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Maroon Economy
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sion. Nevertheless, as noted earlier, the citizens of Palmares practised a high
level of statecraft, even to having special courts of justice and blacksmiths
producing their own weapons (Hemming 1978, 355; Bastide 1978, 82, 86). That
community would hardly have been unique in the specialized deployment of
manual skills; the impressive Quilombo do Ambrósio in the mid-eighteenth
century in Minas Gerais seems to have boasted a similar division of labour
(Pinto Vallejos 1998, 192). In the case of the Cofre de Perote palenque,
Davidson (1979, 94–95) states that Padre Juan recorded a clear division of
labour: half the population tended the crops and cattle, and the other half
comprised the military guard and the guerrilla fighters. Labour specialization,
of course, existed to a fair degree in the plantation societies of the
Americas, and was even more highly developed in Africa, the original homeland
of the majority of enslaved Blacks.
As noted, military expeditions concentrated on destroying the Maroon
provision plots, 14 which were usually at different stages of growth. In fact, it
appears that some expeditions in Guyana were dispatched at particular times
of the year, to destroy the plots when the crops were likely to be ready for
harvest. This was often a significant blow to the Maroons, since they would
have to subsist mainly by gathering until they could clear and plant the land
and reap another harvest. To reduce the impact of such destruction (and
sometimes to make use of more fertile soils), some Maroon communities
cultivated several plots, secluded at some distance from their dwellings. 15 It
was possible to hide the crops effectively by interspersing them with the
thick undergrowth. In one instance the André Maroons planted three fields
about a league from the old ones. A military expedition that raided the settlement
in 1748 failed to discover the new fields (Louis 1979, 317). 16 Food
security was critical to the preservation of their independence, and occasionally
Maroons turned themselves over to the colonial forces or sought
peace terms when their provision grounds were destroyed and they risked
death from starvation.
Industry and Manufacture
Apart from agriculture, fishing and hunting, Maroons carried on various
industrial and manufacturing activities, but more extensive research needs to
be done on this topic. We know that the mining of gold (and, in some areas,