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African slave trade

 
African Slave Trade

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African slave trade



 
 
The slave trade in Africa existed for thousands of years. The first main route passed through the Sahara, tying in to the Arab slave trade
Arab slave trade

The Arab slave trade was the practice of slavery in Southwest Asia, North Africa, East Africa, and certain parts of Europe during their period of domination by Arab leaders....
. After the European Age of Exploration, African slaves became part of the Atlantic slave trade
Atlantic slave trade

The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the transatlantic slave trade, was the trade of primarily African people supplied to the colonies of the New World that occurred in and around the Atlantic Ocean....
, from which comes the modern, Western conception of slavery
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
 as an institution of African-descended slaves and non-African slave owners. Despite its illegality, slavery continues in some parts of the world
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
, including Africa.

Elikia M’bokolo, April 1998, Le Monde diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique

Le Monde diplomatique is a monthly publication offering analysis and opinion on politics, culture, and current affairs.Its articles are long, thoughtful, scholarly, and opinionated ....
.






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The slave trade in Africa existed for thousands of years. The first main route passed through the Sahara, tying in to the Arab slave trade
Arab slave trade

The Arab slave trade was the practice of slavery in Southwest Asia, North Africa, East Africa, and certain parts of Europe during their period of domination by Arab leaders....
. After the European Age of Exploration, African slaves became part of the Atlantic slave trade
Atlantic slave trade

The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the transatlantic slave trade, was the trade of primarily African people supplied to the colonies of the New World that occurred in and around the Atlantic Ocean....
, from which comes the modern, Western conception of slavery
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
 as an institution of African-descended slaves and non-African slave owners. Despite its illegality, slavery continues in some parts of the world
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
, including Africa.

Elikia M’bokolo, April 1998, Le Monde diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique

Le Monde diplomatique is a monthly publication offering analysis and opinion on politics, culture, and current affairs.Its articles are long, thoughtful, scholarly, and opinionated ....
. Quote:"The Africa
Africa

Africa is the world's second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km? including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area....
n continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara
Sahara

The Sahara is the world's largest hot desert. At over 9,000,000 square kilometers , it covers most of Northern Africa, making it almost as large as the United States or the continent of Europe....
, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries
Muslim world

.The term Muslim world has several meanings. In a Culture sense it refers to the worldwide community of Muslims, adherents of Islam. This community Islam by country, roughly one-fifth of the world population....
 (from the ninth to the nineteenth)." He continues: "Four million slaves exported via the Red Sea
Red Sea

The Red Sea is a salt water inlet of the Indian Ocean between Africa and Asia. The connection to the ocean is in the south through the Bab el Mandeb sound and the Gulf of Aden....
, another four million through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering about 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by Asia ; on the west by Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and Australia; and on the south by the Southern Ocean ....
, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan
Trans-Saharan trade

Trans-Saharan trade is trade across the Sahara between Mediterranean countries and sub-Saharan Africa. While existing from prehistoric times, the peak of such trade extended from the eighth century until the late sixteenth century....
 caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean
Atlantic Ocean

The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions; with a total area of about 106.4 million square kilometres . It covers approximately one-fifth of the Earth's surface....
"

Slavery within Africa

Africa En
In most African societies, there was very little difference between the free peasants and the feudal vassal peasants. Vassals of the Songhai Empire
Songhai Empire

The Songhai Empire, also known as the Songhay Empire, was a pre-colonial African state of west Africa. From the early 15th to the late 16th century, Songhai was one of the largest African empires in history....
 were used primarily in agriculture; they paid tribute to their masters in crop and service but they were slightly restricted in custom and convenience. These non-free people were more an occupational caste
Caste

Castes are hereditary systems of wikt:occupation, endogamy, culture, social class, and political power, the assignment of individuals to places in the social hierarchy is determined by social group and culture....
, as their bondage
Unfree labour

Unfree labour is a generic or collective term for those work relations, especially in modern history or Early Modern period history, in which people are employed against their will by the threat of destitution, detention, violence , or other extreme hardship to themselves, or to members of their families....
 was relative..

There is adequate evidence citing case after case of African control of segments of the trade. Several African nations such as the Ashanti
Ashanti

Ashanti, or Asante, are a major ethnic group of Ashanti Region in Ghana. The Ashanti speak Twi, an Akan languages similar to Fante language....
 of Ghana
Ghana

The Republic of Ghana is a country in West Africa. It borders C?te d'Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, Togo to the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the south....
 and the Yoruba
Yoruba

Yoruba may refer to:* Yoruba people, a West African ethnic group* Yoruba language, the language spoken by the Yoruba people* Yoruba religion, the traditional religion of the Yoruba people...
 of Nigeria
Nigeria

Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federation constitutional republic comprising States of Nigeria and one Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria....
 had economies largely depending on the trade. African peoples such as the Imbangala
Imbangala

The Imbangala or Mbangala were 17th century groups of Angolan warriors and marauders who founded the kingdom of Kasanje....
 of Angola
Angola

Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordering Namibia to the south, Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, and Zambia to the east, and with a west coast along the Atlantic Ocean....
 and the Nyamwezi
Nyamwezi

The Nyamwezi are the second-largest of over 120 ethnic groups in Tanzania. They live in the northwest central area of the country, between Lake Victoria and Lake Rukwa....
 of Tanzania
Tanzania

Tanzania , officially the United Republic of Tanzania , is a country in East Africa that is bordered by Kenya and Uganda on the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the west, and Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique on the south....
 would serve as intermediaries or roving bands warring with other African nations to capture Africans for Europeans. Extenuating circumstances demanding exploration are the tremendous efforts European officials in Africa used to install rulers agreeable to their interests. They would actively favor one African group against another to deliberately ignite chaos and continue their slaving activities..

"Slavery", as it is often referred to by people, in African cultures was generally more like indentured servitude: "slaves" were not made to be chattel of other men, nor enslaved for life. African "slaves" were paid wages and were able to accumulate property. They often bought their own freedom and could then achieve social promotion -just as freedman in ancient Rome
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
- some even rose to the status of kings (e.g. Jaja of Opobo
Jaja of Opobo

Jaja of Opobo was a Nigerian merchant prince and the founder of Opobo city-state. Born in Amaigbo in Igboland and sold at about age twelve as a slavery in Bonny....
 and Sunni Ali Ber). Similar arguments were used by Western slave owners during the time of abolition, for example by John Wedderburn in Wedderburn v. Knight
Slavery at common law

Slavery at common law refers to the legal status of slavery and the slave trade under the system of law used in England and adopted by its former colonies....
, the case that ended legal recognition of slavery in Scotland
Scotland

conventional_long_name = ScotlandAlba|common_name= Scotland|image_flag = Flag of Scotland.svg|flag_width = 130px...
 in 1776. Regardless of the legal options open to slave owners, rational cost-earning calculation and/or voluntary adoption of moral restraints often tended to mitigate (except with traders, who preferred to weed out the worthless weak individuals) the actual fate of slaves throughout history.

In Senegambia, between 1300 and 1900, close to one-third of the population was enslaved. In early Islamic states of the western Sudan, including Ghana
Ghana Empire

The Ghana Empire or Wagadou Empire was located in what is now southeastern Mauritania, and Western Mali.This is believed to be first of many empires that would rise in that part of Africa....
 (750-1076), Mali
Mali Empire

The Mali Empire or Manding Empire or Manden Kurufa was a West African civilization of the Mandinka people from c. 1230 to c. 1600. The empire was founded by Sundiata Keita and became renowned for the wealth of its rulers, especially Mansa Mansa Musa....
 (1235–1645), Segou (1712–1861), and Songhai
Songhai Empire

The Songhai Empire, also known as the Songhay Empire, was a pre-colonial African state of west Africa. From the early 15th to the late 16th century, Songhai was one of the largest African empires in history....
 (1275-1591), about a third of the population were slaves. In Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Guinea in the northeast, Liberia in the southeast, and the Atlantic Ocean in the southwest....
 in the 19th century about half of the population consisted of slaves. In the 19th century at least half the population was enslaved among the Duala
Duala people

The Duala are an ethnic group of Cameroon. They primarily inhabit the littoral region to the coast and form a portion of the Sawa, or Cameroonian coastal peoples....
 of the Cameroon
Cameroon

The Republic of Cameroon is a unitary state of central and western Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west; Chad to the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of the Congo to the south....
, the Igbo
Igbo people

Igbo people are an ethnic group living chiefly in southeastern Nigeria. They speak Igbo language, which includes various Igboid languages and dialects; today, a majority of them speak English language alongside Igbo as a result of British Empire....
 and other peoples of the lower Niger
Niger River

The Niger River is the principal river of western Africa, extending about 4180 km . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in southeastern Guinea....
, the Kongo
Kingdom of Kongo

