Talk:Atlantic slave trade/Archive 4

Rastafarians
I cannot see that Rastafarians] merit this mention in the article. I am sure that there are plenty of organisations doing serious work who really do a lot about combating slavery - not singing about it. Rui &#39;&#39;Gabriel&#39;&#39; Correia (talk) 00:34, 11 March 2015 (UTC)
 * The source that was used, cited in footnote 137, makes a very good case for the importance of the music. It has to do with remembrance of slavery. Rjensen (talk) 00:52, 11 March 2015 (UTC)
 * I disagree. It can be the BBC, but the BBC is wide - they even produce the Teletubbies and you will find BBC pages where Teletubbies characters say this or that about something - perhas even about slavery. That is not to say that because it is BBC it is therefore a reliable source. Have a good look at that page and tell me how admissible it is as an academic/ scientific study on Reggae and slavery. Rui &#39;&#39;Gabriel&#39;&#39; Correia (talk) 13:57, 11 March 2015 (UTC)

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Owen 'Alik Shahadah
A discussion thread about the reliability and notability of this author and his pages is taking place at Neutral point of view/Noticeboard, please comment there so we can get a final consensus. Rupert Loup (talk) 11:57, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Contracts or records of what was traded?
Can anyone post records of what exchange took place for slaves to african rulers so that the article is balanced in terms of factual information on how slavery was initiated? Also any names of the african rulers in this article — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.49.148.92 (talk) 21:19, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

PBS News Hour Dec 8th 2015, the slaves taken included 1.2 million Muslims
I came here looking for information on the people taken into slavery and to verify the statements made on the News Hour. What tribes? What economic status? What religions? What ethnic groups? The ethnic details are delved into but other demographics are limited or completely missing. Were 10% of the people taken actually Muslims and not tribal religious practitioners? How many were Christian before taken? Is there another article that focuses on the slaves themselves and not the institutions of slave trading which would include details about their pre-enslavement life?

"KHALED BEYDOUN, Barry University: ''Yes, the culture of, you know, scapegoating an entire group is nothing new in the United States, obviously with the interment of Japanese-Americans circa World War II.

The idea of that stereotyped guilt, the idea that an individual’s race or phenotype is signal or symbolic of some kind of national security threat was well embedded in the American narrative, also with the Chinese Exclusion Acts.

There’s also three precedents, if you will, where the idea of banning Muslims signifies that Trump’s rhetoric or message is nothing novel. First, you had a Naturalization Act from 1790 to 1952 which made the naturalization, the citizenship of Muslim immigrants illegal because Islam was viewed as being irreconcilable with whiteness, which was a prerequisite for citizenship.

Second, you had National Origins Act of 1924, which was on the books until 1965, which had very strict quotas against the entry of individuals from Asian countries that were Muslim majority. And, third, you had the decimation of the indigenous Muslim population, enslaved Africans, who actually comprised 1.2 million people in the Antebellum South.

So the idea of banning Muslims is nothing novel, in addition to the precedent of other groups being demonized as well."

Khaled, Beydoun doesn't have an article on Wikipedia. I found references to him as a source about the Baltimore protests (Khaled A Beydoun is an assistant professor of law at the Barry University Dwayne O Andreas School of Law. @KhaledBeydoun) One of his other contentions about the immigration preferences against Muslims since 1790 are something I hadn't heard before, but seem plausible. The Naturalization Act of 1790 included a clause for test of good character ("making proof to the satisfaction of such court, that he is a person of good character") but didn't explicitly mention the Muslim religion although it would be easy to construe good character as excluding non-Christians.

'Does anyone know of confirming sources about the Muslim roots of the people taken on the Atlantic route into the Americas? ' 97.85.173.38 (talk) 13:37, 12 December 2015 (UTC)

I found some potential confirming sources: 97.85.173.38 (talk) 14:20, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Tweed, Thomas A. "Islam in America: From African Slaves to Malcolm X". National Humanities Centre. & Curtis, Muslims in America.
 * The Spread of Islam in West Africa. Margari Hill, Stanford University. January 2009
 * http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/feature/islam-in-america/
 * Were My African American Ancestors Muslims? 2013 Nathan W. Murphy

Semi-protected edit request on 7 February 2016
Mustangsally101 (talk) 03:20, 7 February 2016 (UTC) This website down plays the role of slavery on the part of Europeans and gives the false impression that slavery was instigated by West Africans. "sold by other western Africans to western European slave traders, with a small minority being captured directly by the slave traders in coastal raids," This information is seriously flawed and must be edited to reflect the truth that Europeans went to Africa seeking people they deeded as cattle. They captured and bought human beings to work of plantations that they did not wish to pay labor for. 03:20, 7 February 2016 (UTC)


