VI as an Historical Frontier between the Taino and the Caribe

Reprinted from Afredo E. Figueredo, (1978) "The Virgin Islands as anHistorical Frontier between the Taínos and the Caribs."Revista/Review Interamericana, 8(3), Fall: 393-393, by kindpermission of the author.The PDF version of this article has maintained the originalpagination and formatting.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Virgin Islands as an Historical Frontier between the Taínos andthe CaribsAlfredo E. FigueredoThe role played by the Virgin Islands as a frontier between theTaínos of Puerto Rico and the Caribs of the Lesser Antilles has notbeen studied adequately. Historians and archaeologists either haveavoided the issue,1 or been divided on the subject2 due to anincomplete consultation of printed sources, which are scattered andin various languages. This is the first attempt at a documentedhistory encompassing the whole period in question (1493-1688), andexisting theories may be tested against it. [1]St. Croix was the first of the Virgin Islands to be discovered byColumbus' fleet, and the only one found to be inhabited.3 It wasreported as being well-cultivated in 1493 and was grouped with theother main Carib centers of Guadeloupe and Dominica.4 From itfrequent raids were launched against the Taínos of Puerto Rico. [2]As in Guadeloupe and the other Carib islands, Taíno captives were aconsiderable portion of the Cruzan population.5 Women and boys wereheld in bondage, some of the former as concubines. The latter werecastrated and fattened for slaughter. Exocannibalism, in fact, was anavowed reason for Carib raids. The only captives eaten, however, wereadult males.6 The castrated boys were used in domestic and menialchores until they were old enough for consumption. Miscegenationbetween the two groups was unacceptable at this early date, sinceonly those children born of Carib women were kept, all others beingeaten.7 [3]Traditionally, the Caribs have been mortal enemies of the Taínos.8Without their cooperation, Caribs could not have obtained access totrees suitable for making sea-faring canoes, which were available inPuerto Rico. St. Croix, as now, lacked forests comparable to those ofthe larger island.9 If the sharp division evidenced clearly enough byconstant warfare had been absolute, then it would follow that theTaínos must have ambushed Carib logging parties at every opportunity.That this was not so implies regulated warfare, perhaps of a ritualnature, rather than the total conflict sometimes envisioned. [4]In 1509, Juan Ponce de León began the Spanish conquest of PuertoRico.10 While exploring the southern coast of the island, he cameacross Carib loggers, which he detained.11 The Taínos complained tohim that Caribs raided them often.12 Ponce de León wrote GovernorOvando for permission to build a brigantine in order to patrol thecoasts of Puerto Rico. He also intended to return the Caribs to St.Croix, take the Taíno captives held on that island back to PuertoRico, secure provisions from the Cruzan natives, and in general,pacify them.13 The various requests were granted, and many of theCruzan Caribs were converted briefly and nominally to Christianity.14A conuco (garbled as 'convento' in some texts) was set up for theKing.15 [5]The adventurer Diego de Nicuesa raided St. Croix for slaves onlythree months after Ponce de León's pacification of the island.16 Hetook about 150 Caribs, and scandalized the Cruzans into rebellion.17Spain lost St. Croix permanently the same year that it was won. TheTaíno revolts, aided by the Caribs, kept the Spaniards busyelsewhere.18 The two former enemies had become allies. [6]The great Taíno uprising of 1511 was the first of several aided andperhaps also instigated by the Caribs of St. Croix. Kinsmen fromGuadeloupe and Dominica joined the Cruzans in their incursions onbehalf of the oppressed Taínos,19 trying to reverse the Spanishconquest before it reached their islands. The Virgins became basesfrom which Taíno rebellions were staged and where Carib contingentsassembled.20 [7]The Taíno institution of name-exchange, known broadly to the Caribsalso, is perhaps one of the mechanisms which facilitated theconfederation of these two nations. Upon an exchange of names, theparties involved would adopt each other. Persons so joined were saidto be guatiao.21 Enmity did not cease between them altogether, butpeace or cooperation with a common foe became possible. Insofar asdocumentary evidence is lacking, this is, of course, conjectural; butname-exchange similar to Taíno guatiao was the means whereby Caribssecured trade with the Lokono of the mainland during the early andmiddle XVII Century.22 Specific forms of