Talk:Atlantic slave trade/Archive 1

Nonsensical Sentence
The following sentence in the intro does not make sense, could someone delete or edit it?; "Some contemporary historians estimate that 12 million availability of African slaves at affordable prices (beginning in the early 18th century for these colonies) resulted in a shift away from Indian slavery."

European raiding parties, what a joke. How do fourty men raid a continent and capture 400? Also, The North African Muslims owned and sold many slaves, and played a huge roll in the availablity of african slaves, yet there is not one time that these kind and gentle people are mentioned.

African Slaves is a term used to describe what it is, no need to get picky about how things are worded in the european language you write and read in. Also, would you go and beat up your car or horse? No, you spend good money on possessions, and you want to get the most for your dollar. American slave owners are for the most part victims of anti-slavery propaghanda. I am not saying that slavery was right, I am saying that slave owners werent whipping every slave they owned. Only the trouble makers, and if you look at modern day statistics, African American males under fourty years old, represent the majority of trouble making. Were their ancestors who didn't even get a chance to learn how to read more inclined to be docile? Maybe some of them, but not all.

Opening definition needs work
The Atlantic slave trade was going on for about 100 years before the first slaves were brought to the Americas. Plus, it was not started by the Spanish, and the process of obtaining slaves was far more complex than simply saying they were "kidnapped." So perhaps a more encompassing introduction would be appropriate. M.J.Willett 20:37, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Over-biased?
The introduction makes the important and under-appreciated point that slavery existed in Africa before Europeans arrived and "industrialized" slavery, but seems to be stepping over a line into offensiveness when it claims that slaves' lives were improved by slavery versus poorhouses.

Mockery of the African Holocaust
Please sign your remarks, so we know who you are. To compare Slavery in the Americas or the trade in Africans by Europeans to scattered loose forms of bondage found in Africa is perverted. The reality of systems of enslavement or bondage was not a venture "industrialized" by Europeans it was a system invented and perpetuated by Europeans against African people. It destroyed language, religion and culture. It erroded identities and ethnicities, devalued human beings into commodities--chattel. I would appreciate some respect be shown. I would love to see you making these statements on the Jewish Holocaust site. Where in the European trade was the so-called slave a member of the family, or could become the king of a country re: Sunni Ali Ber? Some so-called slaves in Africa were rich; they owned land and were legal administrators of territories. Dare to compare.--Halaqah 12:51, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

This often resulted in a better socio-economic position and survival rate than the poorest freeborn (e.g. in poorhouses), who often also suffered cruelties including physical punishments that many                                                          slaves were spared.

Look at the above. Has any read about the survival rate of a slave in islands such as Barbados, they had a life expectancy of 15 years. It was cheaper to work them to death than care for them. --Halaqah 12:56, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

References Please
i Have counted 3 proper references in this entire article 2 come from my additions. I have added numerous calls for references, It isnt that i disagree with the submission but we must always site sources to keep this page "worthy" the first thing people would say "it isnt valid" "where is the source" to keep it on the mark please please please use references to anything you add (especially when you know people will attack it)--Halaqah 13:01, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Resistance
I have always noticed how abolishment of slavery is sold as a "white" project. There needs to be a section discussing African resistance and also the truth behind the so-called abolishment of slavery. Myth has it that is was a moral move on the part of the European powers, reality offers a different situation; The end of the Arab slave trade by the European powers also had other agendas, namely the leveling of the playing field to allow the industrial revolution. If Arabs and others were allowed to profit from slavery it would disrupt Europe's economic edge and political persuasion in their industrialization designs.--Halaqah 13:07, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. This section begins with the name of Wilberforce. I think these people deserve recognition, but the section must begin with the efforts of Africans to liberate themselves. In reframing the context, I believe it will be important to include the impact of the Haitian Revolution, South Carolina's Stono Rebellion, Jamaica's maroons, Brazil's quilombos and other events. Each of these events/entities were arguably more critical than the work of white abolitionists. --Temple3 14:41, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Do not remove links
Sankofa is one of the most profound films on the Atlantic Slave trade, even more respected than Roots. I know you dont know this but then you should with out reason start chopping links just because you see them selling something. Why on Gods earth did you delete African Holocaust, which is dedicated to the transatlantic slave trade, you google it thats what comes up. Maybe you dont like their politics. Why dont you delete PBS, arent they OVERTLY COMMERCIAL AS WELL? Its funny how Sankofa is commercial and PBS isnt. --Halaqah 16:58, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Identifying the language of an oppressor
Let me show anyone reading something There is an excellent article on the topic of language that is on the black people page. linguistics blah blah cant remember.
 * Africans would capture other Africans: Only Europeans with an agenda would write this. Would you say this about a Eurpean conflict.
 * black slaves/African slaves: They werent slaves they were people or captives. they were not by any defintion slaves like corn waiting to be picked. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Halaqah (talk • contribs) 13:31, 6 December 2006 (UTC).

Its pretty clear that whomever has been editing this page has a pretty racist agenda. I am researching for a paper and hoped that I could find something useful here...I was wrong. If I want to read a racist anti-white rant I'll go to the nation of Islam website.Terriga 06:35, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

PLease note that your edits will be reverted if you make silly changes based upon your POV, this page has been worked on by a diverse group of people and we will not have you without any evidence disturbing it, clearly you have an agenda from your above statement and that agenda isnt welcomed here. Unless u have serious evidence do not alter anything here!--Halaqah 07:47, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Minority of Africans involved
If it wasnt a minority then who were the people being shipped ? they must have been the majority, this is logic. One king selling 2000 people is a minority of Africans involved in the trade. A majority were not trading another majority into slavery. By this estimate 10 million people would have needed 5 million people to be slavers. Or 10 million people sold into slavery would mean 20 million did the selling. A minority of Jews worked for Hitler, A minority of Native Americans worked for the French. A minority of Africans helped the whites invade Zulu land. A minority of Chinese allowed China to be annexed by the Khans. This is the constant logic of history. --Halaqah 07:58, 9 December 2006 (UTC)


 * There's a world of difference when this minority is the one in power, and remains so. When the king of Dahomey or Asante sells a couple thousand sub-saharan africans (more like a couple tens of thousands, which in the case of Dahomey are probably done for anyway), it's not Joe Public who's doing it, it's the government. 74.13.207.139 14:32, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

U need to look at who helped the French in expanding into North America, And who helped the Khans into the gates of China, it is always the leadership. The leadership is who you seduce in the art of war called betrayal, It was the leaders of the Jewish community, not the scrapper on the street. War is about logical victory and the course of success is the art of seduction. I am stealing words from somewhere, but the point is a few kings where not the governors of the terroritories, one gun in the hands of one man, doesnt form the statement "africans sold africans to Europeans", and nowhere can you show it was any significant majority of Africans, adding to that the social conditions which forced people into the dilemma of sell or be sold. The role of the oppressor as Maulana Karenga says is to reassign blame for the oppression against others, all oppressors do this. YOu dont have the figures read the letters of Alfonso and Umara Tall and see what was going on, using politics to divide and conquere, now african r left to harbour blame.--Halaqah 19:32, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
 * The wording under debate is whether a sentence should say many or a minority "of African kings and merchants" were involved. There is nowhere that it states that the majority of the entire population was involved. - SimonP 21:05, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Halaqah you shouldnt be allowed to voice your opinion, If white people wanted to kill every last nigger they owned in the 1800's if that was the will of those people then there was really nothing to stop them. The fact of the matter is, that white people really did let you all go, based off of a moral descision, perpetuated by anti-slavery propaghanda. Too bad your grandparents didnt hop on the boat to Liberia when they had the chance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 13ill Lumbergh (talk • contribs) 08:45, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Jews and the African Slave Trade
I'm in the process of looking in to this, but MUCH more research needs to be done about the VERY prominent role that these Charleston Jews played in the African slave trade, the slave trade which was overwhelmingly centered in the city of Charleston in North America (especially after The American North became increasingly abolitionist-oriented) until about 1807, when the slave trade was outlawed (though it certainly continued, albeit quietly).

Also, South Carolina eventually had more African slaves living in the state than non-slaves (as Wikipedia says: "For most of its history, black slaves made up a majority of South Carolina's population.") and the slave owners constantly feared a large slave-uprising or insurrection; indeed, even in modern times African-Americans are about 1/3 the population of the state of South Carolina, possibly a bit more.

It seems that wherever there was a very early North or South American synagogue or large Jewish presence you also find a prominent slave market, both in North and South America (along with the Caribbean and North Africa). All evidence points to the fact that it was a very large role that Jews played -- not to mention the fact that many of these Sephardic Jews hailed from the Netherlands (after being expelled from Spain/Portugal), and everyone knows that the Dutch played a huge part in the African slave trade (History of the Jews in the Netherlands), and that they had been recently expelled from Spain and Portugal (Alhambra decree), but the crypto-Jews remained -- Spain and Portugal were both THE dominant shipping powers around this time. The oldest synagogue in North or South America was established in 1636 (the Kahal Zur synagogue in the Dutch capital of Recife, Brazil). Eventually Brazil had more African slaves than any other place on Earth. There were also many Sephardic Jews living in North Africa (a traditional Sephardi area) which served as a jumping off point where the slaves were gathered (see Triangular trade) by both local Arabs and these Sephardi Jew collaborators and then shipped to North or South America.

There was also an amazingly large slave market in Newport, Rhode Island, which is the site of the oldest synagogue in North America (Touro Synagogue); check out these stats: "As early as 1708 African slaves outnumbered indentured servants in Rhode Island eight to one. In fact, between 1705 and 1805, Rhode Island merchants [could they be Jews owing to the first synagogue there?] sponsored at least 1,000 slaving voyages to West Africa and carried over 100,000 slaves back to America.  More slave ships would leave Colonial Newport than any other American port of that time.  By 1770, one out of every three Newport families owned at least one slave".

Does anyone have any reliable links or book recommendations so that we can write a section about this on the page? I've found many but am looking for more. Thank you. --Pseudothyrum 02:36, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
 * The allegations of heavy Jewish involvement in the slave trade are both old and throughroughly discredited. There is overwhelming evidence that Jews, while involved, were peripheral both to the slave trade and in slave ownership. The most recent text in this area is Eli Farber's well regarded Jews, Slaves, and the Slave Trade. He finds that throughout the Americas Jews were less likely than average to be slave owners and played only minimal roles as investors in or operators of the slave trade. - SimonP 03:03, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Surely you do not base you argument on only a handful of sources, as there haven't even been a dozen reliable books written in English on the subject yet; SimonP: does this one book, one view, one author answer ALL of the questions regarding this topic? Be reasonable now: surely it does not...  --Pseudothyrum 11:08, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

We should not fear exploring this topic. But I think both views are inaccurate, they were not heavily involved and they also did not play a minimum role. I think the problem is focusing on their Jewishness, they were more European than Jew, and their Jewish religion did not help nor hinder their role in slaving, so the entire study is distorted when we say Jews involved in slaving. We can say blue eyed people involved in slaving. The reason is it wasnt on account of being a Jew that made them slavers, thats just a POV i got. But as part of European society they would have been involved no more or less as their numbers in the population allowed, to say they did is biased to say they didnt is biased because it isolates them as either "devils" or "gods" they were people who lived in a slaving culture and some of them, like everyone else would have got involved. I strongly disagree with the conspiracy that they ploted and i also disagree with "minimum" because suggest their religion influenced their involvement--and it didnt. see Tony Martin for Jews and Slavery I really think there is dishonesty on bothsides, but i dont think Tony Martin has ill intent, he is not a antijew, --HalaTruth(ሀላካሕ) 12:45, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

The Jews, particularly the Sephardic Jews - many who were Crypto Jews throughout the Caribbean and Latin Americas DID PLAY A HUGE ROLE IN THE TRANS-ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE!!!! Next year 2007, it will all be revealed, when we Commemorate the Abolition of the Slave Trade in Britain. Oliver Cromwell allowed the Jews re-entry into Britain in 1656 for International Trading. All the Sephardic Jews (Spanish and Portuguese origins), were Merchants, trading in Slaves - Shipowners, Plantation Owners, Agents, Brokers - networking with Dutch (DWIC and DEIC), and their families - where they had shareholdings. They networked throughout the Trans-Atlantic Slave Routes. After gaining compensation from the Caribbean for the ending of slavery many emigrated to America where slavery took hold much later and they brought their accumulated wealth and knowledge there, where slavery was still legal. (South Africa, was the modern day remnant of the whole system.)

There is plenty of evidence in Archives. They even Anglicized their names when they were given British Naturalisation in 1660's. Hashem will reveal in due course!!!!Lost 10tribes 11:45, 24 December 2006 (UTC) Lost_10tribes.

Many countries where Jews inhabit covering the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Routes have been celebrating 350years of Religious Freedom and coincides with their SLAVE TRADING!!!!!Lost 10tribes 12:09, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

This is very intresting, now what you have to do is put in in an encyclopedic context and bring your sources and it can be added here, its that simple.But you have to respect why you will have to do your homework and bring real sources and ref for all statements.--HalaTruth(ሀላካሕ) 12:42, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
 * The problem is that many sources are still buried in archives and have somehow been 'lost'; much information has mysteriously disappeared from university archives over time (especially in America and Europe). --Pseudothyrum 11:52, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * You all are correct -- all of the information is becoming quite clear and the evidence is beyond overwhelming; it's a rather simple puzzle, it's just that the information is so scattered about and is found in so many different languages and archives. For the North American slave-trade I again point to the VERY LONG and MAJOR Jewish presence in Charleston, South Carolina, USA (see History of the Jews in Charleston, South Carolina for a TINY bit of info) which was eventually the indisputable capital of North American slavery. In Europe (mostly the UK and the Netherlands where they were settled in large numbers after they were expelled from Spain/Portugal post 1492), the large Jewish presence in both North Africa (Arab) and what was to eventually become South Africa, and the large Jewish presence in Brazil, South America, and the Caribbean throughout the 1500s and beyond (Spain's domain; Spain was where hundreds of thousands of Jews were expelled from in 1492 during the Inquisition).


 * Most of all don't forget the Triangular trade, and remember that these expelled Jews were heavily represented in all of these geographical areas and in the major port-cities of these regions (wherever they settled in any substantial numbers throughout their history, Jews have traditionally settled near or around ports, especially in vastly underdeveloped places as the harsh interiors of these places are too underdeveloped and not conducive to commerce). Also, Brazil soon became a Portuguese colony, and remember that after the Jews were expelled from Spain, many of them ended up in Portugal (they were soon expelled from Portugal too, though).  This Jewish presence largely explains Portugal's naval/economic power during this time period; when the Jews later moved on, Portugal dropped off the map again as far as world-wide powers go.


