A Chronology of Taíno Cultural and Biological Surv

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A Chronology of Taíno Cultural and Biological Survival

www.centrelink.org/Communities.html

www.centrelink.org/JorgeEstevez.pdf

*This page consists of a "work in progress" undertaken by CAC editor
Jorge Estevez. The reader will find below a list of references
annotated with materials extracted from those items. The aim is to
demonstrate that Taíno cultural and biological survival in Cuba,
Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico has in fact been
documented over the past five centuries. The hope is that by
bringing these materials to light, researchers and others will begin
to pay greater attention to Taíno survival and begin to revise if
not reject dominant theories of Taíno extinction.*

*"Inside every mestizo there is either one dead Indian, or an Indian
waiting to re-emerge."
/Jose Barreiro/

"I don't make excuses for them, they don't deserve any. But, in a
world that only leaves room for heroes and demons, so much of this
story has been left untold."
/Alysia Bennet/*

*[This file **can also be downloaded in PDF format*
<http://www.centrelink.org/JorgeEstevez.pdf>*, approx. 180 kb]*

_*1500-1600's*_

*In 1519 Cacique Enriquillo rebelled against the Spanish, in a war
that lasted until 1533. This was a major victory for the Taíno. The
Spanish were defeated and went on to sign the first treaty between a
Native people and a European government in this hemisphere.
Enriquillo was given land for his people in the area known as Boya.
Another Cacique, Murcio also rebelled against the Spanish and fought
until 1545 and was also given lands for his people to live in. The
Murcio war lasted 25 years. /In Audiencia de Santo Domingo 77
Polemica de Enriquillo, 487488 Spanish text in utrera. From Lynne
Guitar's "Cultural Genesis: Relationships between Indians, Africans
and Spaniards in Rural Hispaniola in the first half sixteenth
century" dissertation, December 1998, Nashville, Tennessee. /*

*The death rate in the first quarter century of European occupation
was, no doubt, staggering, as it was among other Native populations
elsewhere, but especially in the tropics. Even smallpox, however,
did not claim all of the remaining Taínos as some Spaniards claimed
in their reports, petitions and testimonies to the crown. That all
the Indians had died as a result of smallpox epidemics is as
difficult to believe as this report to the crown: damages from three
hurricanes that struck the island in 1545, have left "not one tree,
not one piece of sugar cane, nor yuca, nor maize, nor bohio, every
thing has been destroyed. /Marte Manuscritos de Juan Bautista Munoz,
Vol. 1, 412/. /From Lynne Guitar's "Cultural Genesis: Relationships
between Indians, Africans and Spaniards in Rural Hispaniola in the
first half sixteenth century" dissertation, December 1998,
Nashville, Tennessee. /*

*In June of 1547 Dr. Montano was given the responsibility of seeing
the new laws (to protect the Indians) were enforced on Hispaniola.
He demanded that all the Spaniards with Indians to produce either
legal title proving said Indians were slaves, or set them free. He
counts only 150 Indians for all of Hispaniola. /Utrera, Historia
military, Vol. 1, 367-371. . From Lynne Guitar's "Cultural Genesis:
Relationships between Indians, Africans and Spaniards in Rural
Hispaniola in the first half sixteenth century" dissertation,
December 1998, Nashville, Tennessee. /*

*Alonso Lopez de Cerrato wrote in 1548 that in the "city" of Santo
Domingo "everyone sells Indians like Negroes, especially Indian
women to be kept as mistresses". But none of these Indians appear in
the census, neither as freedmen or slaves. Perhaps in more ways than
one, the Indians were treated "like Negroes" and were included in
African categories- not because of their color but because of their
status/. Letter to the Crown dated March 7, 1548, Marte Manuscritos
de Juan Bautista Munoz, Vol. 1, 420-421 /*

*In 1555 four entire Pueblos of Indios in the Puerto Plata region of
the DR that no one previously knew about were found by the Spanish
and all were in peripheral areas well outside of Spanish control,
which proves that the Spanish could only count the people that were
in areas they controlled./ CDIU, Vol 18. 10 Consejo de Indias
advisory dated July 31, 1556. /The Consejo de Indias advised the
crown that none of the Indians of "those" Pueblos should be moved or
divided among the Spaniards, but that priests should be sent to
indoctrinate them into the Catholic Faith./ From Lynne Guitar's
"Cultural Genesis: Relationships between Indians, Africans and
Spaniards in Rural Hispaniola in the first half sixteenth century"
dissertation, December 1998, Nashville, Tennessee. /*

*The Spanish raided the island of Jamaica for slaves almost from the
very beginning. But In the Census of 1570, Spanish sources mention
an unspecified number of Taínos still living in Jamaica. Angel
Rosenblat, In "La Poblacion Indigena y el mestizaje en America" 2
Volumes (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1954, as it appears in /"A
brief history of the Caribbean" by Jan Ragozinski, page 45, 1992. /*

*Yet "another" village of Indians exists some 8 leagues from this
city, they are old and without children, writes the archbishop
Andres De Carvajal to the Spanish Monarchy in 1571. As it appears in
/"La Encyopedia de la Cultura Dominicana" book B, page 282. /*

*Irving Rouse writes in /"The Arawak", for the Handbook of South
American Indians, page 518, 1948,/ that in 1585 Sir Francis Drake
visited the Island of Hispaniola and reports that not a single
Indian was left alive. Yet.... *

*Fray Juan González de Mendoza in his book, published in 1586, wrote
that fewer than 200 Indians still lived on Hispaniola, where "most
[residents] are /mestizos,/ sons of indias and Spaniards, or
negroes/." //Fray Juan González de Mendoza, Historia de las cosas
más notables, ritos y costumbres del gran Reyno de la China (Madrid,
1586), as presented in Juan López de Velasco, Relaciones geográficas
de Santo Domingo, ed. /*

*/Emilio Rodríguez Demorizi (Santo Domingo: Editora del Caribe,
1970),/ 8, /.// From Lynne Guitar's "Cultural Genesis: Relationships
between Indians, Africans and Spaniards in Rural Hispaniola in the
first half sixteenth century" dissertation, December 1998,
Nashville, Tennessee. A/nd again in 1650 Friar Domingo of the
Dominican Republic finds 50 "wild Indians living near the vicinity
of his church. As it appears in the /Census of 1650, Dominican
Republic/. *

*In 1543 it was reported to the King of Spain by the bishop of San
Juan, that there were but 60 Native Indians remaining in the entire
island of Puerto Rico. Yet when the Earl of Cumberland, who had
captured San Juan, fled the island, the King of Spain sent an
armada, commanded by General Don Francisco Coloma, to re-conquer the
colony in 1599, and was surprised to find the city of San Juan
inhabited almost entirely of Indians. As it appears in "/The
Islands, the world of the Puerto Ricans, by Stan Steiner, page 17,
1974. /*

*The Black Legend has done much harm to the Taíno. Much of the Taíno
story has remained untold the past 500 years because the black
legend painted them entirely out of the picture of the history and
culture that developed in the Spanish Antilles. The Taínos, the
legend continues, were the ultimate victims--pushed into extinction,
wiped clean from the face of the Earth, a very dramatic statement,
but not true. Dr. Lynne Guitar, 1998.
*

_*1700-1800's*_

*According to Herbert W. Krieger, Jeffreys describes 100 natives
living in Haiti in 1730./ In/ "Aborigines of the Island of
Hispaniola" page 478, 1930 *

*Alexandre Oliver Exquemelian reported in the 1770's that the
Buccaneers and their "Indian tracker" companions were all over the
Island of Hispaniola. /Alexandre Oliver Exquemelian "The buccaneers
of America: A true account of The most remarkable assaults committed
by the English and the French Buccaneers against the Spaniards in
America (Santo Domingo: Editorial Taller, 1992). /*

*Jose Alvarez de Peralta writes that, at the time of the treaty
between Spain and France on June 3, 1777 at Aranjuez, the Dominican
population was, not counting the Haitian side, 400,000. The break
down was as follows: *

*blancos
(white).....................................................................100,000

Mestizos de Raza India y
Blanca........................................100, 000
Mulatos.....................................................................................70,000

Mestizos de Raza India y
Negro............................................60,000
Negros.......................................................................................70,
000
/Emilio Rodriguez Demorizi In, Relaciones geográficas de Santo
Domingo Vol/ 1, P.162. *

*Medric Louis Elie Moreau de Saint Mery, reported that in 1783 he
observed that there were certain "Creoles who have hair like that of
Indians and "pretend" to be descendants of the primitive natives on
his visit to the Eastern, Spanish side of the Island/. In
//"Descripcion de la parte Espanola de Santo Domingo, trans". C
Armando Rodriguez (Santo Domingo: Editora Montalvo, 1944) 95 and 50
respectively /*

