This fascinating study of resistance to African slavery in North America is a very important contribution to the relatively new and growing field of slavery archaeology. Author Terrance Weik, an archaeologist at the University of South Carolina, focuses his research on the material culture of self-liberated African-Americans known as Maroons, African Seminoles in Florida, and the Underground Railroad that moved runaway slaves to freedom in Canada, Mexico, and elsewhere. He clearly shows that this antislavery resistance is poorly documented in the records of the dominant society and that study of the material culture can provide subtle clues to the life and conduct of the resisters.
Recent studies in the Great Dismal Swamp of Virginia and North Carolina have produced interesting results that show cooperation between freed African-Americans and Native Americans. Archaeologists have also been busy looking for sites used by the Underground Railroad, especially between the Ohio River and Canada. In the Midwest, recent research at African American communities like New Philadelphia and Miller’s Grove in Illinois has demonstrated a wealth of information is available to archaeologists.
In 18th-century Florida, runaway African slaves and freedmen found refuge and protection by Native Americans known as Seminole. Excavations at Pilaklikaha from 1998-2006 produced evidence of an African Seminole town with high potential to define the relationships between Africans and Natives.
This volume is a comprehensive survey of an important new field in historical archaeology. Written as a narrative, it is very accessible to both the professional and lay reader. It well reflects the beginning of an interesting new direction in archaeological research that is bound to produce dramatic results in the years to come.
