A Jesuit and the Caribs

De la Borde’s Relation on the Caribs of the Caribbean, or Kalinago, is a fascinating document. Despite his view of the need to humanize and civilize the Carib before successfully converting them to Christianity, the Jesuit’s account of 17th century Caribs of St. Vincent is filled with interesting details about the lives, customs, religion and healing practices of this indigenous group. While denigrating the Caribs and their “barbarous” practices and religions, one can still detect some degree of respect for the success of the Caribs in their lifestyle. Moreover, for those of us interested in ethnographic and historical sources on an indigenous Caribbean population related to our Tainos, it is interesting to compare our Jesuit with the earlier 16th century sources on the Taino of the Greater Antilles. Indeed, by the time French Jesuits were proselytizing in the Lesser Antilles, the local population of the region had already been interacting with Europeans and Africans for over a century. Moreover, indigenous people from the Greater Antilles had already, at least in the case of Puerto Rico, fled to the Lesser Antilles. That Taino exodus from areas like Puerto Rico plus the already shared culture, to some extent, between the Kalinago and the Taino, makes for interesting readings. For instance, the Carib lunar calendar and important symbolism attached to stars, the sun, and the moon may have been shared elements with the Taino. Some of the similar religious and healing customs of the boye or piaye with the Taino behique, including even the act of sucking on parts of a patient’s body, suggest another commonality. The similar veneration of cemis or zemis points to another deeply rooted aspect of indigenous Caribbean spirituality. Clearly, despite the Kalinago claiming a relationship with the continental Galibias, their culture and language was also immersed in Caribbean island customs and civilizations. What we would like to know is to what extent Louquo of Carib myth, the first man, may have some correspondence with Yucahu and the characters in the corpus of Taino myths collected by Pane. The Caribs, at least as understood by the French, lacked the type of higher ceremonialism attached to political leadership or caciques so one might be justified in concluding that their religious and spiritual practices were less elaborate than those of the Taino. 

The Aboriginal Cultures of the Antilles

Robiou Lamarche's proposed myth-geography of our island

Robiou Lamarche's Tainos and Caribs: The Aboriginal Cultures of the Antilles is perhaps best read in Spanish. The English translation contains numerous errors, but is still worth the investment for anyone interested in a provocative interpretation of the indigenous Caribbean past. Drawing on the usual sources of ethnohistorians, archaeology, and a comparative approach to related and similar societies in northern South America, Robiou Lamarche proposes a number of fascinating theories on Taino and Carib cosmovision, astronomical knowledge, and cultural developments. By integrating the Caribs of the Lesser Antilles into the narrative, one also begins to see parallels between the two groups and how their legacy can be found today across the Caribbean. It is an epic history encompassing thousands of years of migration, cultural transformations and adaptation, culminating in the Taino chiefdoms of the Greater Antilles and the establishment of the Island-Caribs in the Lesser Antilles. The emphasis on religion and culture also gives a human face to the societies who, to a certain extent, are among our ancestors. 

Since one might reasonably worry about the dangers of relying too heavily on Fray Ramón Pané for understanding Taino religion and cosmology, Robiou Lamarche draws from art, petroglyphs, astronomy, and ethnographic research on related societies to expand our knowledge of the Taino world. Naturally, some of the conjectures remain very speculative due to the limitations of our sources. However, the advanced nautical skills of the indigenous Caribbean peoples and certain recurring motifs in their art suggest that Robiou Lamarche was correct about their cosmology reflecting a preoccupation with the Sun, Moon, stars, constellations, and its impact on the natural world. It would be only natural to suspect that the indigenous inhabitants of the Caribbean would organize their calendars, alignment of plazas, rituals, agricultural activities, and social practices around this astronomical observation of the stars, which could be related to the shifts in seasons, tides, animal life, or myths of origin in caves and belief in spirits. The finding of similar artifacts across the Greater Antilles attesting to similar ritual practices (such as cohoba ceremonies) suggest the cosmovision of the so-called Taino sketched by Pané may have been accurate beyond Hispaniola or Haiti. 

We only wish the chapters on Carib interactions with Europeans and Africans, as well as the legacy of the indigenous Caribbean population in the 21st century received a more detailed analysis. If, as stated in the text, the Caribs had been interacting with Europeans and Africans for over a century by the time of the 17th century French chroniclers began describing their societies, it would have been interesting to look for elements of African and European influence on the Caribs (and vice versa). The adoption of the sail, for instance, is an interesting example of technological transfer. But what about African or European influences on Carib religion or ritual? Are some of the similarities some claim to see between, say, Haitian Vodou and indigenous Caribbean religion, perhaps a product of the centuries-long interaction of the Caribs with Africans and not a sign of direct Carib or Taino influence in Haitian religion? The Island-Carib societies described by Robiou Lamarche would have been influenced by the European and African captives and assimilated persons living under their rule, composing perhaps 20% of their population. The indigenous legacy today also deserves more scrutiny beyond the elements of material culture that persisted across the centuries. But that would require oral history or analysis of popular religion in the Caribbean on a vast scale.