Chapter+20

__Africa and the Africans in the age of the Atlantic Slave Trade__


 * The Atlantic Slave Trade Notes: pg 435-440**

MI- The high demand for labor in the new American colonies resulted in the expansion of the slave trade exporting millions in an organized commerce involving both Europeans and Africans.

Details: MI - In a matter of a few years the Slave trade expanded drasticly to several parts of the world.
 * In 1487 portuguese ships reached African Coasts establishing **factories**.
 * Most important was El Mina because it was at the heart of the gold-producing region of the forest zone.
 * Africans aquired goods from Portuguesse, and sometimes got slaves from other parts of the coast.
 * In Exchange for: Ivory, pepper, animal skins, and gold.
 * Portuguese eventually traded with Mande and Soninke merchants from Mali and Songhay.
 * Trade was the basis of Portuguese African relations, through trade it eventually led to political, religious, and social relations.
 * Portuguese were suspicious of Muslims, their traditional enemies.
 * In Kongo- The ruler Nzinga Mvemba (1507-1543) with help from portuguese, converted the kingdom to christianity
 * Portuguese looked at Africans as savages and pagans, but also capable of civilized behavior and conversion to Christianity
 * Portuguese opened a direct channel to sub-Saharan Africa
 * First 50 slaves were sent per year but then it raised up to 500 per year
 * Slave trade increased when Portuguese and the Spanish began to develop sugar plantations
 * Salve trade predominated over all othe rkinds of commerce on the African coast
 * Trend Toward Expansion:**

Details: MI **-** Thoguh the atlantic slave trade focused more on men, women were used as domestic servants in N.A and the M.E.
 * 12 million Africans were sghipped across teh Atlantic
 * Mortality rate of 10 + 20 % on the ships
 * About 10 or 11 million Africans actually arrived int eh Americans
 * A lot of people died in Africa as a result of teh slaving wars or in the forced marches
 * Spanish America and Brazil received the majority of African salves
 * English and French began to grow sugar = slaves were cruticial
 * Brazil alone received 3.5 - 5 million African
 * 16,000 slaves were snet per year -> 7 million slaves ( more then 80%) -> 3 million slave lived in the Americas
 * Cuba received 7000,000 slaves + Brazil received more than 1 million
 * 6 million slaves worked int eh Americas + about 4 milion of them in southern USA
 * British and French Caribbean made up 80 to 90% of the pop
 * Trans-Sahara + Red Seam + east African=added another 3 million people to total of Africans exported slaves
 * Benin alone was importing 10,000 salves per year
 * Demographic Patterns:**

Details: MI - Following the Portuguese's establishment into Africa, other European nations followed to the African coast.
 * Men = Atlantic Slave Trade because it demanded hard working labor
 * Women = mostly kept in Africa as servants
 * Children = due to the mortality rate, people tended not to purchase many children
 * Central Africa population = 25 million
 * Estimated that if no slave trade = probably double
 * More men than women, more women then children = messed the the women to men ratio in Africa.
 * The AST developed new crops that were introduced to Africa as a form of food compensating for the Slave Trade.
 * Organization Of the Trade:**

Details:
 * % of slave trade that Europeans owned, usually reflected their poltical situation
 * Portuguese controled most of coastal trade for nearly 2 centuries.
 * The growth Caribean based plantation colonies = more competition from Europe to Portuguese.
 * Royal African Company = English's source of slaves for Barbados, Jamiaca, and Virginia.
 * Africa = Graveyard, so many diseases and a lot of merchants and traders died there.
 * Diseases such as malaria
 * Slave Trade = Deadly for ALL involved.
 * Spanish developed a complicated syste - Healthy men = Indies Piece
 * **Triangular trade** = Slaves -> Americas, Sugar, tabacco, other products -> Europe , European goods -> Coast of Africa
 * Slave Trade contributed to formation of emerging capitalism in the Atlantic World.

**African Societies, Slavery, and the Slave Trade** Notes: pg 440-448 MI - The slave trade influenced the development of African states both politicly and socially.

Details:
 * Europeans justified slavery - there was already slavery in that continent.
 * Slavery varied from peasent slavery -> chattel slavery - property with a soul
 * In Africa all land owned by Ruler - slavery only way for individuals to increase in wealth and status
 * *** Slaves used as servants, concubines, soldiers, administrators, and field workers.** *
 * Slaves usually denied choice about their lives and actions, rare cases slaves attained position of command and trust.
 * Women used to extend amount of slaves.
 * Slavery = illegal for Muslims, faith practiced by nonbelievers
 * Slaves used for gold mining, and salt production in Sahara.
 * African Rulers did not enslave their own people - enslaved neighboors.

MI - "The trade in slaves is the business of kings, rich men, and prime merchants".
 * Slaving and African Politics: **

Details: MI - Through the slave trade and western influence Africa and its states were never the same again. Details: MI **-** The Dutch colonies created conflicts between Africans and Europeans
 * States of central and Western Africa = small and fragmented
 * Led to instability -> competition = constant warfare to increase territory
 * Endless Wars - promoted military
 * Sale of slaves an extension of politics in Africa.
 * Through European goods such as firearms, iron, horses, cloth, tobacco, and other goods allowed African states to expend their neighbors and enslave more Africans.
 * More slaves = more guns to get more slaves.
 * Endless war
 * East Africa and the Sudan**
 * Indian Ocean trading continued in Swahili coast, adjusting to military presence of the Portuguese and Ottaman Turks.
 * Trade brought in - ivory, gold, and slaves
 * Europeans established some plantation-style colonies
 * 1860s Zanzibar had slave population of 100,000.
 * Not much is known about the interior of east africa
 * Dynasties were created in Africa.
 * Begining in the 1770s - Muslim reform movements swept Sudan
 * Islam influenced the Fulani - pastrold people across western sudan
 * White Settlers and African Settlers un Southern Africa:**

Details:
 * Southern part of Africa - barely affected by Slave Trade
 * Rain favoralbe for agriculture in the south
 * Complex system that involved migration, peaceful contacts, and warfare.
 * Byt 16th century, banktu speakers occupied much of the regions in Southern Africa.
 * Practiced agriculture and herding
 * Worked iron and cooper tools, weapons, and adornments
 * traded with neighbors
 * Villages contained as much as 200 people
 * Men worked as artisans and herders, women did farming and housework

MI - Major changes were taking place among the Nguni peoples, as the Zulu rose to power
 * The Mfecane and the Zulu rise to Power:**

Details:
 * New military organization had emerged
 * 1818 leadership fell to Shaka.
 * Shaka - brilliant military tactician, with iron discipline
 * Introduced new tactics such as short stabbing spears for close combat
 * Fighting men only allowed to marry after service was done
 * Growing Zulu state
 * his cruelty brought enemies among his own people.
 * assasinated in 1828
 * Zulu remained most impresive African military force to the end of the century.
 * mfecane - wars of crushing and wandering
 * Zulu wars in 1870 Zulu was finally crushed by Great Britain.