 * Hi. I came over from 3O.  Be advised that that avenue is designed for two-person disputes that have already seen considerable talk page discussion.  This does not seem to fit those criteria.
 * As per your actual complaint, what I see is that the "small minority" refers not to the slave traders overall but to the subset involved in direct capture. The article still makes it clear that the majority of people taking the captives across the ocean were white.  This information comes from the Liverpool International Slavery Museum.
 * However, if you believe that this is incorrect, that not even a few white slavers were involved in direct raids, all you need to do is find a reliable source that says so, and you can add that information to the article (in a balanced manner). Darkfrog24 (talk) 05:16, 7 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. --allthefoxes (Talk) 16:52, 7 February 2016 (UTC)

Laws of Burgos
The only one Kingdom in XVIth century Europe to forbid slavery expressly through the publication of specific Laws was the Kingdom of Castile, formerly Kingdom of Spain Juanma Campano (talk) 09:19, 10 July 2016 (UTC)


 * That may or may not be true, but (1) the Wikipedia article doesn't say anything about the Atlantic slave trade, only about the enslavement of Indians, (2) Wikipedia articles can't be cited as sources, and (3) there's a footnote at the end of the sentence that cites a book, published by an academic press, by a pair of historians. I think they probably know the subject matter a little better than you or I do. Unless you can cite a reliable source that supports your assertion, it stays out. — MShabazz Talk/Stalk 13:14, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

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 * Archives confirmed. Updated url for the first source was located: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/topic_display.cfm?tcid=104
 * The second was url is current The updated url was added to the article. BiologicalMe (talk) 19:23, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Copyright problem removed
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can someone please cite this source and add a section for me:
cite this please: http://www.un.org/events/slaveryremembrance/background.shtml

and add especially the following information:

Slavery and the slave trade are among the worst violations of human rights in the history of humanity. The transatlantic slave trade was unique within the entire history of slavery due to its duration (four hundred years), its scale (approximately 17 million people excluding those who died during transport) and the legitimization accorded to it, including under laws of the time.

also please vet and cite this source: http://www.worldfuturefund.org/Reports/Slavedeathtoll/slaverydeathtoll.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by Iran-Middle-East (talk • contribs) 04:07, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Draft:Atlantic slave trade to Brazil
I don't know, but there might be sone stuff over here that can be merged in this article. 103.6.159.77 (talk) 01:37, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 February 2017
I would like for you to delete this page or make this sound like a myth, because the transatlantic slave trade never happened. 104.52.209.177 (talk) 03:34, 27 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Gulumeemee (talk) 06:27, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Please edit Europeans to Iberians in the background section
Please edit this statement in the background section: "Although the initial Atlantic naval explorations were performed purely by Europeans, members of many European nationalities were involved, including sailors from Portugal, Spain, the Italian kingdoms, England, France and the Netherlands. " It doesn't make sense. I believe Europeans should be Iberians. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Adomika (talk • contribs) 18:17, 20 May 2017 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your message. I reviewed the source (it's available on Google Books) and corrected the sentence -- it wasn't as simple as just replacing "Europeans" with "Iberians". I also removed an interpolation in a quotation from the source that doesn't appear in the source and a Wikilink to the wrong target. Thanks again. — MShabazz Talk/Stalk 19:43, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

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Steam Engine
There needs to be a correction under the "effects" section concerning the Steam Engine being 1) invented by Watt [it was improved by Watt], and 2) being financed by Plantation owners from the Caribbean [it wasn't, even the Wikipedia article on the Watt's engine gets the history correct, just copy from that]. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.100.131.106 (talk) 15:44, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

English / Scottish slave trade
Whilst there is a substantial mention of English participation in the slave trade, there is no mention of Scottish involvement. My understanding is that Glasgow generally and Port Glasgow and Greenock specifically were involved in the triangular trade, which is why Glasgow became a major port for the importation of tobacco. See, for instance http://www.nts.org.uk/learn/downloads/Scotland%20and%20the%20SlaveTrade.pdf and http://www.blackhistorymonth.org.uk/article/section/history-of-slavery/scotland-and-slavery/ I hesitate to make any changes to this article myself, as I feel I have an incomplete knowledge of the subject - but it may be appropriate for a regular contributor to this article to address this point.ThoughtIdRetired (talk) 22:29, 8 September 2017 (UTC)