social interaction that mayhave led to the alliance of Taínos and Caribs against the Spaniardsare unknown. The exchange of hostages is one possibility.23 [8]It is surprising to read of the Cruzan Caribs as a threat to Spanishrule in Puerto Rico.24 The island is quite small, and a largepopulation is inconceivable. Over 20 villages are reported,25 and theminimum number of inhabitants for each may be postulated at 60. If amaximum of 250 persons were admitted for a large Carib village, thenthe total would oscillate from over 1200 to under 5000, an unknownportion of whom would be Taíno captives. At a density of 40individuals per square mile (within what is feasible for slash-and-burn horticulture) an acceptable figure of about 3275 is obtained.Clearly, Nicuesa's raid was a grievous blow and aid from the LesserAntilles imperative if any large-scale fighting were to beundertaken. [9]The first Spanish reaction depopulated St. Croix for several years.26Significant ships and supplies arrived from Spain in 1511 as aforetaste of the armadas contra caribes.27 The Caribs fled, scatteredamong the northern Virgins, and continued the fight from there.28 Itis interesting that many Puerto Rican Taínos apparently went downisland with the Caribs rather than submit to the Spaniards. This hasbeen noted by historians as a Taíno exodus,29 and, specifically, itis stated that the Virgin Islands received a large number of them.Some also fled to Dominica, Guadeloupe, and other islands of theLesser Antilles. Not only did Caribs come to Puerto Rico to aid theTaínos in their wars against the Spaniards then, but also receivedthem as refugees and sheltered them from their enemies. Were theexodus as large as one might be led to believe, it is probable thathistoric Island Carib culture had blended with Taíno.30 [10]At this point the frontier became one of common resort andcooperation, the Virgin Islands being a battle ground where Taínosand Caribs together put up whatever resistance they could to theSpanish Empire. The fighting qualities of the Indians were held inlow esteem by the Spaniards,31 but one may gather that importantdifferences existed in their modes of warfare. The Taínos gave battleguided by strategic designs that demanded rigid organization. Noallowance was made for individual heroism which might spoil a jointeffort. War was waged for specific objectives and had no other socialpurpose. Rank and station were hereditary among the Taínos and couldnot be achieved in or outside combat.32 [11]The Caribs, however, used war as an instrument of social selectionand ranking. Their only chiefs were military leaders selectedaccording to their prowess. In order to retain social cohesion andstructure, a state of perpetual warfare had to exist.33 They wereorganized exclusively for predation, with no capabilities or numbersfor significant territorial expansion, having only plunder andachieved status to gain from their raids. The Caribs were thereforebetter fighters individually, but less effective collectively.34 [12]During the first rounds of anti-Spanish warfare (1511-1514), theCaribs were junior allies subordinate to the needs, designs, andmultitude of the Taínos. They fought largely, therefore, as specialshock or support units of Taíno armies.35 After the defeats of 1514and the outfitting of the first official armadas contra caribes,36Taíno tactics became ineffective. Added to this, an ant plague spreadin 1518, followed by smallpox in 1519.37 The mortality sustainedbetween war, famine and disease was such that organized resistanceceased in Puerto Rico,38 and the Caribs, deprived of their formerlynumerous allies and on the run in their own islands, reverted toraids having lost all hope of complete victory. [13]Raiding parties still resorted often to the Virgin Islands to holdouïcou or sweet-potato beer festivals, even if permanent populationswere lacking in most of them. Vieques was visited often until around1582, though Caribs never settled it.39 Another island frequentedcasually by Caribs was Virgin Gorda, where a large assembly of them,including Taíno refugees and booty, was broken up as early as 1511.40Three years later a Carib war party from Dominica was surprised whileholding a ouïcou in Vieques and massacred by the Spaniards.41 [14]Culebra was inhabited by Caribs around 1541.42 St. Croix wasinhabited sporadically at least through 1587.43 Aboriginalsettlements close to Puerto Rico, however, were at the mercy of theSpaniards and suffered the fate that many northern European settlerswere to share with them in this area until about 1689: periodicannihilation. [15]One learns of no aborigines encountered when St. Croix was colonizedbriefly by the French