The Kingdom of Kongo was an African kingdom located in west central Africa in what are now northern Angola, Cabinda , the Republic of the Congo, and the western portion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo....
, and the Kasanje kingdom and Chokwe
Chokwe

The Chokwe are an ethnic group of Central Africa whose ancestry can perhaps be traced to Mbundu and Mbuti Pygmies. Large groups of Chokwe currently reside in Angola, Zambia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo....
 of Angola
Angola

Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordering Namibia to the south, Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, and Zambia to the east, and with a west coast along the Atlantic Ocean....
. Among the Ashanti
Ashanti

Ashanti, or Asante, are a major ethnic group of Ashanti Region in Ghana. The Ashanti speak Twi, an Akan languages similar to Fante language....
 and Yoruba
Yoruba people

Yoruba people are one of the largest ethno-linguistic group or ethnic groups in west Africa. The majority of the Yoruba speak the Yoruba language ....
 a third of the population consisted of slaves. The population of the Kanem
Kanem Empire

The Kanem Empire was located in the present countries of Chad and Libya. At its height it encompassed an area covering not only much of Chad, but also parts of southern Libya and eastern Niger....
 (1600–1800) was about a third-slave. It was perhaps 40% in Bornu
Bornu Empire

The Bornu Empire was a medieval African state of Nigeria from 1389 to 1893. It was a continuation of the great Kanem Empire founded centuries earlier by the Sayfawa Dynasty....
 (1580–1890). Between 1750 and 1900 from one- to two-thirds of the entire population of the Fulani jihad states consisted of slaves. The population of the Sokoto
Sokoto

Sokoto is a city located in the extreme northwest of Nigeria, near to where the Sokoto River and Rima River meet. As of 2006 it has a population of 583,039 ....
 caliphate formed by Hausas
Hausa people

The Hausa are a Sahelian people chiefly located in the West Africa regions of northern Nigeria and southeastern Niger. There are also significant numbers found in regions of Sudan, Cameroon, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, and Chad and smaller communities scattered throughout West Africa and on the traditional Hajj route across the Sahara Desert and Sa...
 in the northern Nigeria
Nigeria

Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federation constitutional republic comprising States of Nigeria and one Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria....
 and Cameroon was half-slave in the 19th century. Between 65% to 90%population of Arab
Arab

An Arab is a person who Identity as such on linguistic or cultural grounds. The plural form, Arabs , refers to the Ethnocultural group at large....
-Swahili
Swahili people

The Swahili are a people and culture found on the coast of East Africa, mainly the coastal regions and the islands of Kenya and Tanzania, and north Mozambique....
 Zanzibar
Zanzibar

Zanzibar is part of the East African republic of Tanzania. It consists of the Zanzibar Archipelago in the Indian Ocean, 25?50 km off the coast of the mainland....
 was enslaved. Roughly half the population of Madagascar
Madagascar

Madagascar, or Republic of Madagascar , is an island nation in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa. The main island, also called Madagascar, is the List of islands by area, and is home to 5% of the world's plant and animal species, of which more than 80% are Endemism to Madagascar....
 was enslaved.

When British rule was first imposed on the Sokoto Caliphate and the surrounding areas in northern Nigeria
Northern Nigeria

Northern Nigeria is a geographical region of Nigeria. It is more arid and has less population density than the south. The people are largely Islam, and many are Hausa people....
 at the turn of the 20th century, approximately 2 million to 2.5 million people there were slaves. Slavery in northern Nigeria was finally outlawed in 1936.

Slavery in Ethiopia

Ethiopian
Ethiopian

Ethiopian may refer to:* Something of, from, or related to the country of Ethiopia* A person from Ethiopia, or of Ethiopian descent. For information about the Ethiopian people, see Demographics of Ethiopia and Culture of Ethiopia....
 slavery was essentially domestic. Slaves thus served in the houses of their masters or mistresses, and were not employed to any significant extent for productive purpose. Slaves were thus regarded as second-class members of their owners' family, and were fed, clothed and protected. Women were taken as sex slaves. They generally roamed around freely and conducted business as free people. They had complete freedom of religion and culture. The first attempt to abolish in Ethiopia slavery was made by Emperor Tewodros II
Tewodros II of Ethiopia

Tewodros II was the Emperor of Ethiopia from 1855 until his death.He was born Kassa Haile Giorgis, but was more regularly referred to as Kassa Hailu ....
 (r. 1855-1868), although the slave trade was not abolished completely until 1923 with Ethiopia's ascension to the League of Nations
League of Nations

The League of Nations was an inter-governmental organization founded as a result of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919?1920. At its greatest extent from 28 September 1934 to 23 February 1935, it had 58 members....
. Anti-Slavery Society estimated there were 2,000,000 slaves in the early 1930s out of an estimated population of between 8 and 16 million. Slavery continued in Ethiopia until the Italian invasion in October 1935, when the institution was abolished by order of the Italian occupying forces. In response to pressure by Western Allies of World War II
Allies of World War II

The Allies of World War II were the countries officially opposed to the Axis powers of World War II during the World War II. Within the ranks of the Allies powers, the British Empire, the Soviet Union, and the United States of America were known as "The Big Three"....
, Ethiopia officially abolished slavery and involuntary servitude after having regained its independence in 1942. On August 26, 1942 Haile Selassie issued a proclamation outlawing slavery.

Slavery in Somalia

The Bantus
Somali Bantu

The Somali Bantu are a minority ethnic group in Somalia, a country largely inhabited by Somali people. Bantus primarily reside in southern Somalia, near the Jubba and Shebelle rivers....
 are the descendants of people from various ethnic groups in what is modern-day Tanzania
Tanzania

Tanzania , officially the United Republic of Tanzania , is a country in East Africa that is bordered by Kenya and Uganda on the north, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the west, and Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique on the south....
, Malawi
Malawi

The Republic of Malawi is a landlocked country in southeast Africa that was formerly known as Nyasaland. It is bordered by Zambia to the northwest, Tanzania to the northeast and Mozambique, which surrounds it on the east, south and west....
 and Mozambique
Mozambique

Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique , is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest....
 who were brought to Somalia
Somalia

Somalia , officially the Republic of Somalia and formerly known as the Somali Democratic Republic, is a country located in the Horn of Africa....
 as slaves in the 19th century. It is estimated that the Bantu in Somalia number around 600,000 out of a total population of over 11 million. Contrary to the Somali
Somali people

Somalis are an ethnic group located in the Horn of Africa, also known as the Somali Peninsula. The overwhelming majority of Somalis speak the Somali language, which is part of the Cushitic languages subgroup of the Afro-Asiatic languages language family....
s, who are for the most part nomad
Nomad

Nomadic people, , also known as nomads, are communities of people who move from one place to another, rather than Settler in one location....
ic herders, the Bantu are mainly sedentary farmers. Bantus are also ethnically, physically, and culturally distinct from Somalis, and have remained marginalized ever since their arrival in Somalia. During the civil war
Somali Civil War

The Somali Civil War is an civil war in Somalia that started in 1991....
 in Somalia, many Bantu were evicted from their farms by various armed factions of Somali clans.

Slavery in North Africa

The medieval
Middle age

Middle age is the period of life beyond Young adult hood but before the onset of old age. Various attempts have been made to define this age, which is around the third quarter of the average life span of human beings....
 slave trade in Europe
Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
 was mainly to the East and South: Byzantine Empire
Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire and Eastern Roman Empire are conventional names used to describe the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered on its capital of Constantinople....
 and the Muslim World
Muslim world

.The term Muslim world has several meanings. In a Culture sense it refers to the worldwide community of Muslims, adherents of Islam. This community Islam by country, roughly one-fifth of the world population....
 were the destinations, Central
Central Europe

Central Europe is the region lying between the variously and vaguely defined areas of Eastern Europe and Western Europe Europe. In addition, Northern Europe, Southern Europe and Southeastern Europe may variously delimit or overlap into Central Europe....
 and Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe

Eastern Europe is a term that applies to the geopolitical region encompassing the easternmost part of the Europe. Throughout history and to a lesser extent today, parts of Eastern Europe has been distinguishable from Western Europe and other regions due to cultural, religious, economic, and historical reasons, even though there i...
 an important source. Slavery in medieval Europe
Slavery in medieval Europe

Slavery in early medieval Europe was relatively common. It was widespread at the end of Slavery in antiquity. The etymology of the word slave comes from this period, the word sklabos meaning Slavic people....
 was so common that the Roman Catholic Church repeatedly prohibited it—or at least the export of Christian slaves to non-Christian lands was prohibited at, for example, the Council of Koblenz in 922, the Council of London
Council of London (1102)

The Council of London in 1102 was a Roman Catholic church council of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales convened by Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury to debate and pass decrees to reform the clergy....
 in 1102, and the Council of Armagh in 1171. Because of religious constraints, the slave trade was monopolised by Iberian Jew
Jew

A Jew is a member of the Jewish people, an ethnoreligious group that traces its ancestry to the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East....
s (known as Radhanites) who were able to transfer the slaves from pagan Central Europe
Central Europe

Central Europe is the region lying between the variously and vaguely defined areas of Eastern Europe and Western Europe Europe. In addition, Northern Europe, Southern Europe and Southeastern Europe may variously delimit or overlap into Central Europe....
 through Christian Western Europe
Western Europe

Western Europe refers to the countries in the western most half of Europe. This concept has had different meanings, political and cultural as well as geographical issues have influenced the area....
 to Muslim countries in Al-Andalus
Al-Andalus

Al-Andalus was the Arabic name given to the parts of the Iberian Peninsula governed by Arab Muslims, at various times in the period between 711 and 1492....
 and Africa
Africa

Africa is the world's second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km? including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area....
. So many Slaves were enslaved for so many centuries that the very name 'slave' derived from their name; not only in English, but in other European languages and in Arabic.

