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| Pretense outdoors speaks with a loud voice. It is awkward a silence being pretentious in the great landscapes of the Earth, our Mother... - Gregory E. Woods |
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
DISEASE
FREEDMAN: Toussaint L'Ouverture
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| picture & research from archives of Pitit Neg Ahier |
Portrait of the great warrior Toussaint L'ouverture..
Known to his contemporaries as “The Black Napoleon,” Toussaint L’Overture was a former slave who rose to become the leader of the only successful slave revolt in modern history, the Haitian Revolution.
Born into slavery on May 20, 1743 in the French colony of Saint Dominque, L’Overture was the eldest son of Gaou Guinon, an African prince who was captured by slavers. At a time when revisions to the French Code Noir (Black Code) legalized the harsh treatment of slaves as property, young L’ Overture instead inspired kindness from those in authority over him. His godfather, the priest Simon Baptiste, for example, taught him to read and write. Impressed by L’Overture, Bayon de Libertad, the manager of the Breda plantation on which L’Overture was born, allowed him unlimited access to his personal library. By the time he was twenty, the well-read and tri-lingual L’Overture—he spoke French, Creole, and some Latin—had also gained a reputation as a skilled horseman and for his knowledge of medicinal plants and herbs. More importantly, L’Overture had secured his freedom from de Libertad even as he continued to manage his former owner’s household personnel and to act as his coachman. Over the course of the next eighteen years, L’Overture settled into life on the Breda plantation marrying fellow Catholic Suzanne Simon and parenting two sons, Isaac and Saint-Jean.
The events of August 22, 1791, the “Night of Fire” in which slaves revolted by setting fire to plantation houses and fields and killing whites, convinced the 48 year old L’Overture that he should join the growing insurgency, although not before securing the safety of his wife and children in the Spanish-controlled eastern half of the island (Santo Domingo) and assuring that Bayon de Libertad and his wife were safely onboard a ship bound for the United States.
Inspired by French Revolutionary ideology and angered by generations of abuse at the hands of white planters, the initial slave uprising was quelled within several days, but ongoing fighting between the slaves, free blacks, and planters continued. Although he was free, L’Overture joined the slave insurgency and quickly developed a reputation first as a capable soldier and then as military secretary to Georges Biassou, one of the insurgency’s leaders. When the insurgency’s leadership chose to ally itself with Spain against France, L’Overture followed. Threatened by Spain and Britain’s attempts to control the island, the French National Convention acted to preserve its colonial rule in 1794 by securing the loyalty of the black population; France granted citizenship rights and freedom to all blacks within the empire.
Following France’s decision to emancipate the slaves, L’Overture allied with France against Spain, and from 1794 to 1802, he was the dominant political and military leader in the French colony. Operating under the self-assumed title of General-in-Chief of the Army, L’Overture led the French in ousting the British and then in capturing the Spanish controlled half of the island. By 1801, although Saint Dominque remained ostensibly a French colony, L’Overture was ruling it as an independent state. He drafted a constitution in which he reiterated the 1794 abolition of slavery and appointed himself governor for “the rest of his glorious life.”
L’Overture’s actions eventually aroused the ire of Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1802 Napoleon dispatched his brother-in-law, Charles Leclerc, to capture L’Overture and return the island to slavery under French control. Captured and imprisoned at Fort de Joux in France, L’Overture died of pneumonia on April 7, 1803. Independence for Saint Dominque would follow one year later under the leadership of Jean-Jacques Dessalines, one of L’Overture’s generals.
Sources:
Laurent Dubois, Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004); Martin Ros, Night of Fire: The Black Napoleon and the Battle for Haiti (New York: Sarpedon, 1994).
Contributor:
McNally, Deborah
University of Washington
Known to his contemporaries as “The Black Napoleon,” Toussaint L’Overture was a former slave who rose to become the leader of the only successful slave revolt in modern history, the Haitian Revolution.
Born into slavery on May 20, 1743 in the French colony of Saint Dominque, L’Overture was the eldest son of Gaou Guinon, an African prince who was captured by slavers. At a time when revisions to the French Code Noir (Black Code) legalized the harsh treatment of slaves as property, young L’ Overture instead inspired kindness from those in authority over him. His godfather, the priest Simon Baptiste, for example, taught him to read and write. Impressed by L’Overture, Bayon de Libertad, the manager of the Breda plantation on which L’Overture was born, allowed him unlimited access to his personal library. By the time he was twenty, the well-read and tri-lingual L’Overture—he spoke French, Creole, and some Latin—had also gained a reputation as a skilled horseman and for his knowledge of medicinal plants and herbs. More importantly, L’Overture had secured his freedom from de Libertad even as he continued to manage his former owner’s household personnel and to act as his coachman. Over the course of the next eighteen years, L’Overture settled into life on the Breda plantation marrying fellow Catholic Suzanne Simon and parenting two sons, Isaac and Saint-Jean.
The events of August 22, 1791, the “Night of Fire” in which slaves revolted by setting fire to plantation houses and fields and killing whites, convinced the 48 year old L’Overture that he should join the growing insurgency, although not before securing the safety of his wife and children in the Spanish-controlled eastern half of the island (Santo Domingo) and assuring that Bayon de Libertad and his wife were safely onboard a ship bound for the United States.
