Moore Town, where the ancestors still speak

October has arrived, and with it, Jamaica’s official Heritage Month, a season set aside to honour the island’s layered history, its many bloodlines, and the unbreakable spirit that has carried its people through every age. There is, perhaps, no better place to begin this month’s reflections than Moore Town, tucked in the Rio Grande Valley of the Blue and John Crow Mountains in Portland, where the descendants of Nanny of the Maroons still keep centuries-old traditions alive.

Moore Town’s story begins in resistance. Enslaved Africans who freed themselves fled into Jamaica’s rugged interior, joining earlier Taíno communities and forming fierce, self-governing settlements known as Maroons. Chief among their leaders was Nanny, a spiritual and strategic force schooled in Akan tradition, credited with mastering herbal medicine and guerrilla warfare, and with coordinating her forces across the mountains using the sound of the Abeng horn. In 1739, after decades of conflict known as the First Maroon War, Captain Quao signed a peace treaty with the British on behalf of the Windward Maroons. Nanny herself refused to sign, choosing instead to secure her own 500-acre land grant. On that ground, in 1740-41, she established New Nanny Town, the settlement that would grow into Moore Town.

Nanny was declared a National Heroine in October 1975, the only woman among Jamaica’s seven, and her likeness now appears on the Jamaican $500 bill. Her earlier stronghold, Old Nanny Town on the Stony River, remains part of the Nanny Town Heritage Route, guided today by members of the community she founded.

Moore Town continues to govern itself much as it always has, led by a colonel and a Council of Elders, currently under Colonel Wallace Sterling, the longest-serving Maroon colonel in Jamaica’s history. Its people still practise the Kromanti language, drumming, and spiritual ceremonies, traditions so distinct that UNESCO named them a Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Heritage in 2003. In 2015, the surrounding Blue and John Crow Mountains themselves were inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Even Maroon descendants scattered abroad now serve as Diaspora Ambassadors, carrying Moore Town’s legacy to the wider world.

For elders who remember, for young Jamaicans discovering their roots, and for the diaspora scattered across the world, Moore Town stands as living proof that heritage, once protected, can outlast every attempt to erase it.

Celebration of culture is the highest form of human expression, a reflection of heart, mind, and creativity all at once. Never lose your cultural expression.

Contributed by Dr Lorenzo Gordon, diabetologist, internal medicine consultant, biochemist, and history and heritage enthusiast. Send feedback to inspiring876@gmail.com.