Mamluks were slave soldiers who converted to Islam
Islam

Islam is a Monotheism, Abrahamic religion originating with the teachings of the Prophets of Islam Muhammad, a 7th century Arab religious and political figure....
 and served the Muslim
Muslim

:A Muslim , , is an adherent of the religion of Islam. The feminine form is Muslimah . Literally, the word means "one who submits "....
 caliph
Caliph

The Caliph is the head of state in a Caliphate, and the title for the leader of the Islamic Ummah, an Islamic community ruled by the Shari'ah....
s and the Ayyubid sultans during the Middle Ages
Middle Ages

File:Karl 1 mit papst gelasius gregor1 sacramentar v karl d kahlen.jpgThe Middle Ages of European history are a period in history which lasted for roughly a millennium, commonly dated from the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century to the beginning of the Early Modern Period in the 16th century, marked by the division of Western Christi...
. The first mamluks served the Abbasid
Abbasid

The Abbasid Caliphate was the third of the Islamic Caliphates of the Islamic Empire. The Caliphate is one of the high points of Islam, and at the time Muslim civilization, together with that of Byzantium, China and India, was the most developed part of the world....
 caliphs in 9th century Baghdad
Baghdad

Baghdad is the Capital of Iraq and of Baghdad Governorate, with which it is also coterminous. With a municipal population estimated at 6.5 million, it is the largest city in Iraq, and the second largest city in the Arab World....
. Over time they became a powerful military caste
Caste

Castes are hereditary systems of wikt:occupation, endogamy, culture, social class, and political power, the assignment of individuals to places in the social hierarchy is determined by social group and culture....
, and on more than one occasion they seized power for themselves, for example, ruling Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
 from 1250–1517. From 1250 Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
 had been ruled by the Bahri dynasty
Bahri dynasty

The Bahri dynasty or Bahriyya Mamluks was a Mamluk dynasty of mostly Kipchaks Turkic peoples origin that ruled Egypt from 1250 to 1382 when they were succeeded by the Burji dynasty, another group of Mamluks....
 of Kipchak Turk origin. White
White people

White people is a term which is usually used to refer to Human characterized, at least in part, by the light Human skin color. It often refers narrowly to people claiming ancestry exclusively from Europe....
 slaves from the Caucasus served in the army and formed an elite corp of troops eventually revolting in Egypt to form the Burgi dynasty.

According to Robert Davis between 1 million and 1.25 million Europeans were captured by Barbary pirates and sold as slaves
Arab slave trade

The Arab slave trade was the practice of slavery in Southwest Asia, North Africa, East Africa, and certain parts of Europe during their period of domination by Arab leaders....
 to North Africa
North Africa

North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, separated by the Sahara from Sub-Saharan Africa.Geopolitically, the United Nations subregion of Northern Africa includes the following seven countries or territories:...
 and the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire , also known by its contemporaries as the Turkish Empire or Turkey , was an empire that lasted from 1299?1923. It was Treaty of Lausanne by the Republic of Turkey, which was officially proclaimed on October 29, 1923....
 between the 16th and 19th centuries. The coastal villages and towns of Italy
Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia....
, Portugal
Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic , is a country on the Iberian Peninsula. Located in southwestern Europe, Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east....
, Spain
Spain

Spain or the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in Southern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though Espa?a , Estado espa?ol and Naci?n espa?ola are used interchangeably....
 and Mediterranean islands
List of islands in the Mediterranean

This is a list of islands in the Mediterranean Sea:...
 were frequently attacked by them and long stretches of the Italian and Spanish coasts were almost completely abandoned by its inhabitants; after 1600 Barbary pirates occasionally entered the Atlantic and struck as far north as Iceland
Iceland

Iceland, officially the Republic of Iceland , is an island country located in the North Atlantic Ocean between mainland Europe and Greenland....
. The most famous corsairs were the Ottoman Barbarossa ("Redbeard"), and his older brother Oruç
Aruj

Oru? Reis was a Turkish people privateer and Ottoman Empire Bey of Algiers and Beylerbey of the Mediterranean. He was born on the island of Midilli in today's Greece and was killed in a battle with the Spanish people in Algeria....
, Turgut Reis
Turgut Reis

Turgut Reis was an Ottoman Empire admiral as well as Bey of Algiers; Beylerbey of the Mediterranean Sea; and first Bey later Pasha of Tripoli....
 (known as Dragut in the West), Kurtoglu
Kurtoglu Muslihiddin Reis

Kurtoglu Muslihiddin Reis was a Turkish people privateer and Ottoman Empire admiral, as well as the Sanjak-bey of Rhodes. He played an important role in the Ottoman conquests of Egypt and Rhodes during which he commanded the Ottoman naval forces....
 (known as Curtogoli
Kurtoglu Muslihiddin Reis

Kurtoglu Muslihiddin Reis was a Turkish people privateer and Ottoman Empire admiral, as well as the Sanjak-bey of Rhodes. He played an important role in the Ottoman conquests of Egypt and Rhodes during which he commanded the Ottoman naval forces....
 in the West), Kemal Reis
Kemal Reis

Kemal Reis was a Turkey privateer and Ottoman Empire admiral. He was also the paternal uncle of the famous Ottoman admiral and cartographer Piri Reis who accompanied him in most of his important naval expeditions....
, Salih Reis
Salih Reis

Salih Reis was a Turkish people privateer and Ottoman Empire admiral.In 1529, together with Aydin Reis, he took part in the Turkish-Spanish War near the Isle of Formentera, during which the Ottoman forces destroyed the Spanish fleet, whose commander, Rodrigo Portundo, died in combat....
 and Koca Murat Reis.

In 1544, Khair ad Din captured the Ischia
Ischia

Ischia is a volcanic island in the Tyrrhenian Sea, at the northern end of the Gulf of Naples. The roughly trapezoidal island lies c. 30 km from Naples and measures around 10 km east to west and 7 km north to south with a 34 km coastline and a surface area of 46.3 km?....
, taking 4,000 prisoners in the process, and deported to slavery
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
 some 9,000 inhabitants of Lipari
Lipari

Lipari is the largest of the eight Aeolian Islands in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the north coast of Sicily, and the name of the island's main town....
, almost the entire population. In 1551, Dragut enslaved the entire population of the Maltese island Gozo
Gozo

Gozo is an island of the Malta#Islands in the Mediterranean Sea, the island is part of the Southern European country Malta and is the second largest after the Malta Island itself within the archipelago....
, between 5,000 and 6,000, sending them to Libya
Libya

Libya , officially the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya , is a country located in North Africa. Bordering the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Libya lies between Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
. When pirates sacked Vieste
Vieste

Vieste is a town and comune in the province of Foggia, in the Apulia region of southeast Italy.A renowned marine resort in Gargano, Vieste has often received Blue Flags for the purity of its waters from the FEE....
 in southern Italy in 1554 they took an 7,000 slaves. In 1555, Turgut Reis sailed to Corsica
Corsica

Corsica is the Mediterranean islands#By area in the Mediterranean Sea . It is located west of Italy, southeast of the France mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....
 and ransacked Bastia
Bastia

Bastia , is a commune in France in the Haute-Corse Departments of France of France on the island of Corsica. It is the capital of the department....
, taking 6000 prisoners. In 1558 Barbary corsairs captured the town of Ciutadella
Ciutadella

Ciutadella de Menorca or just Ciutadella is a town and a municipality on the western side of Minorca, one of the Balearic Islands ...
, destroyed it, slaughtered
Murder

Murder as defined in common law countries, is the unlawful killing of another human being with intent , and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide....
 the inhabitants and carried off 3,000 survivors to Istanbul
Istanbul

Istanbul is the largest city in Turkey, List of metropolitan areas in Europe by population, and List of cities proper by population in the world with a population of 12.6 million....
 as slaves. In 1563 Turgut Reis landed at the shores of the province of Granada
Granada

Granada is a city and the capital of the province of Granada , in the autonomous communities of Spain of Andalusia, Spain....
, Spain, and captured the coastal settlements in the area like Almuñécar
Almuñécar

Almu??car is a municipality in the Autonomous communities of Spain of Andalusia on the Costa del Sol between Nerja and Motril . It has a subtropical climate....
, along with 4,000 prisoners. Barbary pirates frequently attacked the Balearic islands
Balearic Islands

The Balearic Islands are an archipelago in the western Mediterranean Sea, near the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula.The four largest islands are Majorca, Minorca, Ibiza, and Formentera....
, resulting in many coastal watchtowers and fortified churches being erected. The threat was so severe that Formentera
Formentera

Formentera is the smallest and southernmost island of the Illes Piti?ses group and belongs to the Balearic Islands autonomous community . It is 19 kilometres long and is located approximately 3 nautical miles south of Ibiza in the Mediterranean Sea....
 became uninhabited.

