Sacatra

{{short description|Person who was the descendant of one black and one griffe parent}} '''Sacatra''' was a term used in the French Colony of Saint-Domingue to describe the descendant of one black and one griffe parent,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.wordnik.com/words/sacatra|title=Sacatra|website=Wordnik}}</ref> a person whose ancestry is {{Fraction|7|8}} black and {{Fraction|1|8}} white. It was one of the many terms used in the colony's racial caste system to measure one's black blood.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://msu.edu/~williss2/carpentier/part2/quadroons.html|title=The Kingdom of This World|website=msu.edu|access-date=2017-03-28}}</ref>

The etymology of ''sacatra'' is uncertain; Félix Rodríguez González linked it to Spanish ''sacar'' {{gloss|take out}} and ''atrás'' {{gloss|behind}};<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5XtdDwAAQBAJ&q=%22sacatra%22+word+origin&pg=PA151|title=Spanish Loanwords in the English Language: A Tendency towards Hegemony Reversal|first=Félix Rodríguez|last=Gonzáles|date=26 June 2017|publisher=Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG|isbn=9783110890617|via=Google Books}}</ref> thus, a ''sacatra'' is a slave who is not kept in the house or at the front as a lighter-skinned servant might be.

== In fiction == * In the 1989 novel ''The Dancing Other'', French author Suzanne Dracius mentions her main character finding "true friendship with a cheery sacatra girl with soft, caramel skin."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://d7.drunkenboat.com/db24/translation/nancy-naomi-carlson-and-catherine-maigret-kellogg-translating-suzanne-dracius|title=Nancy Naomi Carlson and Catherine Maigret Kellogg translating Suzanne Dracius|website=Drunken Boat|language=en|access-date=2017-04-08}}</ref> *Nalo Hopkinson's 2004 speculative fiction novel ''The Salt Roads'' begins with Georgine, an enslaved girl who gets pregnant by a white man, denying that her child is going to be "just mulatto. I’m griffonne, my mother was sacatra. The baby will be marabou."<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Salt Roads|last=Hopkinson|first=Nalo|publisher=Warner US|year=2004|isbn=978-0446677134|location=New York|pages=2}}</ref>

==See also== * Mulatto Haitians * Quadroon * Octoroon * Affranchi * Gens de couleur * Afro-Haitians * Marabou

== References== {{Reflist}} {{Haitian people}}

Category:Multiracial affairs in the Caribbean Category:Saint-Domingue Category:Mulatto Category:Ethnic groups in Haiti Category:Person of color