in 1621. As several nations (chiefly the Dutchand English) struggled for an upper hand there, a similar silenceprevails on the question. Perhaps the island had been abandonedrecently by the Caribs, or they may have been chased off island bythe colonists. Even if the native Caribs were gone, it is likely thatthe Dutch brought some to St. Croix as slaves. During the majorperiod of Dutch colonization on St. Croix (1642-1645) the Carib slavetrade was initiated on nearby St. Eustatius.44 Indeed, the Dutchcolony founded on St. Thomas between 1657 and 1666 included someCaribs.45 These were probably at least partly native, though theywere few. Despite the expulsion of the Dutch from St. Thomas in 1667,the Danes found some of these Caribs still there five years later.[16]The Dutch colony on Tortola (which lasted from around 1648 until 1672)46 may also have had a Carib population. Shortly after 1672, most ofthe St. Thomian Caribs removed to the uninhabited island of St. Johnin order to avoid Danish colonists.47 What became of them isuncertain. A census of St. Thomas counted four Caribs still livingthere in 1688.48 [17]From the preceding it can be seen that the Virgin Islands playedthree different roles as a frontier area. Until the Spaniards arrivedin Puerto Rico they were an embattled frontier between the Taínos andthe Caribs, St. Croix being a Carib center. The smaller Virgins wereundefendable by either side due to constant warfare. After 1509, theVirgin Islands became a common frontier or meeting ground whereCaribs and Taínos pooled their resources in order to save Puerto Ricoand protect the Carib islands. After the defeat of the last majorTaíno revolt in 1514, devastating reverses such as the ones sufferedon Virgin Gorda andVieques, and the onset of diseases in 1519, theVirgin Islands assumed their final role as a frontier area for nativeAmericans, becoming an advanced outpost used by Taíno refugees andCaribs against Spanish Puerto Rico. They were no longer occupied bylarge numbers of Indians.[18]It was the colonization of the Lesser Antilles by European powersthat ended the role of the Virgin Islands in the history ofaboriginal America. Puerto Rico had long been alienated from thatworld when the other side of the frontier also collapsed. Little ofthe Carib homeland was left by the middle of the XVII Century, and ofthis the Virgins were a severed outlier, with a few inhabitants thathad both their escape and succour pre-empted. It is likely that thelast Indians of the Virgin Islands, whether Taínos, Caribs, or ablend of these, died in slavery or trying to resist it. [19]Notes* The author wishes to acknowledge the kind assistance of the WilburCross Library of the University of Connecticut, the Sterling Libraryof Yale University, the Rare Book Division of the Astor and LennoxBranch, New York Public Library, and the West Indian Room, St. ThomasPublic Library, Dr. Hugh M. Hamill of the University of Connecticut,and Mr. Stephen D. Glazier.Cf. Dookhan, pp. 15-29.Cf. Hatt; vide Watlington, p. 5.Bernáldez, p. 287Cf. Bernáldez, pp. 284-286; Cuneo in Raccolta, p. 97.Ibid.Bernáldez, p. 285.Op. Cit., p. 284.Cf. Santa Cruz, p. 498.Martyr, p. 99; cf. Coll y Toste, vol. I (1914), pp. 121-124; videBrau y Asensi, p. 212.Coll y Toste, loc. cit.Doc. Inéd., vol. XXXIV (1880), pp. 361, 488-489, 494.Ibid.; cf. Martyr, loc. cit.Falcó y Osorio, p. 87; Doc. Inéd., vol. XXXIV (1880), pp. 488-489;cf. Murga Sanz, Ponce, p. 45.Santa Cruz, p. 501.Doc. Inéd., vol. XXXIV (1880), p. 361.Doc. Inéd., vol. XXI (1879), pp. 530-531.Santa Cruz, loc. cit.Doc. Inéd., vol. XXXIV (1880), p. 361.Cf. Castellanos, pp. 125-138.Brau y Asensi, pp. 232, 257-258.Las Casas, vol. II, p. 234.Dreyfus-Gamelon, p. 92.Vide Martyr, pp. 99-100.Ced. P.R., vol. I, p. 158, Doc. Inéd., vol. XXXII (1879), p. 261.Santa Cruz, loc. cit.Brau y Asensi, p. 213; Doc. Inéd., vol. XXXIV (1880), p. 146; vol.XXXVI (1881), p. 383.Tapia y Rivera, p. 302.Brau y Asensi, p. 232; cf. Watlington.Vide Murga Sanz, Ponce, pp. 311-312.Cf. Dreyfus-Gamelon.Bernáldez, p. 284.Fernández de Oviedo, Las Casas; cf. Dookhan, p. 24.Cf. Dookhan, loc. cit.; Dreyfus-Gamelon, p. 89.My conjecture on the basis of the foregoing.Castellanos, loc. cit.; Brau y Asensi.Murga Sanz, Manuscritos, pp. 115, 119, 272-273, 287, 295.Las Casas, vol. III, pp. 270-273.Brau y Asensi, p. 299; Murga Sanz, op. cit., p. 158.Doc. Inéd., vol. XXI (1874), p. 285.Tió y Nazario, pp. 30-109.Castellanos, p. 137.Santa Cruz, p. 501.White in Hakluyt, pp. 764-765; vide Marx, p. 50.Hartog, p. 61.Høst pp. 5-6; Oldendorp, vol. I, p. 33.Menkman, pp. 184-185.Oldendorp, vol. I, p. 21.Westergaard, p. 122.ABBREVIATED DOCUMENTARY SOURCESCed. P.R. Vicente Murga Sanz, ed., Cedulario Puertorriqueño, 2 vols.