Arie Boomert
The Indigenous Peoples
of Trinidad and Tobago
from the First Settlers until Today.
Leiden, Netherlands: Sidestone Press, 2016.
xv + 197. (Paper US$ 45.00)
[This is a pre-publication draft. The published version is in the New West Indian Guide (NWIG), Vol. 92, Issue 3-4, December, 2018, https://doi.org/10.1163/22134360-09203027]
Trinidad and Tobago are the oldest settled islands of the
Caribbean archipelago, and as Arie Boomert demonstrates, Trinidad’s geography
is not only still marked by hundreds of Amerindian toponyms (unlike any other
Caribbean island), but the Indigenous Peoples’ cultural heritage was implanted
in the rural and domestic traditions of a peasantry that fused Amerindians,
Africans, and Spanish people and lives on to this day. Arie Boomert’s synthesis
of archaeological, ethnohistoric, and ethnographic research on the Indigenous
Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago is more than
just a capstone to his many years of research in this field. It is also more
than a book written for the general public (students, history teachers, and
adult citizens of the twin-island republic). It is the only existing,
up-to-date text on this long-neglected subject that is both comprehensive and
yet highly informative on very specific points. Both specialists in the
subject, and those with a general interest in the cultural history of the
Caribbean, or even the history of the Spanish Caribbean alone, will find great
value in this work which should form a part of every serious library collection
on the Caribbean.
The structure of the volume is chronologically sound,
divided into eight distinct time periods covering roughly ten thousand years,
without any one period occupying more space than the others. As an
archaeologist himself, Boomert was well equipped to provide the layperson with
a good overview of archaeological research conducted in Trinidad,
dating back to the 1800s, with roughly 300 sites studied. The strength of the
volume lies in its archaeological and ethnohistoric dimensions, with roughly
the past century and the present confined to the final chapter. In that sense,
the volume tends to reinforce the established tendency to speak of Trinidad indigeneity in the past tense. Yet Boomert’s
book also shows how indigeneity in Trinidad is
constantly returning from the margins, and is partly due to the island’s close
proximity to neighbouring Indigenous populations on the mainland, whose
presence figures prominently throughout the book.
Many will appreciate the thick detail in this book,
systematically organized as it is. Boomert draws from a wide variety of
sources, including his own archaeological work, the offerings of diverse museum
collections across Europe, and insights from
very rare texts. There is a minimum of speculation in this book, and a maximum
emphasis on information. It is also very well illustrated throughout, with
attractive photographs, diagrams, and maps. Tobago is not an afterthought
either: a significant amount of information about Tobago
is presented throughout, with a dense chapter devoted to the Indigenous People
of Tobago which in itself is a significant contribution to knowledge. Just to
give the reader a sense of the coverage contained in this book, it typically
focuses on trade, subsistence, material culture (pottery especially, and
weaponry), ritual (burial), warfare, social structure, the division of labour,
house construction, political organization, chiefs (many are named) and
shamans, and an expertly synthesized and engaging presentation of colonial
ethnohistory. The description of the emergence of a rural peasantry, with
syncretic religious, ecological and domestic agricultural traditions founded on
Indigenous knowledge and practices, is impressive. The book thus also covers
issues pertaining to ecology, folklore, health and healing, and food
production. Politically, Boomert also devotes considerable attention to slavery
(which first emerged in the Caribbean with the
Spanish enslavement of Indigenous Peoples); resistance, in the form of revolts;
and, collaboration between Indigenous communities and foreign invaders.
Boomert’s overview of the Catholic missions among Trinidad’s
Amerindians is comprehensive, and not confined to Arima alone, one of the longest
standing and more recent missions that is the current home of the revitalized
Santa Rosa First Peoples’ Community.
Among the very few shortcomings of the book, there was
insufficient effort made to transform archaeologists’ writing into material genuinely
intended for a broad public (few would call a bowl a “serving vessel”), and
some of the names of vegetables and ground provisions do not appear to be
Trinidadian but are imported by the author from elsewhere (such as “coontie
[zamia]”). There was actually very little on the figure of the Nepuyo warrior,
Hyarima, a treasured part of Arima’s history, with only a few lines offering no
new information, yet a subsection of a chapter was seemingly devoted to him. Most
importantly, however, is the consistent lack of citations in the text, thus not
allowing readers to track down the original sources of information. Instead,
Boomert opts for a select bibliography, organized into not very helpful
sections. One could also quibble about other specific historical and
interpretive points, but none of this is meant to detract from the fact that
this book stands as a highly detailed, comprehensive synthesis, that will
likely stand unrivalled for many years as a central, go-to resource on the
Indigenous Peoples of Trinidad and Tobago.
Maximilian C. Forte
Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Concordia University
