African, Europeans, and Finding Castle Cormatine: Archaeology and Cultural Entanglement on the 17th Century Gold Coast
Presented by Professor Christopher Decorse (Syracuse University)
Castle Cormantine, founded in 1632 on the coast of what is now modern Ghana, was England's first outpost in Africa. Occupied for little more than three decades before its capture by the Dutch, the fort nonetheless played a key role in shaping African-European interactions and the nascence of the Atlantic slave trade. In time, the name Cormantine of Coromantee became synonymous with slaves from the entire Ghanaian coast throughout the English-speaking colonies of the Americas, and the name resonates down to the present day. Castle Cormantine is an iconic symbol of a trade that brought millions of enslaved Africans to the Americas. In a well-illustrated lecture, Professor DeCorse will tell the story of Castle Cormantine's rediscovery, continuing threats to its preservation, and its lasting legacies.
