African Diaspora Histories in Central America: The Case of Omoa, Honduras

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Exercising Freedoms: Historical Archaeology of the African Diaspora in Latin America" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In the mid-eighteenth century, Spanish colonial authorities in Central America initiated the construction of a fortress on the Honduran Caribbean Coast, at a place bearing the indigenous name of Omoa. The construction of the fort drew on the labor of a massive population of enslaved people from Africa, as well as conscripted labor from indigenous communities in the immediate region. As the multi-decade construction of the fort and its staffing for defense continued, a thriving town grew up around it, in which the majority of the free population was recorded using terms in the racialized "casta" vocabulary indicating descent from African ancestors. By the 1790s, the town population also included a group of people of African descent called "Free Blacks", people who had escaped slavery in neighboring enemy territory and thus received a degree of legal autonomy. Drawing on a variety of material evidence, this paper presents an understanding of the complexity of relations among different populations in the African diaspora living together in one town, including alliances between people of African descent and indigenous people who lived for periods of time as laborers under the direction of the military commander.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)   •
• Exercising Freedoms: Historical Archaeology of the African Diaspora in Latin America

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 52037