60199616-flight-to-freedom-african-runaways-and-maroons-in-the-americas

226 Flight to Freedom
In 1704 Nieuhof explained that the Palmarinos had a practice that newcomers
who had fled to the confederation on their own volition would
become free immediately, but those seized in raids would remain enslaved
until they had redeemed themselves by capturing another (Kent 1979, 180;
Carneiro 1946, 39–40). It is unclear what measures were put in place to ensure
that these people, who would have had to be taken on raids in order to seize
other captives, would remain loyal to the confederation and not hive off on
their own or, worse still, return to their former overlords and disclose information
vital to the security of the settlements. Nieuhof ’s statement must,
therefore, be viewed with a certain measure of scepticism. Presumably, the
number of captives taken on raids would have had to be very small to enable
their captors to keep an eye on them.
It is more rational to believe that newcomers, whether joining the confederation
involuntarily or voluntarily, were given tasks to perform to show their
willingness to serve their new hosts, and that during this period they enjoyed
few rights or privileges. If we can draw any conclusion from Nieuhof ’s statement,
it is that the so-called slavery in Palmares was temporary and much
more discriminating in comparison with colonial slavery in the Americas.
Moreover, Palmares drew oppressed people of all ethnic and social groups
into its fold. Hemming (1978, 355) asserts that the confederation became an
inspiration and magnet to all Blacks who experienced cruelties and oppression
on the coastal farms. Its capacity to resist more than a dozen expeditions
that the Dutch and Portuguese dispatched against it – including six costly
ones between 1680 and 1686 (Hemming 1978, 355; Kent 1979, 186; Marcano
Jiménez 2001, 52) – only served to enhance its reputation as a bulwark against
White oppression.
The much smaller mocambos also took precautionary measures against
newcomers. Those in the Grão-Pará captaincy allowed newcomers to leave
the settlement only after they had spent at least a year there. After that, individuals
would be allowed to leave only with the leader’s express permission
and only in company with his most trusted men. The system apparently
worked well, for the settlements in Grão-Pará continued to attract significant
numbers of runaways seeking to join friends and relatives or simply to
escape oppression (Santos Gomes 2002, 486–88).
In contrast to many earlier writers, García (1989, 70) insists that no form
of slavery existed in the Ocoyta polity in Venezuela. In his view, the Ocoyta
palenque was a metaphor for freedom (in his own words: “they knew that