*Modesta**-Slave girl from the Dominican Republic sold in 1783
Buyer's Name: Morales
Seller's Name: Labie
Year Document was created: 1783
Origin: Santo Domingo
Gender: female
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
/Document Location/*/*: Orleans (including hapitoulas). [Jefferson 1825]
**http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=14523** */*by Dr.
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall **In the 1787 census under governor Toribio
Montes in Puerto Rico, over 2300 "pure" Indians are listed living in
the Central Cordillera, yet in the census of 1800, there are no
categories for Indians or mixed blood Indians. What do appear in
place of Indians are Freemen of color or "pardo".** As it appears in
the/ 1787 census of Puerto Rico. /According to historian Salvador Brau.
*

*Felipe- Slave boy from _Jamaica _sold in 1793
**Buyer's Name: Laburthe y Barriere
Seller's Name: Leblanc
Year Document was created: 1793
Origin: Jamaica
Gender: male
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
**/Document Location: Orleans (including Chapitoulas). [Jefferson 1825]
//http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=23247 /Dr.
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall *

*Adele**-Slave girl from _Haiti_ sold in 1811
Buyer's Name: Morel/Seller's Name: Pradine
Year Document was created: 1811
Origin: St Domingue/Gender: female
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
**/Document Location: Orleans (including Chapitoulas).[Jefferson 1825]
/http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/fields.php by Dr. Gwendolyn Midlo Hall*

*Benoit- Slave boy from _Haiti_ sold in 1811
**Buyer's Name: Reynaud
Seller's Name: Bidet Renoulleau
Year Document was created: 1811
Origin: St Domingue Gender: male
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
**/Document Location: Orleans (including Chapitoulas).[Jefferson 1825]
/http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=52448 by Dr.
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall *

*Adelle-Slave girl from _Haiti _sold in 1816
**Buyer's Name: Rondeau
Seller's Name: Montas
Year Document was created: 1816
Origin: St Domingue Gender: female
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
**/Document Location: Orleans (including Chapitoulas).[Jefferson 1825]
//http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=68923 /by Dr.
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall *

*Camire**-Slave boy from Cuba sold in 1816
Buyer's Name: Malus
Seller's Name: Lapeyere
Year Document was created: 1816
Origin: Cuba Gender: male
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
/Document Location: Orleans (including Chapitoulas).[Jefferson 1825]
www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=67018// /by Dr.
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall *

*Dorotee**-Slave girl from _Jamaica_ sold in 1816
Buyer's Name: LeBlanc
Seller's Name: Dispan
Year Document was created: 1816 Origin: Jamaica Gender: female
**Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian
**/Document Location: Pointe Coupee
//http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=68559 /by Dr.
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall *

*Celestine**-Slave girl from Cuba sold in 1817
Estate's (Deceased Master) Name: Seguin
Buyer's Name: Borel
Year Document was created: 1817
Origin: Cuba Gender: female
Racial Designation: grif-usually means mixed black and Indian*/
*Document Location: Orleans (including Chapitoulas).[Jefferson 1825]
**http://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/individ.php?sid=72659*//* */*by
Dr. Gwendolyn Midlo Hall *

*So much so that the national complexion of skin and general
physiognomic traits may well be described as being alight brown,
approaching the copper color of the North American aborigines,
straight black hair in the case of the females, glossy and in
luxurious profusion and a combination of features resulting from
about an equal blending of the African, Caucasian and -Indian
physiognomies. The very visible traits of the latter would seem to
indicate, although we are not aware of the existence of any other
evidence of it, that the aboriginal race instead of having been
entirely exterminated, had been particularly amalgamated. In "The
Dominican Republic in the Island of St. Domigue" by S. A. Kendall,
page 243, 1849 *

*The "pure" race wholly died in (Hispaniola) at the latter end of
the "last" century; but their characteristic features and luxuriant
hair, are still to be traced among their descendants, from
intercourse with Europeans, Africans and colored people. These are
still called Indios. /In //Harper's statistical gazetteer of the
world / by J. Calvin Smith ; Illustrated by seven maps. Publication
date: 1855.Collection: Making of America Books /*

*May the devil take me, if I happen see him around here. These
d**ned Indians can never be seen; as soon as they are here they
disappear, and when we think they have been defeated, they re-appear
shooting even more. And they are not bad shots either. They have
spent their entire lives hunting, so wherever they aim, one has no
choice but to make the sign of the cross. By an anonymous Spanish
soldier to his family in 1864 during the War for Dominican
Restoration which began August 16, 1863 as it appears in
www.27febrero.com/larestauracion.htm *

*Few "genuine" representatives of the indigenous race can be found
in the Dominican Republic. /In //"The American Encyclopædia:
Publication date: 1873-76.Collection: Making of America Books /*

*The population of the Dominican Republic is one tenth white,
Spaniards of unmixed descent, and the rest a mixture of Spanish,
Indian and Negro with a small number of pure Negroes. In /Johnson's
new universal Encyclopedia: a scientific and popular treasury of
useful knowledge ... Editors-inchief. Frederick A.P. Barnard ...
[and] Arnold Guyot ... With numerous contributions from writers of
distinguished eminence in every department of letters and science in
the United States and in Europe...Publication date:// 1875-1878. /*

*Although at their entrance the Spaniards found some 2,000,00
Natives, Negro slaves had to be introduced as early as 1522; by 1711
there were only 21,000 natives. /In "The Globe encyclopaedia of
universal information". Edited by John M. Ross. Publication date:
1876-79. Collection: Making of America Books. /*

*In the mid 1800's a Spanish ship rescued 200 Yucatan Indians who
had been stranded by the French on Tortuga Island. These Indians
were taken to live at the town of Boya, perhaps, because there was
an Indian contingent already there? In "/La Encyopedia de la Cultura
Dominicana", book B, page 282. /*

*In 1882 a 91-year-old woman by the name of Josefa Gonzalez, who
along with other neighbors affirmed that the Cacique Enriquillo and
his wife Mencia are buried in a tomb in the center of the church in
the town of Boya. General Don Pedro Santana who after being elected
President of the Dominican Republic, assigned a pension to another
Indian woman who claimed to be a descendant of one of the other
chiefs under Enriquillo, and also lived in Boya. /Manuel De Jesus
Galvan, in Enriquillo page 480, 1882. /*

*In Haiti, Santo Domingo and in New Mexican Pueblos old Indian rites
are wonderfully mixed with Christian ceremonials. Hence we have on
one and the same day mass and tablet dances-church services followed
by dances in which old time mythological personages appear. James
Walter Fewkes, In /"On Zemes from Santo Domingo" Pepper collection:
foot note, page 1, 1891 /*

*There are still half breed Indians living in the town of Boya,
Dominican Republic, notes Frederick Albion Ober, /in "Aborigines of
the West Indies" 1895, page 289. Proc. Amer. Antiq. Soc. n.s. vol. 9
pp. Worcester, Mass. /*

*War Diaries of Jose Marti: Part 1- From MonteCristi, Dominican
Republic to Cap-Haitian, February 14, 1895, page 354...La Esperanza,
made famous by Columbus's route, is a hamlet of palms and yaguas on
a wholesome stretch of level ground encircled by mountains. La
Providencia (Providence) was the name of the first general store
back in Guayubin, the one that belonged to a Puerto Rican husband,
who had some yellowing antique, medical books and a fresh young
Indian girl with marble profile, an uneasy smile, and flaming eyes,
who approached our stirrups to hand cigars up to us. And in La
Esperanza we dismounted in front of La Delicia. From within, General
Candelario Lozano, his hair too long and his pants too short, comes
to open the gate- "la pueita" is how he says puerta- for our mounts.
He isn't wearing socks and his shoes are made of leather, He hangs
up his hammock...War Diaries, Cuba, April 23, 1895 Page 389...."But
why do these Cubans fight against Cubans? I've seen that it isn't a
matter of opinion or some impossible affection for Spain." "They
fight, the pigs, they fight like that for the peso they're paid, one
peso a day, less the lodging that's deducted. They're the bad seed
of the little villages, or men who have a crime to pay for, or
tramps who don't want to work, and a handful of Indians from
Baitiquiri and Cajueri...Page 390-Since el Palenque they've been
following our tracks closely. Garridos Indians could fall on us
here. Jose Marti, Selected Writings, edited and translated by Esther
Allen, 2002, Penguin Classics *

*"The one of most interest is the indio, or that of the descendants
of Inhabitants found on the island at its discovery and settlement.
They form a great mass of the country laborers over the island,
especially in the centre and northeastern section. They have much of
the serious appearance of the North American Indian, with his high
cheek bones, but their color is less red and more swarthy." M.R.
Harrington's , Porto Rico and the Porto Ricans, Catholic world,
volume 70, Issue 416, page 174.*

