Untold History of Panama's Successful Enslaved Resistance Detailed in 'African Maroons' Book
LAWRENCE — The saga of enslaved peoples remains a complicated history. But a new book has made it even more complicated.
“I argue that this is really the first successful example of enslaved resistance in the Americas,” said Robert Schwaller, associate professor of history at the University of Kansas.
His book titled “African Maroons in Sixteenth-Century Panama: A History in Documents” (University of Oklahoma Press) details how, from the 1520s through the 1580s, thousands of enslaved Africans fled captivity in Spanish Panama and formed their own communities.