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For centuries, the trade along a triangular trading route, provided the capital to finance the industrialization of Europe and development of the European economy - trade only possible at the expense of slaves.

The Triangular Trade consisted of three stops:

· The outward passage from Europe to Africa bearing manufactured goods.

· The middle passage from Africa to the Americas bearing African captives.

· The homeward passage from the Americas to Europe carrying sugar, tobacco, cotton, rice, indigo, and cocoa (Source: Triangular Trade).

We know that before the Middle Passage, a slave trade already existed in Africa, but this was different. The Middle Passage was a systematic process of extracting Africans for a specific purpose, as workers stripped of their humanity in the New World.

The ill-fated relationship between the Kongolese and Portuguese evolved over time. While the Portuguese struggled to find an asset with which they could entice the Africans to trade, the shift in their subservient position was gradual. The influx of European goods, particularly firearms, slowly disrupted West African cultures. The technological advancement of gunfire brought the Europeans power and wealth, but for some West Africans is empowered them to more efficiently captured slaves. Religious and political structural division within West African states reinforced the slave system and produced a profitable supply of slaves which were traded for European goods, largely guns. Those communities that captured the most slaves received the most European goods, and were the best equipped to expand their power and prestige in West Africa (Source: Scott).

The Ashantis and Dahomeans specialized in the art of enslaving. Initially cut off from the Europeans by coastal tribes, who acted as middlemen, these two tribes from the interior of Africa, pushed toward the sea, extending their terror as their power increased. In 1727, John Atkins complained that the triumph of Dahomey had destroyed the orderly patterns of the slave trade. Specialized trading states was matched by the arrival of independent traders who sights were set on acquiring slaves quickly for maximum profit (Source: Scott).

It can be argued quite effectively that sugar was the number one crop that produced growth for Europe. Sugar production and potential profits served as the basis for a plantation complex that fueled the need for slaves. Your textbook states that something as evil and gruesome as the Atlantic slave trade was set in motion largely to produce something as apparently benign as sugar. While that is overly simplified, it paints a vivid reality -- trafficking of humans for their labor to satisfy the sweet tooth of Europe and to feed the coffers of capitalists (though they would not have been called capitalists in the 15th century).

Sugar was introduced to Europeans by Muslims during the Crusades. Cultivation began in Cyprus and Sicily at least a centuries before the Portuguese started exploring the African coast. Initially, the Italians controlled the sugar trade. Italians dominated the European commercial world during the 12th and 13th centuries (remember the Italian Renaissance?). They had the finances to support the cultivation of sugar cane, acquisition of the labor force (Slavic slaves) and to purchase equipment to convert the cane into crystallized sugar. They also had the business acumen to recognize an opportunity to produce wealth.

It is not an understatement to say that the capitalism and slavery grew up together and fed each other. There was a major shift going on in Europe --money and skill acquired in commerce (trading) was invested in agriculture and industry. The agricultural side, was labor intensive crops which consumers demanded with more and more frequency.

It was mentioned previously that, Slavic (from which the term "slaves" originated) forced labor was used to work the fields. Then, a couple things happened almost simultaneously that shifted Europe s attention to the continent of Africa for their slaves. First, Constantinople (Christian gateway, later called Istanbul by the Turks) was captured by the Turks. This gave the Turks (Muslims) control of the strait between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean which was the route the Italians (Catholics) had used to transport slaves to European islands, which cutoff the availability of slaves.

The second thing was that the Portuguese acquired the skills necessary to navigate the coast of Africa. With Italian funding, the Portuguese established a island off the West Coast of Africa, produced sugar cane, and developed a relationship with the Kingdom of Kongo, and seized control of the slave trade replacing the Slavs with Africans. On the island of São Tomé sugar production flourished. It was the Portuguese who first demonstrated on São Tomé that sugar could be produced a distance from the consumer and that the relationship between Africans labor and the sugar economy was established. Therefore, when Europeans established sugar plantations in the Americas, from their perspective, the logical source of labor was West Africa.