 * Owing to their wide dispersal and shipping/economic expertise, the Jews seemed to be the main organizers and orchestraters and not the ones that actually kidnapped the slaves or the people with the whips on the ship; they simply put it all together owing to the fact that Sephardic Jews lived in all the key areas associated with the slave trade and have always been associated with shipping, commerce (especially international commerce), and port-cities.


 * Finally, remember that these were overwhelmingly Sephardic Jews that were involved in the African slave trade; the Ashkenazi Jews at this time were still living in very closed off communities (mostly in the Eastern and Central European Pale of Settlement) when all of this was taking place, though there were certainly more than a few Ashkenazis (the ones that had left the Pale of Settlement) working with their Sephardic brethren owing to the fact that they hailed from the same 'tribe.'


 * Also, you're not liable to find much on the internet about all of this. Much of it seems conveniently 'censored' on the web (to put it lightly...) or is simply not found on it owing to the obscurity of the material involved in research; but as others have written here, archives are finally opening up a bit and this of course helps (we need more BOOKS on this subject!). There have only been a handful of books written on this subject (certainly not enough to base any definitive conclusions on), and the people who wrote them may have had certain 'agendas,' trying to hide a few things in the interests of 'tribal loyalty' shall we say -- but if you examine the logic of this whole complicated enterprise you will discover that it fits together perfectly, like a simple puzzle that I wrote before.


 * All we need now is someone that can speak 15th-16th-17th-18th-19th Century English, Spanish, Dutch, Sub-Saharan African languages, Arab/North African languages, Portuguese, and other languages and has the resources and time to travel all over the Western hemisphere (about 4 continents!) and study these archives (the North African and European archives may well prove most useful, as it seems that much North American material regarding the Jews' involvement in the African slave trade has somehow been 'lost' over time), even though Jews by and large are excellent keepers of records and always have been. Not to blatantly announce, but certain American archives have had some of this information 'plundered' -- much of it has simply disappeared (as of early 2007) when we KNOW that it once existed. This is especially found in the universities of the American South, where many of these records are now held owing to the previous prevalence of slavery there. Who are/were the people in charge of these archives/libraries now and in the past?  Where has this information gone?  --Pseudothyrum 11:08, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Again, correlation does not equal causation. Even if you can show that Jews lived in places known for slave trading, that is correlation.  To show causation you'll need more.  Good luck.Pfly 09:06, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews are very much like Catholic and Protestants. Both are Jews but are separate bodies interpreting Judaism in their own unique ways. The Ashkenazi are viewed as Converts to Judaism as opposed to the Sephardi Jews who are viewed as Middle Eastern descendants who often speak Arabic, Portuguese, some African dilects and Hebrew. (Very useful in the trans-Atlantic Trade.) Most Jews do not deny Jewish involvement in the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. It's just the unspoken topic amongst them. Yes, much of the documentation is concealed but they are great record keepers as it comes with the Jewish territory. They did own slaves in Brazil (source:) Unfortunately for Africans they were sold into slavery by their BROTHERS. Just as Joseph was sold into slavery by his same BROTHERS. Lets hope that in finally airing the Truth we can all heal from the deep seated wounds of the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.Lost 10tribes 02:16, 26 January 2007 (UTC) For further clarity, I mean Black Africans were SOLD INTO SLAVERY by their White JEWISH BROTHERS, just as they sold JOSEPH their OWN BROTHER into Slavery. SELAH!!!! Lost 10tribes 04:10, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but outside obscure references and massive leaps in logic provided by Tony Martin, and the Nation of Islam, the evidence clearly points towards a minority of Jewish slave-traders and slave-owners. Counting every merchant coming out of Portugal or Brazil as a white Jew is just absurd. 67.87.223.102 05:31, 7 May 2007 (UTC)Shvetz
 * Of course it is, but we really shouldn't get that debate (if you want to call it so) running again. Malc82 08:38, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

End of the slave trade
I don't think the explanation given for the abolition of the Atlantic Slave Trade is either adaquate or entirely correct.

Inadaquate, because uncited, and apparently original research. The claim that "slave revolts were the chief factor inducing the end of the slave trade" is undocumented, and I am uncomfortable with the assertion.

I don't believe it's even a correct assertion. The reason the US abolishes the slave trade in 1808 is because that date had been set 20 years before at the Constitutional Convention -- prior to the Haitian revolt. I know that during the 1850s, there were proposals by many in the South to resume the slave trade; this is inconsistent with a fear of revolt by the slaveholders being the cause for the abolition. The factions in the UK and the US who were most adamant against the slave trade were abolitionists; who I believe were not motivated by fear of revolt.

In addition, the governments of Latin America, who rely on slaves far more than Denmark, moved relatively more slowly towards abolition.

I am interested in researching and revising that section; thoughts?

Asrabkin 20:24, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

there is a pattern in history books to glorify the actions of Europeans, thus African liberation is marked by charity from white people. slavery and revolt and the cost of continuation of enslaving was not worth it, with the coming of the industrial revolution slavery decreased. Just like African were denied ownership of their lives they were denied ownership of their liberation. but the history books say that slavery in Africa was ended because of some over night "morality".--HalaTruth(ሀላካሕ) 00:11, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
 * There are two main schools of thought on this issue. One is that of Eric Williams and his successors, who argue that the slave trade was ended because it had ceased to be economically beneficial, and may actually have been harming the economic position of the colonial plantation owners. The opposing view, advanced by scholars such as Seymour Drescher and Robert Antsey, is that the slave trade remained profitable until the end, and that it was the lobbying efforts of abolitionists and the growing distaste of the British public for the trade that led to its abolition. I have never heard fear of revolt advanced as the primary cause of abolition, though it certainly was a contributing factor. - SimonP 00:28, 2 January 2007 (UTC)


 * revolt was a serious contributing factor, not the prime, it was a combination, clearly we know why they would leave this out. but eric williams view is the more popular."Williams’s study set out the explore the impact of African slavery on British economic development", i think we can even see in our times re: anti-war that simple lobbying has little effect. the moral plea is being viewed for what it is--a joke. this year is the year for this discussion. logic alone shows that profit and politics never oppose each other.and colonialism follows the same pattern.--HalaTruth(ሀላካሕ) 00:40, 2 January 2007 (UTC)


 * The statement: “Virtually every major reform pertaining to the abolition of the slave trade and slavery took place in the immediate aftermath of a major armed rebellion and/or victory by enslaved or formerly enslaved Africans.” is simply not true. Especially as the article only cites the Haitian Revolution.
 * Not only did slavery continue in neighboring states for nearly 100 years in some cases, but the article incorrectly implies that abolitionist movements only occur after this revolution. Opposition to slavery (within Britain, France, Spain and the US) predates the Haitian revolution.


 * At fist that opposition was largely propounded by individuals; from the 1750s abolitionist organizations came into existence.


 * By the time of Haitian Revolution occurred (1791) the US states Vermont (1777), Pennsylvania (1780), Massachusetts (1783), New Hampshire (1783), Connecticut (1784) and Rhode Island (1784) had all formally abolished slavery.  In Europe (if not their colonies) abolition occurred in England (1772), Scotland (1776) and Portugal (1761).


 * Abolition in these states/countries did not occur because of “a major armed rebellion” but rather because of the changes in public opinion within them. Jalipa 22:48, 4 February 2007 (UTC)


 * "Morality" was clearly not the only cause of Abolition and maybe not the main one, but slave rebellions? Slave rebellions occured since the very beginnings of slavery. The Haitian Revolution actually didn't hurt slave traders at all, because with the sudden breakdown of the world's biggest producer of sugar cane, parts of Brazil enjoyed a boom, thus enormously increasing the demand for slaves over a few years. Please try to check facts before presenting them.
 * I would suggest that it was a function of growing abolitionist movements, mainly in not slave-dependent areas (like New England or the English mainland) and declining importance of the cash crops produced by slaves for overall economy. Note also that in England for example, the slave trade was abolished in 1807, but owning slaves was allowed until 1833.
 * Africans played a significant role in that more and more testimony of their suffering became public, thus helping abolitionist movements. I'm not aware of any authority on the subject who claims that rebellions were a main cause.Malc82 19:55, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Rewrite tag for "End of slavery"-section
Just added a complete rewrite tag to this section of the article. Reasonss for that are:
 * the whole section doesn't name a single reference
 * it contains original research and far-from-consensus claims (as discussed in this section)
 * a much shorter section would do, there already is a long article on Abolitionism], so some wrap-up paragraph would be enough. Malc82 20:56, 2 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Finally replaced it with a very NPOV, very short paragraph and link to the main article. Malc82 20:20, 30 June 2007 (UTC)


 * This discussion was continued in the "End of Slavery II" - section of this talk page. Malc82 21:11, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

More refernces needed
This article needs much more refs--HalaTruth(ሀላካሕ) 00:13, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Indian slavery
I just edited and replaced some text on Indian slavery and why Africans became the common slaves in America. In particular I edited this paragraph:

''To build the New World, European nations enslaved many of the natives of the New World, but they were not suitable because they were already sick or dying from diseases that the Europeans brought over. The Europeans needed to find an exploitable workforce elsewhere. They chose African slaves for a number of reasons: They were experienced in the type of work required on New World plantations (rice growing, cotton farming, etc.), used to the climate and more resilient to the diseases of the area.''

While it is true that large numbers of Indians died from disease, so too did large numbers of Africans. The death rates during the Middle Passage were very high. Even after major epidemics there were still plenty of Indians that could be and were enslaved. Most European colonies were at the mercy of the Indians, who far outnumbered and overpowered the colonists well into the 18th century. That geopolitical reality explains the reluctance of using Indians as slaves -- during the 17th century, when Indian slavery was the norm in South Carolina, Virginia, New York, and New England, the inter-tribal slave-raiding warfare that was required repeatedly led to large-scale Indian rebellions, which almost destroyed each of these colonies. By the start of the 18th century it was clear that what was needed was less chaos and warfare along the colonial frontiers. It wasn't that the Indians were dying or didn't make "good" slaves, but rather that the Indian nations were too powerful to continue exploiting. Up through the middle 18th century Europeans actively sought friendship and alliance with as many tribes as they could. It wasn't until France was out of the picture in North America that the Indians lost their strategic political value.

In addition, the Africa slave trade was at first mostly devoted to supply slave labor to the sugar plantations of the West Indies and Brazil. The value of sugar far outweighed anything being produced with slaves elsewhere in the Americas, and the demand for labor on the sugar plantations was huge and constantly growing. Africa slaves were simply not available in quantity north of the Carribean before the 18th century. The founders of South Carolina came from Barbadoes and brought some African slaves with them from there. But even in early South Carolina, Indian slaves were the norm -- usually being exported to the sugar islands. But during the early 18th century the labor demands in the West Indies slowed, the scale of the Africa trade increased, and the British gained control of the Africa trade. Add to this the near destruction of New England, Virginia, and South Carolina, by Indians, during the late 17th century and early 18th, and the result was the rapid replacement of Indian slavery with African.

In other words, the story that Indians made poor slaves seems to me to be the kind of simple myth that explains something more complex and not well known or understood.

As for this part: ''The Europeans needed to find an exploitable workforce elsewhere. They chose African slaves for a number of reasons: They were experienced in the type of work required on New World plantations (rice growing, cotton farming, etc.)'' -- The Europeans didn't look around for some people to enslave instead of Indians and decide on Africans. The history is much more complex than that. It so happened that the African slave trade boomed while the Indian slave trade turned out to be extremely dangerous and politically suicidal. So the one slave trade replaced the other simply because it worked better. Also, the skills that the Africans had with rice was not something the Europeans needed. Rice growing in the New World came about because African slaves with knowledge about how to grow rice were brought there. The case of cotton is even less logical. Cotton was not a crop of note in the Americas until the 19th century, well after the establishment of African slavery. It doesn't make sense to say Europeans "decided" to enslave Africans for their skill with cotton cultivation.

This above text is mainly on North America and the Caribbean, but I believe the same general argument holds for Brazil, while Mexico was never a major center of African slavery -- Indian slavery lasted there for a long time, as it did in Peru.

Anyway, I just wanted to explain my edits to the page. I am short on time and did not provide references, but can as needed later. There are some good ones on the Indian slavery page. Pfly 03:31, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

challenge
I have a problem with you deleting that statement. First off, and please believe i mean no disrespect, you don't sound that knowledgible on the dynamics of the African slave trade. You do however sound very knowledgible on Native American histroy of the period and that's something this site and page can benefit from.

Europeans DID seek Africans who knew agriculture and mining (that's why certain slave markets sent more people than others). You have a lot of Akan and Gbe (Mina to be exact) slaves brought to central and south america because the spanish needed people who were miners in their old country. The pre-colonial african states like Asante (an Akan group) used slave labor for the exact same thing and thus had a ready market of slaves for easy purchase. For more info on this you can look at Gwendolyn Midlo Hall's Slavery and African Ethnicities. Furthermore, the vast majority of slaves brought to the Americas (both north and south) were farming societies whereas most of the Native Americans (no discredit to them) were hunter/gathers. Slave purchasers purposely sought out slaves for rice growing and cotton cultivation like the Mende for instance (hence the large population of them in Louisiana and much of the southeast according to slave registers throughout the slave trade). From an economic standpoint it was cheaper to buy African slaves as opposed to Native American slaves (who were also sold thoughout the Americas as i'm sure you know) because you didn't have to train them to perform the task.

The other major point on why I think the original statement should remain is that European disease was a bigger factor than war in shifting from Native slavery to African slavery in both north and south america. The Native Americans were not weak, but they were less tolerant to the european diseases in comparison to their African counterparts. This assertion is backed up by virtually every book on thie subject. This is NOT some urban legend or assumption made by contributors to wikipedia. If the Africans died off from European diseases at the same rate as say Taino natives, it would have been rediculous to buy them when they could have spent less money raiding one of the many natives in the area. The Europeans were going to make war on the Natives anyway so writing off the shift as a need to stay friendly with the indians is nonsense.

