The early colonial atlantic world: New insights on the African Diaspora from isotopic and ancient<scp>DNA</scp>analyses of a multiethnic 15th–17th century burial population from the Canary Islands, Spain

Abstract

This set of evidence, along with information from historical sources, suggests that Finca Clavijo was a cemetery for a multiethnic marginalized population that had being likely enslaved. Results also indicate that this population kept practicing non-Christian rituals well into the 17th century. We propose that this was possible because the location of the Canaries, far from mainland Spain and the control of the Spanish Crown, allowed the emergence of a new society with multicultural origins that was more tolerant to foreign rituals and syncretism.