The area of medicine and traditional religion is important to examine for several reasons. First, scholars are only recently beginning to realize the strong tradition of African American medicine that remains in the United States today. However, most of the ethnographic sources regarding African American medicine were written in the 1970s and 1980s when this tradition began to decline, as it continues to do. It is necessary to further document the contributions that African Americans have made to medicine, and it is hoped that archaeology can provide more information regarding traditional African American medicine by examining the artifacts that were used in these practices. Second, the interpretation of Colono Ware for use in medicine and ritual is still fairly recent and needs further clarification and support. Additional historical information is becoming available, and this scholarship can greatly add to an understanding of these expanded uses.

Perhaps more importantly, the study of medicine and ritual seems an ideal context in which to examine gender issues in early African American society. Many sources seem to assume a strict gender division on plantations existed, imposed by slave owners and overseers among African American slaves, although women often worked in the fields and performed the same tasks as men (White 1983:250). This equality in the field "may have encouraged egalitarianism in the slave quarters," surmises White (1983:251) because women participated equally in the process of production, often a measure of women’s power in societies.

Recent scholars believe that gender roles were heavily influenced by African traditions, and that enslaved African Americans created their own egalitarian division of labor, at least in the circumstances they could control, such as household tasks (Creel 1988; Morton 1991:141; White 1983). Many women on plantations spent much of their time in groups of other women who performed work and home tasks together and away from men, supporting each other, forming friendships and alliances, or quarreling and gossiping (White 1983:254-255, 1991:112-113). In addition, some tasks that comprised "women’s work," such as cooking, sewing, creating cloth, and "midwifery" or "doctoring" were often highly valued and the acknowledged domain of women (White 1983:251-252). Thus, the "work done by women in groups, the existence of upper echelon female slave jobs, [and] the intradependence of women in childcare and medical care" are evidence that African American women were "able, within the limits set by slaveholders, to rank and order their female world" (White 1983:258-259). Consequently, African American men and women did experience an equality in their family life that was "based on complementary roles, roles that were so different yet so critical to survival that they were of equal necessity" (White 1991:121).

Elderly African American women slaves, despite being less valued by owners and overseers because of their age, were respected and revered by the younger African American slaves (Jones 1985:41; White 1991:115).

In such authoritative roles as conjurer, healer, and midwife, these respected female elders passed on the old wisdom and skills. Serving "as a tangible link with the African past," the grandmothers preserved the past for future generations of Afro-American women (Jones 1985:41).

Throughout historical records, women are expressly reported as having control over or participating heavily in the areas of medicine and ritual. In examining these areas and the participation of women, information about the gender systems on plantations and in African American society can be gained, adding to a more complete picture of how African American women and men interacted with each other. Perhaps one of the most interesting reasons for this study is that it does examine relationships within the slave community, as well as the area of African American-European American relations, a common topic of historical scholarship.

When studying African American medicine, scholars must first address the fact that medicine and religion, magic, or the supernatural cannot always be separated into distinct categories (Hand 1980). Many historical and current sources from Africa and America show that medicine and traditional religion or magic are intertwined in health care (Mullin 1992:176). Diseases of the body are often thought to be caused by diseases of the mind or supernatural acts, and as such may be treated not only with herbal cures, but with rituals and spells by root doctors or obeah practitioners. Although a dichotomy may exist between herbalists, who use plant and animal materials for healing, and spiritual healers, who use "charms, holy words and holy actions to cure illness" (Harvey 1981:154), this dichotomy is not absolute. For example, Fontenot (1994) found that, in southwest Louisiana, African American "secret doctors generally treat a wide variety of sicknesses, natural and unnatural, physical and mental" (Baer 1995:629). Thus, both aspects of healing will be discussed here under the general term of "medicine," although more attention will be focused upon the preparation and consumption of herbal medicines.

In this chapter, practices of African medicine and traditional religion will first be discussed, specifically addressing women's positions in various African societies. Africa has always been home to regional and cultural groups that are highly diverse and autonomous, and to examine all of these groups is beyond the scope of this thesis. Therefore, the focus is on the areas of West and Central Africa from which the majority of slaves were taken. Attention is also paid to African American medicine and traditional religion, drawing parallels and highlighting differences between the two. Previous arguments concerning the medicinal and spiritual use of Colono Ware will then be presented. Finally, testable hypotheses developed from the ethnographic and historical data presented earlier in the chapter that can illuminate these expanded uses of Colono Ware will be presented.

When trying to examine resources dealing with African and African American women and healing, the largest problem is the use of the generic masculine in historical papers, ethnographies, and reports. In many of these sources, which date before the 1970s, healers are referred to as "he," regardless of their gender, when the position or duties of a healer are being discussed. For example, an ethnography might report that

when a doctor is preparing a medicine for his patient he must compose his mind and put his whole concentration into the medicine. In some cases it is necessary to praise the medicine and call down ancestors to assist him in making the medicine effective (Ezeabasili 1977, cited in Harvey 1981:162).

Furthermore, practitioners of medicine are often referred to as "medicine men," although the practitioners may, in fact, be female. In evaluating these resources, it was not assumed that, when referring to practitioners in a general sense, the authors meant that men always held these positions. Unfortunately, as these writers often did not relate the gender ratios of practitioners, it is difficult to tell how many women participated. However, in some instances, there were specific figures, and in these cases, information on the position of women was obtained.

