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Considering Multiscalar Approaches to Creolization Among Enslaved Laborers at Estate Bethlehem, St. Croix, US Virgin Islands

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Abstract

Archaeological studies of plantations need to consider the scale of the historical circumstances which shape locally circumscribed Creole processes. These circumstances range from broad generalizations down to factors operating only at the local level of the individual estate. Recent excavations at Estate Lower Bethlehem, St. Croix, Virgin Islands, have recovered an artifact assemblage from a laborer village dating from the mid-eighteenth century to the first quarter of the nineteenth century, which was situated adjacent to a previously unrecorded cemetery and a large tamarind tree. This assemblage illustrates the importance of a multiscalar approach to Creolization in two ways: an analysis of the distribution of vessel forms of European pottery and “Afro-Cruzan” earthenwares; and the identification of fragments of lead-glazed slip-decorated redware pottery produced by Moravians.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the following people for reading earlier drafts of this paper: Doug Armstrong, Heather Gibson, Mark Hauser, Ken Kelly, Wayne Lenik, Holly Norton, and Francois Richard. Funding for this research project in 2002 and 2003 was arranged by David Brewer and Myron Jackson of the Virgin Islands State Historic Preservation Office. Funding in 2003 was provided by the Walker Institute of International Studies at the University of South Carolina. I thank Major Clifford E. Crooke of the Virgin Islands Army National Guard for his cooperation and assistance in this project. I thank George Tyson and David Hayes for providing access to a draft of the Estate Bethlehem report.

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  1. Department of Anthropology, Syracuse University, 209 Maxwell Hall, Syracuse, NY, 13244, USA

    Stephan Lenik

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Lenik, S. Considering Multiscalar Approaches to Creolization Among Enslaved Laborers at Estate Bethlehem, St. Croix, US Virgin Islands. Int J Histor Archaeol 13, 12–26 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10761-008-0070-x

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