Enslaved Pearl Divers in the Sixteenth Century Caribbean

Abstract

Over the course of the sixteenth century, a unique and fluid labour regime, based at first upon Indian labour and later upon African labour, developed in the Spanish-controlled Caribbean pearl fisheries. As pearl profits decreased, the complexity of life and labour in the fisheries increased. By the end of the century, African, Indian, and European inhabitants engaged in constant negotiation over the control and management of pearls as well as the social boundaries of the Caribbean communities built around the pursuit of this commodity.In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Spanish-controlled pearl fisheries in the Caribbean were among the most dynamic and destructive settlements in the Americas. The Caribbean pearl trade generated immense profits and remarkable encounters between Indians, Europeans, and Africans, but the history of the fisheries remains largely unexplored. This article focuses on one aspect of this complicated human landscape: the experiences of enslaved pearl divers on Margarita and Cubagua islands during the fisheries' first and most productive century of operation. While Caribbean pearl harvests decreased over the course of the century, the complexity of the relationships between the fisheries' diverse inhabitants increased. The hunger for pearl profits and the evolving labour regime of pearl fishing created an unusual climate of coercion and collaboration between the fisheries' free and unfree residents. 1 The Catholic Monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella, sent Columbus west in search of a new route to the rich markets of the east and their supplies of 'oro, plata, y perlas' -gold, silver, and pearls. Although the admiral failed to reach Asia, and did not live to see the discovery of major deposits of gold and silver, he did encounter a new source of pearls on his third voyage to the Caribbean in 1498, along the southern and eastern coasts of Margarita Island, and to the south and east of the small islands of Cubagua and Coche, off the coast of present-day Venezuela (see Figure 1). 2

Navegantes indígenas, perlas y canoas en el Caribe del siglo XVI: experiencias transculturales conectadas por el mar

“…La isla de Cubagua y la Costa de Tierra Firme: una experiencia conectada por el mar La historia de las pesquerías de perlas de la isla de Cubagua aparece historiográficamente casi exclusivamente como un sinónimo de explotación humana (Acosta Saignes, 1984;Jiménez G., 1986;Tiapa, 2008;Warsh, 2010;Bénat Tachot, 2015) y de depredación ambiental (Perri, 2009;Romero, 2003;Romero et al, 1999). Este ángulo historiográfico para mirar a la isla de Cubagua fue tempranamente inaugurado en el siglo XVI cuando Bartolomé de Las Casas al referirse al buceo de perlas llegó a catalogarlo como un "[…] incomportable trabajo, o por mejor decir ejercicio del infierno" (de las Casas, 1982, p. 141), al mismo tiempo que lo describió de la siguiente manera: "La tiranía que los españoles ejercían contra los indios en el sacar o pescar perlas es una de las más crueles y condenadas cosas que pueden ser en el mundo.…”

Untitled

“…Enslaved distillers died in fires (SMITH, 2015). Enslaved pearl divers died in shark attacks (WARSH, 2010). From plantations to mines, millions of enslaved people died laboring in the dangerous environments of the colonial Americas, producing the valuable commodities that traversed the globe.…”

Catching Air: Risk and Embodied Ocean Health among Dominican Diver Fishermen

“…Fishing labor was considered so valuable that colonizers sought after enslaved people from the Gold Coast of Africa, known for their abilities in the water and as skilled divers (Dawson 2006). While diver fishermen slaves had a certain level of autonomy due to their ability to navigate an environment out of reach of many Europeans, pearl divers encountered a different situation, as they were forced to dive in dangerous conditions that often resulted in exploded eardrums, shark attacks, and drowning caused by shallow‐water blackouts (Warsh 2010 ] ). Despite these experiences, the relatively difficult‐to‐see and difficult‐to‐manage nature of divers’ work allowed them occupy a position of independence in relation to regimes of labor in the Caribbean, faring better than many members of their community in the transition from slave labor to industrial capitalism.…”