Editing Nevis (section)

== Culture ==
{{See also|Music of Saint Kitts and Nevis|Saint Kitts Creole}}
''Culturama'', the annual cultural festival of Nevis, is celebrated during the Emancipation Day weekend, the first week of August. The festivities include many traditional folk dances, such as the [[Masquerade ceremony|masquerade]], the [[Moko jumbie]]s on stilts, Cowboys and Indians, and Plait the Ribbon, a [[May pole]] dance. The celebration was given a more organised form in 1974, including a Miss Culture Show and a [[Calypso music|Calypso]] Competition, as well as drama performances, old fashion Troupes (including Johnny Walkers, Giant and Spear, Bulls, Red Cross and Blue Ribbon), arts and crafts exhibitions and recipe competitions. According to the Nevis Department of Culture, the aim is to protect and encourage indigenous folklore, in order to make sure that the uniquely Caribbean culture can "reassert itself and flourish".<ref>Nevis Department of Culture (2006). [http://www.nevisculturama.net/about_culturama.htm Nevis Culturama] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060713104618/http://www.nevisculturama.net/about_culturama.htm |date=13 July 2006 }}. 8 May 2006. Retrieved 8 August 2006.</ref>

===Language===
The official language is [[English (language)|English]]. [[Saint Kitts Creole]] is also spoken on Nevis and less so on the neighbouring island.{{Citation needed|date=October 2023}}

===Music, theatre and dance===
Nevisian culture has since the 17th century incorporated [[Africa]]n, [[Europe]]an, and [[East India]]n cultural elements, creating a distinct [[Afro-Caribbean people|Afro-Caribbean]] culture. Several historical anthropologists have done field research Nevis and in Nevisian [[Immigration|migrant]] communities in order to trace the creation and constitution of a Nevisian cultural community. Karen Fog Olwig published her research about Nevis in 1993, writing that the areas where the Afro-Caribbean traditions were especially strong and flourishing relate to [[kinship]] and [[subsistence farming]]. However, she adds, Afro-Caribbean cultural impulses were not recognised or valued in the colonial society and were therefore often expressed through Euro-Caribbean cultural forms.<ref>Olwig, Karen Fog (1993). ''Global Culture, Island Identity: continuity and change in the Afro-Caribbean community of Nevis''. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1993.</ref>

Examples of European forms appropriated to express Afro-Caribbean culture are the Nevisian and Kittitian ''Tea Meetings'' and ''Christmas Sports''. According to anthropologist [[Roger D. Abrahams]], these traditional performance art forms are "Nevisian approximation of British performance codes, techniques, and patterns". He writes that the Tea Meetings were staged as theatrical "battles between decorum and chaos", [[decorum]] represented by the ceremony chairmen and chaos the hecklers in the audience, with a diplomatic King or a Queen presiding over the battle to ensure fairness.<ref>Abrahams, Roger D. (1983). ''Man of Words in the West Indies: Performance and the Emergence of Creole Culture''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins U P, 1983.</ref>

The Christmas Sports included a form of comedy and satire based on local events and gossip.<ref name="Abrahams1" /> They were historically an important part of the Christmas celebrations in Nevis, performed on Christmas Eve by small troupes consisting of five or six men accompanied by string bands from different parts of the island. One of the men in the troupe was dressed as a woman, playing all the female parts in the dramatisations. The troupes moved from yard to yard to perform their skits, using props, face paint and costumes to play the roles of well-known personalities in the community.<ref name="Abrahams1"/>

Examples of gossip about undesired behaviour that could surface in the skits for comic effect were querulous neighbours, adulterous affairs, planters mistreating workers, domestic disputes or abuse, crooked politicians and any form of stealing or cheating experienced in the society. Even though no names were mentioned in these skits, the audience would usually be able to guess who the heckling message in the troupe's dramatised portrayals was aimed at, as it was played out right on the person's own front yard. The acts thus functioned as social and moral commentaries on current events and behaviours in Nevisian society. This particular form is called "Bazzarding" by many locals. Abrahams theorises that Christmas Sports are rooted in the pre-emancipation Christmas and New Year holiday celebrations, when the enslaved population had several days off.<ref name="Abrahams1">Abrahams, Roger D. (1973). "Christmas Mummings on Nevis." North Carolina Folklore Journal (1973): pp. 120–31.</ref>

