Signares were the

Mulatto (, ) is a racial classification to refer to people of mixed African and European ancestry. Its use is considered outdated and offensive in several languages, including English and Dutch, whereas in languages such as Spanish and Portuguese ...

French-African women of the island of Gorée and the city of Saint-Louis in French Senegal during the 18th and 19th centuries. These women of color managed to gain some individual assets, status, and power in the hierarchies of the

Atlantic Slave Trade The Atlantic slave trade, transatlantic slave trade, or Euro-American slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of enslaved African people, mainly to the Americas. The slave trade regularly used the triangular trade route and ...

. There was a Portuguese equivalent, referred to as ''Nhara'', a name for Luso-African businesswomen who played an important part as business agents through their connections with both Portuguese and African populations. There was also an English language equivalent of women of mixed African and British- or American descent with the same position, such as

Fenda Lawrence Fenda Lawrence (1742Hassoum Ceesay: Gambian women: an introductory history. 1. Auflage. Fulladu Publishers, Gambia 2007 – after 1780), was an African slave trader who operated in the Saloum town of Kaur. In 1772 she visited the Thirteen Colonies ...

Betsy Heard Betsy Heard (1759 – after 1812) was a Euro‐African slave trader and merchant. Her father was an entrepreneur who had travelled from Liverpool, England, to the Los Islands, off the coast of what is now Guinea, in the mid-1700s. Her mother wa ...

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and Elizabeth Frazer Skelton.

Social and economic role

Signares commonly had power in networks of trade and wealth within the limitations of slavery. The influence held by these women led to changes in gender roles in the family structure archetype. Some owned masses of land as well as slaves. European merchants and traders, especially the French and British, would settle on coastal societies inhabited by signares in order to benefit from the increased proximity to the sources of African commerce. The earliest of these merchants were the Portuguese. These merchants were given the name "''

lançados The ''lançados'' (literally, ''the thrown out ones'' Pardue 2015: p. 42 or ''the cast out ones'') were settlers and adventurers of Portuguese origin in Senegambia, Cabo Verde, Guinea, Sierra Leone, and other areas on the coast of West Africa. M ...

''", because "they threw themselves" among Africans, and they would establish relationships with the most influential signares who would accept them in order to obtain commercial privileges. The Portuguese referred to these women as ''Nhara'', and the earliest named example was

Dame Portugaise Dame Portugaise (d. ''after'' 1634), was a Luso-African Nhara slave trader. She was likely daughter of a Portuguese man and African woman and established as a slave trader and merchant in Rufisque Rufisque ( ar, روفيسك; Wolof: Tëngeéj) ...

in the 17th-century. Many signares were wed under “common local law” that was recognized by priests of the Catholic faith. These marriages were for economic and social reasons. Both signares and their husbands gained from these partnerships. Europeans passed their names down to the offspring and with it their lineage. When some of the signares became too powerful, leaders like the Portuguese Crown sought ways to remove the women from their wealth. Different crimes that the Portuguese Crown sought to accuse the women of were crimes against the state or crimes against Christianity. An example of this appears with Bibiana Vuz de França. She was a prominent signare who over the years accumulated a lot of wealth and slaves. After realizing how powerful she was, the Crown wanted to find a way to dismantle her influence and power. “Accused of rebellion, trading with foreigners, and tax evasion, she was imprisoned with her younger brother and another co-conspirator and taken to Cape Verde Islands”.Havik, Philip J.. Women and trade in the Guinea Bissau region: the role of African and Luso-African women in trade networks from the early 16th to the mid 19th century.2012. Print. She was able to receive a royal pardon and free her younger brother after leading a coup against the Crown's representatives. Due to her power, the Crown sought to criminalize Bibiana Vuz de França. However, once they realized that she was too powerful and too influential, all charges against her were dropped and she was once more considered loyal to the crown. Bibiana Vuz de França's confrontation with the Portuguese Crown represents the strength that the signares in this time period had, and also the Portuguese growing inability to control the people.

Social mobility

The social status of signares also allowed for greater social mobility in Gorée than in other parts of Africa. Though there is limited documentation on the origins of most of the signares, it seems likely that at this time the people of Gorée were divided into several social classes: the ''jambor ''or freeborn; the ''jam'' or people of slave descent; the ''tega ''and ''uga ''or blacksmiths and leatherworkers and ''griots ''or storytellers. Many signares were of the ''jam ''or ''griot'' class, and were often married by European men because they were considered especially beautiful. Once married to European men, women helped them handle many of their trading affairs and transactions, and gained economic and social stature in the community themselves. In this way women of lower social status could gain power in the community and become important traders through their marital status.

Marital practices

Marriages between African women and European men were governed by local law. Given the fact that many European men would not stay in Gorée permanently, marriages were often in a state of flux. If a European man left Gorée and intended to return, the African woman would wait for him. When the man got on the boat to go back to Europe, signares would scoop up the sand where his last footprints were and put it in a handkerchief, which she'd hang on her bedpost it until he returned. Signares would often wait years for men to return without remarrying. If European men left without planning to return, or if a signare learned that her European husband was not going to return to Gorée, women would remarry. This was not considered shameful in any way, and signares would not lose any of their social status, and would often retain much of the trading power that they gained through their prior marital status. Remarried signares would often raise their children from their European husbands alongside their new African husbands, and these children would receive inheritance from their mothers, not their fathers.

List of notable signares

* Victoria Albis * Anna Colas Pépin * Anne Pépin *

* Crispina Peres * Anne Rossignol *

Ana Joaquina dos Santos e Silva Ana Joaquina dos Santos e Silva (1788–1859), was a Euro-African '' Nhara'' slave trader, money lender, and planter in Angola.Emmanuel Kwaku Akyeampong, Dictionary of African Biography, Volym 1–6' She was the perhaps biggest slave trader in An ...

Sources

*George E. Brooks, ''Eurafricans in Western Africa: Commerce, Social Status, Gender, and Religious Observance from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century'' (Ohio University Press, 2003). *

References

External links

signares.fr
site dedicated to signares (bibliography, sources, online resources, portfolio comprising several dozen representations of signares, etc.)

Site relating to Senegalese Mullatos (people of mixed African and European ancestry), page on signares. {{authority control History of Senegal * * Gorée Mulatto Women in Senegal African slave traders Concubinage Multiracial affairs in Africa Creole peoples 16th-century women 19th-century women 17th-century women