CULTURE SEQUENCES IN HAITI 



By HERBERT W. KRIEGER 



Curator, Division of Ethnology, U. S. National Museum 



Much has been written about the mystery and charm of the Black 

 Republic of Haiti. From the days of the Spanish goldseekers, French 

 buccaneers, and colonial squires, through the eventful era of the black 

 king Christophe and his court at Sans Souci with its counts of Limon- 

 ade and dukes of Marmalade, through the political intrigues and 

 murders, caco raids and revolutions, to the days of the United States 

 Marine with his gendarmerie and Treaty Government — the theme of 

 Haitian culture-history is romantic indeed. Travel books of the people 

 of Haiti in a natural history setting with more or less fanciful allu- 

 sions of a historical flavor make delightful reading. The prosaic re- 

 ports of the Treaty Government, however, are more factual. The most 

 useful work dealing with the period of French occupation are the four 

 volumes by Moreau de Saint-Mery published in 1797-8. His detailed 

 historical narrative, observations on natural history, agriculture, and 

 on the slave population of the French colony are remarkable for their 

 accuracy. 



Antedating these historical occupancies and culture sequences are 

 the first inhabitants, the original Haitians. Of these only the Arawak, 

 an offshoot of a South American linguistic stock, are known to lit- 

 erature. This people occupied the more humid northern coastal plain 

 and the Massif du Xord and at the time of the discovery were ruled 

 by a chief, Goacanageric, whose village. Guarico. was located in the 

 immediate vicinity of Cap Haitien. In the South, the center of Arawak 

 occupancy was in the Cul de Sac and the Plaine de Leogane, with the 

 chief's village located where Port-au-Prince now stands. There, under 

 their beautiful " queen " Anacaona they had attained a culture level 

 superior, according to Spanish writers, to that existing elsewhere 

 throughout the ancient island of Haiti. The arid central portion 

 of Haiti, the valley of the Artibonite, was unsuitable for Indian 

 habitation. 



It was with pleasure that the writer undertook the Smithsonian de- 

 tail to make an archeological reconnaissance of the country. The 

 early months of 193 1, from January to May, were delightfully spent 

 in carrying on archeological investigations that took the writer from 

 one end of the Republic of Haiti to the other, from the ancient Arawak 



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