Akan goldweights

Among the great cultures of sub-Saharan West Africa were the Akan — a linguistic group comprising the Asante, Fante, Brong, Akyem, Akwapim, Akwamu, Kwahu, Aowin, Wassa, Assin, Denkyira, Sehwi and the Adansi ethnic groups of present south-western Ghana and south-eastern Côte d’Ivoire. Over centuries, the Akan mined gold, and sold it on vast trading routes across the Sahara Desert. 

From the 1400s, they developed a system of ‘mmbramm ’, or goldweights, to measure gold dust, the Akan currency. Goldweights were acquired by both Dutch and British colonial collectors, but in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries they were also gathered by Black collectors.

Duho ceremonial seat

This ‘duho’ or ritual seat was made at the height of Taíno culture (1000s— 1500s) on the island now home to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. A creature that is part-human and part-animal stands on all fours. In bold curving lines, the sculptor has dressed the creature in a cotton belt around its middle, an object of great value that chiefs gave each other as gifts. Taíno people gathered around this wooden throne for political and spiritual ceremonies.

Magnificent wood sculptures played a key role in society and speak of people’s interactions with their habitat. The ‘cacique’ (leader) would sit in a ‘duho’ to witness the ‘batey’ (or ball game) and also during the ‘cohoba’ ritual.

A man of status

Before the era of transatlantic enslavement, European artists rarely portray black people yet when they do they usually depict them as real people, honourable individuals and in a variety of roles.

'Portrait of an African Man' is the earliest known artwork of a Black person in European Art. In it we see the Dutch artist Jan Mostaert drawing attention to the man’s gloved hands and what he holds: a sword and a luxurious bag — both signs of wealth and high status.

This portrait suggests the wide-ranging roles that Black people played in Europe before the era of transatlantic enslavement. The man’s identity is uncertain but he may be Christophle le More, an archer and bodyguard to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.

Royal patronage

Look closely underneath the heads of these three British monarchs depicted in gold coins from the 1600s. Sitting just at the bottom of Charles II, James II and William III, you'll be able to make out a tiny elephant with a castle on its back.

This symbol indicates that the gold used in these coins was mined by enslaved people in West Africa and came to the Royal Mint via the Royal African Company (RAC), which Charles II helped to establish.

The RAC was the single largest contributor to the transatlantic trade in enslaved African people, shipping in the region of 150,000 - 160,000 captives between 1672 and 1731.

The Company held the right to coin African gold into guineas - the largest denomination in the English coinage.

A further nod to a racist backstory of this particular currency is the name itself - 'guinea' comes from the 17th century word for Africa.

The longitude problem

In 1714, Parliament offered enormous cash prizes for a solution to calculating longitude at sea - a vital aid to navigation.

The British Longitude Act proposed the instrument be tested 'from Great Britain to any such Port in the West-Indies' - the chief destination of slaving vessels.

The chronometer, which can measure time despite temperature changes and unpredictable waves at sea, became the ultimate solution.

This one pictured, manufactured in London, is encased in mahogany produced by enslaved people.

Enslavement and fashion

As drinking tea, coffee and hot chocolate, and smoking tobacco, became commonplace, the wealthy in Britain began to buy beautifully designed items to store them in.

The materials from which they were made, such as mahogany, silver and tortoiseshell, are all the products of enslaved people's work. These items have long been valued, collected and admired - but often uncritically and without consideration of the violence it took to make them. When we consider it closely, this snuffbox paints a clear picture of colonisation:

• Crafted from luxury tortoiseshell likely imported from the Caribbean.
• Filled with tobacco from the Americas.
• An image portraying an aristocratic European being brought hot chocolate - made from Central American cacao and enslaved-produced Caribbean sugar.
• She is attended by a Black servant who is kept in the background.
• The Black servant is wearing yellow 'Indian' livery and would have been considered as 'exotic' as the chocolate, sugar and tobacco.

History at the dinner table

In 2021, New York-based Jamaican artist Jacqueline Bishop created a dinner service recalling her Jamaican grandmother's prized bone china crockery which, whilst 'painted with bright, cheerful carriages and palaces, hid a violent history of slavery and colonialism.'

Her plates show the horrors of plantation violence but also emphasise the dignity and fortitude of the enslaved - particularly women - by deliberately framing them with beautiful Caribbean fauna.

Much of the inspiration for 'History at the Dinner Table' came from Captain John Stedman's graphic book, 'Narrative, of a five years' expedition, against the revolted negroes of Surinam, in Guiana'. The book contains brutal images of women, including one being flogged naked onboard a slave ship.

Through her ceramic plates Bishop intends to give the women depicted back some hope and salvation by taking those images and wrapping them in flowers and nature.

Watch below as Jacqueline Bishop discusses her work and the exhibition alongside Co-Curator Dr Victoria Avery, the Fitzwilliam's Keeper of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts.

Dancing with poise

In 2020, artist Sokari Douglas Camp was inspired to make her 'Jonkonnu Masquerade' series when she learned about the Jamaican festivals called Jonkonnu where indentured plantation workers celebrated by dressing in colourful hand-me-down clothes. From admiral's hats to soldiers' jackets, and highly decorated headgear, plantation workers celebrated for one precious day each year.

The series depicts enslaved performers wearing costumes referencing the Jamaican Jonkonnu ('John Canoe' in English). The sculpture on display in this exhibition is dressed in an admiral's hat with sugar cane instead of feathers and bedecked with imagery relating to slaved-produced sugar and colonial-style English tea-drinking, whilst dancing on the Union Jack.

In 'Black Atlantic', you will find this contemporary work juxtaposed with a pair of torchères-on-stands from c. 1645, once owned by Elizabeth Murray at her stately home of Ham House.

They offer a stereotypical representation of Black people as servants at that time, dehumanising them and placing them in a racist fantasy of African dress that includes feathered skirts, bells and turbans.