This Atlantic world history centers on the life of Juan Nepomuceno
Prieto (c. 1773–c. 1835), a member of the West African Yoruba
people enslaved and taken to Havana during the era of the Atlantic
slave trade. Richly situating Prieto's story within the context of
colonial Cuba, Henry B. Lovejoy illuminates the vast process by
which thousands of Yoruba speakers were forced into life-and-death
struggles in a strange land. In Havana, Prieto and most of the
people of the Yoruba diaspora were identified by the colonial
authorities as Lucumi. Prieto's evolving identity becomes the
fascinating fulcrum of the book. Drafted as an enslaved soldier for
Spain, Prieto achieved self-manumission while still in the
military. Rising steadily in his dangerous new world, he became the
religious leader of Havana's most famous Lucumi
cabildo,
where he contributed to the development of the Afro-Cuban religion
of Santeria. Then he was arrested on suspicion of fomenting slave
rebellion. Trial testimony shows that he fell ill, but his ultimate
fate is unknown.
Despite the silences and contradictions that will never be fully
resolved, Prieto's life opens a window onto how Africans creatively
developed multiple forms of identity and resistance in Cuba
and in the Atlantic world more broadly.