Although there are varying opinions as to the origins of slaves in South Carolina, most scholars agree that a majority of African slaves were brought from the West Coast of Africa (Creel 1988; Littlefield 1981, 1991). Pollitzer (1994) estimated the sources of slaves imported to South Carolina from newspaper advertisements, shipping lists, and treasury records. He found that of 114,788 slaves imported to South Carolina whose origin was known, the largest single group (39 percent), came from the Angola region; almost 20 percent came from the Senegambia region; 17.3 percent came from the Windward Coast; 13.4 percent came from the Gold Coast; six percent came from Sierra Leone; 1.5 and 2.5 percent came from the Bights of Benin and Biafra, respectively; and .5 percent came from the Mozambique-Madagascar region. Unfortunately, the origins of 23,033 slaves were not known, making a definitive distribution difficult (Pollitzer 1994:6). Furthermore, as some scholars (DeCorse 1995) have pointed out, many of the countries listed as "country of origin" were merely places of shipping and often slaves were brought from their homeland in the interior to these ports. Creel (1988:329-334) agrees with Pollitzer (1994) that most slaves in South Carolina came from the Kong-Angola region. During certain time periods, slaves brought from other regions such as Senegambia and the Windward Coast outnumbered those from the Kongo-Angola, but the majority of the total number of slaves came from this region (Creel 1988:332-333).

The origins of slaves were certainly important in how African Americans, as a group, related to each other and maintained traditional practices. Littlefield (1991:30) states, "A situation of ethnic heterogeneity would not mean the necessary loss of ethnic consciousness depending on local circumstances." He believes that the continued influx of slaves into South Carolina from areas of Africa, such as Angola, would have provided a chance for a renewal or reintroduction of ethnic identity among African Americans: "Even though some circumstances conspired against the maintenance of a specific ethnic awareness among slaves, the facts of Carolina’s settlement and economic structure, as well as its desire to embrace the transatlantic trade in humankind as long as possible, counterbalanced these tendencies" (Littlefield 1991:34).

Any study that looks at gender systems in both Africa and the diaspora must take into account the diverse origins of African slaves and the gender systems in the societies from which slaves came. Historically in West and Central Africa there have been varying systems of gender. Amadiume (1987) points out that, among the Ibo of eastern Nigeria, gender and sex are separately defined constructs. She (1987:15) reports that this system had consequences for women’s position in society: "Daughters could become sons and consequently male. Daughters and women in general could be husbands to wives and consequently males in relation to their wives, etc."

Of course one cannot simply "import" African systems of gender to the diaspora. The situation of slavery created certain boundaries and stresses that opened tradition, including gender systems, to change and abandonment. Thus, any examination of gender systems in the diaspora must rely on sources of information from each particular situation. Unfortunately, little is written about gender systems among African Americans in the plantation South, other than their outward appearance--the gendered division of labor. Some tasks were not differentiated by gender, for women, as well as men, worked in the fields and often performed the same tasks. However, some differentiation is found by a careful examination of historical data. As discussed before, women often performed tasks such as childcare, cooking, and sewing that were seldom performed by men. In addition, the literature suggests that African American women were often given the responsibility for medical care, in both the official "plantation" task system and in the private home.

African American medicine was and still is heavily influenced by traditional African medicine, and African American herbalists, root doctors, conjurers, and lay practitioners still operate today, especially in the South (Hand 1980: 215-225; Harvey 1981; Moerman 1974; Savitt 1978:174). In the past, some slaves on plantations

developed or retained from an ancient African heritage their own brand of care, complete with special remedies, medical practitioners, and rituals. The result was a dual system of health care, the two parts of which constantly conflicted with each other (Savitt 1978:171).

Slave owners did not have manuals specifically for treating slave illnesses until the Civil War (Savitt 1978:11). Thus, early plantation owners and sometimes overseers either practiced their own medicine, some of which was "folk medicine" from their country of origin, consulted general medical texts or medical and agricultural journals to perform health care themselves, hired European doctors to tend to their slaves, or allowed slaves to treat themselves (Kiple and King 1981:163). Often the "mistress" of the plantation was responsible for treating sick slaves. The ex-slave narratives offer many examples of "mistresses" using European medicines such as castor oil and "Number Six," as well as remedies from local plants such as jimson root and dogwood tea (Joyner 1991:58).

One historian reports that plantations were "often too isolated or too poor to have a regular doctor for all cases, in which instance the mistress, the overseer, or an elderly slave looked after the everyday health problems and a physician was called only in emergencies" (Mitchell 1944:435). Goodson (1987:200) demonstrates that African American slaves--specifically women--were often the "doctors" on plantations whose owners could not or would not pay for medical doctors to treat both slaves and plantation owners' families. Savitt (1978:176) reports of one slave owner in Virginia who had a female slave doctor, and Mitchell (1944:435-436) and Kiple and King (1981:168) found that many plantations had a "sick nurse" or "doctor woman." Joyner (1991:59) reports that "Old slave women made ‘teas’ for various ailments," including red oak bark to combat dysentery, suggesting that African American women were responsible, at least informally, for healing during epidemics.

