Arquitectura en Capas

Jay B. Haviser

L. E. Bosch’s 1836 descriptions of rock art at Fontein, Aruba, constitute the oldest records of prehistoric re-mains in the Dutch Caribbean. The most important research in the nineteenth century was completed by Father A. J. van Koolwijk, who assembled a rich collec-tion of artifacts in the period 1870–1886 in the Leeward Islands of Curaçao, Aruba, and Bonaire. During that period, he found Amerindian shells, earthenware frag-ments, and stone artifacts. He also examined native rock art. His collection was sent to Leiden University in the Netherlands. Van Koolwijk’s collection drew the atten-tion of Prof. J. P. B. de Josselin de Jong, the curator of the National Museum for Ethnology at Leiden. In 1923, De Josselin de Jong was the first to identify prehistoric loca-tions in St. Maarten, St. Eustatius, and Saba. During his time, his work was the best example of applied archaeo-logical research in the Dutch Caribbean. In the 1920s, De Josselin de Jong conducted surveys on all six Dutch Caribbean islands; some of this work involved excava-tions. His published works provided well-documented descriptions of all of the sites and artifacts he encoun-tered. However, he avoided making any interpretations of the lifeways of the prehistoric peoples whose remains he described. The majority of the artifacts De Josselin de Jong recovered were shipped to Leiden University in the Netherlands, while a few returned to the Antilles in the 1980s.

The early 1940s to about 1960 marked a transitional period for the field of archaeology in the Americas, which was becoming more anthropological in nature, and was placing greater emphasis on new contextual-functional approaches. In the Dutch Caribbean, this period was ushered in by a Dutch archaeological team led by H. R. van Heekeren and C. J. Du Ry in 1960. Wa-genaar Hummelinck (a rock art expert), J. Tacoma (a physical anthropologist), and Du Ry and Van Heekeren

were the primary archaeologists working in the Dutch Antilles at this time. Toward the end of the 1960s, José Cruxent and Irving Rouse published an overview of the status of archaeological research in the Netherland An-tilles. Cruxent visited Curaçao and Aruba in 1965 and identified some historical archaeological sites. In 1965, he processed the first radiocarbon dates for historical archaeology sites on Curaçao, providing a date of 1610 for the Spanish-period Gaito site.

During the 1950s and 1960s, P. Brenneker, E. Juliana, and C. Engels made extensive amateur collections of ethnographic materials relating to Curaçao. The Engels collection forms the basis for the Curaçao Museum ex-hibits, while the majority of the Brenneker and Juliana collections are currently in the possession of the Na-tional Archaeological Anthropological Memory Man-agement Foundation (NAAM). To date, the Brenneker and Juliana collections are the largest ethnographic arti-fact collections for the island. These collections remain an important reference for material culture research in Curaçao.

Beginning in the 1960s, archaeology in the Dutch Caribbean changed from a descriptive to a more ana-lytical science. During the 1960s and 1970s, P. Glazema, P. Wagenaar-Hummelinck, J. Cruxent, and E. Boerstra were engaged in scientific archaeology in the Dutch Caribbean. In 1967, the Archaeological-Anthropolog-ical Institute of the Netherlands Antilles (AAINA) was founded, with Edwin N. Ayubi as director. In 1976, E.

Boerstra was hired, and W. Nagelkerken and J. Haviser were both hired in 1981. This led to an expansion of the archaeological institute, and the department for cultural anthropology was placed under the leadership of Rosemary Allen. The institute made major contribu-tions to scientific research and increased public aware-ness of archaeology in the Dutch Caribbean. During

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these decades, AAINA began to implement a more multidisciplinary approach involving the integration of geology, biology, and physical anthropology into ar-chaeological research. Major scholars involved in this methodology included P. de Buisonje, H. Coomans, S.

Gould, D. Hooijer, J. Tacoma, and E. Wing. During the 1980s, AAINA assisted with the founding of the Curaçao Rock Drawings Working Group, a group of amateur ar-cheologists.