**

_*1900-2000*_

*As a result with their battles with the Spanish, of disease and
emigration to other islands, of hard labor in the mines, and other
unaccustomed drudgery, the Native population of Puerto Rico rapidly
disappeared, so that in 1543 it was reported to the King of Spain by
the bishop of San Juan, that there were but 60 Native Indians
remaining in the island. At this time there are few traces of them
remaining, at least this census has not discovered any. Still in
such matters no census can vie with the trained observer, and
therefore attention must be called to the following statements of
Captain W.S. Shuyler in a report on August 30, 1899: while work was
being done on the roads, I had the occasion to watch crowds of 700
or 800 men gathered around the pay tables at Las Marias, La Vega,
and Anasco. The frequency of the Indian type was very noticeable.
While its almost certain that there is today no single Indian of
pure stock in PR it is equally sure that the type can be seen every
where in the mountain settlements. At San German I noticed a woman
whose color, hair, and features were true Indian as seen in the
Southwest of the US. /(report of General George W. Davis) .War
Department Census Of Puerto Rico 1899, LT. COL J.P. Sanger,
Inspector-General, Director. Government Printing office 1900 /*

[blackcrowheart]

*Stewart Culin reported that upon his arrival to eastern Cuba to
investigate rumors of wild Indians living in the mountains, he finds
that the Indian phenotype was everywhere and very pronounced. He
also asserted that on his way to the Indian village of Yateras, he
stopped at a plantation called "La Sorpresa" where he met the owner,
"a white Cuban man", Senor Eugenio Ysalgue, who, living near the
Indians was expected to know something definite about them. Mr.
Ysalgue who was part Mexican, asserted that the Indians of Yateras
were actually Indians that had been brought over by Spanish soldiers
from the Dominican Republic some sixty years earlier (this is 1902).
Some ten families of Indians were taken to Cuba from the DR where
they eventually intermarried with the Indians already living there.
/Bulletin of the Free Museum of Science and Art of the University of
Pennsylvania. Vol. 111 Philadelphia, May 1902, No.4. /*

*Between the years 1898- 1912, 62 children from the "Porto Rican
Tribe" were placed in the Carlisle Indian School of Pennsylvania. To
date, no one knows exactly why these children were placed there,
what is known is that the criteria for being a student at the school
was that you had to be Indian. /Valerie Nanaturey Vargas In "The
Carlisle 62" Native Americas magazine, page 23, winter 2000. Also
Barbara Landis at the Cumberland Historical Society, who originally
researched the names of all 62 children and Mr. Bobby Gonzalez who
independently researched the story at the Huntington Free Library in
New York and passed on his findings to Jorge Estevez of the National
Museum of the American Indian who did further research on the
Carlisle 62. note: Sonia M. Rosa has a published paper on the
Carlisle 62 in the Caribbean Amerindian Centrelink's "Issues in
Caribbean Amerindian studies" www.centrelink.org/Papers.html /*

*Walter J Fewkes writes: El Yunque, where marked Indian features
were casually observed everywhere, especially in the isolated
mountainous regions, where the inhabitants still preserve Indian
features to a marked degree. In /"The Aborigines of Porto Rico"
1913. Johnson re-print corporation, USA 1970, p. 24-25 Further: /*

*In the Cibao and Higuey provinces likewise the natives resisted
with desperation. Henriquillo, the last cacique of Santo Domingo,
was never subdued, but was given the pueblo of Boya, north of the
capital, where the descendants of the early Natives still live. /The
Aborigines of Porto Rico 1913. Johnson re-print corporation, USA
1970, page 31. /*

*We now come to the class of people though smallest in numbers,
interest us the most-descendants of the original Indians. They are
not so rare either in the Baracoa district, for one will pass many
persons of strongly Indian features in a days journey in almost any
direction. All however, have more or less Spanish blood although
once in a while a type that looks almost pure may be seen. Mixtures
with Negro blood will not be considered. These people still make and
use a few articles of aboriginal character, while their houses,
their methods of agriculture, and, to a large extent, their mode of
life, are still quite Indian. /In "Cuba Before Columbus" Vol. 1&2
for the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1920. /*

*G. Jimenez Rivera, school inspector for District no. 41 Northern
Department of Santiago. Dominican Republic reported that the people
living in the campos around San Jose de las Matas are mostly of
white/Indian descent as are the people of the towns of Janico and
Najayo etc. /In Emilio Rodriguez Demorizi "Lengua y Folklore "April
12, 1922 /*

*Today there no pure Taínos writes Sven Loven, Mestizos are found in
the rural towns of Oriente plateau in Cuba, also in the woods of El
Yunque massif on Puerto Rico, page 499. He writes further: the
Taínos were a people that long ago became extinct. Such relics in
the form of objects still used, or ancient superstitions occurring
in folklore, as may still be found among their mestizo "descendants"
in the Yunque Rainforest, of Oriente in Cuba, or among the Negro
interbred population of the Dominican Republic. Summary page 657 in
/Origins of Tainian Culture, Sven Loven, 1935. /*

*In 1948 Dr Jose de Jesus Alvarez concluded after a study based on
A-B-O blood groups, that the "Indian mestizo " did in fact exist in
the Dominican Republic. He found that 57% of the Dominicans studied
had a predominance of Blood type O, M and Rh¹ which is highest among
American Indians. He also stated that in places where the people
displayed strong Indian features (like the mountain communities and
isolated regions, there was between 54 and 70 percent Indian
descent. As reported to the /"American Anthropologist" 1951 page 127
titled "Studies on the A-B-O, M-N and Rh-Hr blood factors in the
Dominican Republic, with special reference to the problem of
admixture. Also in EME EME Vol 2, No 8 Sept-Oct. 1973 /*

*In 1949 Bertita Harding writes: What appears most noteworthy about
the entire district of Constanza, Dominican Republic is the fact
that the population has remained almost pure Indian. Almonds shaped
eyes, aquiline features, straight black hair, and high cheekbones
all bear the stamp of Taíno and Carib strains. In /"The Land
Columbus Loved" Bertita Harding, 1949 Chapter 21, p141 /*

*Dr. David de Jongh who was interviewed by Taíno/Ciboney activist
Mr. Jorge Louis Salt says: "it is quite obvious that Indians still
remain in Oriente, Cuba, his conclusion coming after an O blood Type
group study he conducted in that region of Cuba, in the 1950's./ LC
CONTROL NO. 72214899 TYPE OF MATERIAL: book (print, Microform,
electronics,et.c) BRIEF DESCRIPTION: Gates, Reginald Ruggles,
1882-1962 (from old catalog) Race Crossing (Roma, Instituto
"Gregorio Mendel," 1961?) (25)-153 p. illus. col.). ports. 29 cm.
CALL NUMBER: RB155.D37 pars 2 Copy 1 REQUEST IN: book service:
Jefferson (Main Eur Hip LHG) or Adams 5th Fl. STATUS: not charged
DATABASE NAME: library of Congress Online Catalog PUBLICATION IN
ENTITLED Studies of interracial crossing VI. The Indian remnants in
eastern Cuba, Genetica 27, 65-96 (1954/). *

*Don Joaquin Priego writes that unquestionably there are many
Dominicans who show truly Taíno Indian phenotypes, and calls for a
thorough investigation into this matter. In /"Cultura Taína" page
43,1967. /*

*A man may not know that he is Indian. A man may know and not admit
he is Indian. "But it does not matter". The ignorance of your father
and mother does not change who you are, he said. "No matter what a
Puerto Riqueno decided he is. It already has been decided for him.
Interview with an Elder in Caguana," /The Islands, the world of the
Puerto Ricans, by Stan Steiner, page 9, 1974. /*

*The Natives of the island, the so-called "Taino" Indians, who never
called themselves that since it was not their name-hidden in their
mountain villages, beneath whatever cultural guises most effectively
disguised them, were not about to reveal themselves in writing. Like
many conquered tribal people they decided it was safer to be
"nonexistent". "The Islands: The worlds of the Puerto Ricans" by
Stan Steiner. Page 499 *

*Studies on the so called "shovel shaped incisors" conducted in the
town of Sabana de los Javieres , indicated that between 35 and 40
percent of Dominicans in this town (many of which were aware of
Native ancestry) had shovel shaped teeth which is a trait found in
Native Americans and Asians/. //Hernan Omos Cordones, in Boletin
(15) Museo del Hombre Dominicano. 1980 /*

*There was also an admixture of Negro, white and Arawak blood that
produced many exotic types. In both the Spanish and French areas of
the island, there developed a legal system of grading such mixtures.
There were samboes, mullatos, mestizos quadroons and octoroons, each
having different legal rights. But since statistics were not
reliably kept, if at all, we can only guess at the evolution of race
in Hispaniola. In "A Dominican Chronicle" by Carlton Alexander,
second edition,page 54, 1986 Impreso Editorio, Stanton. *