Still other planters called upon doctors to treat more serious illnesses, but allowed slaves to tend to minor illnesses, childbirth, and routine medical care (Savitt 1978). The African American female "nurse" was given these responsibilities because "She knew the medicinal virtues of all the herbs in the surrounding woods and fields and could cure many childish and other ailments without calling upon the Doctor" (Doar 1936, cited in Morton 1974:15).

African American nurses, mostly women, therefore often held the responsibility of caring for slaves on plantations. They administered European medicine, but also often used their own knowledge of plants and herbs (Kiple and King 1981:170; Savitt 1978:179-180). They "usually won the respect of both blacks and whites for their curative skills" (Savitt 1978:180). Other African American slave women, such as Jensey Snow of Petersburg, Virginia, were "hired out" to practice nursing in towns and sometimes gained notoriety and freedom (Snow later opened a hospital in Petersburg and continued her practice [Savitt 1978:180]).

African American slave and free women also served as midwives and delivered the babies of both black and white women, and many were paid for their help (Joyner 1991:59; Lebsock 1984; Savitt 1978:182). Often, however, midwives used "unsafe" practices, such as packing umbilical stumps with mud or shaking women until they delivered the placenta. These practices, also common in Africa, were detrimental to the health of mothers and babies and were denounced by European doctors (Kiple and King 1981:171). Morton (1974:165) found midwife informants in South Carolina who, as late as the 1970s, still rubbed soot on a newborn infant’s umbilical cord to "heal the cut."

On plantations where African American medicine was suspect or forbidden, it often survived in secrecy, and remedies were handed down to children and grandchildren (Savitt 1978:173). For example, one slave in Virginia in 1729 was given freedom in exchange for revealing his "secret cure for yaws and syphilis" (Savitt 1978:76; Wood 1978:52). On other plantations, African American medicine was recognized as effective and "the plantation herb doctor was not only encouraged by the slaveholder but at times consulted by him" (Kiple and King 1981:171). Goodson (1987:198) points out that African American women were often consulted by European doctors for information on plants and herbs to cure the diseases of both slaves and owners. These women imparted valuable plant knowledge to these doctors and the "medical news was rapidly disseminated throughout the newly-organized medical community of the United States...." (Goodson 1987:199). Sometimes European Americans relied directly on African Americans for medical treatment, as did a farmer and his neighbor in 19th century South Carolina; the neighbor was "cured by an ‘old African’ through ‘conjuration’" and the farmer was cured when visiting another African doctor (Sobel 1993:67).

On the plantation, African Americans often relied on root doctors or conjurers to heal illnesses that were either caused or treatable by "magic" or spells, as well as by physical factors (Mullin 1992:185; Savitt 1978:174). Kiple and King (1981:173) point out that many illnesses thought to be supernatural "stemmed from vestiges of West African religious beliefs that lived on in the slave quarters." Treatments were often given "with many flourishes and charms to enlist the supernatural in buttressing the remedy" (Kiple and King 1981:170). Joyner (1991:59, 76) notes that charms such as dimes, or pouches of herbs, were often worn to prevent or treat illnesses or visits by unwelcome spirits. These treatments were often more successful than those of European doctors, who, while treating the physical manifestations, did little to address the psychological origins of illnesses (Kiple and King 1981:173). In many cases, beliefs in conjuring, spirits, and the supernatural existed in African American Christianity (Joyner 1991:77).

As discussed above, African American women often practiced herbal medicine on plantations, either in official or secretive positions. Wood (1978) demonstrates that African American women at times used their knowledge specifically for resistance. For example, African American women in South Carolina, to the dismay of plantation owners, practiced herbal abortion, infanticide in rare cases, and reportedly concocted poisons to resist domination (Hine 1979:126-127; White 1991:113; Wood 1978:52).

In fact, in South Carolina in 1751, a large number of suspected poisonings resulted in a law which made it illegal, and punishable by death, for a slave to teach another slave about poisonous plants, roots, or herbs; a slave was also to be punished by lashes for administering medicine unless directed to do so by a European. Furthermore, this law forbid European doctors to hire slaves who would have access to drugs or medicine (Wood 1978:52). If the historical literature is any indication, however, this law was less than successful; as Wood (1978:52) observes, the "re-enactment of such laws suggests that none of them were entirely successful in their purpose."

Women were also said to be powerful in the area of the supernatural. For example, Savitt (1978:178) reports that a woman who had been "displaced from a position of power within the plantation slave hierarchy" had placed a spell on the man who had taken away her power. Lebsock (1984:171-172) discovered accounts of an "Obeah woman" who served the free black households of Petersburg, Virginia, in 1860. This account, according to Lebsock (1984:172), "hints at the existence of an important medical underworld in which women may well have been the main practitioners." Slave women also practiced obeah, or spiritual medicine, in the Caribbean (Mullin 1992:176).

African American women on the plantation who were considered witches were both respected and feared (White 1991:115). In later times, women were still seen as powerful in this area. For example, WPA workers in Louisiana interviewed one woman who had consulted a "voodoo woman" for help with her nephew’s legal problems. The woman was given a paper containing powder and a root, and was told to give it to her nephew. He was to chew the root in the courtroom, and spit on the paper during the trial. Unfortunately, the charm did not work (WPA 1945:249). People also told WPA workers of their fears of "voodoo women" who could "put snakes in their legs" (WPA 1945:248). The "witches" described by many informants were also invariably female (WPA 1945:249-250).