I hope you see where i'm coming from on this and keep an open mind to what i've written here. I'm not going to put back the statement you deleted just yet cuz i hope we all can come to a compromise on the subject before we start editing each other's stuff all willynilly. Thanks for your time Scott Free 20:18, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi -- I do see your points. Here's my thoughts-- I can believe that Europeans sought out Africans with particular skills and experience. The trouble I had with the statement was that its wording implied that the Europeans chose to start enslaving Africans instead of Indians, or anyone else, because of African experience in growing rice, cotton, etc. Perhaps I read too much into it and the Europeans merely chose to start using the already existing African slave trade system on a much larger scale. Also, unless I'm mistaken, the African slave trade across the Atlantic was well established before rice became a New World staple (first about 1710 in South Carolina, I think) and long before cotton did (end of the 1700s?). Indian slavery was in sharp decline or gone completely by the era of rice and cotton plantations. The statement seemed to imply that these kinds of plantations were well established in the New World before Indian slavery declined and African slavery began.


 * With mining, I don't know. My understanding was that Indian slaves were used in the Mexican mines for a long time. I don't know about Peru though. New World sugar plantations go way back, and I could believe that Africans with experience with sugar (or at least farm work in general) were sought. But were Africans sought instead of Indians for working the sugar plantations? My sense is no-- while the natives of the sugar islands were rapidly wiped out and African slaves brought in, Indian slaves were also imported to the West Indies until the end of Indian slavery in the early 1700s. Before 1715, South Carolina exported more Indian slaves than imported African. Nearly all of the Indian slaves were exported to the sugar islands of the West Indies -- about 50,000 between 1670-1715.


 * On the topic of Africans being farmers and Indians being hunter-gatherers -- the Indians of the American Atlantic and Gulf Coast regions as well as those of Mexico and Peru, were farmers. The main food staple of early Virginia and New England was maize, the cultivation of which was taught to the English by the Indians. It involved more than just planting seeds -- forest land had to be quickly cleared for crop fields, something the English had little experience with. Also, the Spanish in Florida during the late 1600s used Indian slaves (more like serfs or indebted laborers) for the purpose of growing crops. As far as I know, very few African slaves were imported to Spanish Florida before the English destroyed it around 1705 (or more precisely, the Indian allies of the English, who did most of the destroying work). During the 1700s Indians increasingly abandoned farming for a variety of reasons, but for the first century or two of European-Indian contact, agriculture was the norm.


 * On economics, I'm not sure that African slaves were less expensive then Indian slaves before 1715 or so, outside of the sugar islands. There may have been a savings with Africans who didn't have to be trained, as you wrote, but that would be offset by a rather steep tax on African slaves and slave trading companies operating under monopolistic power. Indian slaves, in contrast, shipped from Carolina to the West Indies, were not taxed. War with France, an almost constant situation in those days, made the African slave coast dangerous and trans-Atlantic shipping risky, increasing the price of African slaves in places like Barbadoes dramatically. In contrast, South Carolina's Indian slave trade was little effected by war with the French (in fact, it helped by giving an excuse to attack French-allied tribes), and the transport to Barbadoes was relatively short and done in relatively small ships with less risk of attack. The price difference was so great that sometimes, like during Queen Anne's War, South Carolinians found they could make a profit exporting their African slaves as well as Indians. And the price difference in the northern English colonies like Pennsylvania, New York, and New England, was greater still -- up until Indian slaves were banned in the north during the early 1700s -- laws passed not because Indian slaves died easily, but because they were said to be "revengeful" and "surly", and could more easily run away and rejoin their people than could Africans. Before King Philip's War in 1676, New England had been an exporter of Indian slaves. The export stopped not because African slaves were cheaper or better, but because the Indian attack of King Philip's war nearly wiped New England out completely. And afterwards the main Indian power facing New England was the Iroquois, who far outpowered New England at the time. Thus, New England stopped exporting Indian slaves.


 * Finally, on the topic of Indians falling prey to disease-- yes, huge numbers died, up to 95% or more. I didn't mean to suggest that Indians were not less susceptible to disease than Europeans or Africans. Some Indian societies were totally eliminated by disease. Yet in general, Indians still far outnumbered Europeans in the colonies outside the sugar islands well into the 1700s. And I don't mean all Indians, but Indians living within or on the frontiers of European mainland colonies far outnumbered the Europeans and the Africans. South Carolina took a census in 1708 and found the population within the colony's borders to be just over 4,000 whites, 4,000 blacks, 1,400 Indian slaves, and 6,300 Indians within 200 miles of Charleston, over 10,000 within 300 miles, well within the colony's frontier. Just beyond that were tens of thousands more, already tightly bound into political and economic systems with the English. So, yes, epidemic disease took an unbelievable toll on the Indians, but they had a bit of a head start over the Europeans living in the New World. That the Indians continued to be the most powerful group in America can be seen in the French and Indian wars of the middle 1700s. The wars were the English fighting with the French, yet most of the actual armies and troops were Indians. In the middle 1700s in North America, if a European power wanted to make war against another, alliances with Indian powers were essential.  The Europeans were going to make war on the Natives anyway so writing off the shift as a need to stay friendly with the indians is nonsense. -- I think if you look at the political attitude of European powers toward the Indians up to the late 1700s, the need for friendly relations and alliances for the purpose of making war were essential, and a tremendous amount of money and resources were spent in order to gain the friendship of Indian powers.


 * Anyway, gotta go, I didn't mean to write this much, and I hope it comes off as friendly and open-minded as I mean to be. Sometimes I can write in a stronger tone than I intend. And I can certainly be wrong about things! Pfly 23:11, 18 January 2007 (UTC)


 * thanks for replying and you have made some very very good points. You've enlightened me on some info i didn't know and i'm glad I didn't make any changes to your statement.  whether you can believe europeans sought specific african for specific work doesn't really matter.  They did according to the books i mentioned earlier.  African slaves seemed to have been used first and foremost for labor and secondly fo agriculture.  Natives did possess farming in certain regions as you mentioned, but labor wise the africans seemed t outlast them on the mainland.  you do bring up a good point about the high mortality rate on the islands.  This can be attributed to the seasoning camps, which emloyed torture or "conditioning" on the new arrivals that weren't used on the natives.  Also, the africans were sought not only for rice or cotton cultivation but for their experience in similar work environs as well (many african slaves in the americas were also slaves in africa doing similar hard labor though under different conditions since chattel slavery didn't exist in most of sun-saharan africa).


 * I think where we both get our facts wrong is our generalizations (my bad). I forgot that many Natives were farmers in the US.  And if not for these farmers (especially in the plymouth county and carolinas) the european colonies would have never got off the ground.  The spanish in florida did bring a lot slaves prior to the 18th century.  Many of those slaves were freed in return for defending against the florida native americans. this definately feeds into your statement about the political dynamics of war/slavery with the natives.  I do believe making alliances with the natives were essential as you stated, and I also remember the catholic church stressing a conversion of the natives rather than slavery (or at least conversion while in slavery).


 * I guess the overarching theme as to the shift from native to african slavery (at least in north america) was mortality rate due to disease. But the political situation cannot be excluded and you have thoroughly swayed me into believing that it must be mentioned. I'm all ears as to what should be put in that paragraph. i also believe that the shift from native to african slavery should have its own section in the article.  Thanks 4 ur input and time.  Holla.Scott Free 14:51, 19 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry, should have consulted here before editing, but somehow I skipped this part of the discussion page. Anyway, i don't think my edits are challenging yours. Please tell me if your not happy with the changes.Malc82 20:08, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Hundreds of slave ships existed
Fighting in Haiti did not deter slaveholders in the United States from buying slaves. Slavery increased after the invention of the cotton gin in the 1790s made it possible to become rich by trading cotton. Prior to 1790, very little cotton had been traded in and shipped across the sea by American planters. The number of slaves in the United States tripled (more or less) from 1810 to 1860. Many were home-grown mixed-raced people, but many were newly-introduced fresh from Africa. The claim that fighting in Haiti affected Americans by scaring Americans is nonsense. GhostofSuperslum 10:00, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Pre-Euro slave trade & african part in Euro trade 
This article completely fails to adequately account for the slave trade existing between various tribes that existed pre-Euro, an additionally forgets the extreme roll that africans played in the trade with the Euros. Although the euro's are undoubtedly the key players in the intercontinental trade of slaves and the exploitations of slavery for purely financial purposes, the trans-atlantic slave trade that existed for almost have of the last millenium was completely fueled by the natives. '''The key thing that many people miss about this issue is that the Euro's did NOT simple turn up, kidnap natives and cart them off. The vast majority of slaves that ended up in america were intitially captured by Africans, who transported other africans to the coast, to sell them on to the white slave merchants.'''

I don't at this time have time to make substantial edits, but am ii the process of writing a thesis on the subject and will try to incorporate my findings at a later point.

Please dont see me as shifting the blame off the europeans, i am expressing the dire truth.

Feel free to talk to me, Greengiraffe 08:39, 2 February 2007 (UTC)


 * We have seen this pattern of edits which seek to blame Africans for their holocaust, clearly you wouldn’t think of doing this with the Jewish Holocaust as it would bring down the heaviest hammer imaginable. Any controversial edits and original research are not allowed and any attempt to downgrade and violate the tragedy on Africans by Europeans will be seen for what it is by this editor. everything you have said above is clearly in error and no sources what so ever exist for the above crazy statements. If you are interested in "TRUTH" then explore the social consequences of enslavement on the social development of Africans, yet you would find this kind of topic less notable. It wasnt enought to enslave and continue to brutualise African people, no the historical reduction also must also occur. --HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 11:13, 2 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Hey there, i must point out that I have no intent on verging from the dire truth of the "the social consequences of enslavement on the social development of Africans", but it saddens me to think that you, like most of the rest of the world seem to hold the belief that euro simply kidnapped africans & sent them to america. The slave trade would have been completely impossible without the intra-continental logistics by africans driving slaves. You want "sources"?. Any book on the topic by a reputable historion. Greengiraffe 04:41, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Some Africans did take part in the Slave Trade. African Kings, merchants and kidnapers actively took part. The victims did not turn up at the coastal slave forts of their own volition. Nor did Europeans conduct raids into the African interior. African slaves were sold to the Europeans by other Africans. This is well documented.

Expanding the article to cover the African slave trade before the discovery of America would be valid. Although the nature of African slavery* was quite different to American Slavery, the export of slaves from Africa pre-dates Columbus. Arab Merchants from North Africa had already developed an African Slave trade, both overland & by sea; and were probably the first to sell African slaves to the Portuguese & Spanish.


 * Thankyou. Two intelligent people. Greengiraffe 04:41, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * This article is primarily about the Atlantic slave trade rather than slavery within Africa. Jalipa 23:59, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Please see African Slave trade this article is about the Atlantic Slave trade, the first Europeans to deal in Slavery went in under Prince Henry and captured them by force. Prior to this we would be talking about a more ancient trade between North Africa and Rome, Spain etc. Many Europe nations did raid the interior i have no idea why this myth is running around. They were trading guns and fighting wars against many African nations so why would capturing Africas be so taboo? The absolute languages is very worrying "They DIDNt conduct raids". Well documented bring the documents, like 3 sources, they are also many documents of the wars Europeans funded to generate enslaved Africans. Well Documented by the Europeans is what you should say, And how will the victors write history? to make them guilty or make them look as passive as possible? When adding content we need to bear this in mind.--HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 01:12, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

History is complex
The thing about history is the the deeper you look into it, the more complex it is. The terms "European" and "African" are both extremely broad and don't always serve well in describing a centuries long, extremely large process such as the "Atlantic slave trade". There had always been slavery and slave trading in Europe and Africa, and most everywhere in the world. The kind of slavery that developed after about 1500 was dramatically different from that which existed before. Still, it is not wrong to say that the Portuguese, exploring down south of Cape Blanco, contacted and tapped into an existing trade network with Mauretanian merchants and Muslim caravans, which, in addition to a wide variety of trade goods included slaves -- perhaps a few hundred per year. The early Portuguese trading post was at Arguin Island and the slaves were sent to Lisbon, Madeira, and elsewhere, for work on estates, in galleys, etc, as was an ancient tradition. However, in the mid-1400s, Madeira underwent a sugar boom, followed by São Tomé and Príncipe and Fernando Po. On these islands the new slave systems evolved. Some key differences from the ancient system included: extensive use of mass labor for cash crops and mining, slaves as a commodity to be used up and replaced, a large system of supply at low prices, formalized debasement of slaves, links to skin color and slavery. As the New World and especially Brazil began to boom, the system expanded all the more. The Cape Verde Islands became a major trade center. While it is true that some European ships penetrated the African mainland on slave raiding missions, the mortality rate for Europeans on the mainland was far too high for any lasting colonization, except on islands and protected peninsulas. On Cape Verde and other trading centers, a mulatto population of European-African mixture rapidly developed. Mixes of Portuguese, Genoese, Castilian, Wolof, Sereer, Malinke, Joola, and others, came to dominate these trading islands. The people were, to European eyes, African or mulatto, but the culture was Portuguese and Christian. Of these mixed peoples, one type called Lançados were important slave traders -- speaking creole and several African tongues, professing to be Christian but often practicing otherwise, they became "resident brokers" on the mainland, procuring slaves from a vast network. This is in the late 1400s and early 1500s. After that, the Atlantic slave trade grew by magnitudes and the Portuguese were ousted by other powers. But the roots of the trade can be found in Portuguese 15th century places like Cape Verde, El Mina, Sao Tome, Madeira, and Brazil.

The layers of European-African mixing, with many shades in between, complicate the simplistic arguments pro or con about whether and how much Africans participated in the slave trade. Do 15th century mulattos on Cape Verde Islands, speaking Portuguese and following Portuguese customs, count as "African"? Do the lancados? Are they European? The questions are too simple for a history so complex. Pfly 08:43, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * There is one thing that isnt complex, the slavery that came with Europe transformed Africa and the rest of a World in a way that was never seen in the history of humanity. The entire subject of modern racism, the targeting of an entire "race" based on skin color was never done before. The so-called Arab trade was not an exclusive Arab enterprise and it didn’t only pick Africans. Slavery in Africa, or so-called slavery in Africa didn’t destroy Africa's potential or its economy. When its people started being shipped across the Atlantic being stripped of culture and becoming objects that was when things changed. When we look at the Exodus and see the condition of Jews in Kemet (true or false) we realize they were Jews, they had Jewish names, Jewish customs and a Jewish God. Not so the enslaved African. When we look at the Holocaust we look at those who controlled it, those who tapped it, and in Africa the who is the European. They didn’t tap into an existing system, they created a brand new one by exploiting people (they did it with India, with Native America, everywhere). No System in Africa made humans into units of trade, or removed their names and culture. This system is 100% different. Notice that with all of the transSahara trade it never had the destruction of African civilizations with it, isnt it funny that when this trade came to Africa all of the African kingdoms collapsed.