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Semi-protected edit request on 21 March 2018
Please change the sentence "The slave trade used mainly the triangular trade route and its Middle Passage, and existed from the 16th to the 19th centuries." The dates should be changed from 16th to 19th century --> 15th to 19th century because there are numerous amounts of evidence proving its existence prior to the 16th century. In fact, it is definitely earlier than the 16th century because it was in the 15th century that Portugal finally had the technology to cross the seas and reach Africa. Therefore, it is best that these dates be corrected to provide historical truth. Ibarnes489 (talk) 16:42, 21 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 17:25, 21 March 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 September 2018
I strongly dispute the way the idea that West Africans selling their fellows into slavery was the majority of the capture of slaves as opposed to Europeans conducting slave raids themselves or with the help of a few Africans. This needs to be corrected. 74.96.226.203 (talk) 00:39, 21 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. L293D (☎ • ✎) 15:12, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Cassare not understandable
In the "African participation in the slave trade" section the concept of "cassare" is not explained at all. It seems that European men were marrying African women, but the connection to slavery is left unexplained. For example, does the woman become a slave, or did the marriage help establish a connection between a European slave trader with an African supplier of slaves? Or something else? Minimum change right now is the addition of (which I cannot do because the article cannot be modified by me.)


 * In the same section, it tries to minimize white control of the trade saying they didn't go to the interior areas out of fear, when in fact they didn't have to, there were plenty of locations on the coast to raid. And perpetuating the myth the majority of the trade came from blacks selling captives to whites, when that was only a small portion of the overall trade. White trades didn't buy slaves or want to if they didn't have to. Why buy what they could take.  This myth of blacks selling their own as a major part of it is a myth perpetuated by white supremacists to excuse the white history and say, 'they are just as bad'.  Look at the historical locations of the trade it was raiding the coasts not the interior. Sad wikipedia perpetuates this whitewashing 96.31.177.52 (talk) 01:32, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Not "whitewashing", just facts Yellowgirl44x44 (talk) 21:37, 6 June 2018 (UTC)


 * The various African tribes had numerous and frequent wars between each other and the taking of their enemies as captives was a means of providing slaves that could be traded on the coast with Moslem traders which is why within the Ottoman Empire the majority of slaves were black Africans. The various tribes didn't have Prisoner of war (POW) camps so the only alternative to killing captives was to sell them as slaves.


 * The majority of the African interior was unknown to 'whites' as these areas did not get known to the rest of the world until the likes of David Livingstone and Henry Stanley explored them, hence the existence of 'slave ports' on the coasts where Africans could be bought and sold at such places as Mozambique and Zanzibar.


 * BTW, within the Ottoman Empire there were plenty of 'white' slaves, the English term 'slave' originating from the Slavs who made up a large proportion of the white slaves within that empire. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.172.230 (talk) 09:43, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

regarding table: Distribution of slaves (1519–1867)[105]
Reference 105 is based on data from David Eltis, 'A Brief Overview of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade,' Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, https://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/about. In addition, regarding reference #105, the data is from page 263, please add the page number. Please add the reference to the table in addition to #105.

Thank you.

Cristian Riella, MD — Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.174.110.22 (talk) 20:27, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 August 2019
Please change the "w" in "Stowage of a british slave ship" in the description of the first picture to an "r". Thank you very much! 78.34.105.238 (talk) 08:46, 30 August 2019 (UTC)


 * ❌. See, e.g., stowage.  –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 13:35, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

'End of the Atlantic slave trade' last paragraph rather dubious
The last para of this section is rather dubious and not very well written. The slave trade is described as 'beneficial to capitalism' which presumably means something like 'still profitable', as the idea that 'capitalism' was something that needed defending at this point it silly. The idea there was a 'moral shift' is dismissed but only by saying why people might push that idea, not by showing it was wrong. It says it was really about undermining competitors profits, which needs expanding upon because Britain abolished the trade in 1807, when its chief rival was France, who themselves banned in it 1814. Why would France ban it in order to undermine Britain's profits if Britain had already banned it?

Last we are told the real reason was the constant slave revolts, as if that was ever enough to abolish slavery previously (hello Spartacus?). At the least this argument needs substantiating.

Either this para needs rewriting in order to make its arguments clearer, or deleting. I am not an expert enough to feel warranted doing either, so I will just leave this objection here. LastDodo (talk) 15:28, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

There are numerous misleading & 1/2 truths- "12.5 million shipped to new world/americas"-referred to SOUTH America where 70% were shipped-less than 388,000 were directly shipped to today's "America" sometime after 1642.People like Louis FARAKAN claiming "WE" enslaved MILLIONS for 400 years are LIARS WITH AN AGENDA. TheWholeTruthSetsUFree (talk) 19:50, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 24 June 2019
Majority of slaves were captured, not brought, which is a misconception that is propagated by Eurocentric idealistic white Supremisct who feel a need to reiterate ones own history, so they can feel better about themselves and ones ancestors actions. 70.167.171.76 (talk)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. aboideautalk 17:19, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