Europeans knew about African American medicine, and were threatened enough to make it the subject of ridicule and derision. This bias against African American medical knowledge has a long history. Wood (1978:50) notes that William Postell’s book The Health of Slaves on Southern Plantations (published in 1951) contained an "allegorical picture by a ‘medical artist’ [that] dramatically illustrates widely held assumptions about the evolution of Southern medical care." The picture, according to Wood (1978:50, emphasis in original),

conveyed a curious message. The print suggested that residents of rural cabins, where good health rested firmly upon the family Bible and the home medicine chest, had two outside alternatives in times of sickness. At the back door, a "black mammy," labeled QUACKERY, waited with her witch-like charms while her kinfolk danced Indian-fashion around a moonlit campfire. At the front door, meanwhile, appeared THE PHYSICIAN, carrying the latest in bottled drugs. So that no one would have any doubts about the preferable way to turn, the professional doctor was bathed in sunlight and his non-professional counterpart was wrapped in darkness.

That women were the primary purveyors of this traditional medicine is supported by historical evidence. In addition, contemporary ethnographic evidence from the Southeastern United States seems to suggest that African American women still practice herbal medicine in numbers greater than their male counterparts. For example, Harvey (1981:159) found that most "non-commercial" herbalists he met were "female, southern born, and over sixty." Root workers in South Carolina today may be more apt to be male, but it is not known if this was so in historical times. Additionally, the differences between the duties that root workers and herbalists perform may have changed over time, and the distinction between root workers and herbalists is not always very clear (Fontenot 1994; Mullin 1992).

If, as references show, the practice of traditional medicine by African Americans was prevalent and continued through slavery, archaeological correlates of that activity should be visible from excavations of plantation sites. Nevertheless, although archaeological excavations recovered many data about medicinal practices, surprisingly few excavations have focused on plantation hospitals or infirmaries, or urban African American medical facilities. Singleton (1992) found that archaeological excavation had a great potential to answer many questions about medicine on plantations, even when a wealth of historical data existed. In the limited excavations that were performed at Butler plantation in Georgia, many patent medicine bottle fragments were found near the slave dwellings, which probably date from the early to mid 1800s (Singleton 1992:59, 63). The consumption of patent medicine could have been for medicinal purposes, or for alcohol consumption; in fact, rum was often given to the slaves for medicinal use (Singleton 1992:63). Singleton (1992:64) points out, however, that more excavations would have been very profitable:

Excavations of the slave infirmary would have produced data on the nature of slave health care, such as the kinds of medical instruments used, the kinds of medications administered, and possibly evidence of the kinds of foods prepared for ill slaves. This information was only vaguely described in the written sources (Singleton 1992:64).

Orser (1994) has pointed out that interpretations of many objects as evidence of traditional African religion (which would include traditional medicine) are tenuous, with some more plausible than others. Artifacts that have been interpreted as possible objects of protection against the supernatural or for other religious purposes include iron fist-shaped amulets from the Hermitage in Tennessee, peeled forked sticks from Horton Grove in North Carolina, blue beads from several plantation sites, and pierced coins from several sites including Monticello (Orser 1994).

Archaeologists Brown and Cooper (1990) excavated a collection of ritual items they believed belonged to a "shaman" who practiced on the Jordan plantation in Texas in the latter part of the 19th century. This collection of items included samples of medicine as well as cast-iron kettle bases, shells, spoons, doll parts, and animal bones. However, some of the most important ritual objects that have been found, at least for this study, are marked Colono Ware vessels from South Carolina.

Most archaeologists (Ferguson 1992b; Wheaton et al. 1983) first assumed, and rightly so, that Colono Ware was used to prepare and consume food. Historical evidence suggests that many African Americans ate African-style meals, and the small size of Colono Ware jars and bowls is congruent with this practice. In Africa, a meal usually consists of a starchy main course, such as rice, cassava, millet, or manioc, which is served in a large container. Sauces or relishes of vegetables, sometimes with small amounts of meat, are served in small bowls, and people eat with their hands. Small vessels are thus good for cooking and serving sauces or relishes, or for drinking liquids (Ferguson 1992b:94, 97).

Ferguson was the first archaeologist to suggest that Colono Ware vessels may also have been used for religious or ritual purposes, or for medicinal use. He first proposed (1992b, in press) that Colono Ware bowls marked with an "X" may have been used in rituals to represent the BaKongo cosmogram. This cosmogram, or depiction of the sun rising over the earth to return to the underworld at night, represents "the continuity of life: birth, death, and rebirth" (Ferguson 1992b:115). It is associated with the BaKongo, an influential culture from the Kongo-Angola region of Africa, and is connected with minkisi, or sacred, spiritual medicines. Ferguson (1992b:113-116) hypothesized that the marked Colono Ware bowls could have been used as containers for minkisi, which were associated with water. He believes that the "traditional African association of medicines or charms with earthenware vessels," the fact that only earthenware and not European ceramics are marked, and the underwater context of many marked bowls "suggests an interpretation of the bowls as receptacles for minkisi or for use in a ritual similar to those involving minkisi" (Ferguson 1992b:115, emphasis added).

