The Historical Document “A Portrait of Barbados”

Analyze the document “A Portrait of Barbados”.

Explore what Ligon’s account can teach historians about the English institutions of servitude and/or slavery in the mid-1600s. Pay attention to the contextual information provided in the editor’s introduction to the document. What sort of information do you get about the document? What information do you have about the author? When was the document created, and why? How might this information affect your interpretation of its contents?