Abstract
In this article, artifacts excavated from 19th-century African-American contexts at the Hermitage plantation near Nashville, Tennessee, are examined in light of their possible use in religious ritual, traditional healing, and other behaviors related to spirituality. While specific spiritual behaviors cannot be determined from the Hermitage archaeological and documentary record, the presence of a distinct African-American belief system at the Hermitage is suggested through comparison of selected artifacts from the Hermitage assemblage with various historical, folkloric, and archaeological sources. This belief system and its associated behaviors may have aided African Americans in achieving limited social and economic autonomy within the system of plantation slavery.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
Adams, Eric 1994 Religion and Freedom: Artifacts Indicate that African Culture Persisted Even in Slavery. African-American Archaeology (11): 1–2.
Armstrong, Douglas 1990 The Old Village and the Great House: An Archaeological and Historical Examination of Drax Hall Plantation, St. Anne’s Bay, Jamaica. University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago.
Berlin, Ira, and Philip D. Morgan (editors) 1993 Cultivation and Culture: Labor and the Shaping of Slave Life in the Americas. University Press of Virginia, Charlottesville.
Blier, Suzanne Preston 1995 African Vodun:Art, Psychology and Power. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Brown, Kenneth L. 1994 Material Culture and Community Structure: The Slave and Tenant Community at Levi Jordan’s Plantation. In Working Toward Freedom: Slave Society and Domestic Economy in the American South, edited by L. E. Hudson, pp. 95–118. University of Rochester Press, Rochester, NY.
Brown, Kenneth L., and Doreen C. Cooper 1990 Structural Continuity in an African-American Slave and Tenant Community. Historical Archaeology 24(4):95–118.
Cabak, Melanie A. 1990 Searching for the Meaning of Blue Beads to Afro-American Slaves. Manuscript on file, The Ladies’ Hermitage Association, Hermitage, TN.
Camehl, Ada Walker 1946 The Blue China Book: Early American Scenes and History Pictured in the Pottery of the Time. Reprint of 1916 edition. Tudor Publishing, NY.
Douglass, Frederick 1986 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Reprint of 1982, 1845 editions. Penguin, NY.
Ferguson, Leland 1992 Uncommon Ground: Archaeology and Early African America, 1650–1800. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
Fisher, Angela 1984 Africa Adorned. Harry N. Abrams, NY.
Franklin, Maria 1995 Rethinking the Carter’s Grove Slave Quarter Reconstruction: A Proposal. Kroeber Anthropological Society Papers 79:147–162.
Frazier, E. Franklin 1957 The Negro in the United States. Revised edition. Macmillan, NY.
Herskovitz, Melville J. 1958 The Myth of the Negro Past. Reprint of 1941 edition. Beacon Press, Boston, MA.
Hyatt, Harry Middleton 1970 Hoodoo—Conjuration—Witchcraft—Rootwork, Vol. 1. Reprint of 1935 edition. Western Publishing, Hannibal, MO.
Jones, Lynn Diekman 1995 The Material Culture of Slavery from an Annapolis Household. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of The Society for Historical Archaeology Conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology, Washington, DC.
Karklins, Karlis 1985 Glass Beads. Parks Canada, Ottawa, ON.
Klingelhofer, Eric 1987 Aspects of Early Afro-American Material Culture: Artifacts from the Slave Quarters at Garrison Plantation, Maryland. Historical Archaeology 21(2):112–119.
La Roche, Cheryl J. 1994a Glass Beads Excavated from the African Burial Ground, New York City: Conservation, Analysis, and Interpretation. Unpublished M. A. thesis, Department of Museum Studies, State University of New York— F.I.T., New York, NY.
1994b Beads from the African Burial Ground, New York City: A Preliminary Assessment. Beads: Journal of the Society of Bead Researchers 6:3–20.
Logan, George C. 1992 Archaeology at Charles Carroll’s House and Garden and of His African-American Slaves. Charles Carroll House of Annapolis, Baltimore, MD.
MacGaffey, Wyatt 1991 Art and Healing of the Bakongo Commented by Themselves: Minkisi from the Laman Collection. Folkens Museum-Etnografiska, Stockholm.
McKee, Larry 1993 Summary Report of the 1991 Field Quarter Excavation. Tennessee Anthropological Association Newsletter 18(1).
1995 The Earth Is Their Witness. The Sciences (March/ April):36–41.
McKee, Larry, Brian Thomas, and Jennifer Bartlett 1994 Summary Report on the Hermitage Mansion Yard Area. Manuscript on file, The Ladies’ Hermitage Association, Hermitage, TN.