References can also be found in the African literature regarding the sacred uses of pots. As late as 1927, a female oracle in Nigeria whose position was being threatened by Christianity (which came with the construction of a new road into town) related that "her pot of indigo dye had been broken by the new road, and that she was leaving Efon to return no more..." (du Toit and Abdalla 1985:113). In this case, the metaphor of the smashing of her sacred pot was used to show that the traditional ways were being replaced with new customs.

Pots may have also been used to decorate graves, as references exist to African Americans using personal objects of the deceased such as "broken pitchers," glass, wooden figures, and quilts (Joyner 1991:81). This decoration is an African tradition which remains today in parts of the South such as the Sea Islands of South Carolina and Georgia; one photograph from Sapelo Island, Georgia taken circa 1920 shows items resembling earthenware bowls and a jug placed on a grave, along with pitchers, glasses, plates, and shell pieces (Campbell and Rice 1991:76, Figure 67).

The interpretation of Colono Ware was later expanded by Ferguson (1992a, 1995) to include the preparation and serving of traditional African medicines and the use for personal hygiene. Based on historical and ethnographic evidence, Ferguson proposed that the use of small, undecorated earthenware vessels (mostly jar forms) in West and Central Africa to prepare and administer medicine may have continued, albeit as a changed, adaptive behavior, in early South Carolina.

In West Africa, medicine vessels for sale in the Big Market of Freetown, Sierra Leone, are usually plain with minimal decoration. Ferguson (1995:6-7) attributes this to the "personal character of healing practice," noting that many medicines are prepared by practitioners for private, individual, and often singular use. African pottery shapes and sizes are highly variable in and between regions, and in most areas a wide range of vessel sizes are used for specific purposes such as cooking, storage, and beer making (Ferguson 1995:11-12). However, those vessels used specifically for medicine are usually fairly small, and are also associated with personal hygiene in published ethnographies as well as in Ferguson's (1995:9-10) own ethnographic research. The use of these vessels for personal hygiene includes post-menstrual ceremonial washing, as well as storage for body oils (Ferguson 1995:9-10).

Finally, Ferguson demonstrates that the use of earthenware vessels for medicine continues even in areas of Africa where a wide variety of metal or plastic containers are available because earthenware is repeatedly specified or prescribed in medicinal recipes or concoctions (1995:13-18).

In a comparison of attributes from African pottery and Colono Ware, Ferguson notes that unlike much African pottery, most Colono Ware is plain, with little or no decoration. He posits, following Fairbanks (1984:10), that the lack of decoration could mean that the vessels were purely functional. The use of decoration to transmit social messages could have been abandoned and replaced by more "flexible" means of transmission such as "songs, stories, [and] clothing" (Ferguson 1995:3). He also reasons, however, that the lack of decoration could be consistent with the use of these Colono Ware vessels for the preparation and administration of private and individual medicines (Ferguson 1995:8).

In the area of vessel size, Ferguson compares two African vessel collections--one from Nigeria and one from Zaire--to selected Colono Ware vessels from Virginia and South Carolina. The Nigerian collection from a museum exhibit "consisted of a wide-range of pottery collected from more than 70 ‘tribes’ and includ[ed] more than 1,100 specimens" of historical and contemporary pottery (Leland Ferguson 1995 pers. comm., 1995:11). The contemporary collection from Zaire was a result of ceramic inventories performed by Smith (1993) in two villages (Ferguson 1995:11).

Through this comparison, Ferguson (1995:10-12) finds that the Colono Ware vessel forms--bowls and jars--are much smaller than the African vessels and generally are more uniform in size, while the pots in the African collections are larger and show more variability in size. Four vessels in the collections from Nigeria and Zaire and three from Ferguson's Sierra Leone collection that had been identified as "medicine pots" (jars) were very similar in size to Colono Ware jars (Ferguson 1995:12).

Although Ferguson did not test attributes of Colono Ware other than decoration and size, he uncovered two historical references from the Southeastern United States for medicinal prescriptions requiring earthenware, and, through interviews on the South Carolina coast, discovered a man and woman who remembered herbalists, or root doctors, using earthenware to prepare medicines in earlier times (1995:15-16).

As a result of historical and ethnographic evidence and the similarities in the areas of decoration and size, Ferguson proposes that enough similarities exist to warrant a broadening of the functions of Colono Ware to include medicine and personal hygiene. Furthermore, he (1995:21) finds it likely that, as a population experiencing severe physical and mental stress, African American slaves would try to adhere to traditional healing methods. According to one scholar of folk medicine, this practice is not uncommon in populations experiencing change: "Traditional beliefs and practices ... serve many functions for adherents and are often highly resistant to change even when the cultural tradition itself is no longer viable (Matthews 1992:1). These practices were likely "survival mechanisms" used to afford African American slaves "an escape from an oppressive environment and degrading life situation" (Harvey 1981:155).

