10 Facts About Code Noir

Code Noir prohibited slaves from publicly practicing any religion other than the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Catholic religion, including the practice of the Protestant faith .

Code Noir prohibited masters to have or to allow adulterous relations with their slaves and decreed the substantial fines of two thousand pounds of sugar in addition to the confiscation of the children and of the mother.

Code Noir was not intended for northern New France where the general principle of French law that Indigenous peoples of lands conquered or surrendered to the Crown be considered free royal subjects upon their baptism.

Code Noir coexisted for forty-three years with the Napoleonic code despite the contradictory nature of the two texts, but this arrangement became increasingly difficult due to the French Court of Cassation rulings on local jurisdictions' decisions following the 1827 and 1828 ordinances on civil procedures.

Code Noir was a multifaceted legal document designed to govern every aspect of the lives of enslaved and free African people under French colonial rule.

Related searches

Code Noir was conceived to “maintain the discipline of the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman church” in the French colonies.

Code Noir thus gave a guarantee of morality to the Catholic nobility that arrived in Martinique between 1673 and 1685.

In 1661, the Barbados Slave Code Noir reiterated this 1636 decree and the 1662 Virginia slave law passed by governor William Berkeley under the reign of Charles II used similar jurisprudence.

Code Noir has been roundly supported by the historical community which has denounced the verbal and physical intimidation of specialists in the colonial history of the region.

Code Noir is mentioned in Assassin's Creed IV: Freedom Cry, as it is mainly set in Port-au-Prince.