Chapter 20.3

1. Chapter 20.3 The Atlantic Slave Trade

2. Causes • The Americas • Need for cheap labor source: Sugar and Tobacco • Native Americans (original labor source) die from European diseases • Why didn’t Africans die? • Profitability of industries (sugar, tobacco, mining, coffee, cotton) is a “pull” factor • Africa • Drought and famine in Africa results in selling of children and adults into slavery • Warfare and enslavement: response to European demand • African merchants and rulers willing role to sell its people • Supply and demand (for products and labor)

3. Slavery in Africa • Slavery not a new concept • 7th century (600s) spread of Islam increases slave trade • Across the Sahara, the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean • Justification for • Muslim belief non-Muslim prisoners can be bought and sold • b/t 650 -1600 17 million Africans transported throughout Muslim land in North Africa

4. Slavery in Africa Cont… • African and Muslim Societies allow • Slaves’ rights and upward mobility • Muslim slaves have positions of power and serve in military • African slaves may marry into family of slave owner

5. Africa’s Role • Euro traders wait at ports • Local rulers and merchants capture Africans to sell • Exchange humans for gold, guns, and goods • Profits lure more rulers

6. Contributors to Slave Trade • Portugal and Spain lead way • Colonization of Americas kills off native population • African’s Advantage over Native Americans: • Exposure to Euro’s diseases and animals • Experienced farmers • Escape less likely • Skin color (you are a slave!)

7. Contributors by Volume • England: • From 1690 to abolishment leading carrier • 1.7 million to colonies in West Indies • 400,000 to North American colonies • Portugal: • 17th century more than 40% to Brazil • French, Dutch, Spanish • Danish least amount

8. Mapping the Contributors

9. Mapping the Volume

10. Triangular Trade • Triangular Trade crisscrossed northern and southern colonies, West Indies, England, Europe, and Africa • The first stage : • Take manufactured goods from Europe to Africa: cloth, spirit, tobacco, beads, shells, metal goods, and guns. • Guns were used to help expand empires and obtain more slaves. Goods were exchanged for African slaves. • The second stage of the • The Middle Passage involved shipping the slaves to the Americas. • The third stage • Involved returning to Europe with the products of the slave-labor: cotton, sugar, tobacco, molasses and rum.

11. Mapping the Trade

12. The Middle Passage • Humans are “cargo” on a slave ship • Theory: majority of deaths occurred during the middle passage – • Result of malnutrition and disease • Survival Rate for the Middle Passage • Estimated death rate of around 13% • Lower than the mortality rate for seamen, officers and passengers on the same voyages

13. Population Shift • Result of the slave trade on colony populations: • Five times as many Africans arrived in the Americas than Europeans. • David Eltis 1893: • By 1820: 8.4 million African immigrants to Americas • 2.4 million Europeans • Euro population however exceeds African’s by 11 million • Sex ratios: more men then women • Survival and reproduction of Africans dramatically lower • Fertility rates low/mortality rates high • Location, location, location • Geography: most slaves settled in low-lying tropical areas • General mortality rate in areas higher than temperate regions

14. Culture Survives • Cultural heritage survives as way of coping • Forms of Resistance • Slow work • Escaping • Revolts: Spanish, Brazilian, North American, and West Indies colonies • Stone Rebellion • South Carolina 1739