This Awl Means. Minnesota Historical Society Press, St. Paul.Google Scholar
Storey, Rebecca, and McAnany, Patricia 2006 Children of K'axob: Premature Death in a Formative Maya Village. In The Social Experience of Childhood in Ancient Mesoamerica, edited by Ardren, Traci and Hutson, Scott, pp. 53–72. University Press of Colorado, Boulder.Google Scholar
Tardieu, Jean-Pierre 2005 La esclavitud de los negros y el plan de Dios: La dialéctica de los jesuitas del virreinato del Perú. In Esclavitud, economía y evangelización: Las haciendas jesuitas en la América virreinal, edited by Negro, Sandra and Marzal, Manuel M., pp. 67–82. Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Lima.Google Scholar
Tiesler, Vera, Zabala, Pilar, and Cucina, Andrea (editors) 2010 Natives, Europeans, and Africans in Colonial Campeche: History and Archaeology. University Press of Florida, Gainesville.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ubelaker, Douglas, and Colantonio, Sonia (editors) 2019 Biological Anthropology of Latin America: Historical Development and Recent Advances. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Vanvalkenburgh, Parker, Chase, Zach, Arias, Abel Traslaviña, and Weaver, Brendan 2016 Arqueología histórica en el Perú: Posibilidades y perspectivas. Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 20:5–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Voss, Barbara 2006 Sexuality in Archaeology. In The Handbook of Gender in Archaeology, edited by Nelson, Sarah Milledge, pp. 365–400. AltaMira Press, Lanham, Maryland.Google Scholar
Wesp, Julie 2020 Working in the City: A Historical Bioarchaeology of Activity in Urban New Spain. Historical Archaeology 54:92–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wylie, Alison 1992 The Interplay of Evidential Constraints and Political Interests: Recent Archaeological Research on Gender. American Antiquity 57:15–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar