Black Blood Brothers: Confraternities and Social Mobility for Afro-Mexicans

305 Pages·2006·1.42 MB·English

by  Nicole von Germeten

Black Blood Brothers
Confraternities and Social Mobility
for Afro-Mexicans
Nicole von Germeten
university press of florida
Black Blood Brothers
The History of African-American Religions
University Press of Florida
Florida A&M University, Tallahassee
Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton
Florida Gulf Coast University, Ft. Myers
Florida International University, Miami
Florida State University, Tallahassee
New College of Florida, Sarasota
University of Central Florida, Orlando
University of Florida, Gainesville
University of North Florida, Jacksonville
University of South Florida, Tampa
University of West Florida, Pensacola
The History of African-American Religions
Edited by Stephen W. Angell and Anthony Pinn
Laborers in the Vineyard of the Lord: The Beginnings of the AME Church in Florida, 1865–1895,
by Larry Eugene Rivers and Canter Brown, Jr. (2001)
Between Cross and Crescent: Christian and Muslim Perspectives on Malcolm and Martin,
by Lewis V. Baldwin and Amiri YaSin Al-Hadid (2002)
The Quest for the Cuban Christ: A Historical Search, by Miguel A. De La Torre (2002)
For a Great and Grand Purpose: The Beginnings of the AMEZ Church in Florida, 1864–1905,
by Canter Brown, Jr. and Larry Eugene Rivers (2004)
Afro-Cuban Religiosity, Revolution, and National Identity, by Christine Ayorinde (2004)
From Garvey to Marley: Rastafari Theology, by Noel Leo Erskine (2005)
Hell Without Fires: Slavery, Christianity & the Antebellum Spiritual Narrative,
by Yolanda Pierce (2005)
Where Men Are Wives and Mothers Rule: Santeria Ritual Practices and Their Gender
Implications, by Mary Ann Clark (2005)
Around the Family Altar: Domesticity in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, 1865–1900,
by Julius H. Bailey (2005)
Black Blood Brothers: Confraternities and Social Mobility for Afro-Mexicans,
by Nicole von Germeten (2006)
Black Blood Brothers
Confraternities and Social Mobility for Afro-Mexicans
Nicole von Germeten
Foreword by Stephen W. Angell and Anthony B. Pinn, Series Editors
University Press of Florida
Gainesville/Tallahassee/Tampa/Boca Raton
Pensacola/Orlando/Miami/Jacksonville/Ft. Myers/Sarasota
Copyright 2006 by Nicole von Germeten
All rights reserved
A record of cataloging-in-publication data is available from the
Library of Congress.
ISBN 0-8130-2942-2 (cloth)
ISBN 978-0-8130-3632-8 (ebook)
The University Press of Florida is the scholarly publishing agency
for the State University System of Florida, comprising Florida A&M
University, Florida Atlantic University, Florida Gulf Coast University,
Florida International University, Florida State University, New College
of Florida, University of Central Florida, University of Florida, Uni-
versity of North Florida, University of South Florida, and University of
West Florida.
University Press of Florida
15 Northwest 15th Street
Gainesville, FL 32611-2079
http://www.upf.com
Contents
List of Tables and Graphs vii
Series Foreword ix
Preface and Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
1. Blood Brothers: Afromexican Confraternities in the Seventeenth
Century 11
2. Sisters: Women in Confraternities 41
3. Africans in Mexico City: From Rebellion to Religious Conformity 71
4. Confraternities in Valladolid 104
5. Moving toward Freedom in Valladolid 124
6. Patronage and the Pardo Confraternity in Parral 159
7. Conflict and Accommodation in Confraternities 188
Conclusion 221
Appendix 227
Notes 231
Bibliography 259
Index 279

Tables and Graphs
Table 2.1. Eighteenth-century patents for the Saint Nicolás confraternity
in Valladolid 67
Table 3.1. Afromexican confraternities in Mexico City 83
Table 3.2. Confraternity advocations in seventeenth-century Mexico City
testaments 95
Table 5.1. Afromexican babies baptized in Valladolid whose fathers were
unknown [padres desconocidos], sample years 1597–1789 129
Table 5.2. Afromexican babies baptized in Valladolid whose fathers were
slaves, sample years 1597–1789 130
Table 5.3. Race of slaves sold in Valladolid, 1630–1789 131
Table 5.4. Male and female slaves sold in Valladolid by decade, 1630–1789
132
Table 5.5. Afromexican orphans baptized in Valladolid, 1597–1789 133
Table 5.6. Afromexican babies baptized in Valladolid whose mothers were
slaves, 1597–1789 135
Table 6.1. Immaculate Conception members mentioned in 1768 census
180
Table 6.2. Immaculate conception members mentioned in 1788 census
181
Table 6.3. Occupations of men in Parral in 1788 census 182
Table 7.1. Confraternity dues based on race 212
Graph 5.1. Race of Afromexican mothers in Valladolid baptism records,
1598–1737 128
Graph 5.2. Price of slaves in Valladolid, 1630–1780 132
Graph 6.1. Parral baptisms recorded by racial labels, 1634–1776 161
Graph 6.2. Baptisms of children with no father present, Parral, 1695–1776
163

Series Foreword
The shelves of libraries are lined with volumes that address the mechanics of
slavery in the Americas, including the nature of labor, living arrangements, fam-
ily structures, religious developments, and forms of rebellion. However, missing
from many such treatments of slavery is attention to more-nuanced dimensions
of life, the tone of slave society that cannot be captured so easily through flat
attention to statistics, archaeological findings, written texts, and the like. Yet
scholars have recently realized with a sense of urgency the importance of captur-
ing the tone of slave society in order to unpack the nature of African identity in
the New World as well as the implications of assimilation for this identity.
They have also come to understand that recovering the complexities of life
and identity within slavery in the Americas requires that we examine these ma-
terials with questions geared toward the subtle dimensions of life. The manner in
which levels of nuance can best be understood and portrayed awaits discovery.
It is because this volume makes advances in addressing such dimensions of
nuance and subtlety that we are pleased to present it as an important addition to
this series and to scholarship on the African presence in the New World in gen-
eral. Giving primary attention to African involvement in confraternal organiza-
tions, Nicole von Germeten provides significant insights into the complexities of
African identity in colonial Mexico. Through a comparative examination of case
studies in Mexico City, Valladolid, and Parral, she presents a rich depiction of
piety and religiosity particularly within the environment of the confraternities
and among what she calls the “Afromexicans” of colonial Mexico.
Particularly illuminating is her depiction of the early involvement of Afro-
mexican women, the social significance of African and mulatto confraternities
in Mexico City, the connection of confraternal organizations to rebellions, and
the push for respectability attendant on efforts to assimilate. Overall, the author
creatively and carefully depicts the shifting religious and larger cultural life pat-
terns of Afromexicans. By highlighting the similarities and differences in the
ways various confraternities in various locations in colonial Mexico understood,
responded to, and shaped issues of identity, race, gender, and religion, she points