Les pirogues du Maroni

On the Maroni river, natural border between French Guyana and the Surinam, canoes tied to the river banks can be counted by the hundreds. They are the only mean of transportation for thousands of people living along the Maroni river. The various shapes of the canoes caracterize the geographical and the cultural diversity of the populations of the Maroni. Costal Amerindians sail only on rivers estuaries. They build wide and high canoes ending on the stern with a high prow that penetrates the waves. Those canoes are constructed with a single hull and raised with one or two side boards. When heated, emptied wooden trunk, acquired a certain amount of elasticity, this enables the trunk to have its sides spread, in order to end up with a wide hull from a small diameter tree. The Maroons, originated in Africa and run away from the colonial plantations of Dutch Guyana as early as the XVII century, settled on both bank of the Maroni and developed the canoe’s shape that allows them to pass the rapids. There canoes are built using the widening technique of the hull with fire, they are narrow and long and equipped with curved ending that raise high above the side. The long motor canoes such as the “paddle canoes”, are decorated with interwoven design called “tembé” as well as decoration from contemporary inspiration. The inventory of the Maroni river canoes showed a rich and vibrant nautical patrimony at the beginning of the XXI century, in terms of shapes decorations and usages