This is not a misconception but a fucking blatant lie by these worthless evil being trying to clean their concience and an insult to African people. You should correct this stuff Toungthiam (talk) 16:46, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

Putting this shit out there and prevent a counter argument under the phony disguise that you are protecting vandalism is just shameless act of dishonesty. Toungthiam (talk) 16:47, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

The change to make is that African slave was capture or forcefully sold to evil and unconciencious European to fulfill their material pursuit in life. Truth is not hard to tell. In some case did not find some worthless African ruller and pitted them against other African ruler to force them to cooperate ? Yes but that was the will of the African people. A clear example if we currently have a proper as the president of US who is ready tell cooperate with Russia and any body who can help him win against the interest of the USA. Does it make it the USA cooperating and selling it's soul to Russia ? Off course not. He is rebegating the US engagement to protect the Kurds ? Does that make the USa a tractor nation, I don't think so. You know better and should know better to out this kind of trash talk out there Toungthiam (talk) 16:53, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

So enraged by this document that I did not proof read and made some typos in the previous post. This following should read n some case did not find some -> in some cases did they not find some

Yes but that was the -> Yes but that was not the

selling it's soul -> selling its soul

He is rebegating the -> He is renegating the

Does that make the USa a tractor nation -> Does it make the USA a traitor nation

know better to out this kind -> know better to put this Toungthiam (talk) 17:03, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

So enraged by this document that I did not proof read and made some typos in the previous post. This following should read n some case did not find some -> in some cases did they not find some

Yes but that was the -> Yes but that was not the

selling it's soul -> selling its soul

He is rebegating the -> He is renegating the

Does that make the USa a tractor nation -> Does it make the USA a traitor nation

know better to out this kind -> know better to put this Toungthiam (talk) 17:03, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 November 2019
African Kings took a large part in selling slaves to Europeans. In the mid-eighteenth century, the Kingdom of Dahomey, for example, had chiefs and state officials, under the king, who acted as middlemen in supplying their captives as slaves for the Atlantic slave trade. The kings of Dahomey did not try to end the slave trade since many chiefs and state officials were allowed to trade on their own. Additionally, the Kingdom of Dahomey sold captives from Africa’s interior and moved the captured to the coast to be sold in the slave trade. 150.108.242.135 (talk) 05:38, 7 November 2019 (UTC)


 * ❌. It's not clear what changes you want to make.  Please make a precise request.  And in any case, this seems redundant to information that's already in the article.  –Deacon Vorbis (carbon &bull; videos) 06:01, 7 November 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 November 2019
Change "In 1809 President James Madison outlawed the Slave Trade with the United States," to In 1808, the United States banned the slave trade, however, this led to a larger slave trading system within the United States. Jackelinerodriguez99 (talk) 21:37, 14 November 2019 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. Editors may not agree with your source. Please discuss this first. -  FlightTime  ( open channel ) 21:46, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

Need map showing both sides of the Atlantic
This article really needs a map showing both sides of the Atlantic, perhaps broken down by Colonial power.(Portugal, England, etc) There is this map but it really doesn't help the viewer much, it does not even have the percentages directly embedded into the image. I have something such as this map from here in mind, but I did not want to do a direct ripoff.

I created the following map purposefully over-simplified, I am hoping to see several revisions until something more fitting for the article can be created. I used only numbers already existing in the current article.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Progressingamerica (talk • contribs) 01:36, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 18 December 2019
please let me edit I can make Wikipedia a lot better if you let me edit 2A00:23C5:CC12:DD01:B89A:D3CE:3BC8:874D (talk) 12:14, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: this is not the right page to request additional user rights. You may reopen this request with the specific changes to be made and someone will add them for you, or if you have an account, you can wait until you are autoconfirmed and edit the page yourself. &#8209;&#8209; El Hef  ( Meep? ) 14:31, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 January 2020
can I please edit 2A00:23C5:CC12:DD01:198D:FD98:EBC8:F94D (talk) 09:03, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: this is not the right page to request additional user rights. You may reopen this request with the specific changes to be made and someone will add them for you, or if you have an account, you can wait until you are autoconfirmed and edit the page yourself. SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 09:09, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Refrence 18 is a dead link
Can someone fix it? I was able to find an archive of that link, right here: https://web.archive.org/web/20181107045055/http://www.afbis.com/analysis/slave.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95m95 (talk • contribs) 02:46, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

