The Combat and Military Systems of Africa and its Diaspora

The Odum of Ala Igbo

The Odum of Ala Igbo

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koolkeef said:
:ohhh:

My pops served in a clerical role under an Army gerneral back in the 50's. He used to love telling this story of how he was deployed to a base somewhere in Africa. He claimed they did bio-warfare research there...
Anyways, I always assumed that it was a given that the US had bases all over the continent.
Click to expand...

Where in Africa?
 
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BigMan

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Good thread

Very interested in late 19th century/pre WWII conflicts in Africa and resistance in the diaspora. Do you have info on Black seminoles and Maroons/slave revolts in Brasil? I believe there was an independent black nation in Brazil at one point
 
The Odum of Ala Igbo

The Odum of Ala Igbo

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Dip said:
Good thread

Very interested in late 19th century/pre WWII conflicts in Africa and resistance in the diaspora. Do you have info on Black seminoles and Maroons/slave revolts in Brasil? I believe there was an independent black nation in Brazil at one point
Click to expand...

I have info on slave rebellions in Brazil. You're speaking of Quilombo do Palmares. I got you breh
:salute:
 
The Odum of Ala Igbo

The Odum of Ala Igbo

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Brazilian Quilombos: Flight and Fight Part I
  • The African experience prior to enslavement shaped the establishment of runaway slave societies in the Americas in places such as Florida (the United States of America), Guyana, Jamaica and Brazil.
  • In Brazil, quilombos (maroon settlements) had inhabitants numbering in the tens of thousands. The quilombo of Para in
    , located deep in the Amazon, had a population of over 2,000 runaway slaves in 1823 and it exported cacao and other agricultural products to Dutch Guyana
    (Suriname)
  • The descendants of runaway slaves were given constitutional protections in the 1988 Brazilian Constitution after decades of isolation and neglect by Brazilian governments
  • The key elements of African societies from which enslaved people were drawn from give us clues as to how quilombolos (quilombo residents) tried to recreate Africa in the Americas
  • The majority of slaves taken to Brazil were from West-Central Africa, and it was these slaves who played the greatest role in the formation of quilombos. In fact, the word ‘quilombo’, according to historian Robert Nolan Anderson is from KiMbundu (a language spoken in Angola). Moreover, the word ‘quilombo’ was not the word used to describe the autonomous settlements of runaway slaves in Brazil until much later on. The word ‘mocambo’, (also of KiMbundu origin meaning hideout) was utilized far earlier.
  • It is also important to note that the word
    ‘quilombo’ was a reference to a male initiation camp for warrior societies in Angola. Anderson says that
    the collapse of the Kongo kingdom created a new concept of state formation in Angola. Instead of societies centering on royal or ancestral lineages, societies like the Imbangala of Central Angola (who coalesced during this period of violence) were not united by common ancestral lineages but rather by constant military threats against their lives. The quilombo, the warrior settlement, became the centrepiece of this new type of native Angolan society
  • Quilombos in Brazil were constantly threatened by the colonial armies of Portugal and later on the armies of the Brazilian Empire. For instance, the Quilombo of Palmares withstood a military campaign every 15 months between 1672 and 1694. Once a quilombo was formed, white supremacists would try to destroy it.
  • Inheriting from Angola the means to create an armed quilombo, was an essential tool for a runaway slave. It is no wonder that Palmares was called 'Angola Janga' meaning 'Little Angola'. It was the largest maroon settlement in the Americas with a population over 20,000.
  • Palmares was populated by many African ethnicities (and even some Amerindians and Europeans), the title of the leader of Palmares - Ganga Zumba - is derived from a religious title of Nganga a Nzumbi from the Imbangala people. A Portuguese soldier sent to destroy Palmares described the settlement as,

    …the

    negroes from Angola who fled the rigors of captivity and sugar mills of this captaincy [who] have established numerous inland settlements…”.[1]

    [1] Ferao de Sousa Coutinho."The War against Palmares: Letter from the Governor of Pernambuco, Ferao de Sousa Coutinho (1 June 1671) on the Increasing Number of Insurgent Slaves Present in Palmares." In Early Brazil: A Documentary Collection to 1700, edited by Stuart B. Schwartz. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 264.
    Click to expand...

  • Despite the presence of slaves from the Bight of Benin later on (Yoruba, Hausa) who would lead their own wars of liberation in the 1830s, the origin of Brazilian slaves largely came from West-Central Africa (Angola, Congo) and Brazilian resistance to slavery had Angolan roots.
Atlantic-Slave-Trade.jpg
 
The Odum of Ala Igbo

The Odum of Ala Igbo

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Brazilian Quilombos: Flight and Fight Part II (The Quilombo at War)

  • The formation of the largest quilombo in Brazil occurred during the Dutch-Portuguese Wars over control of Brazil.
  • Running away or marronage was a common occurrence, but permanent escape depending upon the ability to get to hard-to-access mountains and forests. Brazil had a wide open frontier for fugitive slaves to run into, especially in the North-Eastern region where the majority of sugarcane is grown. Most quilombos were founded in this country.
  • Quilombo communities were dependent on good soil and climate for food production. Like maroon settlements in Jamaica, Quilombos would raid plantations for food before acquiring enough food and liberated Africans to grow food themselves. Following self-sufficiency in food, they would trade their foodstuffs for supplies they needed. As previously mentioned, the quilombo of Para would trade cacao to Dutch Guiana (Suriname)
  • Runaway communities depended on two main criteria: Food production and security.
  • Since Palmares was large, it was able to diversify its production. It created ceramics, straw products (like mats), gourds - which they traded for salt, guns and ammunition when they were not fighting the Portuguese. Although they were traded with the enemy, the opportunity to possess guns was too great to pass-up.
  • Out of the 10 large-sized quilombos which existed in Brazil, 7 of them were destroyed by Portuguese/Brazilian expeditions.
  • But of course, quilombolos fought back. They raided plantations for food, weapons, tools and women. This helped to reduce demographic instability in their settlements. They also captured skilled artisans and craftsmen.
  • Raiding plantations was just one way they waged war. Quilombos fought to convince colonial authorities that they could not win in battle, although no quilombo could live in a permanent state of war.
  • Quilombos had a sophisticated system of pikes, palisades, camouflaged traps and walls that were common in pre-colonial West-Central Africa. Moreover, the quilombolos used ambush and encirclement tactics to defeat numerically superior Portuguese colonial forces.
  • Palmares withstood a 42-day siege by 6,000 soldiers before its final destruction in 1695.
  • Often colonial regimes had to enter treaties with quilombos in order to maintain a truce. A treaty signed between Palmares and Portuguese Brazil led to the Ganga Zumba being over thrown by his war chief, Zumbi.
  • Women also fought in quilombos. Filippa Maria Aranha, a female quilombo leader, was so powerful that the Portuguese sought an alliance with her quilombo, Alocobaca
  • Quilombos were typically led by a chief, followed by a war captain with their consorts/queens. Palmares had a system of tax collection and territorial holdings held by aristocrats.
 
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