*/Abstract:/ Previous studies performed at Universidad Autonoma de
Santo Domingo (1982) confirmed the Incidence of Shovel Shaped teeth,
taurodontism and dentis ingirl thingytus in the population of the
Dominican Republic. Precise genetic transmission mechanism of shovel
shaped teeth has not yet been established, although heredity by
dominant autosomas is very probable. It is necessary to establish
prevalence and distribution among modern races and the eventual
value as criteria for the differentiation among the populations. No
previous studies have been conducted with relatives of the 1st or
2^nd degree. This has only been established by brothers. There is a
noticeable incidence of Shovel shaped teeth in the Dominican
Republic's actual population, in the different ethnic groups, due
perhaps to the racial mixture established in our country since the
first days of colonization./ F. Mornab Laucer, in Boletin (20) 1987
page 17, Museo del Hombre Dominicano. /Bernardo Boyrie De Vega,
writes of the many Taíno elements found in modern Dominican
Culture/. In //"La herencia Indigena en la cultura Dominicana de
hoy" Ensayos sobre la cultura Dominicana, 1988. /*

*They withdrew into the mountains, later intermarrying with the
escaped black slaves and deserting Spanish soldiers. They later
became the rural proletariat. Indeed, their imprint is still visible
in the faces and stature of many Puerto Ricans as well as in the
Islands language. In /"The Puerto Rican Houses in Socio-historical
Perspective" by Carol F. Joppling page 11, 1988 /*

*Dr Rivero De la Calle who studied the natives of eastern Cuba in
1964, as did Dr. V. Ginsburg in 1967 who came to the same
conclusion: the Taínos did in fact survive in Eastern Cuba. As
reported to the Cuban Publication /"Granma" News letter #4, August
13, 1989 /*

*Maya Derin's Study of Haiti was one of the first to point out the
many areas of "cultural convergence" among the Taíno and African
Peoples who were brought to the island as slaves. /Derin, Divine
Horsemen: The living Gods of Haiti. 1964 (New York: McPherson & Co.
1991. See especially 61-67 and appendix B, 271-286. /*

*"The persistence of a Taíno genetic component in contemporary
Dominican life, along with the survival of certain undeniably
indigenous beliefs and traditions (kept alive in rural areas and
passed along through oral tradition) requires the recognition of a
native substratum in our midst today in: "Trans-culturation in the
contact period and contemporary Columbian Consequences", by Garcia
Arevalo, 1990 page 275 *

*"Although the Taino population of Hispaniola was "wiped" out within
thirty years of the discovery, it is as though the Tainos had left
their mode of life embedded in the land, to be reenacted in a
surprisingly similar form by the campesinos now". Rich soil, a
benign climate, and plants of predictable yield guarantee basic
survival, although today on a threadbare level..... Pucho asks me a
lot about the Tainos-- I once read him from Las Casas the
descriptions of their common crops and agricultural practices, and
he was as startled as I was that everything was all still growing
within shouting distance, that we were more or less enacting the
Tainos' agricultural patterns, using their words, living more or
less as they did except for our clothes and our discontents. In
"Reflections: Waiting for Columbus" by Alastair Reid in "The New
Yorker" (February 24, 1992, pp. 57-75)
muweb.millersville.edu/~columbus/data/art/REID01.ART *

*Dr. Irving Rouse, although first stating that the Taínos are
"extinct", goes on to say that people claiming to be of Taíno
descent have survived on all three of the Spanish speaking islands
of the Caribbean, and that they have in fact retained cultural,
biological and linguistic traits of their Taíno ancestors. Irving
Rouse, /In "The Taínos, The Rise and Fall of the People that Met
Columbus", page 161, 1992. /*

*We never disappeared as a people or as a culture. As a new people
we made ourselves one with the European and with the African, and as
a culture our customs and knowledge fused with theirs, creating an
unreal but certain us. The Dominican Taínos still live 500 years
later. Only knowing truly what we were can we see what we want. /E.
Antonio De Moya, In "Animacion Sociocultural y Polisintesis en la
Transformacion del Sistema Educativo Dominicano," Revista de
Educacion , Santo Domingo, 1993, P 10. /*

*In any case I discovered that Native Americans had been legally
defined as mulattoes in Virginia in 1705, without having any African
ancestry. Thus I knew that the dictionaries were wrong and that
there was a lot that was hidden away from view by the way most
authors had written about the Southern United States, about slavery,
and about colored people. I later discovered also, that the same
thing was true as regards the Caribbean, Brazil and much more of the
rest of the Americas. Quoting from page 2. The term Mestizo does not
appear in the Nebrija dictionaries o c.1495 or 1520 although
/mezcla, mesturar/ and related words are included. /Mestico /also is
not a word found in Santa Rosa de Virterbo's study of medieval
Portuguese language. Its first known appearance is in Cordoso's
Portuguese dictionary (1560's Nearly 68 years after contact) when it
is equated with Latin Ibira (corrected to Hybris, hybrida) in the
1643 edition. Quoting from page 125 Surprisingly such an important
term as "/mulatto/" seems never to have been systematically studied
historically. This is, as we shall see, a sad example of scholarly
oversight since the term /mulatto,/ like most racial terms, has not
had a static or single meaning. We have already seen that /mulatto
/in the sixteenth century was treated as being the equivalent of
'hybrid' and thus applicable to many kinds of persons. It is
necessary to be more precise, however, in terms of the changing
meanings of this word. Quoting from page 131 "Africans and Native
Americans, The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black
Peoples" by Jack D. Forbes, Illini Books edition 1993 *

*It is true that much of the Taíno culture has been lost due to
destruction by the conquistadors or absorption into the dominant
Puerto Rican culture. The latter observation is often unknown,
however, even by Puerto Ricans themselves who have been conditioned
to believe that the Taínos were completely wiped out. It is my
contention that Taíno Customs and beliefs provide the extensive
roots of Puerto Rican culture. Only by nourishing these roots with
recognition and preservation can the Puerto Rican people nurture a
strong positive self- identity/. /*

/*Toni-Ann Ramos's thesis UMI # 1376047 pages 82-83, 1995 */

*These few strands of indigenous culture were not perceived as such
in the consciousness of the Puerto Rican people until
anthropologists and members of independence movements began to
rescue Puerto Rico's indigenous roots in recent years. However, even
now, a type of discrimination creeps in, ranking Taíno culture
"lower" or "more primitive" than the Aztec, Maya, or Inca
civilizations. In spite of the efforts to reconstruct indigenous
life in Puerto Rico as it was before the arrival of Columbus
(extensive anthropological work, two museums), it remains an
artifact of the past and few people feel a connection to it. In
Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, or Ecuador large indigenous populations
have managed to survive in spite of genocide and repression. Puerto
Rico's indigenous legacy has been assimilated, however, although a
visit to the Taíno museums in Puerto Rico help to identify those
elements of everyday life that Puerto Ricans owe to our indigenous
ancestors. Moreover, identification of indigenous communities in the
Caribbean (Cuba, Dominica, St. Vincent, Trinidad) is opening new
doors to the real history of that region **Piri Thomas. "Puerto Rico
- 500 years of oppression." Social Justice Summer 1992: 73-75.
*

*In a letter to Dr. Richard Morrow of Brisas Del Mar, Luiquillo
Puerto Rico:
Dear Dr. Morrow,
We are pleased to inform you that since 1993, when Merriam Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth Edition was first published, the word
extinct has not
appeared in our definition of the Taíno people. It has been retained
only in the
definition of the Taíno Language. Here is the entry as it appears
therein:
**Tai-no, n pl Taíno or Taínos [sp] (ca1895)
1: member of an aboriginal Arawakan people of the Greater Antilles
and the Bahamas 2: the extinct language of the Taíno people. We
certainly appreciate your concern about this, and we thank you for
the information you have supplied in this regard. Sincerely James G.
Lowe Merriam Webster *