Mintz, Sidney W., and Richard Price 1992 The Birth of African-American Culture: An Anthropological Perspective. Originally published in 1976 as An Anthropological Approach to the Afro-American Past. Beacon Press, Boston, MA.
Orser, Charles E. 1994 The Archaeology of African-American Slave Religion in the Antebellum South. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 4(1):33–45.
Otto, John Solomon 1984 Cannon’s Point Plantation, 1794–1860: Living Conditions and Status Patterns in the Old South. Academic Press, Orlando, FL.
Patten, Drake 1992 Mankala and Minkisi: Possible Evidence of African-American Folk Beliefs and Practices. African-American Archaeology (6):5–7.
Pogue, Dennis J., and Esther C. White 1991 Summary Report on the “House for Families “ Slave Quarter Site (44 Fx 762/40–47), Mount Vernon Plantation, Mount Vernon, Virginia. Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association, Archaeology Department, Mount Vernon, VA.
Polhemus, Richard 1977 Tellico Blockhouse Site. Tennessee Valley Authority, Chattanooga, TN.
Public Acts of Tennessee 1831 Public Acts of the State of Tennessee passed by the General Assembly. Jean and Alexander Heard Library, Law Library, Vanderbilt University Law School, Nashville, TN.
Puckett, Newbell Niles 1968 Folk Beliefs of the Southern Negro. Reprint of 1926 edition. Patterson Smith, Montclair, NJ.
Schorger, A. W. 1966 The Wild Turkey: Its History and Domestication. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman.
Schroedl, Gerald F. 1986 Overhill Cherokee Archaeology at Chota-Tenasee. Tennessee Valley Authority, Chattanooga.
Singleton, Theresa A. 1991 The Archaeology of Slave Life. In Before Freedom Came: African-American Life in the Antebellum South, edited by J. D. C. Campbell and K. S. Rice. University Press of Virginia, Charlottesville.
1995 The Archaeology of Slavery in North America. Annual Review of Anthropology (24): 119–140.
Smith, Samuel D. 1977 Plantation Archaeology at the Hermitage: Some Suggested Patterns. Tennessee Anthropologist 2(2): 152–163.
1976 An Archaeological and Historical Assessment of the First Hermitage. Division of Archaeology, Tennessee Department of Conservation, Nashville.
1987 Archaeology of Slavery: Some Tennessee Examples. Paper presented at the Afro-American Local History Sixth Annual Conference, Nashville, TN.
Stine, Linda France, Melanie A. Cabak, and Mark D. Groover 1996 Blue Beads as African-American Cultural Symbols. Historical Archaeology 30(3):49–75.
Thomas, Brian William 1995a Source Criticism and the Interpretation of African-American Sites. Southeastern Archaeology 14(2).
1995b Community Among Enslaved African-Americans on the Hermitage Plantation. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, State University of New York at Binghamton, Binghamton. University Microfilms International, Ann Arbor, MI.
Thomas, Brian William, Larry McKee, and Jennifer Bartlett 1995 Summary Report on the 1995 Hermitage Field Quarter Excavation. Manuscript on file, The Ladies’ Hermitage Association, Hermitage, TN.
Thompson, Robert Farris 1983 Flash of the Spirit: African and Afro-American Art and Philosophy. Random House, NY.
Weaver, Guy G., Jeffrey L. Holland, Patrick H. Garrow, and Martin B. Reinbold 1993 The Gowen Farmstead: Archaeological Data Recovery at Site 40DV401 (Area D), Davidson County, Tennessee. Garrow and Associates, Memphis TN.
Wilkie, Laurie 1994 “Never Leave Me Alone “: An Archaeological Study of African-American Ethnicity, Race Relations and Community at Oakley Plantation. Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles. University Microfilms International, Ann Arbor, MI.
1995 Magic and Empowerment on the Plantation: An Archaeological Consideration of African-American World View. Southeastern Archaeology 14(2): 136– 148.
Yentsch, Anne Elizabeth 1994 A Chesapeake Family and Their Slaves: A Study in Historical Archaeology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England.
Young, Amy L. 1994 Change and Continuity in African-Derived Religious Practices on an Upland South Plantation. Paper presented at the Southeastern Archaeology Conference, Lexington, KY.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Russell, A.E. Material culture and African-American spirituality at the hermitage. Hist Arch 31, 63–80 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03373603
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03373603