Two brothers, Curaçao and Santiago and the Atlantic Ocean divide.

Nederlands? …Nah.  English it is!
Were my people at?! Where my people at?! Curaçao(Love)!
My people are Africans which like most african descendants have a hard time accepting.
But we are! I’m a Pan-African and this is a Pan-African page if you didn’t notice…#Duhhh

While I do believe that all Africans are family, there is a close blood relation between the island of Santiago within the Cape Verdean archelipago.
How happy would you be if you found your long-lost big brother?! #PrettyExciting huh?!
Enter our blood family: The Cape verdeans.

(I will focus primarly on Curaçao and Santiago because they are the originators of their Afro-Portuguese creole)

Let’s do this! Yabadabadoooooooo!

The Connection

I remember being just hanging out one day, when a question entered my mind:
Why do I and my people speak Papiamentu and why is there only three island speaking it namely Curacao, Bonaire and Aruba. I was 16, when a cousin talked about the Cape Verdeans speaking a dialect very similar to us. Thats the moment I put my inspector hat on and Scooby-Dooby-Doo all the way through!

Flag colors of Cabo Verde painted on a house. (Right)

Summary:
Cabo Verde was one of the first and biggest ”slave” markets in the Old World.
Which was founded (Cidade Velha) by the Portuguese in 1462 on the island called Santiago.
From Senegal stretching to Sierra Leone, thats where the ancestors of the Cape verdeans came from.
The most important tribes are the: Wolof, Mandingo and Fulani.
These are the tribes that also had to most influence in the formation of Cape Verdean Kriolu.
(why must Africans have tribes and Europeans don’t?..but I digress)

Click here to hear Santiago Creole.

On a sidenote: The enslaved Africans were put into two distinct groups:

Bozales – Africans who didnt know anything about European slavery and culture.
Landino’s – Africans who had contact and learned latino(spanish,portuguese) culture and had experience with slavery.

 

Curaçao was ”discovered” by the Spanish in 1499.
(I say ”discovered” cause there were Amerindians living there)
But it was in 1634 that the first settlement was founded by the Dutch as a naval base.
And by the 1650’s Curaçao  become the biggest ”slave”market in the New World. Yet enslaved Africans really started to stay on the island around 1660.
Which meant people where brought there and sold to other areas.
It was a passing-by station.
The Dutch slavers had a few slave-dungeons in the Old World near Cabo Verde namely in what is now known as Guinea-Bissau till 1677 when the French captured those slave-dungeons.

This means the following:
The Dutch had 17 years to transport the early Cape Verdeans who came to Curacao.
Effectively transplanting a early version of Cape Verdean creole.
These people where the founders of future Papiamentu.

After 1677 when they lost their slave-dungeons at Goree Island, the Dutch started focussing more on the slave-dungeons in Ghana, Nigeria & Congo.
And with the arrivals of these different Africans, the early Cape Verdean creole began to transform more into modern papiamentu.
These African people were of the Bantu & Kwa extractions.

Click here to hear Papiamentu.

Human Cargo

A reconstruction of the cramped space…

– In 1659, the Dutch ship Gideon brought 28 slaves from the Cape Verde region to Curaçao. (Sources: Moraes 1998b: 42).
The same ship was again reported as transporting slaves from the Cape Verde region to Curaçao in 1671. (Sources:Moraes 1998a: 326).

 

– Moraes (1998b: 42) introduces Matthias Beck, the governor of Curaçao between 1657 and 1668, who, in a letter to the directors of the WIC in 1659, expresses his hopes “to bring from Cape Verde ‘a good lot of Negroes”.

– Moraes (1998b: 51) describes the activities of the WIC vessel Casteel van Curaçao, which in 1674 transported around 200 slaves from Gorée to Curaçao and made a second, third and fourth return trip Gorée-Curaçao, before returning to Amsterdam in 1676.

– Among other Dutch WIC vessels setting sail from Gorée and/or the Cape
Verde region to Curaçao transporting ‘mixed cargoes’ (i.e., slaves + other
merchandise) are the Gerechtigheyt in 1672–1673, the Morgenstar in 1673– 1674 and the Elisabeth in 1674 (Sources:Moraes 1998a: 328–330).

– One reference to the Dutch buying slaves directly from Santiago. However, even if the Dutch were no frequent customers on Santiago, they may still have had easy access to the Santiago slave market and, hence, to speakers of Upper Guinea PC, given that, as I hope to show below, (descendants from) native Cape Verde Islanders were omni-present inthose parts of the Senegambia region controlled by the Dutch.

-: “The years of most importance to the slave trade were the years from 1667 to 1674 when an average of 3,000 slaves per year arrived at Curaçao.

On a sidenote: The Cape Verdean region includes Senegal, Guinea-Bissau and The Gambia.

 

Question and Answers

Question: Why are the appearances between Afro-Curaçaoans and Cape Verdeans so distinct?
Answer: After 1677 the enslaved Africans were imported to Curaçao almost exclusively from Kwa- and Bantu-speaking areas. Thus gaining the appearances of these African peoples.

Question: Can Kriolu speakers and Papiamentu speakers understand each other?
Answer: Based on my personal experience, both speakers will have to speak very slowly and articulate more. But there will be a lot of obstacle because of the 300+ years split. I must say its easier for a speaker from Santiago to comprehend a speaker from Curacao than vice-versa.

Question: Do you believe that the Papiamentu speaking countries need to form strong bond with Cabo Verde?
Answer: I must say yes, because we are siblings of each other but also because I believe in Pan-Africanism. I believe in the unity of all African peoples worldwide. This bond must be united because of historical and economic reasons. This also includes Guinnea-Bissau.

Question: Is there any link between Papiamentu and Guinea-Bissau creole?
Answer: Well the matter of the fact is that Guinea-Bissau creole is a daughter language of the Santiago creole variety. That makes us family. Papiamentu-speakers have a niece-language!

Similarities.

Papiamentu: Baka ku yega pos promé ta bebe awa mas limpi.
English: The cow who reaches the well first, will drink the cleanest water.

Santiago Kriolu: Báka ki tchiga na funti purmeru , el bebi águ mas limpu.
English: The cow who reached the well first, drank the cleanest water.

Papiamentu: Nan ta biba nan ku nan.
Santiago Kriolu: Es ta bibi es ku es.
English: They live among themselves.

I was inspired to write this blog after reading this article about my fellow Curaçaoan sister: Tamara Nivillac

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Pass the truth to the next generation and teach them early what we learn late.

Signed.
Omowale Asante – The child has come home because of the wars.

For many more details I recommend this book .

Sources:

Origins of a Creole: The History of Papiamentu and Its African Ties