Individuals from the Kongo region of Central Africa were befriended by the Portuguese and came in conflict with other African states, most notably Ndongo. The economies of the region became more and more dependent on the slave trade. Increaed warfare and taxation became the means by which African states made demands upon the Europeans. Trade routes, depots and caravans were established to bring captives from as far as 2,500 miles inland to the coast. This tract is referred as the Continental Passage.  In the 1580s the Ngondo State was invaded by the Portuguese. While military conquest failed, alliances were able to gradually undermine the state. Princess Njinga rose to the throne in 1618, in a State unaccustomed to female sovereigns. (Side note: She dressed as a male and her consorts, which were male dressed as females). In 1641, she choose the wrong side and aligned with the Dutch who challenged the Portuguese over Kongo. The Dutch were defeated, which left Ndongo in a tenuous position. Though Ngondo was permitted to remain an independent state, they were  forced to permit Christian missionaries. This era in Ngondo is an example of the complexity of African slavery. The Princess was an early example of African nationalism, an early feminist, and an opportunist that willingly involved her State in the abduction of slaves in order to acquire and maintain power.  In 1685, the Portuguese invaded Kongo, their former ally. Unsuccessful in their attempt to control the Kongo, they managed to disrupt the stable community. The king was killed, which led to instability and dynastic disputes and ultimately to civil war. By 1710, the Kongo totally disintegrated, which left the only victors in the turmoil slave traders, both European and African.  West Africa s experience was distinct from that of Central Africa. With a greater population and geographic region, no single community of West Africa suffered as high of per capital incidence of enslavement as Central Africa. Trade in West Africa shifted according to local political conditions. Benin and Warri, were trading partners with the Portuguese, trading other commodities as well as slaves. Benin s wealth was built on the diversity of the trading relationship. By 1516, the ruling oba (king) banned the trade of slaves, which lasted for nearly 200 years. However, as the European appetite for diverse products declined, so did the wealth of Benin, which lead them to reopen trade in slaves in the 1700s.  Oyo, Dahomey, and Asante represent three additional states in West Africa that participated in the slave trade. In order to increase their military power, slaves were traded for weapons. Oyo, who had a similar idea, built her military on a horse-based cavalry, which enabled her to defeat the Yoruba and assume the dominant role of the slave trade until the late 1700s.

Founded in the 14th century, Oyo was situated in the woodland north of the tropical forest, making it a region ideal for growing cereal crops and a region free of tsetse flies, making it suitable for horses. With the increased demand for slaves in the 1780s, Oyo became a major handler of slaves. The overdependence on the European appetite proved devastating when wars broke out between England and France in the 1790s which effectively reduced the demand for slaves. The loss of income, led to less wealth to support political constituents in Oyo and over taxation of peasantry and the decline of the State (Source: Shillington, 2005).  Dahomey was one of the neighboring communities of Oyo that was forced to pay tribute to the alafin (ruler). Founded in the early 17th century, Wegbaja organized a loose federation of communities into a powerful centralized state. Wegbaja took profits from the sale of captives and invested in firearms to secure his imperialistic appetite and consolidate power. The expansion of power permitted them to defeat coastal states in the early 1700s , thus allowed them to sell directly to European traders. At least one historian recorded that Dahomian king Agaja attempted to suppress the exportation of slaves out of Africa. He is reported to have asked Europeans to establish plantations in Dahomey using slave labor so that the slaves would not be actually lost to Africa, a proposal the Europeans rejected (Source: Shillington, 2005).  The most successful of the states was the Asante, which was founded by Osei Tutu in 1670. At its peak, Asante controlled much of the region of modern Ghana, comprising about 100,000 square mile and a population of 3 million. Asante did not export all of its captives, many were retained to work in the gold mines and work on plantations. By the 19th century. Asante was faced with the growing coastal influence of the British, who supported the Fante confederation. The Asante and Europeans fought in a series of wars for control of the coast and trade. The first head-to-head battle took place in 1824. The Asante killed the British governor, giving them the victory. Then in 1874, military technology shifted the balance of power to the British who defeated the Asante and burned and sacked their capital.

