Group Identity, Scarification, and Poro among Liberated Africans in Sierra Leone, 1808–1819

Abstract

Abstract In this article, identity is complicated by considering examples of marks that denoted membership in the Poro society of the upper Guinea coast among the so-called Liberated Africans freed in Sierra Leone in the nineteenth century. As opposed to a correlation of ethnicity with scarification, this article demonstrates that scarification as an identifier may be understood in far more nuanced and complex ways. The article further shows the familiarity that British clerks in Freetown had concerning the Poro society. Their use of the term “purrah,” specifically to indicate body markings among Liberated Africans removed from seized vessels with no further explanation, indicates that familiarity. The article considers how scarification may continue to be used to understand origins and identity within documents originating along the upper Guinea coast, while underscoring the meanings of such body marking.