In 1498, the world was on the brink of a seismic shift. Christopher Columbus, during his fateful third voyage, stumbled upon the Pearl Coast-an enchanting realm teeming with riches beyond imagination. Yet, behind the glistening pearls lay a dark and treacherous history that would forever change the course of human lives.
At the heart of this gripping historical thriller lies Cubagua Island, a place where dreams and nightmares intertwined. Here, the lives of two souls, Charaima, a Native American, and Dembe, an African, were forever altered. Enslaved by the avaricious European invaders and subjected to unimaginable cruelty under the sadistic Captain Pedro, they clung to each other, united by a shared determination to secure their people's freedom.
Hidden amidst the chaos and suffering, a cache of pearls was concealed in a buried clay jar-a symbol of hope and a means to their liberation.
The Pearl Coast, bore witness to the ruthless harvest of an estimated two-hundred billion oysters. But this insatiable greed came at an unthinkable cost. Within two decades, the entire Native population had been decimated, and the first African enslaved people in America perished as pearl divers, meanwhile the local ecosystem was destroyed.
In 1498, the world was on the brink of a seismic shift. Christopher Columbus, during his fateful third voyage, stumbled upon the Pearl Coast-an enchanting realm teeming with riches beyond imagination. Yet, behind the glistening pearls lay a dark and treacherous history that would forever change the course of human lives.
At the heart of this gripping historical thriller lies Cubagua Island, a place where dreams and nightmares intertwined. Here, the lives of two souls, Charaima, a Native American, and Dembe, an African, were forever altered. Enslaved by the avaricious European invaders and subjected to unimaginable cruelty under the sadistic Captain Pedro, they clung to each other, united by a shared determination to secure their people's freedom.
Hidden amidst the chaos and suffering, a cache of pearls was concealed in a buried clay jar-a symbol of hope and a means to their liberation.
The Pearl Coast, bore witness to the ruthless harvest of an estimated two-hundred billion oysters. But this insatiable greed came at an unthinkable cost. Within two decades, the entire Native population had been decimated, and the first African enslaved people in America perished as pearl divers, meanwhile the local ecosystem was destroyed.
THE YEAR WAS 1498, on the mainland shore of the Caribbean Ocean, located off the eastern coast of Venezuela, around the same region as the Coche, Cubagua, and Margarita islands. The settlement at the seashore bore a pacifying feeling of paradise, with abundant palm and coconut trees, shiny sand that glittered below a lovely clear blue sky, and a soothing blue body of water bathing the mainland. A gentle and warm ocean breeze moved the majestic palm trees with their dark green foliage, like the invisible waves of a rhythmic concert. Below the palm trees tucked between bushes at the line where the rainforest ends, and the shore begins are straw huts seemingly in disarray but, upon closer analysis, reveal a particular formation—a semi-circular arrangement.
The coastal paradise environment encouraged high-spirited antics amongst the children playing around and amongst the loud, chatty adults, especially the women. It was a peaceful, serene environment, beautiful to behold. The water at the ocean's shores was blue and crystal-clear—one could see the bottom of the ocean with its coral reef, sea urchins, schools of fish, and rock formations. The shoreline is a beautiful golden-colored sand beach, where little children ran from one end of it to the other end in carefree enthusiasm. There was laughter and playfulness and a sense of oneness and unity. It was a utopian and harmonic society. Such was the delightful state of the inhabitants of the mainland of the Venezuelan Ocean —the Guaiquery tribe.
The Guaiqueries were one of several tribes that inhabited this region for thousands of years. The Cochaima, Mochima, Guraguao, Chaima, and Paria were also there. They shared the same language, the Mayum language, although each tribe had a different dialect. All those local tribes belonged to the Arawak people, who stretched from the Orinoco River to the TaÃno region. In a certain way, they can be considered cousins, as those tribes, divided into hundreds of chiefdoms, shared certain physical, social, and linguistic traits from marrying among themselves. Arawak people, also known as Lokono, lived in the Northern Antilles and the northern coast of South America. The Caribs, known as the Kalina people, lived in the lower Antilles. Those two ethnographic groups were quite different because of physical differences and customs and because the Kalina people were hostile travelers and the Lokono were peaceful settlers.
