Period 4 (1450-1750) Aim: How did demand for labor increase and change as a result of

demand for agriculture?

Overview: Traditional Peasant AgriculturePlantations expanded• Demand for labor increased. • These changes both fed and responded to growing

global demand for raw materials and finished products.

• Slavery in Africa continued both the traditional incorporation of slaves into households and the export of slaves to the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean.

• The growth of the plantation economy increased the demand for slaves in the Americas.

• European colonization and introduction of European agriculture and settlement practices in the Americas often affected the physical environment through deforestation and soil depletion. WHY?

Coerced Labor• Colonial economies in the Americas depended on a range of

coerced labor (chattel, indenture, encomienda, hacienda)

• Chattel slavery, also called traditional slavery, named because people treated as the personal property (chattel) of owner, bought and sold as if they were commodities.

• Indentured Servitude- was a form of debt bondage, established in the early years of the American colonies and elsewhere. Way for poor teenagers in Britain and the German states to get free passage to the American colonies. Work for a fixed number of years, then be free to work on their own. Employer purchased the indenture from the sea captain who brought the youths over. Worked as farmers or helpers for farm wives, while some were apprenticed to craftsmen.

• Would YOU become an indentured servant? Why, why not?

Encomienda• A legal system that was employed

mainly by the Spanish crown during the Spanish colonization of the Americas to regulate Native American labor and autonomy.

• The Spanish crown granted amount of natives. Should protect natives from warring tribes and instruct them in Spanish language and Catholic faith

• They could extract tribute from the natives in the form of labor, gold, or other products. The difference between encomienda and slavery minimal. Many natives forced to do hard labor and subjected to extreme punishment and death.

• Similar to former Inca Empire system, of extracting tribute in the form of labor - Mita System

• Were natives better off or worse under Spanish?

Hacienda System• Hacienda is a Spanish word for an estate. Some haciendas were plantations, mines or factories. Many haciendas combined these productive activities. The hacienda system of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, New Granada and Peru was a system of large land holdings.

• Similar system existed on a smaller scale in the Philippines and Puerto Rico. The hacienda were developed to be self-sustaining in everything but luxuries meant for display, which were destined for the handful of people in the circle of the patrón. Similar to Medieval European eco.?

Atlantic Slave Trade - Overview• Most important link

between Africa and the Atlantic World

• Slaves sought for plantation labor

• Africans traded for manufactured goods

• Weapons traded- sometimes strengthened military forces

• Ended in 19th cen.

• Foundations of Slave Trade• Slavery was not a new concept• Bantu migrations spread

agriculture, need for labor• War captives, criminals• Some slaves worked as

administrators, soldiers, advisors• African law and society led to

slaves being seen as private investment

• Muslim merchants sold slaves in Africa, Arabia and Persia

• Merchants captured innocent people when demand was up

For 300 years, slaves were sold in West Africa & brought to America along a route across the

Atlantic Ocean known as the Middle Passage

The majority of African slaves worked in harsh conditions on sugar & indigo plantations or

in gold & silver mines

HEIGHT OF THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE

SLAVE ROUTES OUT OF AFRICA

Middle Passage• Portuguese use slaves in

Brazil’s sugar industry • Spanish colonies need labor

in Caribbean and Americas • Capture of slaves was brutal,

forced march to coast• Middle Passage: 4 to 6

weeks trans-Atlantic journey• Slave ships crowded, filthy,

chained, 50% mortality• Not enough room to stand• Some slaves attempted to

revolt or starve

The Middle Passage

What does this tell about

the motives of the

slavers?

The Middle Passage: This mid-18th cent. painting of slaves held below deck on a Spanish slave ship illustrates the horrendous conditions of the transatlantic voyage, a journey experienced by many millions of captured Africans.

The Middle Passage

Effects of Slave Trade• Social• 16 million Africans lost• Several individuals

societies devastated• Labor diverted from

Africa• Sex ratios distorted• Angola- polygamy

practiced, women take on men’s duties

• Political• Europeans introduced

firearms as trade• Firearms encouraged

some kingdoms to go to war to capture slaves

• Kingdom of Dahomey expanded

The “Coffin” Position Used Below DeskAfrican Captives Being Thrown OverboardSlave auction upon arrival in AmericaSugar plantation in Haiti

Plantation Societies• Fertile lands in the Americas

• Growing demand for sugar in Europe

• 1516- plantations established in Hispaniola

• 1530s – plantations in Brazil

• 17th cen. – English, Dutch and French plantations

• Cash crops- cotton, rice, indigo, coffee

• Plantations specialized

Regional Differences• Caribbean and S. America• Slaves fell victim to malaria

and Yellow Fever• Hard, brutal conditions• Low standards of sanitation

and nutrition• Low rates of reproduction

(mostly men)• Imported continuous

streams of slaves• ½ went to Caribbean, 1/3 to

Brazil

• N. America

• 5 % of slaves to N. America

• Disease less threatening

• Conditions less harsh

• Imported large number of females- encouraged families

In general, European merchants waited on board their ships or in fortified port cities to purchase slaves from African merchants & elites.