And if mixed race people are being brainwashed and used to do evil, who is the primary agent of enslavement?, the primary benefactor was the European, and this behavior saw the destruction of every single indigenous person they meet, i think legacy speaks as loud as a cannon, every single culture that they touched was destroyed and i find it funny there can ever be a discussion on who did what to who, next i bet it was the fault of the Caribbean people that the Europeans destroyed them, And the Native Americans. Everyone was just fine until they showed up.--HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 11:11, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, the transformation of the old systems of slavery into the modern diabolical one is the thing. Yes it was terrible and destructive and evil. It is hard for me to believe that the reason for the transformation was because Europeans were evil, terrible people more so than anyone else on the planet. There are evil people everywhere. It is fine to lay blame on the people who have done wrong, but it would be useful to look into contributing factors that allowed such vast evil to occur. One factor in the commodification is, I think, the rise of capitalism and mercantilism, with company stockholders never having to see firsthand the effects of their investments. Still, the local peoples who did witness and participate were not stupid. Saying the Cape Verde people of the 15th century were "brainwashed" to do dehumanize them. As for Native Americans, they too participated and collaborated with Europeans. To paint them broadly as innocent victims of European genocide is a similar dehumanization. Pfly 16:15, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Within every horror there is an element of blame, which can be put at the victims feet. The aspects of collaboration is un weighted. A woman takes a wrong turn or gets in an unmarked taxi late at night is by some arguments contributing to her rape, her action was poor in judgment. She is the victim of a rape. Native Americans were just fine before the Europeans arrived. Likewise all the civilizations Europeans destroyed. Fine means they were alive and doing what they do like all human beings. We can explain it away, or find reasons to soften the reality, call them whatever but i find it strange the destruction visited on this planet by one group of people.


 * Take a look around, no Mongol army, no Khan subjugated the entire world. If they got the chance maybe they would have. The reality is most Europeans probably didn’t take part, but they all profited (western Europeans), and still today they continue to enjoy absolute domination due to that period (which hasn’t ended) because of that horrid "trade". The history books, the films all soften this reality. And this in part is the legacy of the greatest Holocausts (plural) in history (African,jewish, Native American, Indian, Austrailian, Arab, etc). And one of the key reasons for slavery ending was again capitalism, not morality, so the morality we see today is only there 2nd to capitalistic interest. And I find that worrying. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Halaqah (talk • contribs) 18:01, 5 February 2007 (UTC).


 * I titled this section "History is Complex" for a reason. The closer one looks the more one discovers that individual people around the world have always been basically the same -- mostly decent, intelligent people trying their best and faced with various hardships both personal and external. There is plenty of blame in historical writing. What I find more interesting is trying to understand how groups of basically decent people can have managed to create such things as the Atlantic slave trade. That's the challenge of history. Calling a large portion of the planet's population, like "Europeans", evil is simple bigotry, not history, which is, as titled, complex. Pfly 21:04, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

If I had gained much wealth from my ancestors trade in the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, I would be a wealthy decent person today as well. They would have taken me out of many hardships of the "POOR" in this life. Did you know many of these people became MILLIONAIRES in the 18th and 19th century???? That wealth did not disappear.Who do you think they are TODAY???Don't even begin to SOFTEN the atrocities of the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. People TODAY without their TRUE IDENTITIES because of the GREED of EUROPEANS. Who also became LAW ENFORCERS to continue their FREE TRADE and PLUNDER of AFRICA. They have left BILLIONS of African descendants without their TRUE NAMES, LANGUAGES, ANCESTRY, HERITAGE and even BLOODLINE. This is SERIOUS DAMAGE AND NEED REPAIR!!!!! unsigned
 * very helpful, thank you! Malc82 22:13, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

The type called the Lançados, were jews escaping the Spanish Inquisition. Every route of the trade was covered by the Jews. You don't need a lot of people to make a strong network.They made a LOT OF MONEY. The White merchants constantly wanted them thrown out of the Caribbean and Latin America due to their underhand practices.(Read their history books) Lost 10tribes 05:50, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
 * and it gets even better! Malc82 22:13, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Am I the only one fed up with the term 'Europeans' being used to describe the entire population of Europe. People seem to be forgetting that Europe during this period was controlled by a variety of tyrannical monarchy's: the vast majority of ordinary people had little or no say over the events of the Transatlantic slave trade. Therefore if we are attributing blame we must take this into account. In our information rich and relatively liberal lives we do tend to forget that during the 16th-19th Century the people of Europe were controlled by what would be classified by today's standards as brutal authoritarian dictatorships! There was NO free press, NO human rights, NO true 'rule of law'. This is not to diminish the undoubted guilt of the European 'ruling classes' for the horrific slave trade that they instigated and profited from, but it is important to make a distinction: remember in Britain during this period for example the average life expectancy was in the 30's at best for working class people. In fact white working class people were instrumental (together with the heroic actions of slaves and former slaves) in bringing about the eventual abolition of slavery once they became aware of the true consequences of the barbaric trade. However as usual the focus is on the efforts of the ruling classes to rid the world of the very practice that they most benefited from in the first place! unsigned


 * Conclusion of this section: Okay, obviously all Europeans are to blame for everything evil that has ever appeared (except for Lost10tribes, who knows it was really only all of the Jews). On the other hand everyone else participating in said evils was only "brainwashed" by the evil Euros. Oh, and while European merchants were and are representative of all Europeans, African kings selling their own people for booze were a tiny minority (additionally to being brainwashed).
 * Thanks to Pfly for the continued effort, but obviously some people aren't interested in discussion, they only want someone to blame. Malc82 22:13, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Hehe, thanks Malc82.. I stopped checked this article and only just now read up. Been spending my wiki-time on less heated topics, like rivers. :-) Pfly 07:53, 31 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm fairly new to this article, but Malc82 and Pfly are right about many things, perhaps most importantly about the view of history that denies Africans and other non-Europeans agency and reduces them to objects.


 * As the article correctly notes, most enslaved Africans were delivered by other Africans to slavers in colonial ports, and during the period of the Atlantic slave trade Europeans rarely ventured into the interior of Africa. Western-hemisphere slavery was different by orders of magnitude from slavery that existed in Africa, from slavery as the Africans who supplied the European slavers might have understood it — but imagining that Africans would have stopped supplying slaves for European traders if they better understood the fate of the enslaved is fantasy. The concept of "Africa" and "Africans" is a modern one; the members of one African nation felt no special kinship toward members of other African nations, especially those with whom they were at war.


 * None of this minimizes the evils of the Middle Passage and the barbarity of slavery in the Western Hemisphere. Within its scope, the article should appropriately describe those conditions. But generalizing about evil Europeans and poor African victims denies the individuality and "personhood" of both groups. — Malik Shabazz (Talk | contribs) 08:59, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Were Slaves Immortal?
I see no mention of slaves dying during the voyage from Africa to anywhere. I see no mention of slaves dying from lynching or harsh treatment. Even this talk page mentions Native Americans dying instead. I think the point the article tries to reach is that slaves never died and live among us today, centuries old. The only time death is mentioned in this article is when English would punish others for transporting slaves after they declared the international slave trade illegal. Hail Mary! Hail George! Hail England! I'm sure the slaves still living today thank those wonderful British. Another example of the slant on wikipedia. --Docjay8406 01:58, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
 * So find us some references - this is an encyclopaedia, not a Ph.D. thesis. --Scott Davis Talk 03:59, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
 * There is some reference to slaves being killed in History of slavery in the United States which appears to have an extensive reference list, although not linked to individual paragraphs. There is mention of high death rates in transit in Triangular trade, but no references at all in that article. --Scott Davis Talk 04:33, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Good Point
I was pretty sure I had added something to this article about the death rates associated with the slave trade. I took a look through after reading your comment, Mr. Davis and you are right on. I guess we all get so caught up in the little details we sometimes miss the bigger picture of this tragedy. I am an African-American myself, and was pretty embarrased when I realized no numbers were present on the deaths resulting from this stain on humanity. I took the liberty of adding a section (see: Human Toll). The numbers are pretty reliable. I looked the info up about two summers ago. I will site the sources ASAP, but I thought it was more important to get the numbers up then wait a second longer. Thanks for looking out. We all owe you a round of applause. Scott Free 07:08, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * No need to applaud. I only got here by reading the article as a followup to something only vaguely related on television. Having given an abrupt response, I figured I needed to check a few other articles to soften my comment somewhat. --Scott Davis Talk 09:34, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Book references and further reading
WP:CITE prefers that page numbers are provided where possible, but says ISBNs are optional. When formatted properly ISBNs provide magic links to sources to buy or borrow the book. Could people with access to the books please consider adding page numbers and ISBNs to the references? Thankyou. --Scott Davis Talk 11:03, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

IDIOTS
i'm going to stop adding info to this page if wiki doesn't get on the ball about vanadalism. this place is full of idiots who have nothing else to do but destroy valubale information about important topics. meanwhile the rest of us try our hardest to shed light on complicated issues. where the hell are the bots?Scott Free 15:20, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

request protection, it is how they operate. if there was no vandalism we wouldnt have to stay on this site 24/7 protecting work. so wiki wins--HalaTruth(ሐላቃህ) 17:08, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Why in the African-American section, see: New World Destinations
I'm curious why this is in the African-American section, when slavery in the United States, while a huge destination, did not account for anywhere near the majority of African slaves brought to the Americas. Is it for simple classification? Does this represent the vast majority of slaves and their descendents who don't live in the United States, but live in South America and the Carribean? Should we reclassify it to represent all slaves and their descendents? Just a thought.

I'd also like to see expansion of the New World Destination topic with citations. As it stands, it is a sad attempt that lacks citation and professionalism. Moreover, if we are talking about the New World destinations, why is Europe included? Perhaps we should change the title? Here is the current entry:

Central America only imported around 200,000. Europe topped this number at 300,000, North America, however, imported 500,000. The Caribbean was the second largest consumer of slave labour at 4 million. South America, with Brazil taking most of the slaves, imported 4.5 million before the end of slavery.[citation needed] —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Theboondocksaint (talk • contribs) 15:52, 7 March 2007 (UTC).
 * The section is a useful one to have, but I am relocating it in the article, as it does not sit comformatbly where it is. Peterkingiron 22:05, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Coffee Houses
I have added 'fact' (asking for a citation) to "75% of all sugar produced in the plantations came to London to supply the highly lucrative coffee houses there." The implication is that all this sugar was used to sweeten coffee. I suspect that some one has misunderstood something they have read. I am quite prepared to believe that part of the sugar that reached London was traded IN coffee houses. This may well have been where the commission agents to whom the sugar was consigned met the sugar bakers who bought it, but I do not think the coffee houses can have been the destination of the trade itself! Peterkingiron 22:04, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

reference for ethnic groups
Does anybody have the source for which ethnic groups were most effected by slave trade? That would really help me. Thanks! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.90.153.61 (talk) 19:49, 13 March 2007 (UTC).


 * All the info for the ethnic groups was put there by me. I got the information from the following book:

Hall, Gwendolyn Midlo: Slavery and African Ethnicities in the Americas: Restoring the Links. The University of North Carolina Press, 2006

it's truly a fantastic source. Scott Free 13:45, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

African versus European slavery
While slavery within Africa clearly was (on average) more "humane", status and treatment of slaves differed enormously between African states. This section might need a re-write by an expert on the issue.Malc82 14:49, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

WHAT ARE THESE FACTS BASED OFF OF? Africans are notoriously savage people, based off statistics, just look at how many U.N. troops are stationed there to try and stabalize the place.

The treatment of slaves by Africans cannot be defined as a continent or as a race, it is a tribal thing. Just like with Native Americans, each tribe had different values and morals. To try and say that ALL African slave owners were more humane than civilized and educated people is racist in itself, because you are assuming that ALL africans are one way. Where did they learn all these same universal principles as black tribal men living in the hard and unforgiving continent of Africa? They must have been just one giant tribe of roaming people right? haha. whatever. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 13ill Lumbergh (talk • contribs) 08:51, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Human toll section
I think the intro to this section (except for the last sentence) should be deleted. It contains a number of unreferenced claims on highly controversial issues and isn’t written like an encyclopedia article at all (see Northrup: The Atlantic Slave Trade. Houghton Mifflin, 2002. for a survey of the scientific debate). The subsections are much better, although Meltzer's figures don't reconcile with those mentioned at the beginning of this article. Please discuss.Malc82 15:12, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
 * removed everything except first and last sentence. Malc82 09:33, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Numbers that high?
I'm sorry, but are these numbers of africans who died during the time even correct? They seem almost cartoonish. I've generally heard that atleast 10-11 million arrived in the new world, but now 20 million died alone?

"According to David Stannard's American Holocaust, 50% of African deaths (10 million) occurred in Africa as a result of wars between native kingdoms, which produced the majority of slaves.[10] This includes not only those who died in battles, but also those who died as a result of forced marches from inland areas to slave ports on the various coasts.[11] The practice of enslaving enemy combatants and their villages was widespread throughout Western and West Central Africa, although wars were rarely started to procure slaves. The slave trade was largely a by-product of tribal and state warfare as a way of removing potential dissidents after victory or financing future wars.[12] However, some African groups proved particularly adept and brutal at the practice of enslaving such as Kaabu, Asanteman, Dahomey, the Aro Confederacy and the Imbangala war bands.[13]"

Stannard's work has been heavily criticized, primarily on the topic of native americans. He "estimates" that 100 MILLION people in the Americas died following European contact. Most of his "sources" come from well-known to be dubious estimates and accounts of native american populations at the time- often completely over-exxagerated, and just off-quotes from Spanish and Portuguese soldiers. How could the americas support a population this massive when it was largely a place of hunter-gatherers? The Aztec, for instance, numbered at around 6 million- the other major civilizations bringing this up to around 20 million. It's completely insane. Well, that, and how he panders to a purely "noble savage" view of the pre-columbian americas.

But back on his work on Africa..... 10 MILLION DIED IN WARS?!? Impossible. No time frame is given for when this occured, whether it was during the time of the European contact or far before then. To achieve such numbers, there would have to be constant, unending, epic-scale warfare involving loads of outright genocide and famine, disease, etc. being spread. There's absolutely no way the regions from which most slaves were procurred- the coastal forests- could even support this. The soil composition for faming is much poorer compared to the high fertility of the Sahel, and empires like Ashanti totaled at only 3 million- though high for it's time- is nothing approaching what's listed here. Ashanti reaching this in the early 1,800's, when this article lists the Gold Coast as producing about 15% of all slaves.... about 6-7 million. So, how could it be this high when prior to the Ashanti hegemony, Ghana was largely populated by tribal proto-states numbering in the few tens of thousands? Were the Ashanti just rounding up everybody they conquered and throwing them at the Europeans? Even for a period of 350 years this is still too high.

