Settlement Orginization at Sugarloaf Estate

Summary

This paper is a summary of the ongoing analysis of artifacts and spatial data recovered from the enslaved quarters of the Sugarloaf Estate in northern Dominica. The enslaved village associated with the estate was established sometime before 1771 and abandoned in 1834 after a violent hurricane destroyed much of the village and left at least 3 dead. Initial interpretations of the landscape have emphasized symmetry, optics, and relationships of power. Yet such interpretations are premised on a short period of construction. With its shorter occupation and abrupt abandonment, we are able to scrutinize the villages’ chronology closely to further our understanding how such ideas of control and symmetry shaped the material lives of Sugarloaf's enslaved population. To that end, our project works in conjunction with the DRC Initiative to both catalogue and analyze data already collected in an effort to compare Sugarloaf with sites that had shorter term occupations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2015   •
• A Progress Report on the DAACS Research Consortium

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 606