African Religion Survived Among American Slaves

The Archaeology News feed, which you can see at the righthand column of this blog, had an interesting article recently about a 300 year-old African "spirit bundle" found in Maryland. The bundle of sand and clay contained bits of metal and a stone axe, and may be the earliest evidence of slaves preserving their West African religion after being brought to the New World. Bundles like it are still used in West Africa to ward off evil spirits.

The archaeology of slavery has only recently become an area of interest to American archaeologists (who are predominantly white) and hopefully this important find will lead to more digs. An excellent book on African survivals in African-American culture is Flash of the Spirit by Robert Farris Thompson. It's well worth a read.