Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida" at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Over the past few decades, the archaeology of marronage has emerged as a distinctive subdiscipline exploring the material culture of freedom-seeking people resisting the institution of enslavement by living in the margins of colonial hegemony in the Americas. Much of the work in this area has been led by research in the Caribbean and South America, where large maroon communities developed and survived, maintaining a continuity of culture through descendants to the current day. In contrast, the major maroon communities of colonial and territorial Florida were effectively eliminated by the mid-nineteenth century and were often short-lived and ephemeral occupations, creating unique difficulties for archaeologists. Due to its geopolitical context, however, marronage in Florida was characterized by responses to enslavement not typically experienced elsewhere, with African-descendant people manning European military outposts, integrating with Indigenous communities, and developing expedient networks of communication and trade. This symposium will explore the unique characteristics and challenges of maroon archaeology in Florida with an intra-regional comparative approach, examining the recent research at some of the more significant sites in an effort to better understand the lost history of a freedom-seeking people.

Other Keywords
Historic • Landscape Archaeology • marronage • Maroon archaeology • Slavery • digital archaeology • Ethnohistory/History • Remote Sensing/Geophysics • Ritual and Symbolism • Cultural Heritage and Preservation

Geographic Keywords
United States of America (Country) • Delaware (State / Territory) • Georgia (State / Territory) • Mississippi (State / Territory) • Tennessee (State / Territory) • North Carolina (State / Territory) • Kentucky (State / Territory) • West Virginia (State / Territory) • Virginia (State / Territory) • South Carolina (State / Territory)

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-5 of 5)

  • Documents (5)
Documents
  • Autonomous Landscapes at Fort Mose (2023)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Mary Elizabeth Ibarrola. Lori Lee.

    This is an abstract from the "Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Fort Mose was the first legally sanctioned free Black community in North America. While the direct result of petitions by self-liberated Africans seeking formal emancipation, the policy that generated the settlement reflected political, military, and religious concerns of the Spanish as well....

  • Mapping Marronage and Afro-Indigenous Relationality in Central Peninsular Florida (2023)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jordan Davis.

    This is an abstract from the "Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Following investigations at the early nineteenth-century African/Black Seminole settlement of Pilaklikaha (“Abraham’s Old Town”), Florida has emerged as a key space for examining the complex intersections between archaeologies of marronage and Afro-Indigenous relationality. Beginning with...

  • Maroon Ritual Belongings Excavated on Gulf Coast Florida (2023)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Uzi Baram.

    This is an abstract from the "Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Nearly erased from history, the early nineteenth-century marronage of Angola on the Manatee River is now established as part of the Network to Freedom in Florida. Recent excavations provide a view of daily life for the freedom-seeking people. Allied with British filibusters, connected to...

  • More Than a Footnote to History: Rediscovering the Maroon Community at Prospect Bluff (2023)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Dawn Lawrence. Jeffrey Shanks.

    This is an abstract from the "Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The fort at Prospect Bluff was not only a post held by the British during the War of 1812 but also, and perhaps most importantly, one of the largest maroon communities in North America. The British proclamation offering freedom to enslaved people in the United States in exchange for service in...

  • Reconstructing “Negro Fort”: A Geophysical Investigation of the Citadel at Prospect Bluff (8FR64) (2023)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jeffrey Shanks. Dawn Lawrence. Andrew McFeaters.

    This is an abstract from the "Seeking Freedom in the Borderlands: Archaeological Perspectives on Maroon Societies in Florida" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 1814, the British began construction of a large fort on a site known as Prospect Bluff on the Apalachicola River. There they trained a corps of Colonial Marines made up primarily of freedom seekers and maroons of African descent who fought in the War of 1812. The heart of the fort was a...