On St. Eustatius, a College of William and Mary ar-chaeological research program under the direction of Norman Barka continued both general historical ar-chaeology field schools and specific historical archaeol-ogy excavation programs from 1981 to 1998. Archaeo-logical researchers from the University of South Florida had initiated investigations in 1981 but discontinued participation after the 1982 field season. AAINA collabo-rated with Jay Haviser from 1982 to 1985 in land surveys and mapping. W. Nagelkerken conducted underwater surveys and artifact recovery in Orange Bay. In 1984, AAINA also began research on the prehistory of St. Eu-statius. This was jointly undertaken by Aad Versteeg of the Instituut voor Prehistorie of Leiden University, the St. Eustatius Historical Foundation (SEHF), and Jay Haviser of AAINA.

Given that the focus on historical archaeology began on St. Eustatius in 1981, it is ironic that Sint Maarten was given such little attention, considering that one must travel through Sint Maarten to reach St. Eustatius. Even-tually, various historical archaeology sites were recorded on Sint Maarten: M. Sypkens-Smit worked there in 1981 and Haviser worked there in 1987. Both of these site list-ings were part of an overall prehistoric site survey. In 1987, the first extensive historical archaeology excava-tions were conducted at the Fort Amsterdam site by J.

Baart (the city archaeologist for Amsterdam) in collabo-ration with AAINA. In 1989, Baart conducted further ex-cavations at the Fort Amsterdam site again and did addi-tional surface collections at the Bishop Hill site. In 1989, researchers from the College of William and Mary un-der the direction of Norman Barka conducted a survey and mapping of the Welgelegen Estate on Sint Maarten.

This was followed by surveys and mapping of various historical sites on the Dutch side of the island from 1990 to 1992. Most of these sites were plantation estates of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Underwater survey and mapping directed by K. Bequette was conducted at the Proselyte shipwreck site off the coast of Sint Maarten in 1994 and 1995. During the 1994 field season, Bequette and S. Sanders were called upon to make an emergency soil profile drawing of historic burials that were eroding

from a road cut at the Bishop Hill cemetery site. In 1996, Jay Haviser of AAINA conducted an archaeological sur-vey and excavations at the Belvedere Plantation for the government of St. Maarten. In 2006, Menno Hoogland, Corinne Hofman, and Grant Gilmore conducted sur-veys and excavations at the Bethlehem Plantation site for the property owners. From 1996 to 2010, Jay Haviser conducted numerous historical archaeology investiga-tions on St. Maarten. Since 2007, he has conducted field activity in his capacity as the government archaeologist for St. Maarten.

In 1983, Haviser conducted an island-wide archaeo-logical survey of Saba for AAINA that identified both prehistoric and historic sites (outside the developed residential areas). This survey of Saba included the lo-cation and mapping of numerous historical sites and abandoned historic village complexes of the eighteenth through the twentieth centuries. Most had never been mapped before, for example, Mary’s Point. Into the late 1980s and 1990s, Corinne Hofman and Menno Hoogland of Leiden University conducted significant prehistoric archaeological investigations at numerous sites on Saba, for which they acquired radiocarbon dates and new site pattern data for the island’s prehistory. Both Hofman and Hoogland eventually published their doctoral dis-sertations at Leiden University based on their Saba re-search. In 2009, Ryan Espersen conducted archaeologi-cal research at the Mary’s Point settlement on Saba.

The types of sites investigated on Curaçao using his-torical archaeology in the 1980s and 1990s were quite variable. Professional archaeological research on Cu-raçao was primarily conducted by AAINA, beginning in 1982 with an island-wide land survey of prehistoric and historic sites. One result of this investigation was the eventual publication in 1987 of a doctoral disserta-tion by Jay Haviser at Leiden University on prehistoric sites of Curaçao. The historic sites Haviser first reported in this survey were mostly of the protohistoric period.

AAINA conducted excavations at the San Hironimo site on Curaçao. In 1990, Haviser and N. Brito conducted ar-chaeological tests over much of the urban Punda district on Curaçao. This was followed in 1991 by excavations at the Zuurzak site by Haviser. Zuurzak is believed to be a Dutch slave camp from the late seventeenth century.