100-200 million figure
In the Human Toll section, it says some estimates are that 100-200 million Africans died. The source, an NYT article attributes this figure directly to an organizer of the event the article covers, so it is clearly not reliable and undue and also misleading unless there are reliable scholarly sources that give similar estimates. It is a lot higher than all the other estimates used on this page and is even higher than average Africa's total population during this period.GreenCows (talk) 19:15, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * , it says, [s]ome, like Mr. Akeem, place the figure between 100 million and 200 million. Note the word "some" so it is not just attributing to one person. It also says, [w]hichever is true, many historians note that the numbers of enslaved Africans who died at sea were so great that sharks learned to follow the slave routes because they fed on the bodies thrown overboard.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 19:20, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It's still clearly not reliable. Are there any scholarly sources that give estimates like this? I doubt there are giving this figure is demographically impossible for the time and is many many times higher than other sources on this page.GreenCows (talk) 19:31, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * , I have readded that part you added. I didn't notice it, sorry. I am not sure but the NYT says that some, who they are referring to?.I will invite who also objected removing that number to join this discussion.-SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 19:38, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you for re adding what you accidentally deleted. The NYT article also doesn't say where 14 million comes from either. I think 100-200 million is used by activists. In the article, it is endorsed by the event organizer and also quoted by author and activist Toni Cade Bambara. I doubt any reliable scholarly figures come anywhere near this.GreenCows (talk) 19:55, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
 * ~Thanks for pinging me.  the New York Times is viewed by Wikipedia as a reliable source. You even said so in your edit summary here. As per Wikipedia policy, we go by reliability and venerability. We do not go by truth—i.e. what you think the truth should be. Even if you feel that the NYT article attributed the figures in question to an organizer of the event, the NYT must have perceived him as a notable and reliable person to quote him. Whatever the reason, I don't have an issue attributing the source to the organizer. Then if you wish, adding a different source providing a different figure. The reader therefore gets to read both sides of the argument and make up their own minds. Although it would be nice every now and then if an article is truthful, Wiki does not go by truth but what reliable and verifiable sources say. In your initial post above, you claim that: "[...] and is even higher than average Africa's total population during this period." Do you have any sources for this? Also, remember that this article is not covering one particular period, but a period of 400 years as stated in the article? I reverted you for the reason that you removed a reliable source and content, and that there are other sources supporting your view point which are already in the article with respect to weight. So I could not understand why you would remove a huge content and source. What I would suggest is, we attribute the 100-200 million figure to the person quoted in the NYT article or exactly as written in the NYT. I however take issue with the next line "Estimates by Patrick Manning are far more conservative." That statement/wording should be changed i.e. the wording "are far more conservative" seems to me like we are passing judgement and doubting the accuracy of the previous source - thereby inserting our own biases into the reader's mind. We don't allow the expressions of doubt here. Senegambianamestudy (talk) 00:17, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply. With regard to the claim that Africa's population was lower than 100-200 million. Demographics of Africa page has a source with an estimate of 74 million in 1820 and http://www.thuto.org/ubh/ub/h202/wpop1.htm has 90 million in 1800. I don't think NYT is quoting him because he is reliable or notable on this topic, I think they're quoting him simply because he's an organizer of the event, the article covers and he is one of the subjects of the article. However, I think it's fair if the figure is attributed or you quote the NYT article as you proposed. I also support changing the wording "far more conservative" regarding Patrick Manning for the same reasons as you stated.GreenCows (talk) 01:06, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Good! At least we are moving somewhere. If everyone is happy, we can probably draft wording here that everyone is happy with then update the page. Senegambianamestudy (talk) 02:28, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Williams thesis
Whoever wrote the blurb on the thesis by Eric Williams seems unaware that Capitalism and Slavery focused primarily on the institution of slavery itself, and the slave trade was just a small part of the Williams thesis. That person also seems to have confused the abolition of the trade in 1807 with the emancipation of the slaves in the 1830s. I have made the necessary corrections to show the difference between Williams' arguments on the slave trade, and the much larger Williams thesis itself, which focuses on the declining economic importance of the sugar plantations, and the eventual abolition of slavery itself.Mikesiva (talk) 12:59, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Remove the fake English
Can someone kindly removed all the fake English like "enslaved people," "enslaved Africans," etc. and replace it with the standard English "slaves," "African slaves," etc. "Enslaved" is a verb, not an adjective. Only radical leftist SJWs who hate the English language use bizarre and nonsensical language constructions like this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.73.59.187 (talk) 17:25, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Botanist and geological evidence for much worse impact of European slave trade and associated gun trade on West- and central Africa
There is considerable evidence from botanist research in West-African forest, that during the transatlantic slave trade, many large agricultural and semi-urbanized areas were abandoned, and overgrown by what we now see as rain forest. Also, carbon-dating fire places from the ages of the slave trade provides strong evidence of a similarly large impact on inland African settlements.