Sahrawi-Moorish society in Northwest Africa
Northwest Africa

Northwest Africa or Northwestern Africa is a variably defined region of North Africa. The term incorporates cardinal directions, and is used in various disciplines: geopolitics, archaeology, anthropology, meteoritics and genetics....
 was traditionally (and still is, to some extent) stratified into several tribal castes, with the Hassane
Hassane

The Hassane is a name for the traditionally dominant warrior tribes of the Sahrawi-Moorish areas of present-day Mauritania and Western Sahara. Although lines were blurred by intermarriage and tribal re-affiliation, the Hassane were considered descendants of the Arab Maqil tribe Beni Hassan , and held power over Sanhadja Berber people-descende...
 warrior tribes ruling and extracting tribute - horma
Horma

The horma was a tribute paid by subservient tribes to their protectors in traditional Sahrawi-Moorish society in today's Mauritania and Western Sahara in North Africa....
 - from the subservient Berber
Berber people

Berbers are the indigenous ethnic groups of North Africa west of the Nile Valley. They are discontinuously distributed from the Atlantic to the Siwa oasis, in Egypt, and from the Mediterranean to the Niger River....
-descended znaga
Znaga

The Znaga or Zenaga tribes were at the bottom of Sahrawi-Moorish society in today's Mauritania and Western Sahara in North Africa. They performed demeaning duties for their Hassane and Zawiya overlords, and were additionally exploited through payment of the horma tax in exchange for protection, as they could not bear arms....
 tribes. The so-called Haratin
Haratin

Haratin is a name for Black people oasis-dwellers in north western Africa. It is an exonym with negative connotations. The word has an unknown origin and is applied mainly in Mauritania, southern Morocco, Western Sahara, Algeria, Senegal and Mali to largely sedentary oasis-dwelling Black African populations speaking either Tamazight or Ar...
 lower class, largely sedentary oasis
Oasis

In geography, an oasis or cienega is an isolated area of vegetation in a desert, typically surrounding a spring or similar water source. Oases also provide habitat for animals and even humans if the area is big enough....
-dwelling black people, have been considered natural slaves in Sahrawi-Moorish society.

Slaves taken from Africa


Trans Saharan trade

Main article Arab slave trade
Arab slave trade

The Arab slave trade was the practice of slavery in Southwest Asia, North Africa, East Africa, and certain parts of Europe during their period of domination by Arab leaders....
The very earliest external slave
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
 trade was the trans-Saharan slave trade. Although there had long been some trading up the Nile River and very limited trading across the western desert, the transportation of large numbers of slaves did not become viable until camel
Camel

Camels are even-toed ungulates within the genus Camelus. The dromedary, one-humped or Arabian camel has a single hump and is well known for its healthy low fat milk, and the Bactrian camel has two humps....
s were introduced from Arabia in the 10th century. By this point, a trans-Saharan trading
Trans-Saharan trade

Trans-Saharan trade is trade across the Sahara between Mediterranean countries and sub-Saharan Africa. While existing from prehistoric times, the peak of such trade extended from the eighth century until the late sixteenth century....
 network came into being to transport slaves north. It has been estimated that from the 10th to the 19th century some 6,000 to 7,000 slaves were transported north each year. Frequent intermarriages meant that the slaves were assimilated
Cultural assimilation

Cultural assimilation is when an individual or individuals adopts some or all aspects of a dominant culture . Cultural assimilation is a process of socialization....
 in North Africa. Unlike in the Americas
Americas

The Americas are the region of the Western hemisphere that consists of the continents of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions....
, slaves in North Africa were mainly servants and soldiers rather than labour
Manual labour

Manual labour is physical work done with the hands, especially in an unskilled employment such as fruit and vegetable picking, road building, or any other field where the work may be considered physically arduous, and which has as a profitable objective, usually the production of good s....
ers, and a greater number of females than males were taken, who were often employed as servants for the women of harem
Harem

Harem refers to the sphere of women in a usually polygyny household and their quarters which is enclosed and forbidden to men. It originated in the Near East and came to the Western world via the Ottoman Empire....
s. It was also not uncommon to turn male slaves, both African and European, into eunuch
Eunuch

A eunuch is a castrated man, in particular one castrated early enough to have major hormonal consequences; the term usually refers to those castrated in order to perform a specific social function, as was common in many societies of the past....
s to serve as guardians to the harems. The Moroccan Sultan Moulay Ismail "the Bloodthirsty" (1672-1727) raised a corps of 150,000 black slaves, called his Black Guard
Black Guard

The Black Guard were charged with fighting Ismail's campaigns against the European-controlled fortress enclaves dotting his empire's coast and with patrolling Morocco's unstable countryside: They crushed rebellions against Ismail's rule not only by Moroccan Berber clans but also by Ismail's seditious sons, who defected from service as his provinci...
, who coerced the country into submission. Slavery in Morocco
Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa with a population of nearly 34 million and an area just under 447,000 km2....
 was finally outlawed in the 1930s.

Indian Ocean trade

The trade of slaves across the Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering about 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by Asia ; on the west by Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and Australia; and on the south by the Southern Ocean ....
 also has a long history beginning with the control of sea routes by Afro-Arab
Afro-Arab

Afro-Arab refers to people who possess both black African and Arab ancestry.It may in addition refer to Arabs who are not descended from recent African ancestry but who live on the African continent....
 traders in the ninth century. It is estimated that only a few thousand slaves were taken each year from the Red Sea and Indian Ocean coast. They were sold throughout the Middle East
Middle East

File:GreaterMiddleEast1.pngThe Middle East is a region that spans southwestern Asia, western Asia, and northeastern Africa. It has no clear boundaries, often used as a synonym to Near East, in opposition to Far East....
. This trade accelerated as superior ships led to more trade and greater demand for labour on plantation
Plantation

A plantation is usually a large farm or Estate , especially in a tropical or semitropical country, like Brazil or Nicaragua on which cotton, tobacco, lice coffee, sugar cane and the like are cultivated, usually by resident laborers....
s in the region. Eventually, tens of thousands per year were being taken.. In east Africa the main slave trade involved arabized east Africans

David Livingstone
David Livingstone

Doctor David Livingstone was a Scotland Congregational church pioneer medical missionary with the London Missionary Society and List of explorers in Central Africa Africa....
 wrote of the slave trade: "To overdraw its evils is a simple impossibility.... We passed a slave woman shot or stabbed through the body and lying on the path. [Onlookers] said an Arab who passed early that morning had done it in anger at losing the price he had given for her, because she was unable to walk any longer. We passed a woman tied by the neck to a tree and dead.... We came upon a man dead from starvation.... The strangest disease I have seen in this country seems really to be broken heartedness, and it attacks free men who have been captured and made slaves." Livingstone estimated that 80,000 Africans died each year before ever reaching the slave markets of Zanzibar
Zanzibar

Zanzibar is part of the East African republic of Tanzania. It consists of the Zanzibar Archipelago in the Indian Ocean, 25?50 km off the coast of the mainland....
. Zanzibar was once East Africa's main slave-trading port, and under Omani Arabs in the 19th century as many as 50,000 slaves were passing through the city each year.

Some sources estimate that between 11 and 17 million slaves crossed the Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and Sahara Desert from 650 to 1900.

