THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE
As the number of European colonies increased, so did the volume and area of
European trade. An Atlantic slave trade also began. Altogether, as many as 10 million
enslaved Africans were brought to the Americas between the early 1500s and the late
1800s. Not until the late 1700s did European feeling against slavery begin to grow.
Trade, Colonies, and Mercantilism
In less than 300 years, the European age of exploration changed the world. In
some areas, such as the Americas and the Spice Islands, it led to the destruction of
local civilizations and the establishment of European colonies. In others, such as Africa
and mainland Southeast Asia, it left native regimes intact but had a strong impact on
local societies and regional trade patterns. European expansion affected Africa with
the dramatic increase of the slave trade, which played an important part in European
trade. The increase in the volume and area of European trade as a result of European
expansion was a crucial factor in producing a new age of commercial capitalism. This
is one of the first steps in the development of the world economy. The nations of
Europe were creating trading empires.
Led by Portugal and Spain, European nations established many trading posts
and colonies in the Americas and the East. A colony is a settlement of people living in
a new territory, linked with the parent country by trade and direct government control.
Colonies played a role in the theory of mercantilism, a set of principles that dominated
economic thought in the seventeenth century. According to mercantilists, the
prosperity of a nation depended on a large supply of bullion, or gold and silver. To bring
in gold and silver payments, nations tried to have a favorable balance of trade. The
balance of trade is the difference in value between what a nation imports and what it
exports over time. When the balance is favorable, the goods exported are of greater
value than those imported. To encourage exports, governments stimulated industries
and trade. They granted subsidies, or payments, to new industries and improved
transportation systems by building roads, bridges, and canals. They placed high tariffs,
or taxes, on foreign goods to keep them out of their own countries. Colonies were
considered important both as sources of raw materials and markets for finished goods.
The Slave Trade
Traffic in enslaved people was not new. As in other areas of the world, slavery
had been practiced in Africa since ancient times. In the 1400s, it continued at a fairly
steady level. The primary market for enslaved Africans was Southwest Asia where
most served as domestic servants as in some European countries like Portugal. The
demand for enslaved Africans changed dramatically with the discovery of the Americas
in the 1490s and the planting of sugarcane there. Cane sugar was introduced to
Europe from Southwest Asia during the Crusades of the Middle Ages. Plantations, or
large agricultural estates, were established in the 1500s along the coast of Brazil and
on Caribbean islands to grow sugarcane.
Growing cane sugar demands much labor. The small Native American
population, much of which had died of diseases imported from Europe, could not
provide the labor needed. Thus, enslaved Africans were shipped to Brazil and the
Caribbean to work on plantations.
Growth of the Slave Trade
In 1518 a Spanish ship carried the first enslaved Africans directly from Africa to
the Americas. During the next two centuries, the trade in enslaved people grew
dramatically and became part of the triangular trade that connected Europe, Africa and
Asia, and the American continents. European merchant ships carried European
manufactured goods, such as guns and cloth, to Africa where they were traded for
enslaved people. The enslaved Africans were then shipped to the Americas and sold.
European merchants then bought tobacco, molasses, sugar, and raw cotton in the
Americas and shipped them back to Europe. King Afonso I c. 1456–c. 1545 African
king An estimated 275,000 enslaved Africans were exported during the 1500s. In the
1600s, the total climbed to over 1 million and jumped to 6 million in the 1700s.
Altogether, as many as 10 million enslaved Africans were brought to the Americas
between the early 1500s and the late 1800s. One reason for these astonishing
numbers was the high death rate. The journey of enslaved people from Africa to the
Americas became known as the Middle Passage, the middle portion of the triangular
trade route. Many enslaved Africans died on the journey. Those who arrived often died
from diseases to which they had little or no immunity. Death rates were higher for
newly arrived enslaved Africans than for those born and raised in the Americas. The
new generation gradually developed at least a partial immunity to many diseases.
Owners, however, rarely encouraged their enslaved people to have children. Many
slave owners, especially on islands in the Caribbean, believed that buying a new
enslaved person was less expensive than raising a child from birth to working age.
Sources of Enslaved Africans
Before Europeans arrived in the 1400s, most enslaved persons in Africa were
prisoners of war. Europeans first bought enslaved people from African merchants at
slave markets in return for gold, guns, or other European goods. Local slave traders
first obtained their supplies of enslaved persons from nearby coastal regions. As
demand grew, they had to move farther inland to find their victims.
Local rulers became concerned about the impact of the slave trade on their
societies. In a letter to the king of Portugal in 1526, King Afonso of Congo (Bakongo)
said, “so great is the corruption that our country is being completely depopulated.”
Europeans and other Africans, however, generally ignored such protests. Local rulers
who traded in enslaved people viewed the slave trade as a source of income. Many
sent raiders into defenseless villages.
Effects of the Slave Trade
The effects of the slave trade varied from area to area. Of course, it always had
tragic effects on the lives of individual victims and their families. The slave trade led to
the depopulation of some areas, and it deprived many African communities of their
youngest and strongest men and women. The desire of slave traders to provide a
constant supply of enslaved persons led to increased warfare in Africa. Coastal or
near-coastal African chiefs and their followers, armed with guns acquired from the
trade in enslaved people, increased their raids and wars on neighboring peoples.
The slave trade had a devastating effect on some African states. The case of
Benin (buh•NEEN) in West Africa is a good example. A brilliant and creative society in
the 1500s, Benin was pulled into the slave trade. As the population declined and
warfare increased, the people of Benin lost faith in their gods, their art deteriorated,
and human sacrifice became more common. When the British arrived there at the end
of the 1800s, they found a corrupt and brutal place. It took years to discover the
brilliance of the earlier culture destroyed by slavery. The use of enslaved Africans
remained largely acceptable to European society. Europeans continued to view
Africans as inferior beings fit chiefly for slave labor. Not until the Society of Friends,
known as the Quakers, began to condemn slavery in the 1770s did European feeling
against slavery begin to build. Even then, it was not until the French Revolution in the
1790s that the French abolished slavery. The British did the same in 1807.
Nevertheless, slavery continued in the newly formed United States until the Civil War
of the 1860s.
