HEAD of the Moore Town Maroons in Portland, Colonel Wallace Sterling says culture preservation is one of the main reasons maroon towns still exist in the country.

Jamaica has several Maroon settlements of which Accompong in St Elizabeth, with approximately 600 residents, is the largest. Other major maroon communities can be found in Moore Town, Scotts Hall, Trelawny Town, and Charles Town.

Wallace, who was speaking to the Jamaica Observer North and East recently, said it is important to retain as much of the African culture as possible in order to pass it on to future generations.

“When I used to go to school there was a book that we used to read about Brother Rabbit. Brother Rabbit who lives on an island would say ‘you can’t know why I wish to leave my island unless you live there’. He lived on an island surrounded by crocodiles. So unless you live here with us and you grow up and you have our experience, then you won’t understand what we speak about when we say the spirit of our ancestors and why the culture is important,” the colonel said.

For him, although all the customs and traditions of Maroons have not been maintained, a “sufficient” amount still exists.

“Even if you think you have lost something, you need to know the key to get back through the door which was closed, and that is the most important thing. So, if you want to know something that happened in the past and nobody here don’t know, you need now to consult the ancestors to get the answer. If I can’t spell a word but I know where a dictionary is, I can go to the dictionary and get the information from it. It’s like that,” Wallace explained.

The Maroon towns are governed by elected chiefs who bear the title of colonel. That position was once a lifetime position but has now been modified to a five-year elected position. Each colonel is assisted by a council comprising a counsillor, major, captain, secretary and treasurer, who are from other maroon communities.

The existence of these towns has been long scrutinized, as they can no longer function as a closed society, primarily due to unemployment. Many leave in search of a better life.

However, Wallace is not fazed by this. He believes that the communities and their culture will remain for generations to come because of necessity.

“Up to seven years ago, if a child was born in the community you would have to know which of the ancestors is reincarnated in that child. Failure to know might mean the death of the child. It may sound stupid, but that’s how it is,” he said.

“It is a mistake to think that the structure that we have now came about when our foreparents moved here. They had this structure thousands of years before they came to Jamaica. The history of the African man did not start when he stepped off the ship as slaves. It is how you look at what you had before and how you continue to practise that.

He added: “For example, look at the word our parents used to refer to themselves as, ‘yankunkun’. What does it mean? It means a free people; it means an independent people; it means reliable people; it means friendship and brotherhood. It is people who would come together, lived together, worked together to defend their own community. That is why today we still refer to ourselves as yankunkun pickiney. That means we are children of those who came before us,” said Wallace, adding “We do those things because that is what our foreparents were doing when they were on the other side of the Atlantic.”