Plantation

Adéwalé: "And there are a few [of the crew] talking about meeting with Master Kidd to steal from a nearby plantation."

Edward: "A plantation? That's ambitious."

Adéwalé: "Profitable too, if we can manage it."

—Adéwalé and Edward Kenway discussing whether to raid a sugar plantation, 1715.

A sugar plantation on Saint-Domingue

Plantations are large farms that typically grow cash crops like sugarcane, tobacco, coffee, opium, tea, or cotton at immense scale. The practice dates back to the Roman Empire's latifundia (Latin: "spacious farm/estate") made for grains and olive oil, and famously was a hallmark of European colonialism as it expanded the global economy.

In modern times, the term primarily refers to the slave plantations that were widely prevalent and highly profitable throughout the Caribbean and the growing United States in the 17th and 18th centuries. They were often owned by a single family and worked by said family's slaves, who were kept under guard by a sizable contingent of soldiers.

History

In the 9th century, select farmers made tree plantations with oil palm trees in the Wilderness around the Abbasid Caliphate's capital of Baghdad, and date palm groves in the oases near al-Ula due to its high water table, with the purpose of exporting the palm oil and dates, respectively, through the markets.

During the early 18th century, the Beckford and Drax estates owned the majority of the Caribbean's sugar plantations. Because of the possible rewards obtainable from a successful raid, they were a promising though risky target for pirates. The pirate captain Edward Kenway once raided a Beckford-owned plantation on Mary Read's advice, and continued to rob multiple plantations throughout the Caribbean, typically by looting money and resources from their warehouses.

Up until September 1715, the Caribbean Templar Julien du Casse owned a small plantation on the island of Great Inagua. After Edward killed du Casse and took the cove for himself, the plantation was maintained by the pirates.

During the 1730s, there were many sizable plantations on and around the island of Saint-Domingue, including those at Wellington and Tortuga, as well as a number near the town of Port-au-Prince. The Caribbean Assassin Adéwalé raided all of these plantations during his time aiding the Maroon rebellion, not for their resources but to liberate their slaves, many of whom went on to join the rebellion.

Appearances

• Assassin's Creed III (first appearance)
• Assassin's Creed III: Liberation (mentioned in Database entry only)
• Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
  • Freedom Cry
• Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag: Blackbeard – The Lost Journal
• Assassin's Creed: Memories (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed comic (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Identity (mentioned in Database entry only)
• Assassin's Creed: Last Descendants (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Mirage
  • Valley of Memory (mentioned in Database entry only)