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Bois Caïman Ceremony
Bwa Kayiman, lit. 'Alligator Forest

The Bois Caïman ceremony has often been used as a source of inspiration to nationalists and as a symbol of black resistance to oppression

On the night of August 14, 1791, representative slaves from nearby plantations gathered to participate in a secret ceremony conducted in the woods by nearby Le Cap in the French colony of Saint-Domingue. Presided over by Dutty Boukman, a prominent enslaved African leader and Houngan, and Cécile Fatiman, a mambo, the ceremony served as both a religious ritual and strategic meeting as enslaved Africans met and planned a revolt against their ruling white enslavers of the colony's wealthy Northern Plain. The ceremony is considered the official beginning of the Haitian Revolution.

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we celebrate the event in remembrance of the beginning of new things and the renewal of self. 

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