An Examination of Housing for Enslaved and Free Blacks on Sugar and Cotton Plantations on the Southeast Peninsula of St. Kitts
An Examination of Housing for Enslaved and Free Blacks on Sugar and Cotton Plantations on the Southeast Peninsula of St. Kitts
Like most of the Lesser Antilles, St. Kitts' historic economy was powered by sugar cultivation. Enslaved Africans and ultimately freedmen were the labor source in the sugar fields. Using historical evidence and archaeological data from three investigated plantation sites from St. Kitts’, the built environment of enslaved African villages and house yards is examined. At a macroscale, enslaved Africans took advantage of and manipulated the natural landscape in each slave village’s spatial arrangement. Diachronic changes and intra-village differences in housing types are explored. A close examination of one village shows how enslaved and freed Africans used the built environment to display their position within the village’s social hierarchy.
Keywords: St. Kitts, Plantation site, Slave village, Social hierarchy, Sugar field
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