Antebellum carnival in Wilmington! See images from Bellamy Mansion's 2007 Jonkonnu celebration.

Jonkonnu retook Wilmington this December, in a celebration sponsored by the Bellamy Mansion Museum of Design Arts. More than 200 people watched as reenactors brought this fascinating piece of the past back to life.

This festival - a unique blend of West African traditions -- used to take place between Christmas and New Year's from antebellum times through the late 19th century. Originating in enslaved communities, t included masked dancers, vibrant costumes and original songs and chants performed to the sound of bones, cows' horns, drums and triangles. The musicians' songs were in the African tradition of call and response and included sometimes irreverant songs about their masters.

The group paraded from house to house, stopping to perform and collect coins and candies from the people inside, usually their white masters. The procession concluded at their quarters where festvities continued including the serving of foods, among them sweet cakes like gingerbread.

The first recorded report of Jonkonnu was in 1774 from the Caribbean, where it still thrives. Jonkonnu appeared in North America, but it was not widespread. Antebellum accounts of the festivities all come from North Carolina. There are descriptions from Edenton, Hillsborough, and Creswell, but Jonkonnu thrived longest in the Wilmington area. In her 1861 book, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs, an escaped slave from Edenton, recounted the excitement that accompanied the festive holiday event and describes the colorful ragman costumes, dancing, music, and gumba box drums.

Read more about Bellamy Mansion's Jonkonnu reenactment.

(Photos courtesy Bellamy Mansion Museum of History and Design Arts.)