*POSTSCRIPT- the treaty with Enriquillo resulted in the settlement
of the Indian community at Boya, in south central Hispaniola
(Haiti/Dominican Republic). About 4,000 Indian people settled in the
free Indian community, where Enriquillo officiated until his death a
year later. The Boya community persisted and, although intermarriage
and migration eroded Indian jurisdiction, Indian ancestry persists
in the families of the region today. Around the time of the
settlement with Enriquillo, other Taino groups, in Cuba, Dominican
Republic and Puerto Rico, sought refuge in the mountains of their
respective lands, and thus small enclaves of Taino ancestors
survived, some into the 20^th century. Of course, the Taino people,
in intermarriage with Iberians and Africans, are a major genetic
root of the contemporary Greater Antillean population. The Greater
Caribbean islands were under Spanish domination until the end of the
19^th century. In "The Indian Chronicles" by Jose Barreiro, Page 295
Arte Publico Press, University of Houston, Houston Texas 772042090
There is a continuity in Caribbean history: from the Amerindian to
the contemporary Antillean, despite clashes and splits, a culture
has been transmitted and progressively enriched by contributions of
the different peoples. Several Amerindian words are being used in
present languages. Manioc (yuca) tobacco and many other commodities
have been transmitted, as well as the know-how of their preparation.
Ordinary items, fishing techniques, beliefs and imagery have kept
their mark. Thus, the Indian is worshipped in a special way in the
voodoo of the Dominican Republic. The civilization of these first
Amerindian inhabitants represents the basis of the creole cultures
of the Antilles. In "Presents Caraibes, 5000 ans d'histoire
amerindienne", Guadalupe 1994, Directional regionale des affairs
culturales de Guadalupe, Service regionale de L'archeologie 14, rue
Maurice Marie-Claire 100 BASSE-TERRE, tele (590)81 48 82 *

*Dr. Peter J. Ferbel writes: The People of the Sierra region in
general, and from cacique, Moncion in particular, are distinctive in
their physical appearance. While no anthropometric studies have been
made, they appear to have bloodlines stronger in Indian and mestizo
origin than other places in the Dominican Republic, page
156..........In Essence, an admission of the survival of the Taíno
is a critique of the state control of history and national identity.
/Dr. Peter J. Ferbel in "The politics of Taíno Indian identity in
the post Quincentennial Dominican Republic" page 168 and 169. 1996
UMI Dissertation Services #9604952 /*

*The history studied and taught for four hundred years in the
Caribbean tended to focus on the past of the mother country rather
than the pre-history history of the specific Island; indigenous
culture was thus unimportant for national identity. In /"Ancient
Caribbean" page xxxvi, by John M Weeks and Peter Ferbel. 1997 /*

*At the turn of the millennium, centuries after their presumed
extinction, the reassertion of Indigenous identity and the
exploration of culture and life ways of the indigenous ancestors are
increasingly visible trends in the population of the Caribbean
Islands and in their North American diaspora. /Jose Barreiro in /*

/*"Taino Ascendant Extinction, Continuities and Reassertions" page
1, 1997 Mimeograph. */

*The Numerous and Diverse Indigenous people who lived in the
Caribbean at the time of European conquest play a more important
role in contemporary Caribbean society than might be suggested by
any listing of the "contributions" they have made to Caribbean
culture. Beyond the sum of all the surviving traits, words, myths,
plants and practices, the importance of the fist people of the
Caribbean is more far-reaching than is widely recognized. The
descendants of the Indians still live in the islands and play an
important political and social role. In "The Indigenous People of
the Caribbean" Edited by Samuel M. Wilson Chapter 21, page 206, 1997
What of all the Taínos and mestizos who fled to the mountains or
other peripheral regions of the islands to avoid Spanish Domination?
How could the Spaniards count people who were not under their
control, people who hiding from them? How did this affect the
"accurate census"? Dr Lynne Guitar, in /"Cultural Genesis:
Relationships among Indians, Africans, and Spaniards in Rural
Hispaniola, First half of the 1600/^/th/ / century. 1998 /*

*Today many Dominicans retain physical characteristics of their
Taíno heritage--- so many in fact, that they are overlooked, just
accepted as "Dominicans" except for those who are specifically
looking for them/. //Dr. Lynne Guitar in "Cultural Genesis:
Relationships among Indians, Africans and Spaniards in Rural
Hispaniola, first half of the sixteenth century, page 315, 1998. /*

*The documented discovery of Taíno survival has given me the
reputation here in the Dominican Republic of a "crack pot." It pains
me, but I can live with that because my discoveries have provided me
with deep personal satisfaction on several levels. It is not often
that the work of an historian who specializes in the sixteenth
century has direct bearing on the modern day. But these documented
discoveries do, for they provide modern-day Taínos--several of whom
I now count among my dearest friends--with the historical evidence
that they have been lacking to date. I am excited to be part of the
ongoing battle that Modern-day Taínos are fighting. I am happy to
provide them with this documentary evidence as ammunition to reclaim
their rightful heritage, not as the pitiable victims of genocide in
the New World, but as one of the most influential--and therefore
most victorious--groups of Indian people in all of the Americas.
Guariquen-Author's Afterward on Taino Survival/ "Cultural Genesis:
Relationships between Indians, Africans and Spaniards in Rural
Hispaniola in the first half sixteenth century" dissertation,
December 1998, Nashville, Tennessee./ (included in original version
of author's dissertation). Mimeograph obtained from author, Dr.
Lynne Guitar, 1998 *

*In its definition on what constitutes an American Indian, the
American Indian Archaeological Institute states that "Puerto Ricans,
Mexicans and other Latin Americans may also be American Indians.
/Concord MA 1998. /*

*Escaped slaves, called Maroons, mingled in mountain hideaways with
indigenous Taino people. Both peoples had much in common. Taino
memories are still evoked by stone celts placed on altars. Other
Native American traces persist in Vodou as well, from words to
musical instruments, dance and dress styles, and weaponry. Although
discrete Taino survivals are difficult to isolate, the secret
Bizango rites keep alive the history of the intermingling, as do
bands of Rara performers during their post-carnival celebrations. In
"The Sacred Arts of Haitian Voodou" exhibit at the Museum of Natural
History in New York City, 1998-1999.
www.amnh.org/exhibitions/vodou/roots6.html *

*It might therefore come as a surprise to some to learn of the many
"new" Taino organizations which have appeared, as if out of nowhere,
in recent years in Puerto Rico, Cuba and the Dominican Republic, or
when one "discovers" that Island Carib life is being celebrated on a
regular basis in Trinidad and Tobago, at the annual Santa Rosa
Festival (see article in this issue). Yet in 1989, Cultural Survival
magazine reported a population of over 1000 descendants of the
Taino, referred to as Cubenos by Bartolome De Las Casas in the
1500's, living in the far east of that island in the vicinity of
Baracoa. For various reasons, the existence of an Indian population
in Cuba has been vehemently denied by both government sources and
academics for most of this century, and the belief persists that
they were exterminated by 1550. In the view of many Cubans, such
people cease to be Indians if they intermix with African or
Europeans, or if they exhibit any western affectations. In"The
Indigenous People of the Caribbean. Cultural Survival Magazine"
Issue 23.4 December 31, 1999 by Ian S. McIntosh *

[blackcrowheart]

*In March 1999 Dr. Juan C. Martinez Cruzado a biology professor at
the University of Puerto Rico in Mayaguez conducted A Mitochondrial
DNA sequencing study on 800 people to determine how much, if any,
Native American blood could still be found in the modern Puerto
Rican people. To his and everyone else's surprise, 61 % of the
people studied showed definite Taíno MTDNA. In fact even people with
no obvious Native phenotype or knowledge of Indian ancestry also
showed high degrees of Mitochondria stemming from a Native American
female ancestor. The Results showed that most of the Modern Puerto
Ricans with Indian ancestry were mostly Haplo group A or C. Although
some of the genetic markers undoubtedly came from Natives brought to
the island as slaves from other parts of the Americas, most of these
were of Haplo groups B or D which are not present in Taino DNA and
were scarce in the recent findings. The amount of Mitochondrial DNA
found suggests that Intermarriage between Tainos and the
Spanish/Africans was obviously much higher than anyone ever
suspected. In 1970's Don Ricardo Alegria conducted a study on shovel
shaped incisors and found that 35 percent of all the students he
tested had this native "trait" also. /In Human Biology, v.73, no 4,
pp 491-5111, August 2001. First appeared in his paper,
"Ethnic-contributions the Puerto Rican mitochondrial gene pool".
March, 1999, also in www.kacike.org/MartinezEnglish.html /*

*In fact, the supposed extinction of the Taíno people by the Spanish
has been an important part of nationalist projects in the Caribbean,
used by Indigenistas to accentuate the brutality of the conquest and
by "white" elites to emphasize /hispanidad, /much as in many Latin
American countries the "disappearance" of the indigenous populations
is not very nostalgically mourned as an unfortunate but long past
side effect of European contact, which on the whole is viewed in a
positive light. In "The beaded Zemi and the role of the circulation
of objects in the conquest of the Caribbean and its contemporary
reinterpretation" /Alyshia Galvez, May 10, 1999, New York
University, Department of Anthropology, page 13. /*

*There is substantial evidence that there exists an Indo-Cuban
population in the town of Yateras and certain villages of the Sierra
Maestra region that were established Indian villages during the
conquest period. As it appears in "Panchito, Cacique de la Montana,
Testimonio Guajiro-Taino de Franciso Ramirez Rojas"page 19 by Jose
Barreiro, Ediciones Catedral, Santiago De Cuba, 2001. *