Inspired by French Revolutionary ideology and angered by generations of abuse at the hands of white planters, the initial slave uprising was quelled within several days, but ongoing fighting between the slaves, free blacks, and planters continued. Although he was free, L’Overture joined the slave insurgency and quickly developed a reputation first as a capable soldier and then as military secretary to Georges Biassou, one of the insurgency’s leaders. When the insurgency’s leadership chose to ally itself with Spain against France, L’Overture followed. Threatened by Spain and Britain’s attempts to control the island, the French National Convention acted to preserve its colonial rule in 1794 by securing the loyalty of the black population; France granted citizenship rights and freedom to all blacks within the empire.
Following France’s decision to emancipate the slaves, L’Overture allied with France against Spain, and from 1794 to 1802, he was the dominant political and military leader in the French colony. Operating under the self-assumed title of General-in-Chief of the Army, L’Overture led the French in ousting the British and then in capturing the Spanish controlled half of the island. By 1801, although Saint Dominque remained ostensibly a French colony, L’Overture was ruling it as an independent state. He drafted a constitution in which he reiterated the 1794 abolition of slavery and appointed himself governor for “the rest of his glorious life.”
L’Overture’s actions eventually aroused the ire of Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1802 Napoleon dispatched his brother-in-law, Charles Leclerc, to capture L’Overture and return the island to slavery under French control. Captured and imprisoned at Fort de Joux in France, L’Overture died of pneumonia on April 7, 1803. Independence for Saint Dominque would follow one year later under the leadership of Jean-Jacques Dessalines, one of L’Overture’s generals.
Sources:
Laurent Dubois, Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004); Martin Ros, Night of Fire: The Black Napoleon and the Battle for Haiti (New York: Sarpedon, 1994).
Contributor:
McNally, Deborah
University of Washington
"Happy birthday to Haiti. (Jan. 01, 2013)I am not going to dwell on how poor Haiti is, because the News Media covers enough of it. My intention here is not to sweep away the harsh and unimaginable misery my kinfolks are living under, but rather to take one day to say Happy birthday to Haiti .. Haiti's problems are not going away overnight. However, its good to look at a Haiti from a different angle, one that shows the other side of Haiti, which the media will never cover." Pitit Neg Ahier
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| Looking at the people celebrating their independence from the French slavers I am reminded of one very important thing. Haitians have paid a heavy price being the first to rebel and get independence from the colonial powers. |
ANCIENT TEACHINGS FROM ABOVE
"The origin of the Trinity is obvious to anyone who
will observe the daily manifestations of the sun. This orb, being the symbol of
all Light, has three distinct phases: rising, midday, and setting.
The philosophers therefore divided the life of all things into three distinct
parts: growth, maturity, and decay. Between the twilight of dawn
and the twilight of evening is the high noon of resplendent glory. God the
Father, the Creator of the world, is symbolized by the dawn. His color is blue because the sun
rising in the morning is veiled in blue mist.
God
the Son, the Illuminating One sent to bear witness of His Father before all the
worlds is the celestial globe at noonday, radiant and magnificent, the maned
Lion of Judah, the Golden-haired Savior of the World. Yellow is His color
and His power is without end.
God
the Holy Ghost is the sunset phase when the orb of day robed in flaming red rests for a moment
upon the horizon line and then vanishes into the darkness of the night to
wander the lower worlds and later rise again triumphant from the embrace of
darkness.
To the Egyptians the sun was the symbol of immortality, for, while it died each night, it rose again with each ensuing dawn." www.Sacred-texts.com
To the Egyptians the sun was the symbol of immortality, for, while it died each night, it rose again with each ensuing dawn." www.Sacred-texts.com
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
UNTOUCHABLES
There is something missing here. It is in what isn't said in the comments. It is in the picture.
The caste system of India has five levels. The Untouchables are at the bottom. So deep is their concept of themselves, as I understand it, so embedded into their minds their lack of worth only a few have risen above their lowly status for the centuries India has revered their caste system. We learned this in elementary school. And now we are looking at a photograph that tells the story and makes the words we've read, and the news stories we've heard have a body to attach meaning to. Now I understand better. These people mean nothing to the other castes. The Untouchables are the shit carriers, and get the shit beaten out of them leisurely by those who don't give a shit about them. The Untouchables have to carry shit, and eat shit to make a shitty life in the worst shit India has to offer. Now that's some shit.
The picture of an upper caste man brutally beating an Untouchable woman in public asks me, "What am I gonna do about this? What can I do?? I don't like seeing women beaten, but if a whole culture, an ancient culture sees this as their norm, and acceptable what can an outsider do? What help do the activists in India need from Westerners? - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories
CIRCLE IS A GREAT TEACHER
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| "Here the image of breath, the drums, open space, the sound of the wind and the water are telling stories of beginnings, ends and new arrivals from the worlds we come from... These stories the drum tells whether we listen or not." - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 9.07.12 |
PHOTO: John Daleuski at Dillons Beach in California
from Love's Rainbow Universe's Community
LOVING, the mystery of...
"It is in the face the story is told of who you are, and who you aren't. It is an old, an ancient way of telling stories to people you know, love, don't know, hate, like, need and don't need. Your people's history, its contradictions and its deep relationships with higher realms of Being is the beauty of and within your face. In your face are the complex stories of needs, and feelings wanting and waiting to be accepted, and validated, and there is the ever present poem; the songs unheralded by lovers, and the perpetual motion of newness. It is in you the mystery of being beautiful and unheard; seen, and accepted as being beautiful and easy to the eyes. The story, your story, is as beautiful in your face as it is in the memory I will hold of this moment."
- Gregory E. Woods (told august 2, 2012)
- Gregory E. Woods (told august 2, 2012)
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| .. a lot of trust makes two into lovers. |
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| family - Wes, Denisia & the baby |
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