These traditional beliefs and practices were not, however, "unchanged from Africa," but creative adaptations to new circumstances and situations. For example, African Americans could not rely on many African plants, but had to seek new North American alternatives. African Americans also likely used new material culture (e.g., Native American and European ceramics) in the practice of medicine and ritual. For example, Klingelhofer (1987) found spoons, a part of European material culture, decorated with asterisk/cross designs (resembling the BaKongo cosmogram) at the early 19th century Garrison Plantation slave quarters. Leone et al. (1992) discovered a cache of artifacts in the late 18th century slave housing area of the Carroll House in Maryland. This cache of artifacts, interpreted as a collection of ritual objects, included 19 quartz crystals that were covered by a pearlware (a European ceramic) bowl marked with a cross or asterisk design resembling the BaKongo cosmogram. Clearly, African Americans used and modified European ceramics and other items of material culture in traditional religious practices.

Morton (1974) notes that the reasons African Americans kept traditional means of medicine were probably also somewhat practical in nature. For example, many African Americans after slavery lived in geographically isolated areas (such as the Sea Islands of South Carolina and Georgia) and could not travel to areas with doctors; likewise, many could not afford their services (Harvey 1981:164, Morton 1974:15-16). Still others doubted the efficacy of European doctors’ cures and services (Morton 1974:15-16). Many of these conditions would have also been applicable to African Americans living on plantations during the period of slavery.

Finally, Ferguson (1995:13-14) proposes that the use of Colono Ware for preparing medicine could account for the large numbers of sherds found on plantation sites. African use of earthenware vessels for medicine often prescribes daily preparation and ingestion of preventive or palliative cures, and medicine is often cooked in jars and steeped, stored, or consumed in bowls. If this behavior was continued on plantations, the intense daily use of both jars (for cooking medicine) and bowls (for steeping, storing, and consuming medicine) would result in a large amount of breakage, and thus a large amount of broken sherds (Ferguson 1995:13-14). Morton (1974:16) found in her fieldwork during the mid-twentieth century that in South Carolina, as well as the Netherlands Antilles, the "very poor" consumed decoctions, or teas, made from roots on a daily basis.

Marcil (1993) has tested Ferguson's (1992a) theory regarding the medicinal and ritual uses of Colono Ware by examining an 18th century archaeological deposit of the ceramic from Middleburg, a South Carolina low country plantation. She found that the majority of Colono Ware vessels at the site were bowls, consistent with percentages found on other South Carolina sites, and decoration was rare. Although she could not measure height as Ferguson (1995) did, she found, using diameter measurements, that most of her vessels were small and consistent in size with previously excavated South Carolina collections and the small West African vessels (Marcil 1993:66-69). Approximately half of the bowl fragments and nine of the 10 jar fragments were charred (Marcil 1993:69).

Marcil, following Ferguson's (1992a, 1995) arguments, suggests that if Colono Ware bowls used for serving and cooking food were replaced by European ceramics and other materials, but jars remained in use for cooking medicine, the proportion of jars should increase over time as the number of bowls decreases. This would be congruent with the situation in West Africa where jars persist for use in medicine even though other materials are widely available. However, she finds that the number of jars does not increase over time in the Middleburg sample, but decreases, while the number of bowls remains proportionately high. She (1993:87) points out that the higher proportion of jars in earlier years of settlements has been confirmed by Wheaton et al. (1983:245-247).

The decline in the use of jars at Middleburg and other sites could be due to a number of factors. If the use of bowls is expanded to include the preparation, serving, and consumption of medicine as well as food (the bowls are not analogous to West African medicine jar shapes, but are matched in size), then the disappearance of jars is less problematic. Whatever the case, jar forms do decrease on later sites, while bowls remain popular throughout the period of Colono Ware. Perhaps the situation in South Carolina differs from that in West Africa, where jar forms are more important than bowls for use in medicine. Bowls could have been preferred in the creolized practice of medicine by African Americans in South Carolina for any number of reasons, including the ease of manufacture, the flexibility of the bowl form (it could be used more easily than a jar for serving food or dipping sauces), or the availability of bowl forms traded by Native Americans.

Marcil concludes that the small size of the Middleburg Colono Ware vessels would seem to indicate that at least some of them were used for medicine. She hypothesizes that their small size was also due in part to the demographics of slave families, which were often fairly small units with 5 to 6 individuals. These slave families would have had the rare need for large pots met by iron vessels, but would have used the small bowls and jars on a daily basis for preparing and serving the food that a small family unit consumed (Marcil 1993:93). Marcil (1993:93) bases her hypothesis that a small family unit would not need large vessels for cooking or serving upon her own experiences, noting that while growing up her family of seven generally "used pots and pans that held about three liters and less" and the largest bowl that her family of five now uses holds about two and a half liters. These vessels all fall within the size range of Colono Ware jars and bowls (Marcil 1993:94).

From Ferguson’s (1992a, 1995) and Marcil’s (1993) works, several physical variables may be identified that relate to the use of Colono Ware for medicine and magic. These are vessel size, vessel form (e.g., bowl or jar), markings and/or decoration, and charring. A review of the African and African American literature suggests that there are several more variables to consider.

As stated before, it is unwise to generalize about an area as large and diverse as West and Central Africa, an area that contains many cultures which may have very different practices. However, in general, a review of the literature available on historical and current African medicine does suggest that certain factors are common to many cultures, specifically the way in which medicines are prepared and the materials that are used in those preparations.