*Understand that this fascination with investigating, preserving,
educating, and recognizing the truth about our Taino past has only
just begun. This wonderful obsession has governed our lives for so
many years, we hope that it converts itself into a slogan of a life
transformed by the past./ Thesis conclusion, /Acercamiento a los
mitos y leyendas Taínos en la literatura puertorriquena y caribena
(Spanish text) by, Sonia Migdalia Rosa-Velez;, MA,UNIVERSITY OF
PUERTO RICO, MAYAGUEZ (PUERTO RICO), 2002, 329 pages AAT 1415939 *

*There is a sociological and human event occurring in the world
today. Thousands with ancestral consciousness are awakening all over
the planet and the Caribbean is no exception. We are witnessing the
culmination of a dynamic that began hundreds of years ago
manifesting stronger each time in people whose origins are in the
Antilles. The Taino phenomenon occurs not only in the Caribbean but
in the United States as well. In North America this phenomenon is
especially evident in people of Puerto Rican, Dominican and Cuban
origins. In "El Mensaje del Cemi, El despertar de la conciencia
Neo-Taina" by Dr. Jose Munoz Vasquez 2002 1^st edition,
un-published. Available through: [e-mail] *

*Cassava (bitter and sweet) is widely consumed around the islands of
the Caribbean, but I have not seen such wide spread use of cassava
anywhere else as in the Dominican Republic. You can find it anywhere
in many forms on this side of Hispaniola. Marisol Villanueva in
/"The New Old World, CAZABI Gift of the Americas"/ p.18 limited
special edition published in 2003 by Inter-Americas / Society of
Arts and Letters of the Americas. Also part of the "New Old World :
Living beyond the Myth " exhibit, mounted in 2002 at the George
Gustav Heye Center of the Smithsonian National Museum of the
American Indian. *

*However they were not fully exterminated, as history has led us to
believe. In 1655 when the English expelled the Spaniards , Tainos
were still recorded as living in Jamaica. It was noted at this time
that rural farmers spoke a dialect that was mixture of Spanish,
Taino and African languages. Later archaeologists were to discover
English lead shot amongst Taino artifacts , and almost 60 years
earlier in 1596 English privateer Sir Anthony Shirley sacked St Jago
de la Vega ( later Spanish Town) , after being guided there by Taino
tribesmen. Further archaeological finds were later to confirm that
Taino extinction was a myth , although being enslaved and cruelly
treated by Europeans some Taino did survive. Many escaped into the
mountains to coexist with the Maroons , where still today many non
African plants are used medicinally , plants that were once part of
the Taino pharmacology. Hammocks also are still made in Accompong in
the Taino fashion , proving that the Taino still survived , for many
years after the Spanish had left ,with the Maroons in the mountains
of inland Jamaica. In " The Taino of Jamaica" A brief history of the
Indigenous population of Jamaica by Glenn Woodley, 2002
-http://www.uslegacies.org/Legacies/Jamaica.shtml. *

*In the proposed study, an attempt will be made to determine under
which measures and circumstances a multidisciplinary study could
provide relevant information on a segment of the Puerto
Rican-Dominican population claiming a Taino heritage, and the
historical-cultural implications of such claims. In addition, the
proposed study attempts to understanding the most important
socio-cultural, historical, and bio-geophysical transformations that
have left their imprint on the landscape and people of Boriquen and
Quisqueya. Although understanding these transformations is crucial
for the overall study, we are still left with the challenge of
proving common heritage and disproving the total extermination
theory. Without a doubt, genetic testing fills both voids by
establishing a shared DNA or blood-link. However, it is the
multidisciplinary evidence that will assist in the reinterpretation
and redefinition of Taino history and culture, respectively. By
Carlalynne C. Melendez, **[e-mail]*
<mailto:[e-mail]>_*
*_*http://anthro.binghamton.edu/graduates/cmelendez/BoricuaCibao.htm**
2003 *

*He and other guides also take visitors to villages where Taino
descendants remain. One such concentration of descendants is in the
coastal town of Manglito, northwest of Baracoa. "My father was an
Indian," said longtime resident Walquimides Hernández Sevilla, 74.
"Most of the people here have at least some Taino blood. But some
don't admit it or it doesn't matter to them." His neighbor, for
instance, said she almost never thinks of her Indian past. "I have
too many problems for that," said Marta Lores Arias, 42. "My husband
died five months ago. My house needs a roof. And somebody stole my
two pigs." An Indian revival in Cuba"? By Tracey Eaton/The Dallas
Morning News Monday, July 14, 2003
**http://havanajournal.com/culture_comments/A652_0_3_0_M/**
**[e-mail]* <mailto:[e-mail]>

*Although the 1816 census scores 33% of the Aruba inhabitants as
full-blooded Indians, after 1820 only whites, blacks and colored
people are mentioned as ethnic components (Hartog, 1961;Alofs,
1996;Dijkhoff,1997). We hope to show that this poorly defined
category of colored people not only covered Afro-European mulattos
but mostly included mestizos and Amerindians. The persistence of
substantial proportion of Amerindian genetic ancestry in Arubans may
explain the current high prevelances of health-related conditions
that are common in Amerindians, such as diabetes (Muneta et
al.,1993; Ramachandran,1994;Lee et al., 1 995), pterygium (Hilgers,
1959), and lactase deficiency (Caskey et al.,1977; Newcomer et al.,
1977). In the "Caribbean Journal of Science", Mitochondrial DNA
Analysis in Aruba: Strong Maternal Ancestry of Closely Related
Amerindians and implications for the peopling of Northwestern
Venezuela, Gladys Toro-Labrador, Oswald R. Wever and Juan
Martinez-Cruzado, Vol 39, No 1, 11-22, 2003 College of the Arts and
Sciences University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez *

*In August 2002 biologist Juan Martinez Cruzado of Puerto Rico along
with Arlene Alvarez , Lynne Guitar, Peter Ferbel and Glenis Tavares
extracted DNA samples from randomly picked individuals in the
Dominican Republicle (180 samples) . Of these 27 percent resulted in
positive Native American DNA. Just like in the Puerto Rican findings
of 1999 most were Haplo groups A and C with very little B or D. Dr.
Cruzado suggested that in the more remote areas of the Dominican
Republic there would probably be even higher numbers. The Dominican
Republic being such a large island with over 9 million people would
require a wider study in order to get an accurate percentage of the
amount of Indian ancestry on the island. To date no funding has been
acquired to continue this study on the island. In "Era Taina su
tatarabuela? By Miryam Lopez, Areito section of the HOY newspaper
08/24/2003 *

*On March 22 and 23, 2003, more than 900 people attended an historic
two-day event held at the Smithsonian National Museum of the
American Indian in New York City. Taíno and Carib community members
from across the Caribbean were invited to participate in the
museum's Expressive culture Series program. Participants included:
Dr. Jose Barreiro (Taíno) representing Cuba, Prosper Paris (Carib)
representing the island of Waitikubuli (Dominica), Nina M. R. Aponte
(Taíno) representing Boriken (Puerto Rico), Ricardo Bharath (Carib)
representing Cairi (Trinidad), and Cándida Peralta (Taíno)
representing Quisqueya (Dominican Republic). /Celebrating the
Continuance of the Indigenous Caribbean Cultures: Review of an
Exhibition at the National Museum of the American Indian. KACIKE:
The Journal of Caribbean Amerindian History and Anthropology
[On-line Journal]. Jorge E/stevez(2003). /Available at/:
www.kacike.org/NMAIReview.html *

*As a consequence of the New Laws (1542) that gave the Aboriginal
People total freedom, some small villages were created in which
surviving groups of Tainos and their descendants resided in. So is
the case of the towns of Boya and Banica (where in 1744 "one can see
some Indians still") in what is now the Dominican Republic and also
in Guanabacoa, Cuba. As it appears in "Tainos and Caribs, the
aboriginal cultures of the Antilles, page 244" by Sebastian Robiou
Lamarche. Editorial punto y coma Apartado 19802, San Juan , Puerto
Rico 00910. 2003 *

*The people from Ancestry-by-DNA Print Genomics
**http://www.ancestrybydna.com/welcome/home/index.php** a DNA
testing facility based in Florida state the following: **The
AncestryByDNA provides you with a simple and objective description
of your ancestral origins. The test gives you an estimated
percentage of ancestry from the four major historical population
groups: Native American, Sub-Saharan, European and East Asian. /For
people of more complex admixture, (i.e. 4-population admixture, such
as 30% European, 30% African, 20% Native American// and 20% East
Asian, which might be obtained from a person with a Dominican
father// and a Philippine mother//), the MLE is computed using a
more complex 4-D methodology. Because the triangle plot projects the
results in terms of most likely 3-population mixture results, and
because individuals of 4-way admixture are obviously more complex,
on a group-by-group basis, the bar graph is more informative for the
latter. //5/27/04 /*