In 1995, Haviser conducted a historical archaeology field survey and excavations at a slave period and post-emancipation African settlement in the Kenepa area of Curaçao for AAINA. Beginning in 1988, W. Nagelkerken conducted various underwater historical archaeology investigations on Curaçao for AAINA. These studies in-cluded general underwater surveys of the bays on the

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south coast, underwater mapping and excavations of the 1778 shipwreck Alphen in Santa Anna Bay, and un-derwater surveys and excavations along the wharf area of Handelskade in the commercial Punda district. Since the creation of the NAAM in 1999, various archaeologi-cal investigations have taken place on Curaçao. Since 2003, under the direction of Ieteke Witteveen of the NAAM, an amateur Archaeology Work Group, led by Andre Rancuret, Jose DaCamara, and Francois van der Hoeven, has recorded archaeological site locations on the island. In 2010, researchers from Leiden University conducted surveys and excavations of prehistoric sites at Spaanse Water, under the direction of Corinne Hofman and Menno Hoogland.

On Bonaire, archaeology was initially conducted by Haviser for AAINA in 1988 as part of a larger study of the cultural history of Amerindians. AAINA conducted an extensive historical archaeology investigation at Fort Oranje, Bonaire, in 1997, and Haviser and A. Sealy pub-lished the results of this research. In 2007, archaeologi-cal excavations were conducted by the Bonaire Archae-ological Institute (BONAI) at a World War II military camp on Bonaire under Haviser’s supervision. The most recent archaeological work on Bonaire, which was done in 2010, is the result of collaboration between BONAI and Leiden University.

In 1998, AAINA was shifted from full government service to become a government-sponsored founda-tion called the Nafounda-tional Archaeological Anthropologi-cal Museum. The artifacts, which had hitherto been in AAINA’s custody, were transferred to the museum. The decentralization of archaeological research in the Dutch Caribbean started with the creation of the Archaeologi-cal Museum of Aruba in 1981.

Beginning in 2000, archaeological research on St.

Eustatius was done by the St. Eustatius Center for Ar-chaeological Research (SECAR). In 2004, R. Grant Gilmore published his doctoral dissertation on the historical archaeology of St. Eustatius, and since 2004, Gilmore has led the SECAR project. In order to stimu-late local involvement in archaeology, especially that of young people, Jay Haviser founded BONAI in 2003. In

2005, Haviser founded the Sint Maarten Archaeologi-cal Center (SIMARC) on St. Maarten, and in 2012 he founded the Saba Archaeological Center (SABARC) on Saba.

In October 2010, the Netherlands Antilles were dis-mantled and reformulated into four autonomous enti-ties within the Kingdom of the Netherlands: The Neth-erlands, Aruba, Curaçao, and St. Maarten. The smaller islands of Bonaire, St. Eustatius, and Saba were ab-sorbed into the Netherlands and given the status of mu-nicipalities.

Further Reading

Ayubi, E., E. Boerstra, and A. Versteeg. 1985. “Archeologie.” In Encyclopedie van de Nederlandse Antillen II, ed. J. de Palm.

Zutphen: Walburg Pers.

Haviser, J. 1987. Amerindian Cultural Geography on Curaçao.

Amsterdam: Natuurweteschappelijke Studiekring voor Su-riname en de Nederlandse Antillen.

———. 1991. The First Bonaireans. Curaçao: Archaeological-Anthropological Institute of the Netherlands Antilles.

Hofman, C. 1993. “In Search of the Native Population of Pre-Columbian Saba (400–1450 AD).” PhD diss., Leiden Uni-versity, the Netherlands.

Hofman, C., and M. Hoogland, eds. 1999. Archaeological Inves-tigations of St. Martin (Lesser Antilles). Leiden: Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University.

Versteeg, A. H., and S. Rostain, eds. 1997. The Archaeology of Aruba: The Tanki Flip Site. Oranjestad, Aruba: Archaeologi-cal Museum Aruba.

Versteeg, A. H., and K. Schinkel, eds. 1992. The Archaeology of St. Eustatius: The Golden Rock Site. St. Eustatius: St. Eusta-tius Historical Foundation.

See also Bonaire Archaeological Institute (BONAI); Cu-raçao (Former Netherlands Antilles); Foundation for Marine Archaeology of the Netherlands Antilles (STI-MANA); The National Archaeological Anthropological Memory Management Foundation (NAAM); Saba; Sint Maarten (Former Netherlands Antilles); St. Eustatius; St.

Eustatius Center for Archaeological Research (SECAR);

St. Eustatius Historical Foundation.

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