This sort of renders the arguments of J.D. Fage and David Eltis, and especially John Thornton invalid: Large parts of Africa were so much depopulated that agricultural and semi-urban areas were completely abandoned and became permanently covered with forest, often up to today. So the suggestion from these writings that European 'traders' were merely allowed participation into a savagely slave raiding and trading continent, no longer stands up to new evidence. So I think we can reduce the size of such comments. Shall I do that?

This also reinforces the argument that the hundreds of dozens of millions of European guns that were sold to slave raiding groups, often directed by the mixed skinned sons of European slavers, fundamentally changed slave raiding practices in Africa for the worse, both in quality and quantity.

Shall I write something about this, thoroughly sourced?

Pieter Felix Smit (talk) 20:21, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

"#slave-factor" Anchor
This article has an anchor midway through the lead section. I've never seen this before; is it actually an appropriate use of the anchor feature? None of the documentation I can find for anchors makes any mention of this as a suggested usage... Aren't anchors supposed to be anchored to full, titled Sections? Personally I found it quite confusing, because I have never seen an "orphaned anchor" elsewhere on WP and it isn't very visually clear what it's directing me to read. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.213.89.38 (talk) 23:24, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 June 2020
The statement that west Africans sold their people is misleading. This was not the source of the African holocaust. 99.7.134.42 (talk) 17:36, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. --allthefoxes (Talk) 19:30, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 June 2020
Citation 22 ( "Slave trade: a root of contemporary African Crisis", Africa Economic Analysis 2000. ) links to an unclaimed or abandoned link. This citation is used three times throughout the article. Only other link i can find to this article is here: but also links to the abandoned afbis.com. I suggest removing these portions until this citation can be verified again. Padraical (talk) 19:44, 13 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Available here:, have added this as a link. But citations don't need to be accessible online, they just need to be theoretically accsible at some library (WP:SOURCEACCESS). – Thjarkur (talk) 19:53, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

2020 Jun 29 edit to New World Destinations.
Hi everyone. I took out the following line:

Irish immigrants took slaves to Montserrat in 1651, and in 1655 slaves were shipped to Belize.

I was trying to get a verifiable date for the first slaves in Belize and... I just couldn't verify 1655. I dug through some books and Belizean anthro journals as well as hitting the net and couldn't find it. It's plausible, but I would have thought it would be easier to find if it was commonly accepted date. So I started searching for the Montserrat point and couldn't find a source for that either.

So I just removed the whole sentence. Apologies if that's not how it works; I generally don't fiddle with semi-protected pages.

Reve (talk) 04:57, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 July 2020
In the 3rd paragraph on the page, in this text, "although illegal smuggling still occurred. In the early 21st century", shouldn't it say 20th century not 21st? Mchemrouge (talk) 16:46, 4 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: No, that appears to be correct. See the later sections of the article: Atlantic slave trade. Rummskartoffel (talk) 17:02, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

Contradiction w.r.t. whether slavery was hereditary in Africa
Just a few lines apart, in the paragraph “Slavery in Africa and the New World contrasted”, the following (unsourced) claim:

"In general, slavery in Africa was not heritable—that is, the children of slaves were free --- while in the Americas, children of slave mothers were considered born into slavery."

is directly contradicted by the quoted contemporary source:

"The slaves which are thus brought from the interior may be divided into two distinct classes—first, such as were slaves from their birth, having been born of enslaved mothers; secondly, such as were born free, but who afterwards, by whatever means, became slaves. Those of the first description are by far the most numerous..."

Of course one quote from a primary source does not make truth but this contradiction is puzzling and should be commented upon. 129.199.129.11 (talk) 12:15, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 1 September 2020
Man yall put this all wrong what actually happened was the europenas took us from Africa and enslaved us. They went as far as the middle cause the Africans were noticing and the europeans were gonna get wouped if they kept going. 2600:1700:9410:8E80:2CEC:31D9:F185:C0E0 (talk) 14:00, 1 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. ◢  Ganbaruby!   (Say hi!) 14:29, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Africans Caught and Enslaved Africans
Wikipedia should mention who actually caught the slaves in their native environment for over 4520 years. Africans have enslaved Africans since 2500 BC, to work on the pyramids at Giza, for just food and shelter. Blacks are depicted as slaves in Egyptian art work. Africans still enslave Africans today, with no pressure from any other continent. The paragraph claims Europeans "indirectly pressured" Africans to do it. Nature pressures everyone to eat and exchange. Africans traded slaves in return for horses and guns. Ross Kemp, in a BBC documentary, interviewed women caught as slaves and subjected to sexual abuse. Change.org has a Petition to Abolish Slavery in Libya. AllanRosenzweig (talk) 15:55, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Not fit for sale
The American Freedmen's Inquiry Commission produced a report, also published as The Wrong of Slavery, the Right of Emancipation, and the Future of the African Race in the United States that goes into some detail about those captives who made it across the sea and did not die from the trip. Some of these captives may have been sick from disease or otherwise but were still not looked at as a fit candidate for sale on the market, so they were destroyed to make way for future shipment. The following details are noted: There is no evidence that slaves were bred for sale. The concurrent testimony is against it.

