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Christmas Holidays at Sea in the Golden Age of Piracy, Page 3

Père Jean-Baptiste Labat's Psuedo-Buccaneer Holiday Celebration

Père Jean-Baptiste Labat was a French clergyman who
Père Jean-Baptiste Labat, Frontispiece
Nouveau Voyage aux Isles de
l'Amerique by Jean-Baptiste Vol.1 (1722)
decided to become a foreign missionary in 1693. He traveled to the French-held island of Martinique, arriving there in January of 1694. There he started the parish of François in Martinique and was made the proprietor of the estate of Fonds-Saint-Jacques in the north.¹ The estate contained a sugar cane plantation, which Labat ran, coming up with a new method for manufacturing sugar. Labat was an interesting, as well as interested, observer, working with French corsairs, buccaneers and natives alike.

The word 'buccaneer' is sometimes used interchangeably with 'pirate' although they are very different breeds of sailors. The word buccaneer came from the Arawack Indian's word for the platform made of sticks that was used to smoke meat: a buccan (see the photo below right for an example.) The French modified the word to 'boucane' or 'boucan' and French hunters came to be called 'boucaniers.' The English further modified it into 'buccaneer', the word we know today.

The French boucainers lived on Hispaniola where they made their life hunting and farming until the Spanish drove them out. They moved to Tortuga where the Spanish again tried to expunge them. When the Spanish failed,
A Buccaneer, his guns and dogs, from On the Spanish Main
by John Masefield (Original Image: 1744)
they were joined with Dutch and English.

They started seafaring, striking out against their Spanish oppressors in the early 17th century. Since England saw them as a useful group, helping during various conflicts with Spain, they encouraged the buccaneers. The English Jamaican Governor Thomas Modyford even allowed them to sail from Port Royal. The buccaneers robbed Spanish ships and settlements, returning to spend their money in Jamaica.²

In back of this all, however, was a group of men who liked shooting and smoking meat, which is where Père Labat enters the picture. It was at his plantation Fonds-Saint-Jacques where we find him describing what he called a cochon boucan - a sort of buccaneer's holiday - that he put together at the request of a fellow priest.³ While it is a lot to quote, I am going to just go ahead and put his description in here in full. Labat has such an down-to-earth, interesting way of describing things that it is fun to read and I honestly don't believe I can improve upon it much, except by explaining the things that aren't obvious to us today. Enjoy!

A cochon boucan is held in the forest. On these occasions everyone must pretend to be buccaneers, who cook their pig and amuse themselves in much the same way when they wish to take a holiday. One of the differences between my boucan and that of the buccaneers is that they cook a sanglier (wild boar) while I have to be contented with a tame pig. So I had a pig killed and cleaned the evening before, and I also had a place cleared in the woods some 1,500 paces from our house on the bank of the river. Here I had a large ajoupa built. An ajoupa is a hut made of light poles covered with balisier [Heliconia bihai] and cachibou [Asplundia insignis] leaves to keep out the rain. I sent the pig and other things I had prepared to the ajoupa at daybreak and, most important of all, the wine to be cooled in the river.

Photo: Mission
A brochette or boucan for grilling

When all the guests had arrived we walked to the boucan and arrived there at about 9 a.m. The first thing to be done on these occasions is for everyone to set to work. The laziest had to make two brochettes [wooden skewers] for each buccaneer. For this purpose they cut sticks as thick as one’s finger, which are then barked and smoothed. One boucan should have two prongs while the other has but a point. The other guests made the brochette. This is a grill on which the whole pig has to be cooked. To make the boucan four forked sticks, about four feet long and as thick as your arm, are driven into the ground to form an oblong structure about four feet long by three feet wide. Cross-pieces of wood are placed in the forks of these posts. On these one arranges the grill, which is also made of sticks, and all this contraption is well tied together with lianes [tropical vines]. The pig is placed on this bed on its back, the belly wide open and kept in position with sticks to prevent it from closing up when the fire is lighted.

While everyone was hard at work doing these things the slaves set fire to a big heap of wood which they had cut the day before. When the wood was reduced to charcoal the slaves put it under the pig, against all the rules to use any metal instruments, such as shovels, or tongs, or plates, dishes, spoons or forks. Even tablecloths are forbidden as they are too much at variance with buccaneer simplicity.

I have forgotten to say that the belly of the pig must be filled with lime-juice and plenty of salt and crushed pimento. For though pork is excellent and more tender in America than in any other country, these additions are necessary to make it really succulent.

Boucaining a Pig, from On the Spanish Main
by John Masefield (Original Image: 1744)

While the pig was cooking, those who wished to do so, ate some breakfast. They were also permitted to drink a shot (un coup) of wine, provided that they drank it in a coüi (calabash) without water, for buccaneers never pour water into their wine and drink either pure water or neat liquor.