Again on Stannard, why is his "50%" figure used in accordance with scholars who did completely different works, examining entirely different areas of the slave trade?

And finally, on the sections about the most "active" regions- as I've noted about the Ashanti and the Gold Coast, why would such sparsely populated regions produce so many slaves? Shouldn't established empires and states in the Sahel be producing most of them?

...Someone really needs to clarify this. Most of these statistics are just garbage. unsigned


 * 50% and 20 million overall isn't completely impossible. First of all we're talking about a timeframe of about 400 years. Second, the coastal forests weren't necessarily the main "supply area", slaves were oftenly coming from interior Africa, months of travel away from the coast and were sold from one trader to the next (or transported and taxed by local kings). Miller's study of slaves sold at West Central Africa is the most complete that i'm aware of and he estimates and quotes "losses" of about 40-60% until boarding (of course not all slaves were brought from the interior, so the math gets a little more tricky). He points out that most slaves, while being of rather strong constitution, were of course captured at a vulnerable moment (wounded in battle etc.) and thus temporarily weakend.
 * The (unsourced) statement at the top of Human toll is nevertheless questionable. How much African warfare was influenced by the prospect of selling slaves to Europeans is a matter of some debate, surely Europeans can't be blamed for everything that happened in any war in Africa.
 * Established states may have "produced" fewer slaves because warfare may have been more widespread between smaller states, precisely because they were less established (the latter point is a guess, i'm not an expert on African history). Malc82 12:41, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I kind of assumed that there would be paths cutting through to the coast, but no mention of this is made in the article- nor anywhere else in any articles concerning such peoples, nations, regions, etc. during that time that would indicate routes transporting tens of millions of people. There should be clafirification here as well, and once again there's another problem- on the listing of the "10 most prominently traded groups" of the time, once again many of these are groups listed as apart of regions that were relatively sparse at the time, absolutely no way they could achieve such high numbers. I also wasn't trying to offer some sort of apologetics for the africans on the topic of warfare- it just seems too obscenely high to even be real. I didn't really notice how Stannard mentions most of them would be the result of forced marches, but as I noted in the "dynamics", how could these nations even get ahold of so many slaves? Although I guess it would make sense when one considers that about 200 nations and city-states were involved here, again, why are the sparsely populated ethnic groups listed as the most "promintent"? Maybe there was a typo? Were they just reffering to the ones shipped to the the US, which saw the lowest amount of slaves? Also, I've generally heard that the population of West Africa, by the time the Europeans arrived, amounted up to 30-60 million people. I'm not sure if this was reffering to the whole of the region or one of the main subdivisions, IE the sahel and the coastal forests, but there should be clarification as to how big their population was, and how it worked into demography and growth. If 30 million were really sold off, were these numbers constantly being replenished or what? Why did these nations suddenly decide to send off so many of their indentured servants, to a people they had never contacted before and who lived off in entirely different regions? I understand that the african nations didn't realize at first that they were selling off their slaves "permanently", but it doesn't add up. And this also begs why africans would have a need to sell of so many slaves like this- I'm guessing alot of this was involved with the decline of the Songhai Empire, which was technically keeping the region's economy afloat, so the african nations would have to find a new revenue for profit.

Overall, barely any of this article makes sense. unsigned


 * To clarify this, I wasn't refering to Stannards estimations, mainly because I think that his arguments are pretty questionable. He indeed says that 10 million people were lost due to war. All i wanted to say is that 20 million isn't completely impossible, although I would say the number was lower.
 * As I said above, the timeframe in question is about 400 years long, so if (to use your numbers) there were 30-60 million people in the whole area, this would still sum up to hundreds of millions. Malc82 18:13, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

The wide range of numbers mentioned in this article is really a problem. Since absolute numbers in the subsections are from very different sources they don't add up at all. Please use percentages when possible! Malc82 18:13, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

400 pound gorilla strikes back
Okay. it's obvious most of the above writers (especially from the unsigned folks) don't know jack about Africa. I on the other hand, know MUCH about pre-colonial Africa. I'm tempted to believe that some of the white readers of this article might feel a bit uneasy about their ancestors being responsible for the deaths of over 20 million people. Well, like White people tell Black people over and over again GET OVER IT. It happened. Suck it up and be better than our forefathers were. Don't minimize suffering to appease a guilty conscience. You have nothing to feel guilty about. What you are reading is simply facts. Every race (blacks included) has done dirt.

Now, onto my rebuttal. Warfare was endemic in Africa. The regions stated as the most prominent in the slave trade were the most common (largely because they were easy to access/coastal). The formation of states in Africa (as is in much of the world during that period) was directly related to warfare. I can't think of even one state in Western or West Central Africa that did not form out of warfare or as a direct result (i.e. Ewe Refugees fleeing Oyo to Anlo Kingdom). The mortality numbers for the slave trade seem amazing. That much I agree upon. But so are the numbers for the Jewish Holocaust. That doesn't mean either one didn't happen! Hitler murdered 6 million in a little under 5 years. The slave trade went on from 1502 to 1853. That's 351 years of war fatalities, shipping fatalities and seasoning fatalities. 20 million is a VERY possible number. I wouldn't have added the info if I thought for a second it was garbage. 20 million dead requires about 58,000 dying a year. Africa's a big place, though sparsely populated on the whole. What many of you fail to realize (by no fault of your own since your not experts) is that most of the populated areas (Mbanza Kongo, Kumasi, Oyo Ile, etc) were EXTREMELY DENSELY POPULATED. Any one of those cities could contain around 50,000 people. Mbanza Kongo had a population of nearly 100,000 by the mid 17th century. Wars in Africa weren't usually epic (The central African region of the Kongo is the exception to the rule in that regard) but they went on constantly. Dahomey was a virtual slaughterhouse from the mid 17th century well into the end of slavery. I know this is a lot of info to digest, so I'll be frank. SLAVERY KILLED AND DEPOPULATED A LOT OF WESTERN AFRICA. I dare anyone here to find better sources than i put in that section. On a last note, if 2 africans died (1 in Africa and 1 on the Middle Passage or Seasoning Camp) for every one that made land fall...You're looking at a minimum of 20 million dead. I think any reasonable person with knowledge of what these people went through would not find such a statistic that hard to believe (2 dead for every 1 arriving).Scott Free 17:44, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Slavery, and especially the slave trade, was a horrid business. However we cannot undo history.  It has happened.  However what is needed in relation to this article (and related ones) is verifiable facts, preferably citing as references reliable academic studies of the subject.  Where academics disagree (and no consensus has been achieved), both views should be given (with references).  Many people do want to hide from unpalatable historical facts.  However the best way of dealing with far-fetched views is either direction, is to provide truth (as unbiased as possible), with the sources that it came from.  That is irrefutable, at least until the next academic study comes along.  I have been responsible for some past edits to this article, but I am not an expert, and have merely tried to remove some of the grosser errors.  Please try to be objective.  Peterkingiron 22:17, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree with your statement. I was under the impression that the published sources I used were reputable. No one has proven otherwise to me. I am an African American and a descendant of slaves (Mbundu tribe just in case anyone was curious). That does not keep me from being objective. I get tired of people downing wikipedia as a place where any imbecile can put obviously fake facts. I do my best to protect articles that I am knowledgible about. If someone (anyone) can find a PUBLISHED source with a different figure I strongly urge them to put it. Until then let the facts stand as they are. Someone here asked specifically for numbers. I did my best to find them. That's more than anyone else here has done. Still, I'd love for someone here to make a liar out of me AND ACTUALLY PUT A FACT DOWN FROM A SOURCE. That being said, I'm glad we're all at least talking about the subject. Let's just try not to do things out of kneejerk reactions. Peterkingiron seems to have the right idea. I hope we all can learn from his example. sF p.s. if you don't sign your statement it's good as garbage to most people Scott Free 00:08, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I’m not trying to get my ancestors out of anything (I’m pretty sure none of them was involved in the Atlantic slave trade anyway) and from a moral perspective I think 5 or 50 million is pretty much the same, so there’s no personal agenda here. I’m only saying we shouldn’t allow statements without a "reliable" reference, this topic has been and still is subject to heated debate and oftenly unscientific theories from both sides.
 * Middle Passage mortality is usually estimated at about 15%, which in your example would mean that 85% of the slaves landed died in seasoning camp. Is that number really realistic? Considering that a significant number of landed slaves never were in seasoning camps (don’t have an exact number for that, though) such rates don’t sound reasonable to me.
 * If there was any misunderstanding, "Meltzer's figures don't reconcile with those mentioned at the beginning of this article" doesn’t mean they’re false (I've never read his work), only that "All in all, 6.6 million Africans died in these camps reducing the final number of Africans to about 10 million" seems odd when the top of the article says that modern estimates for the number of landed slaves are between 9.2 and 12 million. Either his overall estimations are added or we should just quote his percentage assumptions.
 * Btw, I always say 400 years because the Middle Passage is in direct continuity with the trade of slaves from the continent to the Portugese islands along the African coast, which started mid-15th century. For the effects on Africa, there’s no real difference. Malc82 20:49, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Last Round
I was pretty sure this discussion was dead. None of the people arguing against the numbers I put up (i didn't invent them) have put different ones up. I concur we should only post reliable facts. For all intents and purposes, what I've post are reliable facts. No one here has proven the sources I've put up are unreliable. The only one this discussion has attacked with any real merit makes up only 1/4th of the info. Most of the info for this section comes from Meltzer (which for some reason nobody has a problem with).

You are right in that most scholars put the Middle passage deaths at 15%. Meltzer puts it at 12.5%. You say my example means 85% died when they landed. I say you're full of it. READ THE ARTICLE. It hasn't changed since this discussion has started. The section states (and I believe) that 50% of Africans died during capture. I never claimed that 85% died when they made landfall nor do the sources I put up. 85% is entirely unrealistic, and I don't know why you would even say such a thing. You are correct though that most slaves didn't go into caribbean seasoning camps. Most slaves went to Brazil. The next largest portion however did go to the Islands and thus many would have gone through that ordeal. In Brazil there would have been a similar process to make slaves accustom to their new role.

Furthermore, Meltzer's figures DO reconcile with the rest of the article. The numbers at the begining are ESTIMATES. 10 million is between 9.2 and 12 million. That's basic math. Meltzer's mortality figures break down like this:


 * 4.5% in coastal African "Factories"
 * 12.5% in ships during the Middle Passage
 * 33% in seasoning camps (you know. where they tortured them!)
 * Sum total 50% mortality.

If we take Meltzer's work seriously (and in the absence of other credible research I think that's a must), the other 50% of African deaths had to occur during capture (i.e. African wars, African slavers and European slavers).

As far as timing is concerned, I thought we were talking about the TRANS-ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE, which is usually defined as bringing Africans to the Americas. You are right that the first slaves taken by Europeans were snatched in the mid 15th century. It happened in 1441 in what is now Mauritania. Maybe an article titled European Oppression of Blacks and other Unfortunates" is in order, lol.

Look, I don't have a grudge against you or any white person living today about things that happened centuries ago. It's good you don't have an agenda. But in all honesty, you'll have to excuse me if I take such talk with a grain of salt. Nobody is gonna admit in full light of day their ancestors were rapists, murderers and all out bad people. What's really needed is acknowledgement and not apologies. But I am curious as to your own beliefs. I'd like to know what everyone here thinks is the most likely number of deaths due to the trans-atlantic slave trade. I don't think any reasonable person can put the number of deaths at anything below 10 million. If you think so, just pick up any and I do mean any book on the subject. I admit I do have an agenda here. My agenda is shine light on America's Original Sin. My agenda is to not see the suffering of my ancestors and others marginalized. By saying the death count is anything below 10 millin is doing just that. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 4shizzal (talk • contribs) 00:40, 1 May 2007 (UTC).


 * Meltzer’s numbers, as stated in “Last Round” sound very reasonable to me, maybe there has just been some misunderstanding.
 * I would interprete that "All in all, 6.6 million Africans died in these camps reducing the final number of Africans to about 10 million" means that ca. 16.6 million slaves were landed, of whom 6.6 million died in seasoning camps, which is what I commented on. The 85% referred to your "if 2 africans died (1 in Africa and 1 on the Middle Passage or Seasoning Camp) for every one that made land fall" statement in this discussion, because slaves that died in seasoning camp were already landed. The sentence simply makes no sense.
 * As I already said, I haven’t read Meltzer’s book and won’t be able to get it in the near future, so I’ll have to ask you to put the numbers up. Does he estimate a 33% seasoning camp mortality overall, or for those Africans who actually went through them? Does he conclude an overall "loss" of 20 million people? Malc82 19:09, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Non Rebuttal

 * Your logic makes sense to me. I put most of the human toll intro back.  I put it there in the first place and I'd appreciate it if folks didn't just delete stuff off of kneejerk reactions without discussing other options.  Nobody had proven it unreliable, and it is important info.  I think a more constructive solution would be editing it.  Do you think we should go into the mortality section and replace 20 million with "between 14 and 20" million"?  Or maybe just "approximately 18".  I see your point on a lot of stuff, and the 20 million number seems so absolute when this is definately not written in stone.  Also, would you mind putting your number "14-18 million" in the latest opinion sectio as well.  thnx 4 the input.  I don't believe Meltzer claimed 20 million.  I put that number in by combining the numbers from those two sources.  Nobody's damned Meltze just yet and all I heard against Stannard is that he did some bad/sloppy research on native americans.  How the one relates to the other is beyond me.  I just wish more research was done on this topic.

Scott Free 13:49, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Other Dynamics
This article leaves out many other aspects of the Slave Trade that are commony unanswered. Although it's well-attested that the africans didn't start wars to gain slaves- outside of the Dahomians, who were some pretty horrible people- how did they manage to get so many millions of slaves in such a short time? Wouldn't warfare have to be constant, with population centers shifting constantly? Why would they hold so many slaves if indentured servitude was the norm? Did they just shift after awhile? unsigned
 * please sign your posts. Peterkingiron 22:22, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Ideas
I guess this article is so huge it's hard to cover everything. I think the above commentor is right in saying certain dynamics need to be addressed. I strongly suggest those who have not already read the following sources to check them out. They're very helpful.

