Exhibit Preserves Pursuit Of Liberty

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Museum Unveils Artifacts From African Americans

An exhibit of hundreds of rare artifacts unearthed in Annapolis over the past 27 years shows that the quest for freedom by African Americans is as much a part of the city's history as the fight for liberty by the wealthy property owners who rebelled against the British.

A central theme of the exhibit, which opens Tuesday, is "the quest of African Americans to create and preserve their integrity and to establish their freedom in a slave society," said Mark Leone, a University of Maryland anthropology professor who directs the Archaeology in Annapolis project, a partnership that, through the years, has involved the university, the city's Banneker-Douglass Museum, the City of Annapolis and the Historic Annapolis Foundation.

The items, which the project has discovered in about 40 digs since 1981 with more than 350 students, professors and others at the university, will be on public display together for the first time in "Seeking Liberty: Annapolis, an Imagined Community" at the museum. The exhibit will be the largest archaeological display ever at the museum, the state's official repository for African American material culture.

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"What I can tell from the artifacts is the coherence of African American culture, the survival of African practices, ways that African Americans defeated being marginalized," Leone said.

Washington Post