African slavery in the New World differed fundamentally from past instances of slavery in world history - slavery in the Americas was clearly racially based & plantation economies were the driving force.

Those who were captured & enslaved by other African peoples were seen to be outcasts & foreigners, often prisoners of war, within local villages.

From the European slavers point of view, Africans were the ideal slaves because:★Their immune systems could handle many tropical and European diseases.★They came from a largely agricultural society.★West Africa was relatively close to Brazil and the Caribbean by sea.

The long-term impact of slavery on West Africa was economic stagnation & political disruption.

Without a strong role in the Afro-Eurasian trade network, Africa was “unplugged” from world trade. The sand routes & Islamic trading networks simply destabilized & collapsed as Europeans sailed around the continent. The elimination of the Islamic & North African “middlemen of trade” created a transfer of wealth to Western Europe & devastated the economy & culture of Africa and then the Islamic world (Ottomans mostly).

This development opened the door to corruption, slavery, & later colonization of Africa. It is this time period that the continent descends into what some historians refer to the “Dark Continent” & disorder.

STATISTICS OF THE SLAVE TRADE

ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADECARRIERS DESTINATIONS

PORTUGAL 4.7 million BRAZIL 4.0 million

BRITISH NORTH AMERICA

INCLUDING THE USA

2.9 million SPANISHEMPIRE

2.5 million

SPAIN 1.6 million BRITISH WEST INDIES

2.0 million

FRANCE 1.3 million FRENCH WEST INDIES

1.6 million

NETHERLANDS 0,9 million BRITISH NORTH AMERICA

INCLUDING USA

500,000

DUTCH WEST INDIES

500,000

DANISH WEST INDIES

28,000

EUROPE AND ATLANTIC ISLANDS

200,000

SOURCE: “THE SLAVE TRADE” BY HUGH THOMAS

Resistance to Slavery• Many resisted servitude

• Some resistance mild but costly

• Sabotage, slow work, running away

• Maroons• Revolts- slaves

outnumbered others• Revolts led to fear by

owners• Most rebellions crushed• Saint-Domingue revolt led

to self-governing republic of Haiti

The Making of African American Cultural Traditions

• African traditions hard to preserve• Ships mixed Africans from different regions• American societies= mixed cultures• European languages dominated slave societies• Creole languages- mixed European and African• Combined religious elements on plantations• No institutionalized religion with hierarchies• Vodou in Haiti, Santeria in Cuba, Candomble in

Brazil

End of the Slave Trade

Denmark abolishes slave trade in 1803, followed by Great Britain (1807), U.S. (1808), France (1814), Netherlands (1817), Spain (1845)

Possession of slaves remain legal

Clandestine trade continues to 1867

Emancipation of slaves begins with British colonies (1833), then French (1848), U.S. (1865), Brazil (1888)

Saudi Arabia and Angola continue to the 1960s

Period 4 (1450-1750) Aim: How did European companies facilitate new global circulation of goods? (Atlantic Slave Trade) DO NOW: 1) How did trade change from Period 3 to Period 4?

1450- 1750

Maritime trade grows more important than Trans-Saharan trade

• Africans play vital role in global economy

• Slaves become main export

• Slave trade transforms & disrupts parts of Africa, leaves others unaffected

• European colonization

• 600-1450• Trans-Saharan trade connects

Sub-Saharan Africa• Trade empires rise: Ghana,

Mali, Songhay in W. Africa• Swahili city-states on east coast

of Africa• Gold and ivory• Many merchants and elites

convert to Islam• Large number of Africans

remain organized in kin-based tribes

How should we distribute the moral responsibility for the Atlantic slave trade?Mankind - History of all of usEpisode - Treasure, min. 32:21 - 39:00 Queen Nzingha a Mbande (c. 1583 –

December 17, 1663) - 17th century queen of the Ndongo and Matamba Kingdoms of the Mbundu people in southwestern Africa.

YouTube: CrashCourse WH - Atlantic Slave Trade

1. What was distinctive about the Atlantic slave trade? 2. What did it share with other patterns of slave owning and slave trading?3. What explains the rise of Atlantic slave trade?4. What roles did Europeans and Africans play in the unfolding of the Atlantic slave trade?5. In what different ways did the Atlantic slave trade transform African societies?

Comparing English & Spanish Colonies.

This 18th cent. French painting shows the sale of slaves at Goree, a major slave trading port in what is now Dakar in Senegal.

A European merchant & an African authority figure negotiate the arrangement, while the shackled victims themselves wait for their fate to be decided.

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