It is lawful to eat the dishes brought from the house for breakfast, but once the pig has been tasted it is against buccaneer law to eat anything else.

Since, however, there is no rule so strict that it does not allow some exception, some of the company are allowed to mix water with their wine. This is because, being still novices of the 'Order of Buccaneers', it would not be wise to enforce all the rigour of the law. On which point I wish to remark, en passant, how much more justice and good sense there is in this 'Order', than is some I could mention in which the novices are expected to be more punctual and exact than the old members.

Buccaneers Hunting from the Trees, from On the Spanish Main
by John Masefield (Original Image: 1744)

After breakfast everyone did his share of work. Some went shooting, others collected balisier, cachibou leaves, and ferns to make the tablecloth and napkins. Some looked after the pig to see it cooked slowly, and that the gravy penetrated the meat. This operation is effected by pricking a pig with the point of a brochette, but care must be taken, however, not to stick the brochette through the skin and thus allow the gravy to fall in the fire.

When the boucan was judged to be sufficiently cooked, the hunters were recalled by firing a couple of shots, one after the other. This is according to the rule, for watches are not customary in buccaneer society. As the hunters arrived their game was plucked and thrown in the pig's belly, or it was spitted and placed near the fire to roast. Hunters who brought nothing were not forgiven if they said that they had seen nothing, but were told that they must go back and shoot something or pay the last penalty. If they were old buccaneers, they were punished on the spot by having to drink as many 'shots', one after the other, as the most successful hunter had brought in birds. The only mercy that can be shown them, if it is proved that bad fortune and not carelessness has been the cause of their crime, is to give them the choice of the liquor that they have to drink. In the case of novices, for so those who assist in a boucan for the first time are called, their punishment depends on the master of the boucan. It is then his duty to impose a penalty with discretion and wisdom in proportion to the weakness of the sinners.

Leaves of a Cachibou Plant - Asplundia insignis

After benedicite ["The Song of Creation" taken from the canticle of Daniel, sung in the morning on Sundays and at Festivals⁴] we sat down at a table so solid that nothing but an earthquake could have shaken it, for our table was the earth itself covered with ferns and leaves. Each person laid beside him his two brochettes, his knife, his coüi for drinking, and a cachibou leaf. This cachibou leaf is cut into a square, the four corners of which are bent up and tied to each other with small lianes so as to make a bowl. It is in this bowl that one puts the gravy, which is made sweeter or piquant according to taste. I had provided napkins and bread though this is really contrary to the rules, for real buccaneers know not the meaning of napkins, and use but baked plantains for bread.

The master of the boucan, as head of the party and father of the family, cuts the first helping for all the company. Armed with a large fork in his left hand and a great knife in his right, he approaches the pig, which lies on its peaceful bed over a small fire. He cuts big slices of pork without damaging the skin, and puts them on balisier leaves which the waiters carry to the guests. A large coüi full of gravy and another full of lime-juice, pepper, salt and pimento stand in the centre of the table, and from these each guest mixes his gravy according to his taste. When the first helping is finished the older buccaneers get up and serve the others. Lastly the novices carve the pig, and they should have learnt this art by watching their elders.

Artist: David Teniers the Younger
Peasants Merrymaking (~1650)

I do not think it necessary to inform the reader that one of the essential things in a boucan is to drink frequently. The law compels it, the sauce invites one to do so, and few err in this respect. But since man is frail and would often fail had he no one to remind him of his duty and correct him, the master of the boucan has to watch his party. Should he find anyone idle or negligent he must at once call everybody's attention to the fact. The delinquent must then do penance by drinking a large coüi, a no mean punishment since the coüi is always kept full of wine.

In this harmless manner we spent the day with the greatest possible enjoyment. The good wine which is the soul of a meal never failed. I had imported it from France, Madeira, and Canary, and cooled as it had been in the river, anyone would have said that it was iced.⁵

Now who wouldn't want to join Labat in his buccaneer celebration? Admittedly, what he describes is not an actual Christmas celebration, but being a holiday somewhat along the lines of the officer celebrations written about by chaplain Henry Teonge, I thought it would be worth adding to this discussion on festive holidays. It is probably the way the early buccaneers would have celebrated the holiday. (And if you don't like that weak holiday connection, consider it a sort of a pirate Christmas gift to you.)

¹ Jean-Baptiste Labat, wikipedia, gathered 11/20/12; ² Buccaneer, wikipedia, gathered 11/26/12; ³ Père Jean-Baptiste Labat, The Memoirs of Pére Labat 1693-1705, translated and edited by John Eaden, p. 64; ⁴ Canticle, wikipedia, gathered 11/26/12; ⁵ Labat, p. 52-7

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