The Guaiqueries, however, and the Cumanagotos were the most populous tribe on the coast of northern Venezuela, living not only along the coastal shore but also on nearby islands, such as Coche and Margarita. They were excellent divers and fishermen and farmed seafood along the coast in shallow, closed-off areas with reed-made fencing. They raised spiny lobsters, pearl oysters, ark clams, and crabs. Their lives were intricately connected to ocean life, and their name, Guaiquery, literally translated means "People of Water."
Guaiqueries were tradespeople and seafarers; they traveled throughout the Caribbean waters in large dugout canoes called guairas, equipped with sails. They traveled to Trinidad & Tobago, Santa Lucia, and eventually, as far North as the Bahamas and the Southern tip of Florida, visiting neighboring tribes, such as the TaÃno, Tequesta, and the Lucayan people. Their spiritual belief was that everything and everyone are connected through their gods. Despite belonging to different tribes, most were interconnected by trade and organized commerce, although a few tribes, such as the nomadic Caribs, were frequently at war.
Their peaceful life was governed by deep-rooted spirituality. They revered every element of Mother Nature, respecting all living beings, from the tiniest insect to the most prominent tree. At night, they would watch the star-filled sky; they were experts in astronomy and had names for the stars, the Milky Way, and the spiritual meaning of the cosmos, and the natural balance of nature gave them peace of mind and existential happiness. There was a deeply rooted fear of underground spirits, who, once woken up, would bring sorrow and death to their community, so through a series of rituals, those spirits had to be appeased. They had many gods and knew they had to obey the laws of nature to maintain their paradisiac harmonic lives.
A bird's eye view of the region revealed a never-ending canopy of dense Amazonian Forest, like a green carpet, a fine golden line of shimmering sand along the shoreline, and deep blue from the vast ocean. Between the green and blue, tucked underneath some swaying palm trees, was a coastal settlement of twenty to thirty thatch huts built-in groups across the shoreline, each arranged in a semi-circular pattern. In the middle of the semicircle was the largest hut, used for ceremonial purposes and day-gathering social activities; it provided shade and safety for the numerous children and toddlers running around while the women went ahead with their daily activities. On the east side of the settlement ran a small freshwater stream, creating a clear separation between the town and the rainforest with its almost impenetrable jungle; some women stood up to their ankles in the crystal-clear fresh water to wash some of their belongings while chatting about the upcoming festivities.
Between the stream and the thatch huts, on the backside of the settlement, there was an area with crops for cassava plants, banana trees, passion fruit, corn plants, papaya trees, and other vegetables and fruits. The nearby forest would provide the rest of their varied diet, such as mangoes, lemons, soursop, coconuts, etc.
The women of the tribe were cooking in open fire pits in front of each hut. Their cooking utensils were either clay pots or pans or different types of seashells, coconut husks, drinking containers made from animal bladders. They were experts in utilizing all the tools Mother Nature had to offer. They had a variety of hunting weapons, such as three-pronged spears for fishing, atlatls and "cerbatanas" (blow darts) with tiny, poisoned arrows for hunting, stone axes and knives for tree cutting and animal gutting, bows and arrows, and fishing nets.
On a typical day, men gathered in small groups to hunt; meanwhile, the others attended their fish enclosures. The older men sat on their heels, discussing diverse topics, such as upcoming season changes, how to prepare for it, and the preparations for the next festival. Younger women, pregnant or breastfeeding, would be laying in their hammocks, enjoying the gentle breeze from the ocean, playing with their cappuccino monkeys, and watching their toddlers run around. Others attended their crops and smashed seeds and kernels in the metates. Some older women were weaving baskets making hammocks, and others created stone tools by heating carefully selected rocks and then hitting them with another one with precise force to flake the heated rock. Depending on the size of the flake, the new tool would be used as choppers, scrapers, carving knives, axes, spears, and arrow tips.
