Suriname's Maroons and the freedom treaties of 1760–1762

Enslaved Africans who escaped Suriname's plantations formed Maroon communities in the rainforest and fought the colony for decades. In 1760 the Ndyuka and in 1762 the Saamaka forced the Dutch to sign treaties recognising their freedom and territory, a century before slavery was abolished. Their descendants keep their own languages, religion and woodcarving, and in 2007 the Saamaka won a landmark land-rights case at the Inter-American Court.