What would become the US model of slavery was based on Roman slavery via the Muslim slave trade--an old legacy.

I once read that a Roman-era slave manual was translated into Arabic some time in the medieval era. This manual was then translated back into Latin, and then into what were called the “vulgar” languages of Europe--Spanish, Dutch, English.

This manual is one of the oldest surviving texts of western civilization.

Whoopee!

Slavery existed in Europe before there were Africans to work within it. The preferred slave of the medieval era was a Slav from Eastern Europe and Russia.

Slav = Slave

Muslim Arabs however were also popular as slaves in Europe.

The cities marked were major centers for the processing and sale of slaves.

However, the rise of the Ottoman Sultanate cut off European access to slaves. The Ottomans refused to allow Muslims to be enslaved to Christians--but they had no problem enslaving Christians to themselves.

This lucrative market cut off for the European slavers, they had to look elsewhere for their supply.

A combination of the prior existence of sugar plantations off the coast of Africa, and the existence of African slavery (which had been controlled by Muslim middle-men since the rise of Islam) made Africa itself a logical source of labor.

As they had made the most extensive navigation of Africa during their search for sea-routes to India, the Portuguese became the masters of the early African-European slave trade at the end of the 15th century.

African slavery was different• Hereditary slavery, extending over several generations, was rare. • Slavery in early sub-Saharan Africa took a variety of forms. While

most slaves were field workers, some served in royal courts, where they served as officials, soldiers, servants, and artisans.

• Under a system known as “pawnship," youths (usually girls) served as collateral for their family's debts. If their parents or kin defaulted on these debts, then these young girls were forced to labor to repay these debts. In many instances, these young women eventually married into their owner's lineage, and their family's debt was cancelled.

• Under a system known as "clientage," slaves owed a share of their crop or their labor to an owner or a lineage. Yet they owned the bulk of their crop and were allowed to participate in the society's political activities. These slaves were often treated no differently than other peasant or tenant farmers.

Sub-Saharan Africa was the popular choice for slavers.

The tribes here were agriculturalists, so already knew how to plant,

And were unprotected by powerful kingdoms, so they were easy prey.

So let’s follow the route a slave took from Africa to a plantation.

You might have been captured by slave raiders in your own village, which meant you had to be taken to a slave fort on the coast. This is called a slave “coffel.”

Gold Coast slave trading fort

Once at the coast, you were penned here to wait for a buyer. Buyers usually bought slaves in lots.

Many of these forts were demolished after the abolition of the internat’l trade in the 1830s, but some remain as museums.

Slaves were bought cheap in Africa, and sold for much more in the Americas. So your goal as captain was to pack as many as you could in the hold. If a few died, it wasn’t as big a loss.

Many slave ships were basic cargo ships with extra decks laid down inside the hold.

This document was taken from an American Abolitionist pamphlet, and tries to convey how tightly these slaves were packed for their month-long journey across the Atlantic.

The hold was wet, dark, and cramped, crawling with roaches and rats.

As this picture indicates, you had one third as much room on the slave ship as you currently have on an airplane. And think of how cramped you are on an airplane. Add to that being sea-sick, in pain, and terrified.

The cutaway at right shows the various extra decks built into this typical slave ship.

Children were obviously popular--small, with a long life of hard work still ahead of them.

Periodically, slaves were “exercised”--which could mean making them dance for the amusement of the crew. Female slaves could be sexually assaulted.

Leg irons were one way to curtail slave mutinies on board ship

Upon arrival in the Americas, slaves were then brought to their second slave market--where this time they might be purchased individually. For some slaves, this 2nd market might just be transference to another slave driver, who might then take them to a 3rd market, etc.

What’s happening here?

Inspection. The same thing happens at a livestock market.

Check the teeth, check the eyes, check the skin.

Some sellers tried to cover up defects in their “stock,” so buyers had to investigate closely.

And if you want to breed slaves, check to see their ‘reproductive fitness.’

After that humiliation, you are sold at auction. Families might be separated, so you could watch your spouse and children go one way while you went another.

Notice the irony of a graceful classical capitol building--symbol of American republicanism--being used to sell human beings.

So, where did you go in the New World? Most likely, Brazil, and an early death.

42% of all African slaves were brought to the Caribbean. Why? Sugar plantations, mostly.

These 4 products were the most valuable items in the world at that time, and all produced by slave labor.

And all are addictive!

West Indies Slavery on a coffee plantation

A Jamaican sugar plantation--harvesting cane

Squeezing the juice from the sugar cane…

Slavs probably did not enjoy being worked to death, so various tools were used to either force them to work, or to prevent signs of rebellion among the work force.

A whip is above, while the collar and bells at the right prevented slaves from quietly escaping.

A whole range of devices were available to inflict pain, restrict movement, and prevent slaves from communicating with each other.

Slaves who showed insubordination or worked less efficiently than others were publicly punished.

Why publicly?

Guess.

Outright executions were rare, since you would be destroying your own property, and thus were reserved for the violent.

Bodies were left on display until they rotted as a warning to other slaves.

Whipping, or “flogging,” was a popular punishment.

The slave could return to work after recuperating, but the scars were a visible warning to other slaves.

The US South saw a trickle of African slaves, compared to South America and the Caribbean, but in time would build the largest slave population in the New World. Some states, like South Carolina, had a larger black population than a white one.

The reason is that slaves tended to live longer in the US, and thus the slave population grew by natural reproduction. In other words, you were more likely to be born a slave in the US

Tobacco, rice, and of course, cotton, were the primary slave plantation products, and this formed the basis of Southern wealth.

But also of Northern wealth, since New England built the ships, traded the goods, brought the slaves, and financed the slave economy.

US wealth was built on slavery. Never forget it.

What did the slaves bring with them from Africa?

A form of warrior training that would become “capoeira” in Brazil

The Old Plantation, 1790

Musical instruments such as the banjo and drum, and the importance of rhythm and percussion that was absent in European musical forms.

Arts and crafts that allow us to identify the origin of American slaves based on what they produced for their own consumption.

Mask from

Benin

Vs.

Carving from

South Carolina

And of course, what we call “folk art,” but which most people call “ethnic traditions.”

The slave trade from Africa is said to have uprooted as many as 20 million people from their homes and brought them to the Americas.

“The mortality rate among these new slaves ran very high. It is estimated that some five percent died in Africa on the way to the coast, another thirteen percent in transit to the West Indies, and still another thirty percent during the three-month seasoning period in the West Indies. This meant that about fifty percent of those originally captured in Africa died either in transit or while being prepared for servitude.” (from http://innercity.org/holt/slavechron.html)

You know from freshman year what this did to Africa--depopulation, rise of predator kingdoms, wars of conquest…

Over 50% of Britain’s national wealth during the colonial era came from slavery, and this would go on to fund the Industrial Revolution.

“The first African slaves hit the shores of the United States in 1619 and were constantly imported into the US until 1860 even though importation had been outlawed in 1808.  Over those intervening 246 years they contributed more than 605 billion hours of free labor, which funded the Industrial Revolution, financed most of the fortune 500 companies, helped finance two World Wars, and left a negative sociological impact on an entire race of people.”

In the US, the value in modern dollars of the labor put in by slaves before the Civil war comes to 20.3 trillion dollars.

From http://www.nathanielturner.com/slaveryandtheamericaneconomy.htm