*High levels of admixture are highly characteristic of recent
admixture events and various populations show systematic types of
admixtures. The average African American shows 20% European
admixture, and Caribbean Hispanics tend to show significant
European, Native American and African admixture. Non-African
Hispanics tend to show relatively even European/Native American
admixture with some showing more (even all) European, and others
more (even all) Native American 5/27/04. /Can be found @
www.ancestrybydna.com/welcome/home/index.php /*

*Hartmann fired off a dozen more questions as part of his effort to
complete the first census of the descendants of the Taino Indians,
an indigenous group that once thrived in this remote region of
eastern Cuba and later were thought to be extinct. "Julio is a
mixture of Spanish and Indian like many people," explained Hartmann,
a historian and Taino expert. "I want to eliminate the myth once and
for all that the Indians were extinguished in Cuba." Chicago Tribune
Article, August 17 2004 "Historians work to set record straight on
Cuba's Taino Indians BY GARY MARX "From an archaeological
perspective, Taino cultural continuity and Spanish cultural
transformation in sixteenth-century Hispaniola suggests that
contact-induced cultural change in household domestic practice was
largely unidirectional--from Taino to Spaniard." She found very few
European artifacts in the Post-Contact Era Taino site, despite their
nearness to the Spanish town of Puerto Real (just a few kilometers
away). Quoting from page 621; "This is consistent with
Anderson-Cordova's suggestion that most Tainos retreated to their
home villages when not working in labor drafts, and were largely
insulated there from the Spaniards (1990). It also supports the
suggestion of Taino indifference to and rejection of Spanish
cultural elements and values." In, American Antiquity, published by
the Society of American Archaeology, Vol 69, No 4, 2004, pages
597-626. *

*This is certainly the situation in the Caribbean Antilles, for
though the lifeblood of the earlier people does indeed flow through
the veins of present-day Antillian people, with rare exceptions
their earlier cultures and languages have disappeared through the
passage of time.... Chapter 1, page 2............ The testing of
such a hypothesis will necessitate considerably more archeological
and linguistic research. A very important analytical dimension which
might and should be added-not addressed to date by Antillean
specialists- would be the gathering of serological and DNA evidence
from both the living populations of the Greater Antilles and from
pre-European skeletal remains. Both sources hitherto ignored data
are readily available to the qualified analyst. Chapter 5, page 50.
In "The Languages of the Pre-Columbian Antilles" by Julian Granberry
and Gary S. Vescelius, The University of the Alabama press,
September, 2004 *

*If the Indians became extinct during the first 60 years of the
conquest, then where did La India Maria come from? Why are our
neighbors from Barahona of Morovis called the Indians of
Cabachuelas? How is it that my mother still prepared casabe bread
for breakfast? Why was it that the first home my family lived in was
a Bohio? How is it that four hundred years after the supposed
extinction of the Indians we still eat the same foods they did?....
In " El Sonido del Caracol" by Tina Casanova, authors notes,
Publicaciones Puertorriquenas, inc. 2005
**E-mail:[e-mail]* <mailto:E-mail:[e-mail]>

*Though most of the Tainos of Hispaniola now comprised of Haiti and
the Dominican Republic) vanished in the Americas first genocide,
there are many traces left of them today. Remnants of Taino life
include hammocks, barbecue and tobacco. Among the Taino words are
hurricane, canoe, tuna and iguana. It is believed that most if not
all of Hispaniola's Tainos were exterminated, but there are groups
of people in the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico and Cuba who
identify themselves as Taino. Some have even proven themselves to be
legitimate descendants of the Taino through DNA tests. In the Royal
Diaries, Anacaona, Golden Flower 1490 (fiction), Historical note, by
Edwidge Danticat 2005 Special thanks to Joe and Evelyn Garcia
(Taino) of Seattle Washington. *

*..... THEY ARE TRYING TO EVADE THEIR "BLACKNESS" (Can anyone cite a
representative number of examples to support the assertion? If
Indians with "one drop" of African blood are evading their
"blackness" by proclaiming themselves Indian, then what do we say of
Africans with "one drop" of Indian blood who proclaim themselves
African?). Indeed, "black" is taken as the "normal", "natural", and
unquestionable default identity of Caribbean peoples in such
arguments, and anyone claiming a distinct history must be motivated
by a sinister, separatist agenda. Lurking in the background are
unexamined and thus unquestioned attachments to outdated ideas of
assimilation and evolution, better suited to the era of scientific
racism than the post-colonial period. In "Searching for a Center in
the Digital Ether: Notes on the Indigenous Caribbean Resurgence on
the Internet. Maximilian C. Forte 2005. Mimeograph. *

[blackcrowheart]

*Ponce, Puerto Rico- Tonight an Indian couple from the Indigenous
Ceremonial Center of Tibes will marry in a moonlight ritual which
various tribes and the general Puerto Rican people are invited,
announced the tribes Medicine Man. "This ritual forms part of the
23^rd anniversary of celebration Indigenous Ceremonial Center of
Tibes and also contains the dramatization of a child's baptism" says
Louis Sanchez Garcia, organizer of the actitivites and medicine man.
The activity commences at 7:30 p.m. At this hour the invited guests
will be taken to the Yucayeque (village) where the ceremony will
begin and the guests will be able to appreciate Taino Indian
petroglyphs. Other Tainos invited included the tribes of Vega Alta,
San Juan and Ponce as well as Cacique Yahureibo of Aguadilla. More
than 70 indigenous people are expected to attend. Rito Nupcial Y
Bautismo En El Centro Ceremonial Tibes By Sandra Caquías in El Nuevo
Dia San Juan News Paper, Sunday May 1, 2005,
**[e-mail]* <mailto:[e-mail]>_* *_

*In New York, Florida and Puerto Rico, people of Caribbean
indigenous ancestry have re-organized related families of the Taino
Nation of the Antilles, giving way to a growing cultural
revitalization movement that counts many prominent representatives.
Whereas in times past, immigrants to the United States were only too
happy to leave behind the ''old country,'' to Americanize themselves
into the new ''melting pot,'' the new immigrants from Latin America
are not only sustaining their ties to their country of origin, but
the indigenous among them are keen to maintain and consciously
revitalize their ancestral identities. Editorial: Being Conscious of
origins of Indian affairs, © Indian Country Today May 26, 2005. All
Rights Reserved by: Editors Report / Indian Country Today *

*While the Tainos were once pushed to the edge of extinction, their
capacity for adaption has ensured their survivability during the
last 500 years of radical socio-political changes in the Antilles.
Likewise, their tenacity to preserve their cultural identity has
brought about their emergence from historical shadows to reclaim
their rightful place side by side with other Native Amnerican
cultures that have made invaluable contributions to the shaping of
the Americas. Members within the blossoming Taino community will
continue to promote their deeply imbedded traditions by educating
today's youth. In return, the youth of today will continue to retell
their Taino legends for generations to come. In "Return of the
legend keepers: Revival of the Taino Nation of Puerto Rico, by
Cheryl A. McCabe, page 68, University College University of Denver,
MALS 4901: Capstone project, September 18, 2005. *

_*Side notes *_

*(1) Wendolyn Midlow Hall recognized a similar pattern in her study
of Louisiana 400 years later. "The extent of race mixture and
emancipation in French Louisiana has been minimized by the excessive
reliance upon Spanish censuses, which overlooked the passing of
mixed bloods into the 'White race.'" Midlow Hall, Africans in
Colonial Louisiana : the development of Afro-Creole Culture in the
Eighteenth Century , Baton Rouge Louisiana State University Press
1992, 239. *

*(2)*

*Susan B. Parker's studies have demonstrated that Indians in St.
Augustine Florida, were consistently undercounted because of the
individuals and families who moved into the town and became Spanish,
"to all effects and purposes". She even uncovered documentary
evidence of two ladinoized Indians Francisco and Antonio Xavier, who
married white women, which runs counter to the widely accepted
assumption that "marriages between Spaniards and Indians were always
between Spanish males and Indian females". Susan R. Parker "Spanish
St Augustine's Urban Indians" in El Escribano: the St Augustine
Journal of History 30 (1993) 2 and 5. *

*(3)*

*In many cases , those containers of straw, wood, gourds and
ceramics were made in the traditional ways but in shapes that were
modified by the new cultural influences and with reduced (or
missing) artistic embellishment. See in particular. Kathleen Deegan:
Sixteenth century Spanish -American colonization the Southeastern US
and the Caribbean in Columbian consequences ed . David Hurst Thomas
(DC Smithsonian Press), 1990 225-250. *