On another note, THIS WAS NOT A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME. 350 years is longer than many states exist in any period (Ancient, Classical, Medieval, etc). This trade started in the Rennaisance and didn't end until darn near in the Industrial Age. As far as warfare goes, I hate to admit it but my ancestors were some militaristic b@$tards. As a testament to this inglorious fact, there is only one West African state which was active in the slave trade and formed before 1502 that actually survived to see the end of the slave trade in 1853 (Kingdom of Kongo). The period was THAT destructive. Everyone else was either gobbled up by another African power or colonized by the Europeans. Besides for warfare, I think we should look at the following factors:
 * Gomez, Michael A. "Exchanging Our County Marks". University of North Carolina Press/Chapel Hill and London. 1998
 * Hall, Gwendolyn Midlo. "Slavery and African Ethnicities in the Americas: Restoring the Links". University of North Carolina Press/Chapel Hill and London. 2005
 * Thornton, John A. "Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 SECOND EDITION". Cambridge Univerity Press. 1998
 * Poorer or poor soil in the most urban areas largely due to overuse
 * Virtually a complete lack of medical knowledge on the part of the Africans
 * Nonchalant nature of slavery in Western Africa (criminals, debtors or their relatives and POWs were routinely sold into slavery)

Let's also look at the population of Africa. These stats come from "Africa: A short History" by Robert O. Collins (Markus Wiener Publishers/Princeton; 2006).


 * Total African Population: 20 million (beginning of Christian Era)
 * Total African Population: 47 million (1500 C.E.)..start of trans-atlantic slave trade
 * Total African Population: 129 million (1900 C.E.)..most of Africa under colonial rule
 * Total African Population: 142 million (1920 C.E.)
 * Total African Population: 200 million (1948 C.E.)
 * Total African Population: 300 million (1960 C.E.)...beginning of African independence
 * Total African Population: 750 million (2000 C.E.)
 * Total African Population: 1.5 billion (2025 estimate)

I'm not sure where the hell these figurs come from, but I ain't expert enough to challenge PRINCETON. I had no idea Africa' population was that low. What's interesting is that the population actually doubled from the start of the TAST (trans-atlantic slave trade) to 1900. No reason for this was given in the book, but I figure the centralization of Western Africa had positive and negative affects. On the negative side, warfare seemed to be a constant right up to the 1900s. As hard as it is to believe, the Europeans might have actually stabilized Africa by conquering most of it. On the positive side, centralization seems to have make the urban populace secure enough to expand their population. Population explosions generally don't occur during prolonged periods of warfare, but this seems to be the exception. I couldn't imagine Europe's population doubling after 300 years of war.

On a last note, I hope someone here can find some population stats other than these. I have a hard time believing Africa only grew by 30 million people in 1500 years.

holla back Scott Free 00:57, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Mortality Opinion
I want to get some level headed ops from all you fine folks about the bodycount. Lots of folks are talking about what it can't be. Let's re-arrange our minds and ponder what it likely is. I'll go first. You don't have to put facts here, just your honest opinion.


 * 16 million. No less than 10 million.  No more than 25 million. Scott Free 00:44, 1 May 2007 (UTC)


 * As to my own "educated guess", anything between 14-18 million overall sounds reasonable (that is, people taken from their homestead with the intent of selling them to the New World, or who died in the process; not including warfare body count). Still there is too much research left to be done on the African part of the trade to give an exact number, which is why I think the best thing to do is to give the well-researched numbers and mention the other factors without. I think this is the best possible right now:
 * 9.2 - 12 million landed in the New World
 * 12.5 - 15% mortality on middle passage
 * around 5% mortality on the African coast
 * much uncertainty as to losses during capturing or transport to the coast
 * I'm not sure if Meltzer's 33% for seasoning camps are consensus, but they would be included in the "landed" number anyway
 * If you look at these numbers, there is a pretty wide spectrum of overall possibilities, which is why I wouldn't point one out at this time, they're still highly speculative. Malc82 10:58, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

New Numbers for Human Toll
I believe I have spent way too much time debating the merits of scholarly sources and other dynamics of this "peculiar institution" instead of crunching hard numbers. i guess that's why i'm a historian and not a mathematician (yeah I probably spelled that wrong). I crunched these numbers originally and screwed the pooch. The stats were correct, but my analysis of them wasn't.  For that I APOLIGIZE. Upon a closer inspection, Meltzer's work accounts for 8.052256875 million deaths (from African Port to Seasoning Camp). Since Stannard didn't do his work in cahoots with Meltzer, i cannot assume his "half of all deaths" statement completely jives with the 8 million number. I've made corrections to the section making the overall number less static. If Stannard's stuff is legit deaths in war would match combined deaths anywhere else giving a pretty reasonable number of 16 million. 20 million is still possible (2 for 1 scenario), but I wan't to put a number up that's less vulnerable to speculation. I'd like to thank all of you for bringin my butt to task on this cuz if you hadn't spoke up, the wrong info would still be up there. I am more confident than ever in this section now. Thnx again and let's keep making this article better.

here's a brief summary of the numbers by the way according to Meltzer only


 * Stage 1: 18.3 million Africans captured and put in port factories; 4.5% die there (823,500 deaths)
 * Stage 2: 17.4765 million Africans shipped onto Middle Passage; 12.5% die there (2.1845625 million deaths)
 * Stage 3: 15.2919375 million Africans land with some put through Seasoning Camps; 33% die there (5.046339375 million deaths)
 * Stage 4: 10.245598125 million Africans survive (8.054401875 million deaths total)

So we know, beyond a reasonable doubt, that 8 million died between port and camp. We can only estimate from Stannard's work about how many died during actual conflicts. Upon further examination of his work, I cannot stand by his numbers, and i am glad i never included much of his work. Gwendloyn Midlo Hall, whom I deeply respect, says 2 Africans died for every 1 that arrived. Dr. W.E. DuBois claimed a ratio of 5 to 1 (though I don't know where such numbers come from). It all boils down to how many folks you gotta kill to bring one slave over. I believe 1 for 1 is a sure thing so 16 million total deaths is quite likely. Scott Free 18:35, 1 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I would still think that seasoning camp losses have to be deducted from the number of landed slaves (in Meltzer's example the 10 million), not shipped Africans, and that Meltzer's 33% most likely mean "of those that came to seasoning camps", not "of all landed" slaves (because if we assume that about half of the landed slaves came to s.c., 33% of all would mean 66% mortality in s.c.. That would hardly make sense economically (I'm aware that sounds perverted, but plantation owners were capitalists, after all).
 * To make this perfectly clear, I'm not saying your 16 million are to high, since your example didn't include losses before the arrival at the coastal African "factories", which might well account for gap (see section above). Malc82 19:24, 1 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Only half of the UNITED STATES slaves came to South Carolina (that is what you meant, right?). The colonies and later America only got like 4.5% according to the article.  I'll check in my sources too, but North America got very few slaves (in comparison) cuz ther was little money to be made.  You're right tha a 66% mortality would be uneconomical.  That's why the rates were much lower.  My 16 million does include losses before arriving at factories.  If you take the combat phase out, the losses amount to 8 million.

Scott Free 20:51, 1 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry, s.c. meant seasoning camps. Your data is correct, I put it in the article myself. Malc82 21:01, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Userbox available

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 * }
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cool addition
cool addition. i'll be proud to put it on my user page. thnx Scott Free 15:38, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Info on Irish slaves?
I know this page is focused on slavery of Africans, but would it be possible to add some info on the well-attested transport of Irish slaves across the Atlantic? Since the title is a general one, it seems appropriate. User:Maragrey 3 June 2007
 * The Irish weren't slaves, they were indentured servants and thus aren't in the scope of this article. You can find some info about them in the i.s. article. Malc8210:09, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

A Trans-Atlantic Memorial for the victims of the Atlantic Slave Trade
Two friends and I were discussing the Atlantic Slave Trade a few weeks ago after reading Wikipedia's entry. We thought that a Trans Atlantic memorial needs to be erected to commemorate the victims of the Atlantic Slave Trade. This would need to be a global project. Possibly under the auspices of the United Nations.

Our joint-idea was to erect some type of structure in each of the port cities used in the transportation of slaves from Africa across the Atlantic. This would include major port cities in Africa, Europe, USA, Caribbean, South America.

We thought that the structures would need to be of a dark colour. Darkness to symbolise the deep sorrow that the slave trade has caused. A sorrow that haunts us to this day. A sorrow too that is perhaps the defining characteristic of ‘Blackness’ to this day. Blackness as in the Pearl Jam song: Depression. Sadness. Longing : ‘… turned my world to black / tattooed all that I see/ all that I am / all I’ll be ... '

We thought also that the shape of the structures should be triangular. To mark the fact that 'the slaves were one element of a three-part economic cycle— the Triangular Trade and its Middle Passage—…”

And a flame.

A black pyramid then. Maybe incorporating a flame. In the harbours of each of the port cities. A trans-Atlantic tombstone. A memorial to all the bodies buried in the ocean's depth. A testimony to the sorrow of all the mothers who lost their children. A symbol to remind us of the horrors of the Atlantic Slave Trade. A living symbol of hope.

Crizzozo 15:12, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

End of slave trade II
Hi everyone. Yo I realize that section is too lengthy and needs some cuts, but cutting it down to one tiny paragraph is inappropriate. It's just too important an issue. The tag says we should discuss the edits here before making drastic changes, so let's do that. Suggestions???Scott Free 21:46, 30 June 2007 (UTC)
 * It was tagged and up for discussion since May 2 with no single suggestion or comment on the tagging. The section needed a complete rewrite, not improvements. I haven't got the sources to do this myself at the moment. My attempts basically convinced me that one can only write such an extremely short paragraph or has to go into details to avoid undue weight. In the end I decided to enforce Wikipedia's policy to removed unreferenced statements, which meant removing the section. I don't see this as a huge problem, the End of slavery is basically given by the three numbers mentioned, and abolitionism simply is a very complex topic that can't be summed up in 5 sentences without getting POV. Malc82 22:03, 30 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The main problem here wasn't even the lack of sources, it is that this section is embarrassingly POV and completely against scientific consensus. I have read the opinions of about 10 authors on the subject now and have yet to find someone who says that slave rebellions were "the" main cause for abolition, much less someone who shares the idea that every success was a direct consequence of a rebellion. This has already been discussed in the other "End of slavery" section above. Malc82 22:09, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

I just found the edit that brought the POV-slant into this article. It was this edit by an obvious POV-pusher from December 18, 2006. Undo isn't a good possibility after so many edits, but would anybody object if I removed all of his changes manually? Malc82 22:52, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

That sounds like a much better solutionScott Free 19:57, 1 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I've removed the POV-edit now, but left the article tagged as "neutrality disputed". The reason is that it is still somewhat POV, only in the opposite direction. The section now focusses almost entirely on British abolitionism and (more important) doesn't mention the scientific debate about British motivation and other factors. The Royal Navy's patrolling sounds (maybe unintentionally) like it was entirely done out of humanism, while scientific consensus is that there were also economic reasons for it. Williams' theory should at least be mentioned (but not too detailed, there is a main article about that topic). I don't have enough sources handy right now to do that myself, so if one of the other contributors could do it that would be great. Malc82 21:09, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Most Africans academics dont agree with 12 million

 * Kimani Nehusi
 * Molefi Asante
 * Muhammed Shareef
 * Hakim Quick
 * Walter Rodney
 * Maulana Karenga
 * Tufufu Zuberi -- The authority on population demographics
 * Hakim Adi, oh Tony Martin. Chancelor Williams, Eric Williams,

the list continues, but all of these agree that 12 million is a joke.The only African's keeping it low are the likes of Henry Gates, and we all know who his pay master is. --Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 15:48, 7 July 2007 (UTC)


 * That's why the article states between 9 and 12 million. 10 or 11 million is probably the most accurate number according to the article.  What number(s) do the above experts agree on?Scott Free 19:31, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Not convinced
(Edit conflict) I skipped through what I could find about your examples:
 * Kimani Nehusi - whose WP-article is a clear-cut copyvio of www.kimani.info, has a diploma in egyptology. I went through his (impressive) research archive but couldn't find anything indicating that he ever made own estimations on the subject.
 * Maulana Karenga - not a historian, and as the first sentence in his WP-bio says: a political activist (usually not a RS).
 * Muhammad Alshareef - absolutely nothing I found indicates that he has any professional knowledge about the subject.
 * Hakim Quick - same as above
 * Tukufu Zuberi, Molefi Kete Asante and Hakim Adi - may qualify as RS, where did they say what (and was it their own research)?
 * Tony Martin - a racist who denies the holocaust, now there's a source one can trust.
 * Henry Gates - No, I don't know who his "paymaster" is, apart from Harvard. Does that automatically make him a traitor?
 * Eric Williams and Walter Rodney - not contemporary. Also, I find it interesting that people accuse all white scholars on the subject of trying to minimize the numbers, yet don't find anything POV-questionable in the fact that Williams and Rodney were politicians who largely based their career on their theories (that's not to say their theories are completely wrong).