Older women were busy drilling shells, wood fragments, and pearls for their ornamental body decors. The skills learned showed incredible craftsmanship and patience. Their knowledge had been passed down for generations. These women also ensured the younger girls learned their craft as early as possible.
Laughter and happy chit-chat could be heard underneath one of the palm tree leaves-covered huts. Those women were lying, or half seated and relaxed, chatting and laughing; meanwhile, their colorful hammocks were gently swinging in the light breeze. One was feeding a spider monkey attached to a string and running back and forth while gulping down his banana. On another hammock, a black toucan with its substantial yellow beak was moving his head rhythmically to the chit-chat of the laughing women.
The men of the town were hunters and avid fishermen. Some mornings, these skilled, skinny-looking men would venture into the bushes to hunt game. After some time, they would emerge from the bushes with a large dead deer hanging over their shoulders. Each man was armed with a "cerbatana," a 5- to 7-foot-long blow dart made from the iriartrea palm tree. The foot-long arrows (tsentsak) had a cotton ball that would create balance and air pressure and whose poison was strong enough to neutralize any animal. The poisoned arrow tip contained curare; a powerful paralytic extracted from plants. Depending on the concentration of the curare, it could kill or just paralyze the target and was also used in a lower concentration for therapeutic purposes. Each man carried a pouch (aljaba) made of palm fibers.
Some of them used bows and arrows, all forged from the wood and stones in the area. Strapped to their backs were wicker baskets for their stone tools.
Meanwhile, one group hunted, others visited their fish farms, and the rest went out onto the open ocean with hand-carved wooden canoes. Each canoe could carry several people; however, they would only go out in pairs for fishing purposes. Each of them had a three-pronged spear, and they would jump into the transparent and calm water and go underwater hunting for red snapper or the occasional barracuda. The diet of the Guaiquery tribe was varied and healthy.
When the children saw the men emerge from the bushes with the animal they killed, they abandoned the games they were playing and cheered them on as the men approached their huts, smiles laced with pride written all over their faces. They walked swiftly and quietly toward their women, beaming with smiles as their women uttered words that happened to pay tribute to them for their heroism.
Sometimes I forget that the prettiest things can still have a bloody history. In the book Blood For Pearls by Peter Von Perle we see exactly how that can be the case. It tells the story of what was known as the Pearl Coast, an island known as Cubagua island and the site of a rather bloody example of Spanish conquest. The story opens on a nearby island with a native tribe known as the Guaiqueries and their first meeting with Europeans when Columbus landed there on his third voyage in 1498. We meet several young members of the tribe such as Charaima, the eldest son of the local chieftain and next in line to be the leader, and Cora his soon to be betrothed. While visiting them Columbus realized that they had an excessively large amount of pearls worn as jewelry and other ornaments. Having been searching for a source of wealth Columbus left some men behind to find the pearl’s location and start diving operations. However, driven by greed things soon turn bloody for the natives as events take a deadly turn.
Honestly, I rather liked this book as I could tell there was a considerable amount of research done, especially on pearls, in order to write it. Reading it I could easily tell that the author knew his information and really knew his subject. However, at the same time there were a few things that I did not necessarily like about the story. One of the big ones was the difficulty with continuity that the story had. There were multiple times where the story would reference events without a timescale but would then backtrack and go more in depth on earlier events before going back to the already referenced future events. I often struggled to determine what was happening when in comparison to each other or how long of a time frame there was between events. This made it difficult to piece together the overall narrative at times which definitely detracted from my overall enjoyment. I also struggled with the transitions between perspectives as these were not very smooth and often impeded my immersion with the story. While the story was good I am only giving it three out of five stars.
This book was a work of historical fiction and one that tells a rather bloody story. If you enjoy historical fiction and don’t mind the violence that is present I would suggest you try this. However, the story is rather brutal at times and contains a lot of violence and other mature content so be careful before you do. Due to this content I would also suggest the book is not for younger readers, at best older teens and young adults but no one younger.