Back before George Washington was that George Washington, four of his slaves escaped–even though, as he said, they were treated well by the “Overseers”–and he placed an ad in the Maryland Gazette on Aug. 20, 1761.
It’s an extraordinary document, of course, and will be up for auction soon. I should think it will make some news.
Anyway, he describes the facial markings of the slaves, and one, Jack, has “…Cuts down each Cheek, being his Country Marks.”
What are those? Which “Country”? Who did them? --I believe they are tattoos or scarification of some sort. Neptune, another runaway slave sought in the ad, has “many small Marks or Dots running from both Shoulders down to his Waistband.” But these he does not call country marks, yet I am assuming they are distinct from natural skin marks, because a third runaway, Cupid, is “inclined to be Pimply.” Note, however, that “Pimply” is also called a mark.
ETA: these are my photos of the Catalog pages of Christies.
Jack’s facial markings and Neptune’s “dots” were most likely ritual scars, especially if the men were born free in Africa prior to being enslaved. It was/is the practice in many cultures (on the African continent and elsewhere) for people to acquire scars to mark important life events, for decoration, or for supernatural protection.
I would guess they are scarification marks, which are still very common in many parts of Africa. They may take many forms, from a subtle mark on the temple to elaborate full body patterns. They mean different things in different places, ranging from purely decorative to sacred. It’s not uncommon (though definitely not universal) for them to indicate belonging to a tribe or nation.
Are there any cases of Arab slavers or American slaveholders tattooing or otherwise marking their “property?”
The use of the single word “country,” in any case, is interesting. When was Africa referred to as such? (When was “continent” a thought?) Any chance Washimgton was aware of, and speaking to others, who knew a particular African area/tribe/tribal area/political unit that he would refer to simply as “country?”
I would think slave buyers would want to know those things from their middlemen.
The word “country” is being used in a general sense of an area of origin, rather than a nation state or political area. At the time, there was probably recognition that people originating from a particular part of Africa would have a distinctive kind of ritual scarification. Here’s another example of such scars as used in part of Nigeria. A research colleague of mine from Nigeria, a Ph.D. working in the US, had scars like these.
What Colibri said. I don’t think Washington meand that these marks indicate that the slave comes from Africa, but rather from a particular country in Africa. Washington doesn’t say (and probably doesn’t know or care) what country that is. A different kind of scarification might indicate that he came from a different African country.
“Country” at the time didn’t primarily refer to a political institution, a state; it was a cultural term, referring to the place from which a particular tribe or nation came. A country might also be a state - France, for example - or it might be part of a larger state - Scotland, the country, was part of the Kingdom of Great Britain - or it might include several distinct states - Germany or Italy, at the time. Africa at the time probably wasn’t considered to have any states in the European sense - states were institutions erected by “civilised nations” - but it had many countries.
Africa at the time did have countries in the European sense. Africa had quite a few major medieval kingdoms that would be familiar in political structure, lifestyle and allocation of power to any European.
These consolidated power in the slave-trade era, where it became important to be able to engage in long-distance warfare and manage a complex supply chain. These states along the coasts became highly organized and very powerful during this time period.
Your average American slave owner probably wouldn’t have much of a concept of which African empire was which, but the slave traders definitely did. I’d suspect Washington knew some of the major players.
One of my favorite things in the world is European botanist Heinrich Barth’s journals of his travel’s across Africa. Besides being an astute observer and engaging writer, Barth had an excellent handle of the political situation (as he needed to, traveling with very little money or protection in very dangerous areas.) In one journal, he joins a group of slave raiders on a raid into northern Cameroon. The depiction of the raid is deeply disturbing, but what is most fascinating is just how complex the political issues are as Barth travels from empire to empire, under the protection of various leaders.
Yes, but whether Europeans recognised or acknowledged this, or regarded African polities as the moral equivalent of their own, is open to question. After all, it’s much easier to justify chattel slavery of Africans if you categorise them as “uncivilised”.
In any event, even if George Washington knew of such African states, I doubt that in categorisising these scarifications as “country marks”, meant that they showed that the slave came from an African state organised in this way; merely that he came from a region in Africa, the indigenous occupants of which marked themselves in this way, and considered that this distinguished them from people from other regions.
Yeah, I don’t think “country marks” were anything but a generic term for any African ritual markings.
There’s a ton of references to country marks in google books and none seem to have any specifics as to their origin much more than ‘it’s something Africans did.’ They weren’t used to actually identify the slaves original home within Africa, and I don’t know why a slave owner would care about that anyway, it’s not like they took great interest in their slaves personal life.
Yes, I know. Still, to justify to yourself doing that when you would be horrified at the thought of buying, say, French or English slaves you have to find some basis for saying it’s OK to buy African slaves in Africa (or elsewhere) but not European slaves. And the justification is invariably some version of “Africans aren’t civilised”. And that notion is easier to maintain if, among other things, you keep yourself in ignorance of the fact that African societies organise themselves in polities much like European ones; you just assume whatever political institutions they have are “tribal”, “savage” and so forth, and it would never occur to you that a European state could, e.g., exchange ambassadors with an African potentate.
Which is why, when a man of George Washington’s background talks about the “country” of an African slave, he isn’t likely to be using “country” in the modern sense of an organised sovereign state; he just means the part of Africa which is populated by the nation/tribe of which this slave is a member. And while he may recognise that his African slave has a country in this sense, he almost certainly neither knows nor cares what the country is called or where it is.
^
I think you are mistakening the 19th century and its scientific racism for 1761. People have been shocked at enslaving fellows (countrymen, co religionist like English and French were). Not others. At that time, you had Irish indentured servants aplenty in the colonies. The ever so civilised European Austrians had no problem in working captured Turkish soldiers to death, and no one could argue that the Turks were uncivilised. People were not opposed to the institution of slavery.
“Country mark” turns up quite a few times across the whole span of the database. You can search the ads by any term, so if you were looking for a name, an article of clothing, so on, it works.
Uggh. Interesting stuff, but what a catalogue of evil.
It’s really hard to imagine a society that just goes about its business while the worst stuff that can happen to a person happens to people all the time under their noses, and most people are just fine with it.
Actually, an important justification in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (though not always an accurate one) was “Africans aren’t Christian.” I don’t think that’s the same as “Africans aren’t civilized,” though I can see an argument for it.
At this point in history, it wasn’t “slavery of human beings is inherently wrong,” it was “we don’t enslave our own.”
In his Notes on Virginia, Thomas Jefferson was a pioneer in explaining black inferiority. In nauseating detail. He’d expressed hatred of slavery in his youth, but was more discreet as he aged. TJ thought any free blacks must be shipped far away, which would only add to the expense of manumission. Which he could not afford–due to indebtedness he’d inherited from his father-in-law (along with the Hemings family) & his own very elegant taste. He had a special dislike of race mixing. (!)
With scientific racism would come new niceties of vocabulary. Whites had countries & nations; others had “tribes.”
Washington was another Virginia planter–older & less educated than Jefferson. But leading an army that included blacks & governing the new country had broadened his experience & changed his mind. In his will, he provided for the needs of Martha & other family members.
Washington could foresee a mixed society. Jefferson, Madison & Monroe, other Virginia slaveholders who followed him into the Presidency, did not follow his example.