With all of the sources you named: where did they ever make own estimations and what did they estimate. What strikes me is that almost all sources you name are better known for their political activism than scholary work. Honestly, I have more formal qualification on the subject than some of these people. The most prominent African expert on this subject is Joseph E. Inikori, who is missing from the list and has never questioned the 9.4 to 12 million arrivals numbers, although he rightfully criticized a certain tendency to downplay the effects on Africa. Malc82 19:36, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

cleary you are deeply out of touch with this field, Inikori is one person (and you already said he didnt challenge it, neither here or there). Any African who studies their history knows the 12 million figure is an apology to get Whites of the hook. You dont know them so go and do some reading. " Most means" those in agreement with whites. All of the above are serious academics, especially Zuberi (who studies demographics). Ohh yeah Hilary Beckles, University of the West Indies in his book Caribbean Freedom: Economy and Society from Emancipation to the Present refers to this. Oh i guess he doesnt count. And go and listen to Zuberi speak about this at the bottom of the page i find it strange, you didnt read their work yet you claim to know who and what there are just because you have google--strange. No one knows how many as Zuberi said, but 12 million arrived? how many left? --Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 21:27, 7 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I didn't say I know all of them, as the intro sentence clearly states. I'm "deeply out of touch with this field", because I studied the Atlantic slave trade, not it's perception in parts of the African, Afro-American and Afro-European culture. You still fail to say where which one of the persons you mention claimed a different number than 9.4 to 12 million, how he got to that number and which flaws in the methodology of renowned experts (both White and Black "sell-outs") he identified. Instead you accuse all Whites of being inheritently biased towards apologizing the slave trade while every Black historian who comes to the same numbers is "payed" by a giant White cabal. Racist allegations have no place on Wikipedia. The "how many left" was discussed a few sections above. I have watched Zuberia's clip 2 times now, and while he makes some interesting points (that aren't at all new to me), he doesn't speak about arrivals, he speaks about the impact on Africa and "the actual numbers who were murdered in the slave trade" (Note: he explicitly talks about the Arabian and Atlantic slave trades). Malc82 22:31, 7 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Yo Malc82 is sonning you, Halqh. I've sparred with that cat and he's a good researcher.  Still don't see why this page had to be so comabative.  I'd  just like to add that not all white folks are playing down the numbers.  The sources I used for this page were all White except for one, and I (a black man) have no problem using them. I think we all need to stop looking at the race or even the politics of these authors and pay more attention to who is publishing their work. Can EVERYONE here start giving a little more info on what books their claims are based off of and who published it.  Cuz if its some bullsh!t like WCP (The Destruction of Black Civilization) u should leave it out to save your own cred.  That doesn't mean there aren't bad/racist authors on mainstream publishing houses-- but they're a lot less prevalent.Scott Free 15:52, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

20 people using 1 source (curtain) is still 1 source
I am not aware of Tony Martin denying the African holocaust, give us a break on that who is a racist and who isnt. J.D. Fage et al are kings of racism against Africans. Zuberi Video at the bottom of the page clearly explains this. And on another note, when we dont like something we find ways to justify why it isnt valid. Slavery isnt a contempoary issue so how could that affect solid research of Williams and Rodney? Most of these guys including BAsil are reference people from 18th century. None of them did much original research on teh topic. esp Inikori, it is all a vague calculation of french and british records + or - a few %. None as Zuberi says takes the full history into the number. Both Kimani and Zuberi are very strong on this point, as well as Asante. Try reading their books before you speak.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 21:46, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * There have only been a few scholars that have actually tried to do a census of the numbers, all of them have come up with a number around 12 million. Most of the critiques of these numbers were early reactions, and as more data has been gathered this rough approximation has been increasingly confirmed. Also be careful about confusing the different trades. Many of your sources are referring to the trans-Sahara and Indian Ocean trade as well. It is by combining all three trades that you get the 30 or 40 million number. - SimonP 21:47, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I think the video by Zuberi expains my point. And i didnt give a number and i am not combining 'trades' ( i agree people do that in the Maafa studies). I would love to know these people that did this census b/c Zuberi did it and he didnt come up with 12 million. And again it is the number word game. 12 Million arrived, How many died in the boats, how many died in Africa-- All of this is part of the lost. Do you think the jewish 6 million neglects those who died outside of the gas chambers. imagine just counting those that died in the gas chambers--thats what is happen here with African numbers.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 21:56, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Ahem, Tony Martin denies the holocaust, not the Maafa. It affects research by Williams and Rodney because their theories have been researched and commented on by other historians, whose results should be mentioned to comply with WP:POV, but mostly because that makes them "earlier" estimates, the word in question here. I wouldn't call cataloguing each and every ship register available, as Harvard's DuBois center does, "vague". Davidson numbers were addressed at the Middle passage article talk page (here). Again, please read what has already been discussed here, it may answer most of your questions. Malc82 22:48, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Did he deny it last week? because i never heard him deny it in his numerous videos, just the usual slander attack you get when people dont like your research. In any event Zuberi research contradicts the 12 million, see previous discussion on this point (1 year ago). the point here is usualy unbalanced terms like MOST, MAINSTREAM, CONVENTIONAL, best leave these words alone. B/c Most usually means White supported views on Africa. Belittling anything which contradicts. show both views in equal measure.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 00:13, 8 July 2007 (UTC) p.s see zuberi's comments on Philip D. Curtin.
 * Few historians would quote Curtin as the main authority. He himself goes at lenghts to explain that his census, while still being first honest try, isn't based on primary sources. The first major study to use primary sources was the one by Lovejoy. Later studies by Anstey and others have all found the range given in the article to be correct. The most complete study has recently been done by Harvard's DuBois Center (you know, the one whose "paymasters" we all know). It's findings have been mentioned by Malik Shabazz in the section below.
 * So we have at least 3 extensive studies by historians exclusively studying the AST and which the community of AST-historians basically agrees on. On the other hand we have a film clip of one professor of African studies, who says that the magnitude of the trade and its effects on Africa were underestimated (Note: the clip cuts between statements referring to the Atlantic and Arabian trades together and some referring to the Atlantic slave trade exclusively without always specifying, on of the reasons why video clips fail WP:RS). While he calls the above estimations "ridiculously low" and that "these historians" are a "peculiar bunch" (interesting wording from a scientist, btw) he doesn't provide any counter-evidence and it seems that his own demographic studies are of Africa, not the AST. His main statement refers to "the actual numbers that were murdered in the slave trade", while we're talking about arrivals here. Still, if you find a written source by him it may be okay to put it in the article, but the clip just leaves too many methodological questions open to treat it as an encyclopedic source. Malc82 08:30, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
 * The clip isnt a source here but just to bring light to the argument with regards to the numbers and to show ZUberi who is qualified (speaking in a casual manner- so dont bite his head off) argues against Curtain et al. I am discussing not the arrival but those lost to the Atlantic trade, see my Jewish example. Deaths caused by the Nazi are 6 million, not just deaths in the gas chambers.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ 09:11, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Zuberi sure is a great source for African demographics and if you find his 20 to 60 (or so) statement in one of his works you could add his estimates to the "human toll" or "effects on Africa" sections. But only the arrivals number (for which he doesn't provide an alternative) should be mentioned in the intro. The reason is twofold:
 * 1) The article is about the Atlantic slave trade, not the effects of slave trade (in general) on Africa. This topic should have it's own article, I can hardly believe there isn't one already.
 * 2) The extremely wide range of estimates about the overall human losses (a function of a lack of sources on the African part and a wide range of possible definitions) make these numbers extremely vague, while the "arrivals" are comparatively well-researched and the definition is clear-cut. Malc82 20:49, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Some grist for the mill

 * "The pioneering statistical study of the Atlantic slave trade by Philip Curtin published in 1969 estimated the total of black slaves landed alive in America, by the Atlantic trade up to 1870, at roughly 9,391,000.[Note in original: Philip D. Curtin, The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1969), p. 268, table 77.] Subsequent research has raised the total. It is now estimated that 11,863,000 slaves were shipped across the Atlantic, that the overall death rate during the Crossing or what came to be called the Middle Passage was in the range of 10-20 percent, and that the total for those landed alive must accordingly lie somewhere between 9,600,000 and 10,800,000.[Note in original: Paul E. Lovejoy, "The Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade on Africa: A Review of the Literature," in Journal of African History 30 (1989), p. 368.] An intermediate figure of 10,200,000 would seem, for now, to be a reasonable estimate. It is widely conceded that further revisions are more likely to be upward than downward." — Ronald Segal, The Black Diaspora: Five Centuries of the Black Experience Outside Africa (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1995), ISBN 0-374-11396-3, page 4.


 * "From the 1520s to the 1860s an estimated 11 to 12 million African men, women, and children were forcibly embarked on European vessels for a life of slavery in the Western Hemisphere. Many more Africans were captured or purchased in the interior of the continent, but a large number died before reaching the coast. About 9 to 10 million Africans survived the Atlantic crossing to be purchased by planters and traders in the New World, where they worked principally as slave laborers in plantation economies requiring a large work force." — Stephen Behrendt, "Transatlantic Slave Trade", Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience (New York: Basic Civitas Books, 1999), ISBN 0-465-00071-1.

Maybe there's something helpful in these passages? — Malik Shabazz (Talk | contribs) 03:08, 8 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Than God! Someone who can quote sources!  What is funny is, the above data is useless to the above debate between Malc and Halq.  At best it sorta kills the 12 million notion (which I've stated before was pretty much wrong- about two months ago). I just wish Halq could answer my earlier question and say WHAT NUMBER HE OR IS HIS SOURCES AGREE ON.  Is it more than 12 million or less than 12 million.  The excellent work by Mali Shabazz makes it pretty clear that 12 million did not arrive.Scott Free 15:59, 8 July 2007 (UTC)


 * You have to go through the article's history page to find what the discussion is about. Malc82 20:24, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Injecting Positivity
Just wanted to give props to Malc for the effects addition. Some interesting stuff there.Scott Free 03:36, 11 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks ;-). Do you think that WikiProject Africa (or any other project) would be able to dig deep into this huge debate and write an article on the effects on Africa? As I said above, this is a huge topic and should definitely have it's own article. One could write an encyclopedic article about Rodney's theory or the Impact of European goods on African trade alone, and these are only sections of the "Effects on Africa". My concern is that the users who are knowledgeable about the AST generally don't know enough about African history to really understand it (I know I don't), while Wikipedia's experts on African history may only have schoolbook knowledge (aka worse than none) about the Atlantic and Arab slave trades. At least that's the impression that I sometimes get when I look at the scientific debate, where it seems that Western-culture scholars of economic history and Precolonial-Africa-sociologists are just too far apart to understand what the other side is talking about. Malc82 21:48, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

quote in intro
hi everyone. i removed the following section from the intro of the article...

"Elikia M’bokolo, April 1998, Le Monde diplomatique. Quote:"The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries (from the ninth to the nineteenth)." He continues: "Four million slaves exported via the Red Sea, another four million through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean": see The impact of the slave trade on Africa.

First let me say i have no problem with the content of this paragraph as far as accuracy. I also believe the statement is relevant to the broader subject of the article. I do not, however, believe it belongs in the intro. Even a 6th grader knows you don't put a quote in an introduction. Secondly, the section is not written in the same style as the rest of the paragraph. It begins like a citation for crying out loud. Furthermore, the content of the quote has more to do with African slavery as a whole as opposed to the specific topic of the article, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. That's why I moved it to the page on the slave trade in the segment about Africa. Also, the only relevent info in the above text (as it regards to the subject of this specific) is already present in other sections (namely the human toll section which I authored). I fail to see why this particular segment should be included in the article, let alone the article's introduction.

I realize by removing the segment (AGAIN), I may be starting an edit war (which is the last thing I want to do). I believe Musa (who put the section back) had good intentions. I still don't think it belongs in the intro. Perhaps a reworked version of this segment in another part of the article is in order? Please let me know what y'all think. HOLLA.Scott Free 21:05, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Munsa.Musa's source is a significant article, which should certainly be cited in an article on slavery in Africa; it looks as if it is based on authoritative works. However, what Musa has taken from it seems not primarily to be about the Atlantic slave trade.  Accordingly the quotation does not belong where he put it, and perhaps not in this article at all.  The slave trade is an emotive subject, about which a vast amount has been written.  It is accordingly necessary in WP to be selective in what sources are used.  The present content of the article is not satisfactory in a number of ways.  For example, I am not sure how relevant it is to have lists of contemporary African kingdoms (rather than a short section with a link to something with lists).  I know little of the demographic issues, but wonder how relevant it is to have tables of world population here (rather than in a linked article).  Furthermore this section gives undue prominence to the views of Eric Williams (which are not accepted by modern economic historian.  It is certainly tue that Bouldton & Watt supplied steam engines for sugar mills, but to say that sugar planters financed him is a travesty of the truth.  This article needs considerable work, but I am not qualified to undertake it.  Peterkingiron 22:33, 1 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I've moved the quote to the section African slave market, where it seems to sit well. --Lambiam 22:34, 1 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Glad y'all seemed to agree with me. I do believe the list of kingdoms is important, because it sheds light on where these people came.  Plus, without these states the Atlantic slave trade couldn't have happened. I'm also rather curious about the world population numbers. I think that might be able to go.  Only reason I guess one could make for keeping it is to show the change in Africa's population as a result of the slave trade. Not sure who Eric Williams is. Hope we here from Musa soon.Scott Free 16:04, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * See Eric Williams. My probelm is that the article has become unweildy, and was hoping that some material could be forked off, by summarising it and linking it to a separate article.  Peterkingiron 22:38, 4 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I see what u mean. The article is kinda unweildy. I'll see what i can do about shortening or possibly removing the list for the African states. As for Williams, I just read the article. I think this article may be relying on his theories concerning the end of slavery, but that's just one section. I don't think it damns the whole article. It seems that Williams' research was definately wrong in the details, but his overall statement that the end of slavery had more to do with economy than egalitarianism seems to be true and stood the test of time. I'm more of an African history buff than an African-american history buff, so I'll leave the whole end of slavery section alone to better informed folks. I'll take ur suggestion to heart and see what can be done about shortening the African history sections. Cheers :) Scott Free 00:05, 5 September 2007 (UTC)


 * From what I can see, Elikia M'bokolo is a good source. The problem still remains that he published this text in a newspaper, not a scientific journal. I know that are divided opinions if "good" Newspapers should be treated as RS, but I would argue against it in this case. Le Monde diplomatique doesn't hold it's authors to the same standards of referencing etc. than a scientific journal does (or at least should). Therefore I can't see why we should include such a long, loosely related quote into this already quite long article, seem a bit like undue weight to me. Only one sentence really is about the AST and it doesn't really add to what the article already says. This source could be added as a reference in the "Effects" section. Malc82 13:55, 6 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Here Here! (I'm feelin British today). I second that opinion.  glad the abreviation trend (TAST/AST) is catchin on, lol. Seriously, tho, I think that's a good idea to move it to the effect.Scott Free 14:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Unwarranted removals
Malc. Apparently you have removed every single one of my edits. Furthermore you have made the assertion that I had added 'unreferenced material'

Your removals are extreme and uncalled for. I shall address them one by one (although I might have got some of the edit times mixed up).

Revision as of 14:58, 14 September 2007. 1. I mention Walter Rodey's 'How Europe Underdeveloped Africa'. That book is one of the key works about the impact of the Slave Trade. So, why did you remove my referece to it (rather than simply improve it?).

2. I adjusted the term 'African slaves' to 'Enslaved Africans'. Why do you object to that? The term 'slaves' is a noun that objectifies the person, transforming their identity into mere objects of labour. On the other hand, 'enslaved' is an adverb that implies that 'somebody is doing something to somebody else'  - restoring a sense of agency and personhood. By using 'African' as a noun, you restore the 'super-ethnic' identity of the person prior to their enslavement. It may be that there is room for both descriptions - but why only target my one?