American folklorist and musicologist [[Alan Lomax]] visited Nevis in 1962 in order to conduct long-term research into the black folk culture of the island. His field trip to Nevis and surrounding islands resulted in the anthology ''Lomax Caribbean Voyage'' series.<ref>Cowley, John. [http://www.mustrad.org.uk/reviews/nevis.htm "Caribbean Voyage: Nevis & St Kitts Tea Meetings, Christmas Sports, & the Moonlight Night"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070506220528/http://www.mustrad.org.uk/reviews/nevis.htm |date=6 May 2007 }}. ''Musical Traditions'', 1 November 2002. Retrieved 8 May 2007.</ref> 
Among the Nevisians recorded were [[chantey]]-singing fishermen in a session organised in a rum shop in Newcastle; Santoy, the Calypsonian, performing [[Calypso music|calypsos]] by Nevisian ballader and local legend Charles Walters<ref>Abrahams, Roger D. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1498145 "Charles Walters – West Indian Autolycus'"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170227062618/http://www.jstor.org/stable/1498145 |date=27 February 2017 }}. Western Folklore, Vol. 27, No. 2 (Apr. 1968), pp. 77–95.</ref> to guitar and [[Cuatro (instrument)|cuatro]]; and [[string band]]s, [[fife (instrument)|fife]] players and drummers from Gingerland, performing [[quadrilles]].{{Citation needed|date=October 2023}}

The island is also known for "Jamband music", which is the kind of music performed by local bands during the "[[Culturama]] Festival" and is key to "Jouvert" dancing. The sounds of the so-called "Iron Band" are also popular within the culture; many locals come together using any old pans, sinks, or other kits of any sort; which they use to create sounds and music. This form of music is played throughout the villages during the Christmas and carnival seasons.{{Citation needed|date=October 2023}}

===Architecture===
[[File:The Museum of Nevis History - Alexander Hamilton birthplace.jpg|thumb|upright=1|The [[Museum of Nevis History]] in Charlestown is housed in the restored [[Georgian architecture|Georgian]] stone building which is near the mostly wooden building where [[Alexander Hamilton]] was born.]]
A series of earthquakes during the 18th century severely damaged most of the colonial-era stone buildings of Charlestown. The [[Georgian architecture|Georgian]] stone buildings in Charlestown that are visible today had to be partially rebuilt after the earthquakes, and this led to the development of a new architectural style, consisting of a wooden upper floor over a stone ground floor; the new style resisted earthquake damage much more effectively.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Beat |first=Caribbean |date=2018-07-01 |title=Charlestown, Nevis {{!}} Neighbourhood |url=https://www.caribbean-beat.com/issue-152/charlestown-nevis-neighbourhood |access-date=2024-07-08 |website=Caribbean Beat Magazine |language=en-GB}}</ref>

Two important Nevisian buildings from the 18th century are Hermitage Plantation, built of [[lignum vitae]] wood in 1740, the oldest surviving wooden house still in use in the Caribbean today, and the Bath Hotel, the first hotel in the Caribbean, a luxury hotel and spa built by John Huggins in 1778. The soothing waters of the hotel's [[hot spring]] and the lively social life on Nevis attracted Europeans including Antigua-based [[Admiral Nelson]], and Prince William Henry, [[Duke of Clarence]], (future [[William IV of the United Kingdom]]), who attended balls and private parties at the Bath Hotel. Today, the building serves as government offices, and there are two outdoor hot-spring bathing spots which were specially constructed in recent years{{When|date=November 2018}} for public use.{{Citation needed|date=October 2023}}

According to local [[folklore]], a destructive 1680 or 1690 earthquake and [[tsunami]] destroyed the buildings of the original capital Jamestown on the west coast. Folk tales say that the town sank beneath the ocean, and the tsunami is blamed for the escape of (possibly fictional) pirate [[Red Legs Greaves]].<ref name="Gosse - Who's Who">{{cite book|last1=Gosse|first1=Philip|title=The Pirates' Who's Who by Philip Gosse|date=1924|publisher=Burt Franklin|location=New York|url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19564/19564-h/19564-h.htm|access-date=23 June 2017|archive-date=16 February 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210216221651/http://www.gutenberg.org/files/19564/19564-h/19564-h.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> However, archaeologists from the [[University of Southampton]] who have done excavations in the area have found no evidence for such a tsunami. They state that this story may originate with an over-excited Victorian letter writer sharing somewhat exaggerated accounts of his exotic life in the tropical colony with a British audience back home.<ref>Machling, Tessa (2002). "Jamestown, Morton's Bay and James Fort: Myth, Port and Fort". ''Interim Report for the 2002 Season, Theme Two.'' University of Southampton.</ref>

One such letter recounts that so much damage was done to the town that it was completely evacuated, and was engulfed by the sea. Early maps do not, however, actually show a settlement called "Jamestown", only "Morton's Bay", and later maps show that all that was left of Jamestown/Morton's Bay in 1818 was a building labelled "Pleasure House". Very old bricks that wash up on Pinney's Beach after storms may have contributed to this legend of a sunken town; however, these bricks are thought to be dumped ballast from 17th and 18th century sailing ships.{{Citation needed|date=October 2023}}