What does "The Free Woman" mean under a mother's name in a baptism record

Devon Joseph

Hi all,

Recently when I was indexing Dutch burgher baptism records from Sri Lanka/Ceylon I came across this interesting entry from 1770. For the parents of the child in question, the father's name is written as usual. But under the mother's name, "De vrije vrouw Belliade" is written which using google translate gives "The free woman Belliade". I'm wondering if this is related to the slave trade that was going on at the time. Any clue?

The link to the record is https://www.familysearch.org/indexing/batch/f2879d46-b28b-4a21-994f-e06af4c07aa4

I've included a picture of the entry below

Thanks

Screenshot 2022-03-05 192937.jpg

MaureenE123

I am not connected with Family Search.

I would think it very likely that your interpretation is correct.

It would appear that slavery continued in Ceylon until the 1830s or 1840s.

In 1770 the Dutch controlled Ceylon.

There are some Ceylon histories, which perhaps may provide some details, linked from the FIBIS Fibiwiki page Ceylon, although there isn't much specifically about slavery.

https://wiki.fibis.org/w/Ceylon

Áine Ní Donnghaile

You may find this description useful -

https://www.jstor.org/stable/41056427