3. I referred to European rading parties. You removed this, why? There are no other 'citations' in this paragraph, so why has my addition been targetted? Do you have some kind of prejudice against mentioning European raiding parties? It cannot be because it is 'unsourced' because YOUR revision is also 'unsourced'.

4. I referred to 'deportaion of people'. Why did you remove this? It is quite clear that if a King orders somebody from their land, then it is a deportation. By only ever refering to a 'trade' editors are dehumanising the individuals concerned. People are deported, objects are traded. Even if some 21st century editors do not regard present-day Africans as fully human, we should not allow them to project their contemporary values back onto the past.

Revision as of 15:01, 14 September 2007 1. I removed a link to tribal because the Wiki article it referred to did not mention West Africa at all. Furthermore, the sentence refers to 'kingdoms'. A Kingdom, is patently not a 'tribe' (it's a kingdom). And, again, the endemic warfare article makes no mention of Kingdoms. So, why have you restored this patently irrelevant Wiki reference - surely you can find a proper, academic citation which has a bit more substance to it?

2. I referred to 'criminal elements'. Equiano was kidnapped by criminals - obviously (unless you are claiming that Ibo society had no concept of natural justice and common law). Why did you remove this?

3. I referred to 'European-controlled ports' in Africa instead of 'African ports'. It is important to note that Elmina (among others), was a European controlled port. Angola, one of the main sources for Brazilian slave labourers was a Portuguese colony - so its ports were European controlled. Why did you remove this? You claim that my comments are 'unsourced' but the entire paragraph is unsourced - including your revision. Why is your revision unsourced - whereas my factual clarification is removed?

Revision as of 15:02, 14 September 2007 1. This was a two-word grammatical correction. Why on earth would you undo it? Do you want the article to be ungrammatical, or something?

Revision as of 15:08, 14 September 2007 1. I changed 'chiefdom' to 'fiefdom'. These are both English words, so they are not entirely translatable to the subtleties of West African politics. However, Fiefdom, in my mind seems more appropriate to a polity that exists at the dispensation of a monarch (i.e. it is feudalistic).

2. You have removed my reference to 'warlords, bandits and kidnappers'. There is a tendency to simply 'racialize' enslavement. So African enslavers are simply referred to as 'Africans'. This cannot be correct. Enslaving is an economic activity carried out by economic groups. In Africa, all the evidence suggests that 'warlords, bandits and kidnappers' were the economic agents. Equiano himself described his own kidnapping by bandits. You claim my reference is 'unsourced' but it I can't see any citations in that paragraph, so I certainly haven't made it any worse. Why have you reverted to an unsourced revision and removed my clarification?

Revision as of 15:11, 14 September 2007 1. I changed 'slaves' to 'enslaved people'. Did you want a source for referring to the ancestors of 100s-of-millions of Brazilians, Americans, etc as 'people'. Why did you remove the word people?

Revision as of 15:13, 14 September 2007 I pointed out that the slave markets operated by Barbary pirates were in North Africa. Leaving out 'North' gives the impression that the Portuguese were involved in some kind of 'tit-for-tat' with West Africa. But, in fact the European powers did not impose chattel slavery on millions of Algerians. Instead, they attacked a region completely uninvolved in the enslavement of Europeans. Why did you remove the word North?

Revision as of 15:13, 14 September 2007 I removed an unsourced statement about many fantasies. What fantasies? Reference to fantasy is entirely irrelevant here - it is history we are dealing with not fantasy. Why have you reverted to an unsourced claim about fantasy?

Revision as of 15:51, 14 September 2007 Also in this paragraph I pointed out that the difference between a long term profit of 6% and one of 5% is, in fact, quite substantial. I don't think we need a source for basic math. Why has this simple mathematical fact been removed?

All in all, I feel that my edits have been treated with the utmost disrespect. I object to being told that I alone must 'source' all my statements - when you are reverting the paragraphs to not only unsourced, but simply biased and inaccurate statements whose primary object is imply some kind of vapid moral equivalence between generic 'Africans' and generic 'Europeans'.

The fact that the term 'slave trade' has common useage should not prevent editors from appreciating the individual tragedy of each enslaved person.

I therefore object to you reverting to disrespectful language about people, referring to them only as 'slaves' (objects) rather than enslaved people (subjects). I ask you to reconsider every one of my edits a bit more dispassionately, remembering that you are dealing with people, not inanimate trade objects.

Ackees 17:53, 15 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Long text, short answer. I had to revert all of your changes (even if I didn't object to some of them at all) because the Undo function doesn't work if the changed text was itself changed afterwards. The only alternative would have been to manually go through every edit, which simply was too much work. To address some of the specific points you made above (in a subsection, to make it easier for other editors to join the discussion: Malc82 23:43, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Changes by Ackees
First edit:

1. agree

2. I can live with "enslaved Africans" although I don't see a problem with "slaves" either. e.A. seems a bit to politically correct and complicated to me. After all, we also say "Europeans" not "Slavers from some, but not all, European countries". We might discuss that in a separate section.

3. Even if the other version was unrefed too, you shouldn't add further unrefed material. If you have a reference I won't deny the fact that raiding parties existed.

4. No problem with calling it a deportation once or twice, but the AST was a trade nevertheless. What I have a problem with is the addition of terms like "bandits", "criminal elements" etc., which should be avoided according to WP:WEASEL. According to WP:NPOV judgements should be avoided as far as possible and readers should be trusted to see the horrible social effects of this trade for themselves.

Second Edit:

1. Agree that kingdom is much more appropriate than tribe.

2. See above. Unless you add a reference or refer to the Equiano example specifically, the term should be avoided.

3. African port refers to the location. It doesn't seem relevant to me who ran them because none of them would have worked without support from both sides.

Third edit: as I explained in the edit summary, undo of individual edits wasn't possible. Plus, the initial sentence was absolutely correct.

Fourth edit:

1. Chiefdom is much better in terms of NPOV. I'm not familiar enough with African history to say for sure, but some chiefs/kings might have gotten their position through some kind of "election" or any process that may be unfairly characterized by the word thieving.

2. Already addressed this above. Halfways intelligent readers should be aware that both "Europeans" and "Africans" were actually a small minority of their groups. If we would be that specific everytime the resulting article would read like a High Court comment on a complicated matter of conflicting laws. I didn't remove everything else because removing content in "sensible" articles always means having to defend your decision against a busload of criticism and allegations (your complaint being one of the friendliest I ever had, thanks for that).

Fifth and Sixth edit: entirely a function of the Undo being impossible and a busy schedule. I'll re-install the North afterwards. (Update: Didn't reinstall the "North" because the context already says that it was North African slavers. Malc82 23:52, 15 September 2007 (UTC))

Seventh edit:

The "fantasies" (word might not be the best) sentence is important to give some historical perspective. For example, to understand some of the theories by Rodney it is necessary to understand that in his time it was largely agreed upon that the profit rates were astronomical (50% and higher have been assumed in early sources). Your math might indeed need a reference, because profit rates generally aren't that well known for this period and the difference between 5 and 6 might be two different studies assessing 5.3 and 5.6%. 18th century figures generally shouldn't be treated as written in stone. If however you find a reliable source that did the same math (and whose methodology can be tested) you are very welcome to add this.

Finally:

As I have said before on this talk page, I believe that the more of a moral component a topic (especially a trade) has, the less emotional it should be discussed. Give the reader the best and most complete information you can and trust him to detect the horrible part himself. This is not only true in matters of history. People should be able to understand that Hitler's actions were horrible because they know about them, not because everybody told them so. People study history to understand the present and learn for the future, this is something you don't learn if you only memorize the moral judgements others made but only if you get used to make them yourself. Malc82 23:43, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Portuguese and Spanish spread the slave trade?
Did the Portuguese and Spanish spread the trade of african slaves to the northern countries of Europe (like the Netherlands)? Were the Dutch slave traders recent immigrants from Spain and Portugal? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.69.78.105 (talk • contribs) on October 16


 * Do you mean spreading actual slaves to Northern Europe (this happened, but on a limited scale) or spreading the trade. The latter wouldn't be correct, the Northern European powers simply answered the same problem (lots of work and very few workers in their New World colonies) in a similar way. They started out later because they entered into colonialism later. The Dutch slave traders generally came from the already huge Dutch merchant marine. Dutch slave traders actually used some very different methods than all other nations, regarding f.e. type of ships. The Dutch were also the only ones who more often than not conducted a textbook triangular voyage while ships of all other nations usually returned to Europe without cargo. Malc82 01:41, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Weasel words
Wiki is clear about weasel words. When you say "Most" nobody went out theri an counted opinions. This "most" Eurocentric ideology has come up in this article b4 and it was agreed to show balance. It is well know that figure of 12 million is properly debated by MOST African scholars such as Zuberi, Asante etc. So to say SOME is in keeping with wiki policy on showing bias by using terms such as "Most Historians agree", or "It is accepted that..."--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 19:34, 6 February 2010 (UTC)


 * If you have WP:RS that dispute the figure of 9.4 and 12 million, please bring them. In the meantime, "most" is appropriate because the sources aren't individual historians but descriptions of what multiple historians believe. — Malik Shabazz Talk/Stalk 19:56, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * THe burden is on you to justify the weasle word usage. Who are these "multiply historians" no one can say what MOst historicans think about a disputed figure. Most people think the sky is blue is okay but most should never be used in a debataly situation. See policy. If it is most then show that it is most? One website cannot suggest the opinion of Most historians. Where is the list of these historians, or do White historians have a louder voice than the black ones? Until then respect the editors who edit these pages. Weasel words reflect bias an it is easy to avoid using them.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 20:42, 12 February 2010 (UTC)


 * To save time here is a copy of wiki policy: Weasel words can present an apparent force of authority seemingly supporting statements without allowing the reader to decide whether the source of the opinion is reliable, or they can call into question a statement. If a statement cannot stand without weasel words, it does not express a neutral point of view; either a source for the statement should be found, or the statement should be removed. If, on the other hand, a statement can stand without such words, their inclusion may undermine its neutrality, and the statement will generally be better off without them.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 20:51, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * It's pretty easy to find sources that agree that these numbers are the scholarly consensus. For instance: "the most recent aggregate estimates of the volume and geographic distribution of the transatlantic slave trade, however, have largely confirmed Curtin's 1969 census. David Eltis' estimate that 9,468,000 enslaved Africans arrived in the Americans during the era of the transatlantic slace trade increases Curtin's totals by only 1 percent." James A. Rawley The transatlantic slave trade: a history, 2005. pg. 15 - SimonP (talk) 21:00, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * What i have issue with since years of working here is this view that White Historians make up "concensus" on Africa. Or the authoritative voice. The bulk of Black historians just are not seen as "real" historians. Curtain work is the subject of great debate. Most people today copy and paste this one set of research, so a bad copy of misinformation doesnt get better with time.  Whatever the truth weasle words r best avoided Agreed? Zuberi is heavily critical of curtin. In a nutshell Zuberi argues that he unduly has the dominant voice in history and Afrocentric challenges to these numbers r ignored. Naturally curtin and other White scholars wants to keep the number as low as possible. or is this an imagination that Fage, Curtin et al historically wash out Africa? Now forget Yotube but this is Zuberis position Zuberi on Curtin --Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 21:08, 12 February 2010 (UTC)


 * There are no "weasel words" in the lede. Please read footnote 7 carefully: "It is now estimated that 11,863,000 slaves were shipped across the Atlantic. [Note in original: Paul E. Lovejoy, "The Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade on Africa: A Review of the Literature", in Journal of African History 30 (1989), p. 368.]" A Review of the Literature—that means Lovejoy reviewed the scholarly papers concerning the Atlantic slave trade and found, based on that review, that approximately 12 million people were shipped. Hence the word "most" isn't a weasel word, it's an accurate description of what the source says. — Malik Shabazz Talk/Stalk 21:24, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * This is Wikipedia and not Journal of African History which i cannot edit or present. it is one source which is saying MOST, so does that make it true. I will now add, however Most African historians put the figure much higher and cite Asante "History Of Africa" you uncivil attitude is against the policy of Wikipedia. How can you put the opinion of one source as the slant of a wikipedia article. My argument stands that saying MOST introduces a false bias because anyone can say MOST. It is better for NPOV to avoid using Most or words which give false authority 2 statements. follow policy and use the talk page --Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 21:43, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Editing from pride is not productive. I actually made it better by saying Contemporary historians, So there is no need for MOST. But as oppose 2 looking at my compromise the the editor calling himself Malik (?) reverted. disregarding my compromise.--Halqh حَلَقَة הלכהሐላቃህ (talk) 21:58, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * It's not a compromise unless all parties agree to it. Based on Hugh Thomas' analysis of the numbers and sources in an appendix to "The Slave Trade", I am very comfortable with the 11,000,000 estimate.  Rather than quibbling over the word "most", how about presenting some SOURCED (i.e. work and page number) alternatives from reliable sources that should possibly be added to the article.  There is no reason why the section under debate cannot be expanded to present other numbers (providing they are properly sourced). Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 22:58, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I have no particular view on what the figure should be. This is a question of what is WP:RS, or in this case the most reliable source.  This is not about the majority of historians, but the most reliable view.  If there is a current academic conflict, but best solution is to quote both views and comment on their strength.  I have little doubt that Journal of African History is a peer-reviewed journal.  Accordingly, views published in this are likely to be based on the latest research, and to be robust.  However, what appears in a "review of literature" is likely merely to reflect that a view has been published elsewhere: it would be necessary to assess the merits of the matter reviewed.  It is important that a precise citation is given for all figures quoted are, and older views should not be given priority over newer revisionist research, which will usually have considered and rejected (for reasons) the older views.  Peterkingiron (talk) 17:54, 14 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The Lovejoy article does evaluate the various claims and draw an independent conclusion. Thomas does so to a much lesser extent.  They both find that the numbers estimated in the studies they examined fall between 9 and 12 million.  The YouTube talk referenced above throws out a number between 25 million and 100 million.  If these numbers have actually made it to scholarly peer reviewed journal articles or books, then they probably should be included in the article. From what I could find on JSTOR regarding Zuberi, it does not appear that he has managed to put his opinions with hard numbers in publication. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 20:40, 14 February 2010 (UTC)
 * YouTube can hardly be regarded as WP:RS, (potentially) much more in the nature of WP:OR, probably the result of hyperbole (or plain exaggeration), which is unfortunately all to prevalent when journalists are involved. This is a subject on which there has been a great deal of scholarly research, and an article as well developed as this one should not allow the introduction of non-scholarly sources, however attractive.  Peterkingiron (talk) 21:45, 14 February 2010 (UTC)