Island Carib Origins: Evidence and Nonevidence

Abstract

Origin stories collected among the indigenous peoples in the Windward Islands during the early colonial period have been interpreted as indicating a mainland Carib affiliation for the islanders. This interpretation gave rise to efforts in the present century to identify the archaeological correlate of the presumed late prehistoric or protohistoric migration of Cariban speakers into the Lesser Antilles. Recent debate centers around two models. One of these associates the supposed migration of mainland Caribs into the Lesser Antilles with the advent of the Suazey ceramic complex in the twelfth century; the other implies either a protohistoric migration or an episode of rapid acculturation of island populations to South American mainland Carib culture in the fifteenth or sixteenth centuries. A review of relevant archaeological, historical, and linguistic evidence provides little support for either of these models. Instead, the so-called “Island Caribs” were Arawakan speakers, probably longtime residents of the Windward Islands whose cultural and linguistic connections with the mainland Caribs probably were the products of contacts related to trade and alliance.

Linking Past and Present: A preliminary paleoethnobotanical study of Maya nutritional and medicinal plant use and sustainable cultivation in the Southern Maya Mountains, Belize

“…This would seem consistent with a South American origin for lemongrass's utilization as a medicinal plant and a northerly dissemination of this knowledge attributable to a migration by either Carib or Arawakan speakers sometime around A.D. 1100 if we consider the archaeological evidence (Bullen 1964, Bullen & Bullen 1976, or just before A.D. 1100 if we accept the linguistic evidence (Davis & Goodwin 1990). Interestingly, however, the evidence we present here of its possible presence at the Classic Maya site of Quebrada de Oro could indicate a much earlier origin for its utilization, perhaps independent of its use among Caribs.…”

Where are the Caribs? Ancient DNA from ceramic period human remains in the Lesser Antilles

“…Europeans chronicled these people as ferocious nomadic hunters who raided Arawak and Taíno villages for their women, eventually completely replacing the Arawaks. However, more current analyses no longer portray the Island Caribs as male invaders who arrived from the South American mainland, and the image of the Caribs as cannibals is now thought to have been invented by Europeans to justify the slave trade [4]. Moreover, no gaps in the archaeological record can be linked to potential Carib migration waves prior to contact, and the archaeological continuity observed in the Lesser Antilles-from the post-Saladoid period to the contact period-lends strong support to the idea of local evolution [1,4,5].…”

Migration or Interaction: Reinterpreting Pre-Columbian West Indian Culture Origins

“…the question of Island Carib origins remains very much a matter of debate and competing hypotheses have been offered to account for the patterns of language and material artifacts in the Lesser Antilles at the time of European colonization. Several of these alternate hypotheses are summarized in Allaire (1980) and Davis and Goodwin (1990).…”