There is abundant testimony in proof that as to negroes offered for sale as slaves and rejected by the slave-dealers on account of their state of health or otherwise, their fate is usually a sad one. Even delay in the market may cause their death.

The Rev. Mr. Baggs said, "He had proof that when marauding parties come with their booty in slaves to the coast, and find no vessel, they kill the slaves because of the expense of sending them back."

Mr. Falconbridge said, "He has seen slaves who were offered for sale and refused cruelly beaten."

Mr. Penny, who had made eleven voyages as captain of slavers, deposes, "He has been repeatedly informed that slaves bought for sale and rejected by the slave-dealers on account of disease or otherwise are destroyed as not worth their food."

It seemed that the "human toll" section was the most proper place to put a reference to this. Progressingamerica (talk) 01:19, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Life expectancy of Europeans in sub-Saharan Africa source
"Except for the Portuguese, European slave traders generally did not participate in the raids because life expectancy for Europeans in sub-Saharan Africa was less than one year during the period of the slave trade (which was prior to the development of quinine as a treatment for malaria).[3]"

Is there a better source for this claim than a quote from an essay by Thomas Sowell? No source is given by Thomas Sowell for this claim which is made on page 121 of his book Black Rednecks and White Liberals.

Haussian (talk) 12:32, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

Found a typo
The header in 9.5 says "Brazil ends the Atlantic slave ttade". It should say "Brazil ends the Atlantic slave trade". I can't fix it because I'm not autoconfirmed yet. ✅. Thanks. warshy (¥¥) 17:25, 12 January 2021 (UTC)

Should Islamic Slave Trade be added to the
see also== section? ==

Islamic slave trade — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8003:59DB:4100:24B1:52AA:6851:DE1D (talk) 23:22, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Second Paragraph
While African slaves were present on the early voyages of Christopher Columbus, it was not until 1501 that a formal trade began on African slaves. It was at this time that Spain’s monarchs Isabella and Ferdinand granted the governor of Hispaniola, Nicolás de Ovando, the right to bring in Africans for sale on the island. Shipowners regarded the slaves as cargo to be transported to the Americas as quickly and cheaply as possible,[2] Throughout Latin America, slaves worked as field-hands on sugar plantations or coffee plantations either in large gangs or alongside farmers growing corn, manioc, beans, and fruit. Slaves worked on gold and silver mines in Brazil, Mexico, and Peru. They worked on whaling expeditions as sailors and oarsmen and worked in warehouses extracting and refining whale oil. They worked in the construction industry, they cut timber for ships, worked as skilled labor, and also as domestic servants. Unlike the system that would eventually form in the United States of slaves being mainly used as rural field hands, Latin American slaves filled all jobs in both rural and urban areas.

Seafaring technology bloopers
"For centuries, tidal currents had made ocean travel particularly difficult and risky for the ships that were then available, and as such there had been very little, if any, maritime contact between the peoples living in these continents.[9] In the 15th century, however, new European developments in seafaring technologies resulted in ships being better equipped to deal with the tidal currents, and could begin traversing the Atlantic Ocean."

This is utter nonsense. I don't know if it was stated like this in the cited text or not, but the idea that seafarers could not cross the Atlantic until "tidal currents" were mastered is ludicrous nonsense made up by someone who knows nothing about seafaring -- tidal currents create challenges near shore only and are not even noticeable offshore, so were no impediment whatsoever to transatlantic exploration. The real technological challenge was navigation and cartography, but the Age of Discovery is anyway not really the product of technological change -- it resulted more than anything from simply knowing that there was another continent over there Jaiden is the best person. whoever reads Wikipedia is reading utter nonsense. toddlers love Wikipedia - Boo down with Wikipedia. don't pay. don't read.

This silly passage should be deleted.

African Participation in the Slave Trade
Additionally, many Africans were indirectly pressured to participate in the slave trade by Europeans and their military. Since many Europeans had advanced military technology, they traded weapons and technology with Africans in exchange for enslaved Africans. Many Africans were forced to comply to participate in the slave trade since the Europeans had technology, such as horses and guns, were very useful in defending themselves from enemies.