Atlantic Ocean trade

Main article Atlantic slave trade
Atlantic slave trade

The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the transatlantic slave trade, was the trade of primarily African people supplied to the colonies of the New World that occurred in and around the Atlantic Ocean....
The first Europeans to arrive on the coast of Guinea
Guinea (region)

Guinea is a traditional name for the region of Africa that lies along the Gulf of Guinea. It stretches north through the forested, tropical, regions and ends at the Sahel....
 were the Portuguese
Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic , is a country on the Iberian Peninsula. Located in southwestern Europe, Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east....
; the first European to actually buy African slaves in the region of Guinea was Antão Gonçalves
Antão Gonçalves

Ant?o Gon?alves was a 15th century Portugal List of explorers and slavery trader who was the first European ethnic groups to buy Africans as slaves from black slave traders....
, a Portuguese explorer. Originally interested in trading mainly for gold
Gold

Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and atomic number 79. It is a highly sought-after precious metal, having been used as money, as a store of value, in jewelry, in sculpture, and for ornamentation since the beginning of recorded history....
 and spice
Spice

A spice is a dried seed, fruit, root, bark, leaf, or vegetable used in nutritionally insignificant quantities as a food additive for the purpose of flavor, color, or as a preservative that kills harmful bacteria or prevents their growth....
s, they set up colonies on the uninhabited islands of São Tomé
São Tomé

S?o Tom? is the capital city of S?o Tom? and Pr?ncipe and is by far that nation's largest town. Its name is Portuguese language for "Thomas "....
. In the 16th century the Portuguese settlers found that these volcanic islands were ideal for growing sugar
Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline substances, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose. Human taste buds interpret its flavor as sweet. Sugar as a basic food carbohydrate primarily comes from sugar cane and from sugar beet, but also appears in fruit, honey, sorghum, sugar maple , and in many other sources....
. Sugar growing is a labour-intensive undertaking and Portuguese settlers were difficult to attract due to the heat, lack of infrastructure, and hard life. To cultivate the sugar the Portuguese turned to large numbers of African slaves. Elmina Castle
Elmina Castle

Elmina Castle was erected by the Portugal in 1482 as S?o Jorge da Mina Castle, also known simply as Mina or Feitoria da Mina) in present-day Elmina, Ghana ....
 on the Gold Coast
Gold Coast (British colony)

Gold Coast was a United Kingdom colony on the Gulf of Guinea in west Africa that became the independent nation of Ghana in 1957.The first European ethnic groupss to arrive at the coast were the Portugal, in 1471....
, originally built by African labor for the Portuguese in 1482 to control the gold trade, became an important depot for slaves that were to be transported to the New World
New World

The New World is one of the names used for the non-Eurasian/non-African parts of the Earth, specifically the Americas and Australasia. When the term originated in the late 15th century, the Americas were new to the Europeans, who previously thought of the world as consisting only of Europe, Asia, and Africa ....
.

The first Europeans to use African slaves in the New World were the Spaniards who sought auxiliaries for their conquest expeditions and laborers on islands such as Cuba and Hispaniola, where the alarming death rate in the native population had spurred the first royal laws protecting the native population (Laws of Burgos, 1512-1513). The first African slaves arrived in Hispaniola in 1501.

In 1452, Pope Nicholas V
Pope Nicholas V

Pope Nicholas V , born Tommaso Parentucelli, was Pope from March 6, 1447 to his death in 1455....
 issued the papal bull
Papal bull

A Papal bull is a particular type of letters patent or charter issued by a pope. It is named after the bulla that was appended to the end to authenticate it....
 Dum Diversas
Dum Diversas

Dum Diversas is a papal bull issued on June 18, 1452 by Pope Nicholas V, that is credited by some with "ushering in the African slave trade." It authorized Afonso V of Portugal of Portugal to conquer Saracens and paganisms and consign them to indefinite slavery....
, granting Afonso V of Portugal
Afonso V of Portugal

Afonso V , or Affonso , the African , was the 12th Algarve#History .He was born in Sintra, the eldest son of King Edward of Portugal by his wife, Infanta Leonor of Aragon ....
 the right to reduce any "Saracens, pagans and any other unbelievers" to hereditary slavery. This approval of slavery was reaffirmed and extended in his Romanus Pontifex
Romanus Pontifex

Romanus Pontifex is a Papal Bull written January 8 1455 by Pope Nicholas V to Afonso V of Portugal of Portugal. As a follow-up to the Dum Diversas, it confirmed to the Crown of Portugal dominion over all lands discovered or conquered during the Age of Discovery....
 bull of 1455. These papal bulls came to serve as a justification for the subsequent era of slave trade and European colonialism. However Pope Eugene IV
Pope Eugene IV

Pope Eugene IV , born Gabriele Condulmer, was Pope from March 3, 1431, to his death....
 in his bull, Sicut Dudum
Sicut Dudum

Sicut Dudum is a papal bull promulgated by Pope Eugene IV in Florence on January 13, 1435, about the enslaving of black natives in Canary Islands by Spanish slave traders....
 of 1435 had condemned the enslavement of the black inhabitants of the Canary Islands
Canary Islands

The Canary Islands are a Spain archipelago which, in turn, forms one of the Spanish Autonomous Communities and an Outermost Region of the European Union....
. Pope Paul III
Pope Paul III

Pope Paul III , born Alessandro Farnese, was Pope of the Roman Catholic Church from 1534 to his death in 1549. He also called the Council of Trent in 1545....
 in 1537 issued an additional Bull, Sublimis Deus, declaring that all peoples, even those outside the faith should not be deprived of their liberty. The followers of the church of England and Protestants did not use the papal bulls as a justification for their involvement in slavery.

Increasing penetration into the Americas by the Portuguese created more demand for labour in Brazil
Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is a country in South America. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, occupying nearly half of South America, the List of countries by population country, and the fourth most populous democracy in the world....
--primarily for farming and mining
Mining

Mining is the extraction of value minerals or other geology materials from the earth, usually from an ore body, vein or seam. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, Sodium chloride and potash....
. Slave-based economies quickly spread to the Caribbean and the southern portion of what is today the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
, where Dutch traders brought the first African slaves in 1620. These areas all developed an insatiable demand for slaves. As European nations grew more powerful, especially Portugal
Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic , is a country on the Iberian Peninsula. Located in southwestern Europe, Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east....
, Spain
Spain

Spain or the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in Southern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though Espa?a , Estado espa?ol and Naci?n espa?ola are used interchangeably....
, France
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
, England
England

native_name =|conventional_long_name = England|common_name = England|image_flag = Flag of England.svg|image_coat = England COA.svg|symbol_type = Royal Coat of Arms...
 and the Netherlands
Netherlands

The Netherlands is a country that is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a parliamentary democratic constitutional monarchy. The Netherlands is located in North-West Europe, and bordered by the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east....
, they began vying for control of the African slave trade, with little effect on the local African and Arab trading. Great Britain's existing colonies in the Lesser Antilles and their effective naval control of the Mid Atlantic forced other countries to abandon their enterprises due to inefficiency in cost. The English crown provided a charter giving the Royal African Company
Royal African Company

The Royal African Company was a slavery company set up by the House of Stuart family and City of London merchants once the former retook the England throne in the English Restoration of 1660....
 monopoly over the African slave routes until 1712.

The Atlantic slave trade
Atlantic slave trade

The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the transatlantic slave trade, was the trade of primarily African people supplied to the colonies of the New World that occurred in and around the Atlantic Ocean....
 peaked in the late 18th century, when the largest number of slaves were captured on raiding expeditions into the interior of West Africa. These expeditions were typically carried out by African kingdoms against weaker African tribes and peoples. These mass slavers included the Oyo empire
Oyo Empire

The Oyo Empire was a West African empire of what is today southwestern Nigeria. The empire was established by the Yoruba people in the 15th century and grew to become one of the largest West African states encountered by colonial explorers....
 (Yoruba
Yoruba people

Yoruba people are one of the largest ethno-linguistic group or ethnic groups in west Africa. The majority of the Yoruba speak the Yoruba language ....
), Kong Empire
Kong Empire

The Kong Empire , also known as the Wattara Empire or Ouattara Empire for its founder, was a pre-colonial African state centered in north eastern Cote d'Ivoire that also encompassed much of present-day Burkina Faso....
, Kingdom of Benin, Kingdom of Fouta Djallon
Kingdom of Fouta Djallon

The Kingdom of Fouta Djallon was a pre-colonial West African state based in the Fouta Djallon highlands of modern Guinea....
, Kingdom of Fouta Tooro
Kingdom of Fouta Tooro

The Kingdom of Fouta Tooro or the Kingdom of Fuua Tooro was a pre-colonial West African state of the Fula language people centered around the middle valley of the Senegal River....
, Kingdom of Koya
Kingdom of Koya

The Kingdom of Koya or Koya Temne or Temne Kingdom was a pre-colonial African state in the north of present-day Sierra Leone. Its capital was at Cape Mount in what is now modern Liberia....
, Kingdom of Khasso, Kingdom of Kaabu
Kaabu

The Kingdom of Kaabu was a Mandinka people Kingdom of Senegambia that rose to prominence in the region thanks to its origins as a former province of the Mali Empire....
, Fante Confederacy
Fante Confederacy

The Fante Confederacy can refer either to the loose alliance of the Fante states in existence at least since the eighteenth century, or it can refer to the briefly lived Confederation formed in 1868 and dissolved in 1874....
, Ashanti Confederacy
Ashanti

Ashanti, or Asante, are a major ethnic group of Ashanti Region in Ghana. The Ashanti speak Twi, an Akan languages similar to Fante language....
, and the kingdom of Dahomey
Dahomey

Dahomey was the name of a country in west Africa now called the Benin. The Kingdom of Dahomey was a powerful west African state founded in the seventeenth century which survived until 1894....
. Europeans rarely entered the interior of Africa, due to fear of disease and moreover fierce African resistance.

