This is the tomb of a Dutch planter at Peerboome (or ‘Pear Tree’) in Berbice, Guyana. The tombstone was probably made in Europe during the planter’s life, with only the dates left blank.
This is the tomb of a Dutch planter at Peerboome (or ‘Pear Tree’) in Berbice, Guyana. The tombstone was probably made in Europe during the planter’s life, with only the dates left blank.
The planters expected an early death. Slavery didn’t just kill slaves; it also killed the slavers. The abundance of everything was suffocating. One observer noted, in 1773, that life on the plantations was a ‘vortex of dissipation’. Planters would do whatever they dreamed, and then drown in their fantasies.
Drink and the pox killed most, but some just faded away. The average weight of a planter on death was 8 stone. Meanwhile, the wives seemed to survive. Often, Dutch women were widowed two or three times before they’d find another hard-drinking planter. It was almost as if the Dutch colony was about some gruesome masque, dancing itself to death.