To search for, much less summarize, all the historical and current African material available on medicine would be beyond the scope of this thesis. Therefore, this study has relied on a few sources, which, upon comparison with African American sources, seem to bear many similarities. For example, in his treatise on West African medicine and magic, Traoré (1983) presents an extensive collection of recipes and prescriptions for medicines, spells, talismans, and other medicinal or magical items. Earthenware pots and sherds are repeatedly mentioned as necessary for the manufacture of these items: "patients and caregivers are frequently instructed to cook roots, leaves, powders, and other elements in earthenware" (Ferguson 1995:14). Earthenware pots are used whole or broken, and sherds may be used as a surface to char medicines upon, or even as ingredients in recipes (Ferguson 1995:14-15).

A great number of the recipes in Traoré’s (1983) book call for an infusion or decoction of herbs, plants, or, less frequently, animal materials. An infusion is created by steeping (soaking) materials in a liquid to cause the liquid to take on properties of the items being soaked in it. Infusions are not created by boiling of either the liquid or the materials (Random House 1992:692). When the liquid or materials are boiled, the result is a decoction (Random House 1992:352), or a tea. Traoré (1983) gives many accounts of infusions and decoctions being ingested, bathed in, or topically applied. Some instructions also call for the patient to breathe the vapors from a decoction. Infusions are also sometimes fermented to create a presumably mildly alcoholic drink to cure, among other things, malaria (Traoré 1983:23). Prescriptions repeatedly call for infusions and decoctions to be prepared in a canari, or an earthenware pot (Anna M. Backer 1995, pers. comm.; Ferguson 1995:14). In the methods listed for divination, earthenware pots are repeatedly prescribed, as well as calabashes.

As Traoré’s book shows, members of the French-speaking countries of West Africa had--at least in the mid-twentieth century--a complex system of medical care closely tied to the supernatural. Many of the cures are different for men and women, and the book includes separate sections on women’s diseases as well as children’s diseases. Medicines for women’s ailments include preparations for the cure or relief of problems associated with pregnancy, childbirth, and menstruation. Furthermore, preparations for birth control and abortion are also listed. In particular, one medicine used for abortion calls for the patient to drink indigo prepared in an earthenware pot (Traoré 1983:347). African American women in the Southeastern United States certainly had access to indigo, a very popular plantation crop in South Carolina, and could have used indigo as an abortifacent as well as the cotton that historical records indicate they used (Goodson 1987:200; Wood 1978:52). Recipes or prescriptions pertaining to the supernatural in Traoré’s compendium include spells and charms for protection or for some action against another person. The preparation of various potions or charms that cause discomfort, pain, or death is also discussed. Many of the diseases listed in Traoré’s work were ones which slaves suffered from in the Southeast during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Malaria (paludisme), yellow fever (fiévre jaune), and pneumonia (pneumonie) are just a few of the diseases listed which also greatly afflicted African Americans.

A review of both historical and current medical practices by African Americans shows many parallels with West African practices. For example, in the book Folk Remedies of the Low Country, Morton (1974) found that many recipes and prescriptions given to her by a group of African American informants were also used by informants in the study she performed in the Netherlands Antilles. In addition, many of the ingredients were the same, such as chinaberry, wormseed, cotton, okra, and sorghum (Morton 1974:14). Furthermore, she described the pattern she saw in South Carolina of selecting specific plants for their botanical properties a "remnant of the past, usually faithful to the early pattern" (Morton 1974:17).

In the area of preparation, Morton found that the most popular method of preparing medicines was boiling plant material to create a decoction, rather than steeping to create an infusion. When her informants did steep plant material, they told her they "drew" it (Morton 1974:17). Decoctions were imbibed as well as topically applied and were also used for bathing. Other recipes and prescriptions called for seeds, leaves, and roots to be charred, roasted, boiled, ground into a paste, or eaten raw. Poultices and pastes made from these materials were often applied topically. Harvey (1981:163-164) found similar prescriptions and instructions in his examination of "Black American folk remedies" which also called for imbibing teas, applying liquids, poultices, or leaves, inhaling smoke from certain burning plants, and wearing certain herbs on parts of the body (for example, nutmeg was worn around the neck for headaches).

In the historical literature, many of the same plants and methods for preparation are found. Goodson (1987:200) found that

In abortion and childbirth, colds, snakebites, teething, and venereal diseases, female African-American slave doctors practiced medicine using plant substances. Sometimes, they used the root; at other times, they selected the leaf, bark, fruit, or gum resin to boil into a tea or make into a poultice or wear in a bag around the neck.

The plants and herbs used in historical and current African American medicine are by far too numerous to list. However, an examination of some common plant materials, along with their current and historical uses, is useful in creating a list of possible plant residues that could remain on pottery and subsequently be identified through testing (although unfortunately such testing is beyond the scope of this thesis).

Cotton, both historically and presently, has been used for a variety of purposes. A decoction of cotton was used by slaves in South Carolina for abortion (Goodson 1987:200; Wood 1978:52), and is still sometimes used to "promote uterine contractions" (Morton 1974:68). American hemp is also used for abortion, and sometimes administered by midwives (Morton 1974:27-28). Pine is an important plant material for healing. Pine rosin is the "yellowish to amber, translucent, brittle resin left after distilling the oil of turpentine from the crude oleoresin of the pine" (Random House 1992:1170). This rosin was and still is used in "therapeutic plasters and ointments" (Morton 1974:112).