Before the arrival of the Portuguese
Portuguese people

The Portuguese people are the ethnic group or nation native to the country of Portugal, in the west of the Iberian peninsula of Southern Europe-Western Europe Europe....
, slavery had already existed in Kingdom of Kongo
Kingdom of Kongo

The Kingdom of Kongo was an African kingdom located in west central Africa in what are now northern Angola, Cabinda , the Republic of the Congo, and the western portion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo....
. Despite its establishment within his kingdom, Afonso I of Kongo
Afonso I of Kongo

Nzinga Mvemba , also known as King Afonso I was a ruler of the Kingdom of Kongo in the first half of the 16th century. He reigned over the Kongo Empire from 1509 to late 1542 or 1543....
 believed that the slave trade should be subject to Kongo law. When he suspected the Portuguese of receiving illegally enslaved persons to sell, he wrote letters to the King João III of Portugal in 1526 imploring him to put a stop to the practice.

The kings of Dahomey
Dahomey

Dahomey was the name of a country in west Africa now called the Benin. The Kingdom of Dahomey was a powerful west African state founded in the seventeenth century which survived until 1894....
 sold their war captives into transatlantic slavery, who otherwise would have been killed in a ceremony known as the Annual Customs
The annual customs of Dahomey

Every year in the Kingdom of Dahomey, a huge festival in honor of the ancestors was organized called the annual "customs".In the customs, the king would assemble the entire court, foreign dignitaries, and the populace....
. As one of West Africa's principal slave states, Dahomey became extremely unpopular with neighbouring peoples. Like the Bambara Empire
Bambara Empire

The Bamana Empire was a large pre-colonial West Africa state based at S?gou, now in Mali. It was ruled by the Kulubali or Coulibaly dynasty established circa 1640 by Fa Sine also known as Biton-si-u....
 to the east, the Khasso
Khasso

Khasso or Xaaso was a West African kingdom of the seventeenth century to nineteenth century centuries, occupying territory in what is today Senegal and the Kayes Region of Mali....
 kingdoms depended heavily on the slave trade for their economy. A family's status was indicated by the number of slaves it owned, leading to wars for the sole purpose of taking more captives. This trade led the Khasso into increasing contact with the Europe
Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
an settlements of Africa's west coast, particularly the French
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
. Benin
Benin Empire

The Benin Empire or Edo Empire was a large pre-colonial African state of modern Nigeria. It is not to be confused with the modern-day country called Benin ....
 grew increasingly rich during the 16th and 17th centuries on the slave trade with Europe; slaves from enemy states of the interior were sold, and carried to the Americas in Dutch and Portuguese ships. The Bight of Benin's shore soon came to be known as the "Slave Coast".

King Gezo of Dahomey
Dahomey

Dahomey was the name of a country in west Africa now called the Benin. The Kingdom of Dahomey was a powerful west African state founded in the seventeenth century which survived until 1894....
 said in 1840's:
The slave trade is the ruling principle of my people. It is the source and the glory of their wealth…the mother lulls the child to sleep with notes of triumph over an enemy reduced to slavery…


In 1807, the UK Parliament passed the Bill that abolished the trading of slaves. The King of Bonny (now in Nigeria
Nigeria

Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federation constitutional republic comprising States of Nigeria and one Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria....
) was horrified at the conclusion of the practice:
We think this trade must go on. That is the verdict of our oracle and the priests. They say that your country, however great, can never stop a trade ordained by God himself.


The slaves came from many different sources. About half came from the societies that sold them. These might be criminal
Crime

Societies define Crime as the breach of one or more rules or laws for which some Government or force may ultimately prescribe a punishment.The word crime originates from the Latin crimen , from the Latin root cerno and Greek ????? = "I judge"....
s, heretic
Heresy

Heresy is an introduced change to some system of belief, especially a religion, that conflicts with the previously established canon of that belief....
s, the mentally ill
Mental illness

A mental disorder or mental illness is a psychological or behavioral pattern that occurs in an individual and is thought to cause distress or disability that is not expected as part of normal development or culture....
, the indebted
Debt

Debt is that which is owed; usually referencing assets owed, but the term can cover other obligations. In the case of assets, debt is a means of using future purchasing power in the present before a summation has been earned....
 and any others that had fallen out of favour with the rulers. Little is known about the details of theses practices before the arrival of Europeans, and so it is difficult to tell if the number of people considered as undesirables was artificially increased to provide more slaves for export. It is believed that capital punishment
Capital punishment

Capital punishment, the death penalty or execution, is the killing of a person by procedural law for Punishment#Retribution and Punishment#Incapacitation....
 in the region nearly disappeared since prisoners became far too valuable to dispose of in such a way.

Another source of slaves, comprising about half the total, came from military
Military

A military is an organization authorized by its nation to use force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or Threat of force ....
 conquests of other state
State

A state is a political Social contract with effective sovereignty over a geographic area and representing a population. These may be nation states, State or multinational states....
s or tribe
Tribe

A tribe, viewed historically or developmentally, consists of a social group existing before the development of, or outside of, states.Many anthropologists use the term to refer to societies organized largely on the basis of kinship, especially corporate descent groups ....
s. It has long been contended that the slave trade greatly increased violence and warfare in the region due to the pursuit of slaves, endemic warfare
Endemic warfare

Endemic warfare is the state of continual, low-threshold warfare in a tribe warrior society. Endemic warfare is often highly ritualized and plays an important function in assisting the formation of a social structure among the tribes' men by proving themselves in battle....
 was certainly common even before slave hunting had added such an extra inducement.

For the Atlantic slave trade, captives purchased from slave dealers in West African regions known as the Slave Coast
Slave Coast

The Slave Coast is the name of the coastal areas of present Togo, Benin and western Nigeria, a fertile region of coastal Western Africa along the Bight of Benin....
, Gold Coast
Gold Coast (British colony)

Gold Coast was a United Kingdom colony on the Gulf of Guinea in west Africa that became the independent nation of Ghana in 1957.The first European ethnic groupss to arrive at the coast were the Portugal, in 1471....
, and Côte d'Ivoire
Côte d'Ivoire

, formerly Ivory Coast, officially the , is a country in West Africa. The government officially discourages the use of the name Ivory Coast in English, preferring the French name to be used in all languages ....
 were sold into slavery as a result of a defeat in warfare. In the Bight of Biafra near modern-day Senegal
Senegal

Senegal , officially the Republic of Senegal, is a country south of the S?n?gal River in West Africa. Senegal is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Mauritania to the north, Mali to the east, and Guinea and Guinea-Bissau to the south....
 and Benin
Benin

Benin , officially the Republic of Benin, is a country in West Africa. It borders Togo to the west, Nigeria to the east and Burkina Faso and Niger to the north; its short coastline to the south leads to the Bight of Benin....
, some African kings sold their captives locally and later to European slave traders for goods such as metal cookware, rum, livestock, and seed grain. Previous to the voyage, the victims were held in "slave castles" and deep pits where many died from multiple illnesses and malnutrition. Conditions were even worse in the Middle Passage
Middle Passage

The Middle Passage refers to the forcible passage of African people from Africa to the New World, as part of the Atlantic slave trade. Ships departed Europe for African markets with commercial goods, which were in turn traded for kidnapped Africans who were transported across the Atlantic as slaves; the enslaved Africans were then sold or t...
 across the Atlantic where up to a third of the slaves died en route.

Effects


Effect on the economy of Africa

Different Cowries
Most of this money was spent on British-made firearms (of very poor quality) and industrial-grade alcohol.

