HST ASSIGNMENT
Big boss
5_slavery.pptx
Spanish and Portuguese Empires, Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries
Europe in the Sixteenth Century
Iberian exploration copied by the Dutch, French, English
The dominance of Spain, Charles V (1516-1556), Habsburg Empire
Gold, silver, and increasingly
other commodities from the
New World.
Spain as Europe’s first super-power
The Protestant Reformation.
The Ottoman Empire
Cities of Gold or Commodities?
Not every Spanish explorer/colonist/conquistador was as successful as Cortez and Pizarro (and their soldiers)
Indian tributary labor– encomienda, and the New Laws
Sugarcane– native of Asia, but first successfully grown by Europeans in Canary Islands, and by Portuguese
Corn, and other grain crops, tobacco
Slavery…
Don’t Forget the Portuguese!
Carrying trade: Spices and Silk from India, SE Asia, and China
Ivory, some gold from Africa
Luxury goods, for the consumption of the elite mostly.
Sugarcane plantations in Brazil.
The Slave Trade and Atlantic Commerce
Spanish and Portuguese Empires, Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries
The Dutch Commercial Empire, late 1600s
The Netherlands
AKA: Holland, the Low Countries, the United Provinces
The English called them “the Dutch”, from Deustch, German
Part of the Spanish Empire through the sixteenth century.
Rebellion (1566-1648) and Reformation
Textile industry, commercial relations in Europe, commercial ties to the New World.
The Dutch in Asia, Seventeenth century
France and England
Late arrivals to the New World (later sixteenth and early seventeenth century).
Wars with Spain
Caribbean, but mostly North America
Exploitation of North America: Fur trade, tobacco, eventually cotton
The role of the State: Mercantilism
The growth of trade inspired competition between European kingdoms.
Most people viewed international trade as finite, and thus fiercely protected their piece of the pie
Competition means war, and war takes money, so export-trade was encouraged to insure the flow of wealth, especially gold and silver, into the kingdom.
Active government encouragement and control of trade through chartered companies.
Shift in political power from older, traditional social elites to wealthy traders and merchants, the new economic elites
“Commercial Revolution”
Gradual economic growth throughout the Early Modern period (1500s-1700s).
Grows out of the urban trade of the later Middle Ages:
Luxury items (silk, spices, art objects) imported from Asia
Locally monopolized commodities, like the Flanders wool industry or the Baltic fish industry.
Such trade fueled the sixteenth century voyages of discovery, as most explorers were seeking shorter routes to dominate the luxury goods trade with Asia.
Growth in volume of trade increased the size of markets for these goods: soon prices were low enough that non-elites could begin consuming sugar, tobacco, coffee, spices, etc.
Increased trade fueled the creation of institutions of commerce, such as banks, insurance, and credit, which in turn reduced the dangers and cost of trade and shipping, which reduced the cost of luxury good, making them more affordable to non-elites.
“The Companies”
Governments chartered private merchant companies with carrying out trade in certain areas.
These chartered groups eventually merged into companies that monopolized trade in their spheres of influence, and competed with the trade companies of other nations.
Subsidized from
royal treasuries.
British East India Co.
1600
Dutch East India Co.
1602
Dutch West India Co.
1621
etc…
Trade and Slavery
One hundred thousand slaves, Black or mulatto, work in sugar mills, indigo and cocoa plantations, sacrificing their lives to gratify our newly acquired appetites for sugar, cocoa, coffee, and tobacco---things unknown to our ancestors.
Voltaire, Essay on Morals and Customs, 1756
Why did the Christian powers not consider that their religion, independent of natural law, was fundamentally opposed to Black slavery? The answer is that those nations needed slaves for their colonies, their plantations, and their mines.
Denis Diderot, "Natural Liberty," Encyclopedia, 1765
Definitions:
Slavery
Chattel Slavery
Military Slavery
Prisoners of War
Indentured Servitude
Serfdom/Tributary Obligations
Ancient Slavery (Mediterranean)
POWs, usually “outsiders”
Unwanted children and indebted people
Household vs. Agricultural vs. Hard Labor
Legal power of slave owners and limits
Gladiators in Rome
Medieval Slavery (Europe and Mediterranean)
Christianity and Islam both generally discouraged enslavement of co-religionists.
Enslavement of religious “others” permitted, within certain limits.
Encouragement of manumission, especially of converts; humane treatment.
Gradual disappearance in Western Europe, limitation in the Islamic world.
Military Slavery: Mamelukes and Janissaries
Largely, but not exclusively a phenomenon of the Islamic world.
Abbasid Caliphate, Egypt, Ottoman Empire
Turks and Christians
Some thoughts on Pre-modern Slavery
Slavery was ubiquitous
Slavery was not understood in racial terms
Slavery was highly variable
Implications of female slavery
Why African Slaves?
Portuguese connection
Resistance to Eurasian disease (made them healthier than Indian slaves)
War captives and the European manufactured goods trade
Impact on African societies
Increase in the Slave Trade
Commodity agriculture drives slave trade
1500s- Low volume, mostly controlled by Portugal to fuel plantations in Brazil. Some slaves to Spanish colonies (mines)
1600s- Sugar and tobacco farming in Caribbean and North America expand, perhaps 1 million slaves exported. Dutch merchants dominated the trade
1700s- Millions of slaves to the Caribbean and North America
1800s- Slave trade restricted by many states, but cotton industry of the US continued demand
Effects of the New World and the Growth of Trade
New World, new products
New and easier global trade networks
More volume, cheaper prices
Cheaper prices, more consumers
More consumers, more demand
More demand, more production
More production, more labor
More labor, more slavery
Abolition
France- outlawed in Europe since Middle Ages, but in colonies, 1794 and again in 1848.
Code Noir
Haiti, 1804
Britain, 1772 in Europe, slave
trade in 1803, colonies in
1833-1838.
Portugal, 1762 in Europe,
in colonies by 1820
Brazil, 1888
Spain by 1820
Slavery and the United States
The American south and cotton
Britain and the industrial revolution
The North and abolition- religious and economic principals
The Constitution and compromise
3/5ths clause
20 year compromise on slave trade
Open questions remained, especially over future expansion of slavery
American Civil War, 1861-1865
