Settlement patterns and the origins of African Jamaican society: Seville Plantation, St. Ann's Bay, Jamaica

Archaeological and historical research at Seville Plantation, Jamaica, are used to explain changes in settlement patterns within the estate's African Jamaican community between 1670 and the late nineteenth century. Sugar plan tations, such as Seville, are marked by well-defined spatial order based up on economic and power relations that was imposed upon enslaved communities by planters and managers. Archaeological evidence is used to explore how en slaved Africans modified this imposed order and redefined boundaries in way s that correspond with the development of a distinct African Jamaican socie ty. The rigidly defined linear housing arrangements initially established b y the planter, and their relations to the Great House, sugar works, and fie lds, were reinterpreted by the enslaved residents of the village to create a degree of autonomy and freedom from constant surveillance that was at odd s with the motives of the planter class. These changes occurred within the spatial parameters established by the planter, yet they reflect dynamic and creative social processes that resulted in the emergence of an African Jam aican community.