Today, however, some scholars assert that slavery did not have a wholly disastrous effect on those left behind in Africa. Slaves were an expensive commodity, and traders received a great deal in exchange for each slave. At the peak of the slave trade, it is said that hundreds of thousands of muskets, vast quantities of cloth, gunpowder and metals were being shipped to Guinea. Guinea's trade with Europe at the peak of the slave trade—which also included significant exports of gold and ivory—was some 3.5 million pounds Sterling per year. By contrast, the trade of the United Kingdom
United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom , the UK or Britain,is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe....
, the economic superpower of the time, was about 14 million pounds per year over this same period of the late 18th century. As Patrick Manning
Patrick Manning (Professor)

Patrick Manning is the Andrew W. Mellon Professor of World History at the University of Pittsburgh. He is also president of the World History Network, Inc., a nonprofit corporation fostering research in world history....
 has pointed out, the vast majority of items traded for slaves were common rather than luxury goods. Textiles, iron ore, currency, and salt were some of the most important commodities imported as a result of the slave trade, and these goods were spread within the entire society raising the general standard of living. In contrast, other scholars find that the trade in slave had a detrimental effect on long-term economic growth and development. Although the evidence suggests a causal effect, the channel through which slave trade affects subsequent economic growth and development is not clear. One likely explanation is that the slave trade impeded the formation of larger ethnic groups, causing ethnic fractionalisation and weakening the formation of stable political structures.

Effects on Europe’s economy

Eric Williams
Eric Williams

Eric Eustace Williams was the first Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago of Trinidad and Tobago. He served from 1956 until his death in 1981. He was also a noted Caribbean historian....
 had attempted to show the contribution of Africans on the basis of profits from the slave trade and slavery, and the employment of those profits to finance Britain’s industrialization process. He argues that the enslavement of Africans was an essential element to the Industrial Revolution, and that European wealth is a result of slavery. However, he argued that by the time of its abolition it had lost its profitability and it was in Britain's economic interest to ban it. Seymour Dreshcer and Robert Antsey have both presented evidence that the slave trade remained profitable until the end, and that reasons other than economics led to its cessation. Joseph InikoPornri have shown elsewhere that the British slave trade was more profitable than the critics of Williams would want us to believe. Nevertheless, the profits of the slave trade and of West Indian plantations amounted to less than 5% of the British economy at the time of the Industrial Revolution
Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution was a period in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, production, and transportation had a profound effect on the socioeconomics and cultural conditions in United Kingdom....
.

A similar debate has taken place about other European nations. French slave trade was more profitable than alternative domestic investments and probably encouraged capital accumulation before the Industrial Revolution and Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of conflicts involving Napoleon I of France First French Empire and changing sets of European allies and opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815....
.

Demographics

The demographic effects of the slave trade are some of the most controversial and debated issues. Tens of millions of people were removed from Africa via the slave trade, and what effect this had on Africa is an important question. Walter Rodney
Walter Rodney

Walter Rodney was a prominent Guyana historian and political figure.Born to a working class family, Rodney was a bright student, attending Queen's College, Guyana in Guyana and then attending university on a scholarship at the University of the West Indies in Jamaica, graduating in 1963....
 argued that the export of so many people had been a demographic disaster and had left Africa permanently disadvantaged when compared to other parts of the world, and largely explains that continent's continued poverty. He presents numbers that show that Africa's population stagnated during this period, while that of Europe and Asia grew dramatically. According to Rodney all other areas of the economy were disrupted by the slave trade as the top merchants abandoned traditional industries to pursue slaving and the lower levels of the population were disrupted by the slaving itself.

Others have challenged this view. J. D. Fage compared the number effect on the continent as a whole. David Eltis has compared the numbers to the rate of emigration
Emigration

Emigration is the act of leaving one's native country or region to Settler in another. It is the same as immigration but from the perspective of the country of origin....
 from Europe
Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
 during this period. In the nineteenth century alone over 50 million people left Europe for the Americas, a far higher rate than were ever taken from Africa.

Others have challenged this view. Joseph E. Inikori argues the history of the region shows that the effects were still quite deleterious. He argues that the African economic model of the period was very different from the European, and could not sustain such population losses. Population reductions in certain areas also led to widespread problems. Inikori also notes that after the suppression of the slave trade Africa's population almost immediately began to rapidly increase, even prior to the introduction of modern medicines. Shahadah also states that the trade was not only of demographic significance, in aggregate population losses but also in the profound changes to settlement patterns, epidemiological exposure and reproductive and social development potential.

In addition, the majority of the slaves being taken to the Americas were male. So while the slave trade created an immediate drop in the population, its long term effects were less drastic..

Elikia M’bokolo, April 1998, Le Monde diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique

Le Monde diplomatique is a monthly publication offering analysis and opinion on politics, culture, and current affairs.Its articles are long, thoughtful, scholarly, and opinionated ....
. Quote:"The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara
Sahara

The Sahara is the world's largest hot desert. At over 9,000,000 square kilometers , it covers most of Northern Africa, making it almost as large as the United States or the continent of Europe....
, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries
Muslim world

.The term Muslim world has several meanings. In a Culture sense it refers to the worldwide community of Muslims, adherents of Islam. This community Islam by country, roughly one-fifth of the world population....
 (from the ninth to the nineteenth)." He continues: "Four million slaves exported via the Red Sea, another four million through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean"

Legacy of racism

Maulana Karenga states that the effects of the African slave trade were "the morally monstrous destruction of human possibility involved redefining African humanity to the world, poisoning past, present and future relations with others who only know us through this stereotyping and thus damaging the truly human relations among people of today". He cites that it constituted the destruction of culture, language, religion and human possibility. It's worth noting though that slavery was and is a crime of opportunity, not just racism. Those who were enslaved were vulnerable to a more powerful people, and their vulnerability was their liability, not just their race.

Abolition

Beginning in the late 18th century, France was Europe's first country to abolish slavery, in 1794, but it was revived by Napoleon in 1802, and banned for good in 1848. In 1807 the British Parliament passed the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act, under which captains of slave ships could be stiffly fined for each slave transported. This was later superseded by the 1833 Slavery Abolition Act, which freed all slaves in the British Empire. Abolition was then extended to the rest of Europe. The 1820 U.S. Law on Slave Trade
1820 U.S. Law on Slave Trade

The 1820 U.S. Law on Slave Trade declared the trading of slaves by a U.S. citizen punishable by death. The statute was approved on May 15, 1820....
 made slave trading piracy
Piracy

Piracy is a warlike act committed by a foreign nonstate actor, especially robbery or crime committed at sea, on a river, or sometimes on shore, either from a vessel flying no national flag, or one flying a national flag but without authorization from a nation....
, punishable by death
Capital punishment

Capital punishment, the death penalty or execution, is the killing of a person by procedural law for Punishment#Retribution and Punishment#Incapacitation....
. In 1827, Britain declares the slave trade piracy, punishable by death. The power of the Royal Navy
Royal Navy

The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the oldest of the British Armed Forces . From the mid-18th century until well into the 20th century, it was the most powerful navy in the world, playing a key part in establishing the British Empire as the dominant world power from 1815 until the early 1940s....
 was subsequently used to suppress the slave trade, and while some illegal trade, mostly with Brazil, continued, the Atlantic slave trade would be eradicated by the middle of the 19th century. The West Africa Squadron
West Africa Squadron

The West Africa Squadron, established in 1808 after the passing of the Slave Trade Act 1807 in 1807, was a unit of the Royal Navy that was involved in the suppression of the slavery in West Africa....
 was credited with capturing 1,600 slave ships between 1808 and 1860 and freeing 150,000 Africans who were aboard these ships. Action was also taken against African leaders who refused to agree to British treaties to outlaw the trade, for example against ‘the usurping King of Lagos’, deposed in 1851. Anti-slavery treaties were signed with over 50 African rulers.

The Islamic trans-Sahara
Sahara

The Sahara is the world's largest hot desert. At over 9,000,000 square kilometers , it covers most of Northern Africa, making it almost as large as the United States or the continent of Europe....
n and Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering about 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by Asia ; on the west by Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and Australia; and on the south by the Southern Ocean ....
 trades continued, however, and even increased as new sources of slaves became available. In Caucasus, slavery was abolished after Russian conquest. The slave trade within Africa also increased. The British Navy could suppress much of the trade in the Indian Ocean, but the European powers could do little to affect the intra-continental trade.