Many of the plants that African American women administered were native to the Southern United States, and Native Americans had extensive knowledge of the properties and medical benefits of these plants (Wood 1978:51). This knowledge was undoubtedly exchanged between Native Americans and African Americans, as reported by one former slave woman from Texas who said that "her mother had learned knowledge of herbs from the Indians and from ‘old folks from Africy’" (Wood 1978:52). Along with this database of medical knowledge, many plants were brought here by Africans, including "the peanut, benne [sesame seed], yam, okra, sorghum, marijuana, and black-eyed pea plants" (Goodson 1987:202). African American women would have had special knowledge of these plants to share with Europeans and Native Americans.

None of the references to medicine in the historical literature specifically prescribe earthenware pots; however, only a few specify iron pots (but see WPA 1945:525). This could be because the use of earthenware had tapered off by the time most historical documents were written in the nineteenth century. The transition from earthenware pots to containers made of other materials for medicine, while not evident in many parts of Africa, could have been caused in the United States by the time constraints involved in creating earthenware pots, by the loss of knowledge over time of how to craft earthenware pots, or by the lack of an economic impetus to create inexpensive ceramics (Lees and Kimery-Lees 1979).

Ferguson (1992b:107) has hypothesized that the increasing reliance on European ceramics and cooking vessels, among other factors, was responsible for the decrease of Colono Ware over time and its absence on later antebellum sites. This hypothesis is borne out by historical data. For example, photographs of middle and late nineteenth century plantations show a variety of non-ceramic containers used in various capacities. These include a tintype of a woman identified as a cook, shown with a pot or a basket next to her (Campbell and Rice 1991:5, Figure 7). Many paintings and photographs show wooden buckets and barrels, which often would not be found archaeologically (Campbell and Rice 1991:vii, 30, 40, 71, 94, 112, 163, 166, Figures 33, 42, 82, 96, 140, 143, Plates 2, 18), and baskets, which would not survive either (Campbell and Rice 1991:vii, 30, 57, Figures 33, 58, Plate 2). Other images show iron pails and kettles (Campbell and Rice 1991:vii, 65, 112, Figure 96, Plates 2, 7) and ceramic bowls (Campbell and Rice 1991:9, Figure 10).

The increased reliance on non-ceramic containers, such as metal pots, for cooking can be explained by several factors. Increasing availability of metal pots and accessibility in terms of cost would have heightened their popularity. Also, the convenience of using iron pots to cook staples like rice and corn would be a factor.

In his study of the technological change from ceramic to metal cooking technology among the Kalinga, Skibo (1994:119) found that metal pots tend to cook rice a bit more quickly and are more durable than ceramic pots. The Kalinga situation is probably not unlike the situation on Southern plantations: corn (prepared as mush or grits), millet, and rice were main dishes, supplemented by small amounts of meats and vegetables prepared as sauces or stews (Ferguson 1992b:93-98). Iron pots, fragments of which are often found archaeologically, were used as well as wooden bowls and Colono Ware jars and bowls (Ferguson 1992b:98-104).

Skibo (1994:119) found in his ethnoarchaeological investigations that while metal pots replaced earthenware pots among the Kalinga for cooking rice, ceramic pots continued to be used for vegetables and meats. In cooking vegetables and meats, the Kalinga frequently cooked them for long periods of time--up to an hour--and metal pots used for this purpose would boil over more quickly, putting out fires. Thus, the earthenware pot, "having lower heating effectiveness than comparable metal pots, is preferred for this type of long-term boiling" (Skibo 1994:123). This is analogous to the situation on Southern plantations, where Colono Ware, because of its ability to absorb water and cook slowly, would have been preferred for stews and sauces (Ferguson 1992b:105). African Americans likely preferred metal pots to cook starchy main courses such as rice and corn, with earthenware being used to cook vegetables and meats, as in the Kalinga situation. Earthenware would definitely have been preferred for cooking certain vegetables like tomatoes, which because of their high acid content react with iron and turn black when cooked in metal pots (Leland Ferguson 1995, pers. comm.).

In instances where Colono Ware pots are found in relatively late 19th century contexts, the explanation could be related to a continued need to manufacture these earthenware pots specifically for medicinal or ritual use. However, as White (1992) has pointed out, economics and craft practices are sometimes closely related. For example, the non-importation movement and other economic factors during the Revolution led to an increased reliance by slaves upon home-crafted clothing. African Americans during the colonial period had frequently worn ready-made clothing, but the non-importation movement made the production of cloth and the creation of clothes and shoes essential because ready-made clothing could not be easily obtained. He points out that weaving and dyeing of cloth and the manufacture of clothing and shoes "was one African-American craft that expanded in antebellum years" (White 1992:40). The non-importation movement may have had similar effects on African Americans who needed ceramics, especially those in isolated geographical areas with constrained access to affordable mass-manufactured ceramics. Whatever the case, clearly the effects of a changing economy and the "consumer revolution" (White 1992:40) should be further studied and taken into account when interpreting archaeological deposits.