To America

In the 15th and 16th centuries, world events changed Europe and Africa forever. The most important of these events was the European discovery and opening of the New World. It is almost ironic that the first black captives - Black Christians born in Spain and Portugal - were with the first European explorers and settlers. Black explorers - servants, slaves, and free - accompanied Spanish and Portuguese explorers in the expeditions in North and South America. Black were with Pizarro in Peru, Cortes in Mexico, Balboa when he discovered the Pacific Ocean, and Menendez in Florida. W.E.B. DuBois said other Blacks accompanied DeSoto and one of them stayed among the Indians in Alabama and became the first settler. . . " (Bennett, 1992).

Spaniards, who took the lead in exploration of the New World, attempted first to enslave Native Americans. An effort that proved ineffective for a variety of reasons, which led Bishop Bartolome Las Casas, missionary, to recommend in 1517 the importation of Africans. The development of large-scale sugar plantations created a demand for men that could not be supplied by just kidnapping. So, there was a shift in the previous civil dialogue between Africans and Europeans to an almost one-way monologue focused mainly on a trade of humans. Bennett put the tragedy this way, within a few years hundreds of thousands of Blacks were crossing the Atlantic each year and the soil of Africa and America was drenched with their blood. Strange, said Eric Williams, that an article like sugar, so sweet and necessary to human existence, should have occasioned, such crimes and bloodshed (Bennett, 1992).

The numbers of Africans that were transported directly to the United States range from 400,000 to 1 million between 1619 and 1808, when the importation of slaves became illegal. That did not stop the importation of slaves, but seriously slowed down the business of importation. And, please do not get the importation of slaves mixed up with the slave trade. The only thing that became illegal in the United States in 1808 was importing slaves, not slavery! That decision was made as part of the compromises that solidified the U.S. Constitution in 1789 (Berry & Blassingame, 1982).

The first Black immigrants in the Jamestown settlement of 1619 are of critical importance to the history of Blacks in America. They came the same way that most of the first white immigrants came - under duress and pressure. The system of indentured servitude was the means by which poor people came to America, selling their services for a specific number of years to planters. Under the system thousands of poor whites were shipped to the colonies and sold to the highest bidder (Bennett, 1992).

In Virginia, the first Black settlers were absorbed into a well-established socioeconomic system that was not initially racial in its nature. Racial distinction and discrimination came later. For about a 40 year period, Blacks comingled with whites on a basis of equality. Acquiring property, land and servants, testifying in courts, and voting. During the 40 years the Black population of Virginia grew through both natural means and importation. In the 1624 census, Blacks constituted about 2% of the total population of 1,227 (Bennett, 1992).

While the historic records indicate thriving communities of Black Africans in the American colonies, by the 1660s, men who ran the colonies, made decisions that would lead, step-by-step to the racist foundation of human labor. Colonial men, decided to base the American economic system on human slavery organized around the melanin in human skin. Virginia and Maryland led the way, enacting laws in the 1660s that forbade intermarriage and made Blacks slaves for life. Under the law, children born of African women were ruled slave or free, according to the status of the mother. Almost immediately an additional step was taken -the creation of an ideology of racism that justified the subordination of Blacks (Bennett, 1992).

Lasting Impact

From a historical perspective, the importance of slavery lies in three areas. First it was the major determinant of American race relations. Second, slaves played a crucial role in transforming African culture to a unique Black culture in America. And, third, African slavery stood as America's greatest accuser.

When one looks at race relations across the centuries, arguably the most visible example of America's discrimination of its minority populations is its treatment of African and African descendants. During the 19th century, Jim Crow laws became the standard by which America defines its schools, housing, employment, and justice. Legal separation of Blacks and whites, was the legal standard until 1954 and many would argue is the defacto standard by which the nation operates even today. Black culture in America stands uniquely in contrast to, sometimes in opposition to, the dominant culture. Music, dress, religious worship, language patterns, and names are but a few of the cultural styles that are often explicitly defined by a social group. In the next lesson we will explore an African connection by tapping into African traditions. The third element stands as a mirror by which the nation sees its reflection. Forever reminded of the tragedy and travesty of history, slavery is a reality check for the American psyche. Always having to see its greatest in light of its evil. Its national story of liberty and justice for all in contrast to its legacy of chattel slavery. Although some form of involuntary slavery had existed in all societies prior to the formation of the United States, none of them had the fundamental documents and philosophies so unequivocably contradict the very foundation of the nation (Berry & Blassingame, 1982).