The Place beyond the Fence: Slavery and Cultural Invention on a Delaware Tenant Farm

Information about the lives and material culture of 18th- and early 19th-century enslaved black workers of West African birth or descent was recovered from Locus 1 of the Rumsey/Polk Tenant/Prehistoric site (7NCF112) in St. Georges Hundred, New Castle County, Delaware. This site contained the remains of multiple buildings interpreted as enslaved laborers’ quarters and associated cultural features, evidence of which is infrequently found in Delaware. Data from the site elucidate the current understanding of housing, diet, and cultural practices among the enslaved in the cultural borderland of the upper Mid-Atlantic region. Archaeology also reveals ways captives coped with the stresses of human trafficking, bondage, and subjugation, while simultaneously selectively modifying and reinventing cultural practices and customs.