Legacy of racism
This sentence: "However, the belief that Caucasian Europeans were divinely ordained by an omnipotent Judeo-Christian God as 'superior' to other human races with darker skin, a major tenant of the White supremacy movement, was one of the basic perceptions that would allow industrial-scale slavery across the Atlantic to thrive" These are fairly major claims that need citations to show it was a widespread belief and important to allowing the slave trade.

No mention of scientific racism
There should at least be a link to Scientific_racism, ideally to Scientific_racism It is relevant to both the history of the slave trade and its legacy either the African slaver section or the legacy section look appropriate to me.

Coastal raids
I had to revert your edit. The source you provided says "Most slave ships used British 'factors', men who lived full-time in Africa and bought enslaved people from local leaders." That means that direct raids by European did take place, but the majority of enslaved people were bought. Also, using an edit summary makes life much easier, for all editors. --Rsk6400 (talk) 16:48, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

You have been reverted by me and by two other editors. Since you are a comparatively new editor, you might want to look at the way how other editors use references. Also: I started the discussion here. Going on to repeating your changes while you see that other editors disagree is a bit problematic. Please stop repeating your changes and start to discuss here, so that we may reach a consensus, see WP:consensus. --Rsk6400 (talk) 19:24, 8 May 2021 (UTC)


 * Rsk6400, Seriously I thought by going back and undoing the changes you might have gotten my point. You have to understand that the "transatlantic slave trade" is a very sensitive and critical topic. Most times people tend to only view the few descriptive paragraphs of a certain topic on Wikipedia, so information presented in those paragraphs should be very clear. The information contained there now - as edited by you - is not correct. Let me just point out some of the flaws:


 * 1. This statement, "...who had been sold by other West Africans, or by half-European 'merchant princes' to Western European slave traders (with a small number being captured directly by the slave traders in coastal raids)" is childish and glossed-up. To be honest, it doesn't look like someone who wrote this actually read the history of the Atlantic slave trade (no offence). Like I said, this is a very critical topic, make sure the information is presented properly. If you say, "with a small number being captured directly by the slave traders in coastal raids", do you have any credible reference to reflect this (estimated figures to be specific)? Many poeople, I guess, see this as if the writer is trying to minimize the European traders' involvement in the extraction of the slaves. Well, they were heavily involved because they set up the "slave factories", they made all the arrangements for how these slaves were to be captured; they even provided weapons to the African middlemen (such as guns and nets). Think about something like this: "European factors (people who collected the slaves on the coast) seldom ventured inland to capture the millions of people who were transported from Africa as captives. An African middleman would usually sell his slaves to the European factor." I lifted this directly from a BBC online educational program. So, this might be shorten as "European factors seldom ventured inland, instead they were using African middlemen to capture the vast majority of people transported as slaves from Africa".


 * 2. Also, "who had been sold by other West Africans" is so broad and vague. You have to understand that slavery is a sensitive subject. You have to say what really happened here: "sold by African middlemen to European slave factors". Here people reading this will know that there were specific individuals acting as middlemen for European slave traders who were actually involved in slavery, and not just broadly "other West Africans". What you might imply here is that there were the captives (slaves) and the captors (other West Africans) - meaning apart from the captives, West Africans were all involved, ignoring the fact that only certain individuals acting as middlemen were actually involved.


 * These are my two main concerns I would like you to consider, because I myself don't want to be going through this all the time; but I cannot sit by and see people being deceived by wrong information about a critical and sensitive topic about slavey.


 * NB. True that I'm quite new to editing here as I'm not that too familiar with how the referencing works, but don't use that as a way of dismissing my editing. Infact, I know others can easily correct the referencing part as long as the information is correct.
 * I think I can understand very well that you cannot sit by and see people being deceived - some months ago I was warned not to make any more changes to Germans, an article which actually misrepresents a group to which some of my students belong, and who are excellent young people who I see nearly every day. But if you are patient and have some experience, you can really improve Wikipedia. But patience is needed, especially because the issue of slavery is so sensitive, an observation with which I totally agree.
 * That said, I have to tell you that WP is not based on facts or on the truth, but on reliable sources, see WP:RS. We as editors don't claim that we know something, we only claim that we present the results of academic scholarship in a correct and neutral way. The last edits you made were not covered by the BBC source you provided. BBC and the other source that you deleted clearly state that only a small part of the captives were actually caught by Europeans.
 * What you propose in your comment above still has the problem of "middlemen". As far as I understand the BBC text, those people were no middlemen, but leaders, commanders of warriors, and kings. They didn't accept European instructions for all the arrangements for how these slaves were to be captured. Still, it was the Europeans who provided guns and caused the intensifying of warfare, killings and enslavements by providing a "market" for human beings. --Rsk6400 (talk) 11:43, 9 May 2021 (UTC)