Transcript Slide 1

Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Chapter 21 – Africa in an Era of Slave Trade
Stages
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Portuguese established trading forts
(factories); ie El Mina – gold from interior
Most forts established with permission from
African kings who desired trade.
Portuguese and African traders
(landcados) followed routes to the interior
to open new markets.
Missionary efforts followed – really only
Benin and Kongo had any early success.
King Nzinga Mvemba for trade relationship
In the 1570’s Luanda and Angola were
established among the Mbundu.
 In the Indian Ocean they established bases
on Mozambique island to control gold trade
from Monomotapa.
 Other Europeans followed Portuguese
patterns and in almost all instances slavery
eventually became the principal focus of
relationships.
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The Slave Trade
1. Existed in Africa before the coming
of the Europeans.
2. Portuguese replaced European slaves
with Africans.
Sugar cane & sugar plantations.
First boatload of African slaves
brought by the Spanish in 1518.
275,000 enslaved Africans exported
to other countries.
3. Between 1450-1850, about 12 million
Africans shipped to the Americas.
Trend Toward Expansion
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Out of those slaves exported, only 10 or 11
million arrived alive.
A number equal to 1/3 of that number is
believed to have perished in initial raids to
collect and the march from the interior to
the African coast.
80% of the slaves that came, came in the
1700s = 18th century.
Brazil received 40% of the slaves coming
to the Americas.
At the same time, there were still African
slaves being traded by the Muslims around
3 million.
Slave Ship
“Middle Passage”
“Coffin” Position Below Deck
African Captives
Thrown Overboard
Sharks followed the slave ships!
Demographic Patterns
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The Muslim slave trade carried mostly
women for sexual and domestic
employment.
The Atlantic trade forcused on young men
fit for hard labor.
African societies who sold slaves might
keep women and children for their own
uses.
West African population is believed to have
been half of what it would have been
without the trade.
Maize and Manioc helped suffering regions
to recover from population losses.
Organization of Trade
Before 1630 the Portuguese were the
original suppliers.
 The Dutch then took over el Mina and
became suppliers.
 By 1660, the English were supplying
their own colonies.
 The French followed in the 1700’s.
 Each nation established forts for
receiving slaves.
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The value of a man (Indies Piece) was
calculated in currencies such as iron
bars, brass rings and cowery shells.
 Dahomey had a royal monopoly on
slave flow.
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Question of Profitability
First of all, the profits of the slave trade
have been linked to the rise of
commercial capitalism and the Industrial
Revolution.
 Individual voyages did bring profits to
merchants and ports involved, but…
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 There were risks in the business such as
loss of life by mutiny or loss of valuable
property as a potential slave. Infections from
dying slaves on the ships. Etc.
English profitability in the late 1700’s
was about 5 to 10% profit which is equal
to other commercial ventures, but with
more risk.
 Of course the labor it supplied was
essential to the mining and agricultural
economies that built American
capitalism.
 The triangle trade incorporated Africa
into the world economy.
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5. New Patterns of World Trade
African Societies
Individuals who could somehow get
themselves a slave could gain wealth
and status for themselves and their
lineage.
 Slaves were treated differently
depending on the local system
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 Kinship systems were normally less severe
 Under centralized hierarchical societies,
slaves were economically and socially
exploited.
Slaving and African Politics
Most of the states of west and central
Africa were small and unstable.
 The continuing wars elevated the
importance of the military and promoted
the slave trade.
 Increasing centralization and hierarchy
developed in the enslaving societies
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Those attacked reacted by augmenting selfsufficiency and antiauthoritarian ideas.
 A result of the presence of the Europeans
along the western coast was a shift of the
locus of African power.
 Inland states close to the coast, and
therefore free from direct European
influence, through access to Western
firearms and other goods, became
intermediaries in the trade and expanded
their influence.
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Asante
Asante between the Hausa and the
coast.
 Gained access to firearms in 1650 and
began centralizing and expanding
 Osei Tutu became asantehene –
supreme civil and military leader
 By 1700, they were doing business
directly with the Dutch.
 Maintained power until the 1820’s
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Fall of Benin, Rise of Dahomey
Benin was at the height of its power when
European arrived.
 The ruler controlled the trade with
Europeans and slaves were never a
primary commodity.
 Dahomey, however, emerged in the
seventeenth century and by the 1720’s had
access to firearms leading to the formation
of an autocratic regime based on trading
slaves.
 The states maintained its policies into the
nineteenth century.
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Overall Effects
Too much emphasis on the slave trade
obscures creative processes occurring
in many African states.
 Growing divine authority of rulers
paralleled the rise of absolutism in
Europe.
 New political forms emerged that limited
the power of some monarchs.
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In the Yoruba state of Oyo, a council and
king shared authority
 Art, crafts, weaving, and woodcarving
flourished in many regions.
 Benin and Yoruba states created
remarkable wood and ivory sculptures.
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East African Slaves
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Swahili trade towns had been active since
the Muslim trade began; that continued.
The commerce that went out of those ports
included ivory, gold and slaves.
Those items usually went to Middle
Eastern markets.
A few slaves went to European colonies.
On Zanzibar and other islands, Arabs ,
Indians, and Swahili produced cloves with
slave labor.
White African Settlers and
Africans in Southern Africa
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Southern Africa not as affected by slave trade
By 16th c. Bantu-speaking peoples occupied area
 Agriculture, herding, iron and copper metallurgy
Dutch East India Company establish colony at
Cape of Good Hope, 1652
 Dutch Boers expand northward into Bantu
territory
 Viewed Africans as source of labor
 British seize colony in 1795
The African Diaspora
Slave Lives
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For most, slavery meant destruction of village,
capture in war, separation from family
 As many as one third died on the way to or in
slave pens
Middle Passage was traumatic
 Branding, confinement, disease, fear of being
eaten by Europeans
 Leads to suicide, resistance, mutiny
The African Diaspora
Africans in America
 slaves brought to mainly plantations and
mines
 Tobacco, sugar, cotton
 Gold mining in Brazil, Silver in Mexico
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Urban slaves also characteristic of the
time
 Artisans, street vendors, household servants
The African Diaspora
American Slave Societies
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Each American slave-based society was reflective of its
European origin and component African cultures
Similarities did exist
 Distinguish between salt-water slaves vs. Creole slaves
 Race played a role in American slavery it had not played
in Africa
Hierarchies were creation of slaveholders
 Slave rebellions often organized along African ethnic,
political lines
Differences
 In different societies, slaves represented varying
proportions of the overall population
The African Diaspora
The People and Gods in Exile
Africans brought to Americas faced series of
problems
 Exhausting working conditions, split families
 Despite hardships, African culture proved durable
 Africans brought aspects of language, religion,
and art
 Continuity of culture depended on intensity,
volume of slave trade from particular area
 Masters attempted to mix slave populations to
weaken sense of identity
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The African Diaspora
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African slaves had to adapt, incorporate ideas,
customs of other Africans
 Religion—slaves were converted to Catholicism,
yet African religious ideas, practices did not die
out
Realities of Middle Passage made certain aspects
of religion easier to transfer than others
 Lack of priestly class made Africans more
malleable
Resistance and rebellion were present wherever
slaves were held
The African Diaspora
Africa and the End of the Slave Trade
End of trade, abolition was result of economic,
political, religious changes in Europe
 Enlightenment, Age of Revolution, etc.
 Slavery seen as backward and immoral
 Slave trade seen as symbol of inhumanity,
cruelty
 England was key to end of slave trade
 Uses navy to enforce agreements with other
countries
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