(1961).Doc. Inéd. Academia de la Historia (Spain), Colección de DocumentosInéditos Relativos a1 Descubrimiento, Conquista y Organización de lasAntiguas Posesiones Españolas de América y Oceania, 42 vols. (1864-1884).Raccolta Guglielmo Berchet, ed., Narrazioni sincrone, Fonti Italianeper la Storia della Scoperta del Nuovo Mondo, Raccolta di Documenti eStudi Pubblicati dalle R. Commissione Colombiane pel QuartoCentenurio dalla Scoperta dell'America, Parte III, Volume II (1893).GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHYBernáldez, Andrés. Memorias del Reinado de 1os Reyes Católicos.Edición y estudio por Manuel Gomez-Moreno y Juan de M. Carriazo.Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1962. lxvi+708 p.Brau y Asencio, Salvador. La colonización de Puerto Rico. Desde eldescubrimiento de la Isla hasta la reversión a la corona española delos privilegios de Colon. Cuarta edición anotada por Isabel Gutierrezdel Arroyo. San Juan de Puerto Rico: Instituto de CulturaPuertorriqueña, 1969. 639 p.Castellanos, Juan de. Primera Parte de las Elegias de VaronesIllustres de Indias. En Madrid, en casa de la viuda de Alonso Gomez.Año 1589. 382 p.Coll y Toste, Cayetano (ed.). Boletín Histórico de Puerto Rico, 14vols. (1914-1928).Dookhan, Isaac. A History of the Virgin Islands of the United States.Charlotte Amalie: College of the Virgin Islands, 1974. 321 p.Dreyfus-Gamelon, Simone. "Remarques sur l'organisation socio-politique des carai'bes insulaires au XVIIème siecle." Proceedings ofthe Sixth International Congress for the Study of Pre-ColumbianCultures of the Lesser Antilles (1976), pp. 87-97.Falcó y Osorio, Maria del Rosario. (Duquesa de Berwick y Alba,Condesa de Siruela) Autógrafos de Cristóbal Colón y Papeles deAmérica. Madrid, 1892, v+203 p.Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés, Gonzalo. Historia General y Natural delas Indias. Edición y estudio preliminar de Juan Perez de TudelaBueso. Madrid: Biblioteca de Autores Españoles desde la formación dellenguaje hasta nuestros días, tomos 117-121 (1959). 5 vols.Hakluyt, Richard. The Principall Navigations, Voiages and Discoveriesof the English nation, made by Sea or ouer Land, to the most remoteand farthest distant Quarters of the earth at any time within thecompasse of these 1500 yeares. Imprinted at London by George Bishopand Ralph Newberie, Deputies to Christopher Barker, Printer to theQueenes most excellent Maiestie. 1589. 825 p.Hartog, Johannes. De Bovenwindse Eilanden Sint Maarten-Saba-SintEustatius. Eens Gouden Rots nu Zilveren Dollars. Geschiedenis van deNederlandse Antillen, vol. IV. Aruba, 1964. xi+747 p.Hatt, Gudmund. "Archaeology of the Virgin Islands." XXI InternationalCongress of Americanists: Proceedings of the First Session (1924),pp. 29-42.Høst, Georg Hjersing. 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New York:The Macmillan Company, 1917. xxiv+359 p.-------------------------------About the AuthorAt the time of publication, Alfredo E. Figueredo taught anthropologyat the University of Massachusetts. He is currently retired.CitationPlease cite this article as follows:Figueredo, Alfred E. (2006). The Virgin Islands as an HistoricalFrontier between the Taínos and the Caribs. KACIKE: The Journal ofCaribbean Amerindian History and Anthropology [On-line Journal].Available at: http://www.kacike.org/FigueredoVirginIslands.html [19par.] [Date of access: Day, Month, Year].Or use the original bibliographic data found at the top of thisarticle (the original pagination has not been preserved in the HTMLversion published by KACIKE).EDITOR'S NOTE:This article, published originally in 1978, offered a very innovativeunderstanding of the relations between Taínos and Caribs during earlycolonial encounters with European intruders. While at the start ofthe article the author reproduces what were the orthodoxunderstandings of Carib cannibalism, and here readers should exerciseprudence in considering the many critiques of these once commonportrayals. KACIKE nevertheless reproduces this article for two mainpurposes: (i) its publication is in keeping with KACIKE's goal ofproviding an archive of articles printed in journals that may not beeasily accessed by the wider public; and, (ii) the article doesprovide us with what are still some very necessary data and analysesof the ways that boundaries between the Caribs and the Taínos, theirincreasing exchange, and common resistance to Spanish colonizers.Very little information is available on the Virgin Islands duringthis period, and, we have very little in the way of detailedinformation or interpretation on Carib-Taíno relations during thiscritical period.