Mariana Franko (d. after 1777), was a free colored in

Curaçao Curaçao ( ; ; pap, Kòrsou, ), officially the Country of Curaçao ( nl, Land Curaçao; pap, Pais Kòrsou), is a Lesser Antilles island country in the southern Caribbean Sea and the Dutch Caribbean region, about north of the Venezuela coast ...

in the Dutch West Indies. She is known as the central figure in a famous court case. She was born a free black in

Sint Eustatius Sint Eustatius (, ), also known locally as Statia (), is an island in the Caribbean. It is a special municipality (officially " public body") of the Netherlands. The island lies in the northern Leeward Islands portion of the West Indies, so ...

, owned a couple of slaves herself, and worked at the plantation Zorgvliet as an employed secretary. In 1758, her lover, the slave Pedro Anthonij, was sentenced for theft and sold, while she was exiled in 1760, left for the Netherlands and had her property confiscated. In 1764, she sued and questioned the verdict to clear her name and prove that all free citizens regardless of color were equal to the law. In 1772, the Dutch state finally brought the colonial authorities on Curaçao to court, and in 1777, she won the case and her property was restored (however, the costs of the trial consumed it).

References

* Han Jordaan, Franko, Mariana, in: Digitaal Vrouwenlexicon van Nederland. URL: http://resources.huygens.knaw.nl/vrouwenlexicon/lemmata/data/Franko 3/01/2014 {{DEFAULTSORT:Franko, Mariana 18th-century people from the Dutch Empire 18th century in Curaçao 18th-century Dutch businesspeople Dutch slave owners Sint Eustatius people Women slave owners Free people of color