The continuing anti-slavery movement
Abolitionism

File:BLAKE10.JPGAbolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and emancipate slaves in western Europe and the Americas. The slave system aroused little protest until the 18th century, when rationalist thinkers of the Age of Enlightenment criticized it for violating the rights of man, and Quaker and other evangelical religious groups con...
 in Europe became an excuse and a casus belli
Casus belli

Casus belli is a Latin language expression meaning the justification for acts of war. Casus means "incident", "rupture" or indeed "case", while belli means "of war"....
 for the European conquest and colonisation of much of the African continent. In the late 19th century, the Scramble for Africa
Scramble for Africa

The Scramble for Africa, also known as the Race for Africa, was the proliferation of conflicting European claims to African territory during the New Imperialism period, between the 1880s and the World War I in 1914....
 saw the continent rapidly divided between Imperialistic Europeans, and an early but secondary focus of all colonial
Colony

In politics and in history, a colony is a Territory under the immediate political control of a state. For colonies in antiquity, city-states would often found their own colonies....
 regime
Regime

The word regime refers to a set of conditions, most often of a political nature. It may also be used synonymously with "wiktionary:regimen", for example in the phrases "exercise regime" or "medical regime"....
s was the suppression of slavery and the slave trade. In response to this public pressure, Ethiopia officially abolished slavery in 1932. By the end of the colonial period they were mostly successful in this aim, though slavery is still very active in Africa even though it has gradually moved to a wage
Wage

A wage is a compensation, usually financial, received by a worker Coincidence of wants for their Labor .Compensation in terms of wages is given to worker and compensation in terms of salary is given to employees....
 economy. Independent nations attempting to westernise or impress Europe sometimes cultivated an image of slavery suppression, even as they, in the case of Egypt, hired European soldiers like Samuel White Baker's expedition up the Nile. Slavery has never been eradicated in Africa, and it commonly appears in African states, such as Chad
Chad

Chad , officially known as the Republic of Chad, is a landlocked country in central Africa. It is bordered by Libya to the north, Sudan to the east, the Central African Republic to the south, Cameroon and Nigeria to the southwest, and Niger to the west....
, Ethiopia
Ethiopia

Ethiopia , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country situated in the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia is bordered by Eritrea to the north, Sudan to the west, Kenya to the south, Somalia to the east and Djibouti to the northeast....
, Mali
Mali

Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is a landlocked nation in West Africa. Mali is the seventh largest country in Africa, bordering Algeria on the north, Niger on the east, Burkina Faso and the C?te d'Ivoire on the south, Guinea on the south-west, and Senegal and Mauritania on the west....
, Niger
Niger

Niger , officially the Republic of Niger, is a landlocked country in Western Africa, named after the Niger River. It borders Nigeria and Benin to the south, Burkina Faso and Mali to the west, Algeria and Libya to the north and Chad to the east....
, and Sudan
Sudan

Sudan is a country in northeastern Africa. It is the largest in the African continent and the Arab World, and List of countries and outlying territories by total area by area....
, in places where law
LAW

LAW may refer to:* Anti-tank warfare, e.g. the US Army M72 LAW or the British Army LAW 80*Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights ...
 and order
Peace

Peace is a term that most commonly refers to an absence of aggression, violence or hostility, but which also represents a larger concept wherein there are healthy or newly-healed interpersonal relationship or international relations, safety in matters of social or economic welfare, the acknowledgment of equality and fairness in political re...
 have collapsed.. See also Slavery in modern Africa
Slavery in modern Africa

Slavery in Africa continues today. Slavery existed in Africa before the arrival of Europeans - as did a African slave trade that exported millions of sub-Saharan Africans to North Africa, the Middle East, and the Persian Gulf....
.


Although outlawed in nearly all countries today slavery is practiced in secret in many parts of the world. There are an estimated 27 million victims of slavery worldwide. In Mauritania
Mauritania

Mauritania , officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, is a country in northwest Africa. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on the west, by Senegal on the southwest, by Mali on the east and southeast, by Algeria on the northeast, and by the Morocco-controlled Western Sahara on the northwest....
 alone up to 600,000 men, women and children, or 20% of the population, are enslaved, many of them used as bonded labour. Slavery in Mauritania
Slavery in Mauritania

Slavery in Mauritania is an entrenched phenomenon the national government has repeatedly tried to abolish, banning the practice in 1905, 1981, and August 2007....
 was finally criminalized in August 2007. It is estimated that as many as 200,000 black Sudanese children and women have been taken into slavery in Sudan
Slavery in Sudan

Since 1995, international rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and CASMAS have reported that slavery in Sudan is a common fate of captives in the Second Sudanese Civil War....
 during the Second Sudanese Civil War
Second Sudanese Civil War

The Second Sudanese Civil War started in 1983, although it was largely a continuation of the First Sudanese Civil War of 1955 to 1972. It took place, for the most part, in southern Sudan and was one of the longest lasting and deadliest wars of the later 20th century....
. In Niger
Niger

Niger , officially the Republic of Niger, is a landlocked country in Western Africa, named after the Niger River. It borders Nigeria and Benin to the south, Burkina Faso and Mali to the west, Algeria and Libya to the north and Chad to the east....
, where the practice of slavery was outlawed in 2003, a study found that almost 8% of the population are still slaves.

See also

  • Atlantic slave trade
    Atlantic slave trade

    The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the transatlantic slave trade, was the trade of primarily African people supplied to the colonies of the New World that occurred in and around the Atlantic Ocean....
  • Arab slave trade
    Arab slave trade

    The Arab slave trade was the practice of slavery in Southwest Asia, North Africa, East Africa, and certain parts of Europe during their period of domination by Arab leaders....
  • Barbary pirates
  • Christianity and slavery
    Christianity and slavery

    The issue of Christianity and slavery is one that has seen intense conflict. While Christian abolitionists were a principal force in the abolition of slavery, the Bible sanctioned the use of regulated slavery in the Old Testament, while the New Testament does not explicitly condemn slavery in all its forms....
  • Islam and slavery
    Islam and Slavery

    Historically, the Madh'hab traditionally accepted the institution of slavery. Muhammad and many of Sahaba bought, sold, freed, and captured slaves. Slaves benefited from Islamic dispensations which improved their situation relative to that in pre-Islamic society....
  • Slavery in Mauritania
    Slavery in Mauritania

    Slavery in Mauritania is an entrenched phenomenon the national government has repeatedly tried to abolish, banning the practice in 1905, 1981, and August 2007....
  • Slavery in Sudan
    Slavery in Sudan

    Since 1995, international rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and CASMAS have reported that slavery in Sudan is a common fate of captives in the Second Sudanese Civil War....
  • Unfree labor
  • Maafa
    Maafa

    Maafa is a word derived from the Swahili term for disaster, terrible occurrence or great tragedy. The term refers to the 500 years of suffering of Africans and the African diaspora, through slavery, imperialism, colonialism, invasion, oppression, dehumanization and exploitation....
  • Tippu Tip
    Tippu Tip

    Tippu Tip or Tib , real name Hamed bin Mohammed bin Juma bin Rajab bin Mohammed bin Said el Murgebi, was a Swahili people-Zanzibari trader, notorious slaver, plantation owner and governor....
  • Slavery in modern Africa
    Slavery in modern Africa

    Slavery in Africa continues today. Slavery existed in Africa before the arrival of Europeans - as did a African slave trade that exported millions of sub-Saharan Africans to North Africa, the Middle East, and the Persian Gulf....
  • Abolitionism
    Abolitionism

    File:BLAKE10.JPGAbolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and emancipate slaves in western Europe and the Americas. The slave system aroused little protest until the 18th century, when rationalist thinkers of the Age of Enlightenment criticized it for violating the rights of man, and Quaker and other evangelical religious groups con...
  • History of slavery
    History of slavery

    The history of slavery covers many different forms of human exploitation across many cultures throughout history. Slavery, generally defined, refers to a situation where one human being is considered to be the property of another, and is therefore obligated to perform tasks for their owner without any choice involved....
  • Slavery in ancient Rome
    Slavery in ancient Rome

    The institution of slavery in ancient Rome reduced those held to a condition of less than persons under Roman law. Stripped of many rights, including the ability to marry, slaves were the property of their owners....
  • History of slavery in the United States
    History of slavery in the United States

    Slavery in the United States began soon after British colonization of the Americas first settled Colony of Virginia in 1607 and lasted as a legal institution until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865....
  • James Riley (Captain)
    James Riley (Captain)

    James Riley was the Captain of the United States merchant ship Commerce . He led his crew through the Sahara Desert after they were shipwrecked off the coast of Western Sahara in August 1815, and wrote a book on their ordeal detailing his memoirs....
     white slaves in the Sahara
  • Slavery
    Slavery

    Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
  • Slave ship
    Slave ship

    Slave ships were cargo ships specially converted for the purpose of transporting Slavery, especially newly purchased African slaves.The most important routes of the slave ships led from the northern and middle coasts of Africa to South America and the south coast of what is today the Caribbean and the USA....
  • African Diaspora
    African diaspora

    The African diaspora was the movement of Africans and their descendants to places throughout the world - predominantly to the Americas, then later to Europe, the Middle East and other places around the globe....


Further reading

  • Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery
  • Fage, J.D. A History of Africa (Routledge, 4th edition, 2001 ISBN 0-415-25247-4)*Lovejoy, Paul E. Transformations in Slavery 1983
  • The Peopling of Africa: A Geographic Interpretation.(Review): An article from: Population and Development Review [HTML] (Digital) by Tukufu Zuberi
  • Edward Reynolds. Stand the Storm: a history of the Atlantic slave trade. London: Allison and Busby, 1985.
  • Walter Rodney: How Europe Underdeveloped Africa


External links

  • - Interview with an Ex-Slave