^*(4)*

*The offspring of Spanish men by Indian women "was regarded as in no
way racially different from the Spaniards," writes Hugh Thomas about
colonial Cuba. He notes, however, that "imperial-born Spaniards...
from the beginning" were held to be socially superior. Hugh Thomas,
/Cuba: The Pursuit of Freedom/ (New York: Harper and Row, 1971),
1,512. Sidney Mintz agrees, noting that the colonists were virtually
"color-blind--so far as getting the job done was concerned." He
stresses demographic and economic forces as the categoric *

*differentiators throughout the colonial era. Mintz, /Caribbean
Transformations /(Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press,
1974), 66. Richard Boyer found political forces to be the strongest
differentiators in seventeenth-century Mexico. "A common mistake,"
he writes, "... has been to assume that the designations are
descriptive rather than political." Boyer, "Negotiating /Calidad/:
The Everyday Struggle for Status in Seventeenth-Century Mexico," an
unpublished paper presented at the Society for Historical
Archaeology conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology,
Vancouver, BC, Jan 1994, 3. See also Leonico Cabrero, "Visión del
indio americano en tiempos de Carlos V," in /Cuadernos
hispanoamericanos/ 107-108 (Nov-Dec 1958): 168-180; Douglas Cope,
The Limits of Racial Domination: Plebian Society in Colonial Mexico
City (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1994); Lewis Hanke,
"Indians and Spaniards in the New World: A Personal View," in
/Attitudes of Colonial Powers Toward the American Indian/, ed.
Howard Peckham and Charles Gibson (Salt Lake City: University of
Utah Press, 1969): 4-18; Elizabeth Anne Kuznesof, "Ethnic and Gender
Influences on 'Spanish' Creole Society in Colonial Spanish America,"
in /Colonial Latin American Review/ 4(1), 1995: 153175; Miguel Angel
Ladero Quesada, "Spain, circa 1492: Social Values and Structures,"
in /Implicit Understandings: Observing, reporting, and reflecting on
the encounters between Europeans and other peoples in the Early
Modern Era/, ed. Stuart B. Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1996): 96133; Magnus Mörner, /Estratificación social
Hispanoamericana durante el periodo colonial/ (Stolkholm: Institute
of Latin American Studies, Nov 1980); Anthony Pagden, /Lords of all
the World: Ideologies of Empire in Spain, Britain, and France, c.
1500-c. 1800/ (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1995); Danilo
de los Santos and Valentina Peguero, "Visión cultural en La Española
del siglo XVI," in /Eme Eme: Estudios Dominicanos/ 5(26), Sep-Oct
1976: 3-10; Stuart B. Schwartz, "Colonial Identities and the
/Sociedad de Castas/, in /Colonial Latin American Review/ 4(1),
1995: 185-201; and Emilio Willems, "Race, sex, and miscegenation,"
Chapter 5 in /Latin American Culture: An Anthropological Synthesis/
(New York: Harper & Row, 1975: 5-50. *

*(5)*

*Male immigrants from Iberia to the Indies outnumbered females by a
17:1 ratio through 1539, although more Spanish females began
arriving afterward. Peter Boyd-Bowman estimated that only 308 out of
5,481 Spanish immigrants to the New World between 1493 and 1519 were
female. The overall ratio from 14931580 was 7.2:1. Boyd-Bowman,
/Patterns of Spanish Emigration to the New World (1493-1580)/
(Buffalo, NY: Council on International Studies, State University of
New York, April 1973). See also Analola Borges, "La mujerpobladora
en los orígenes Americanos," in /Anuario de Estudios
Hispanoamericanos/ (1972): 389-444; and Richard Konetzke, "La
emigración de mujeres españolas a América durante la época
colonial," in /Revista Internacional de Sociología/ 3(9-10), 1-28:
1945. *

*(6)*

*Nearly every royal document dealing with the importation of African
slaves to Hispaniola in the sixteenth century mandates ratios of one
female to every three males--or more. See, for example, Archivo
General de Indias (hereafter, AGI), Indiferente General 424, L21,
which contains hundreds of slave permit records from May 21,
1547-August 27, 1549. For more detail about African women on
Hispaniola, see Celsa Albert Batista, /Mujer y esclavitud en Santo
Domingo /(Santo Domingo: Ediciones CEDEE, 1993). For the African
woman who founded the dispensary, see page 19.*

*(7)*

*The first documentary evidence of the word "cimarron" used to refer
to runaway Indians is a letter written by Gonzalo de Guzmán to the
crown on Sep 18, 1530. AGI, Audiencia de Santo Domingo 54, R1, No.
34; available in /Colección de documentos inéditos relativos al
descubrimiento, conquista y organización de las antiguas posesiones
españoles en Ultramar/, 25 volumes (Madrid: Establecimiento
Tipográfico, 1885-1932) (hereafter, CDIU), Vol. 2(4), 145-148. By
mid-decade, the term was in common use and can be found in many
documents as synonymous with "/indios alzados,/" which was defined
as Indians who ran away or who otherwise resisted or refused to be
subjugated, and "/indios bravos/," which implied "wild" or "savage"
Indians. By 1544, cimarron was also used in the documents as
synonymous with "/negros alzados/." See José Juan Arrom and Manuel
A. García-Arévalo, Cimarron (Santo Domingo: Fundación
García-Arévalo, 1986) and Carlos Esteban Deive, /Los guerrilleros
negros: Esclavos fugitivos y cimarrones en Santo Domingo/ (Santo
Domingo: Fundación Cultural Dominicana, 1989), 12. Esteban Mira
Caballos, however, notes that in the earlier decades of the island's
conquest, the Spanish documents recognized only two kinds of Indian
resistance and made a clear distinction between them: Indios
alzados, he writes, were those Indians who fought, refusing to
accept Spanish domination. They were punished with enslavement.
Indians who simply fled from their encomenderos, however--if
caught--were whipped and put back to work. Mira Caballos, /"El
pleito Diego Colón-Francisco de Solís: El primer proceso por malos
tratos a los indios en La Española (1509)," in Anuario de Estudios
Americanos 50(2), 1993, 320. /*

*(8)*

*The Calusa Indians and the Tekesta Indians of South Florida were
taken to Guanabacoa (a suburb of Havana) around the 1700's. There is
a letter that Cacique Carlos of the Calusa had written with the help
of a friar to the governor of Havana -- to send ships to pick up his
people (copy of the letter is in the Archives in Spain) there may be
a copy in D.C. as well. At that time, the Florida Indians spoke
Spanish and were Christianized. The Florida Indians and the Spanish
lived side by side, so during the invasion of the English from the
North. Cacique Carlos of the Calusa and the Tekesta were transported
to Havana *

*-- the archives in Havana still has the genealogy records dating
back to the time. One of the surnames assigned was Perez. /Private
conversation with Mr. Jorge Louis Salt of Florida, December 12, 2001. /*

*The following is excerpted from page 5 of the book _Puerto Rico:
The Trials of the Oldest Colony in the New World_ by José Trías
Monge, Yale University Press, 1997, New Haven and London. *

*"When colonization started in earnest in 1508, the Spaniards,
undoubtedly for evangelical reasons, distributed the Indians as
slaves among themselves ... Being unaccustomed to good, Christian
hard work, the taínos (sic) died in great numbers ..." "Soon the
Spaniards had to resort to African slavery, and turned their
attention to saving the souls of the blacks." Note: These are not
quotes from a 16th century European. These are the writings and
beliefs of a contemporary "scholar." *

*We are not and have never been extinct, our presence has always
been felt in the Caribbean throughout the centuries, and now the
whole world is beginning to take notice. Western civilization
however is rapidly encroaching on our homelands, and into our
campos. Our campesino life ways are rapidly changing and
disappearing, our Taino ways and knowledge are today, truly in
danger. Curiously this comes at a time when many Caribbean people
are aggressively searching out their Native roots and there is
staunch native reaffirmation. If it is to be so, that we, the Taino
and our culture will become extinct one day, the whole world must
know, that at this time, in this place, we were relentless in
asserting our Nativeness and strived to tell the world of who we
were, and that we were still here at this time, and that at
least...we tried. Random thoughts running through Jorge's head one
crazy afternoon, Jorge Estevez 2001. *

/*Curious */

*The Spanish seemed to be harsher than the English, French, Dutch or
Portuguese in their views of what constitutes Native people. I find
it curious that on the islands that were held by the English or
Dutch, Native ancestry is accepted as fact, while on the larger
islands where survival was more easily attainable, the denial of
Taino Heritage is strong. I came to this conclusion after reading
about the native people of Aruba, Dominica, Saint Lucia and
Trinidad. Jorge Estevez 2002.*