Atlantic Slave Trade - Causes and Effiects
INTRODUCTION
The Atlantic slave trade, between the fifteenth and the nineteenth centuries, was the largest forced migration in the history of mankind. This migration was distinct from others of the kind, in terms of its begrudging nature, record breaking mortality rates and the alienation of generations from their roots. This essay aims to explore the various factors that led to the development of Atlantic slave trade - political, technological, social and economic. It also analyses the profitability of the trade from the viewpoint of the various stakeholders entangled in this epic trade network – kings, slave traders and middlemen, planters and ordinary consumers. POLITICAL FACTORS The yearning of the Europeans especially Portuguese, Spanish, British and the Dutch for exploration, colonisation and imperialism was a major factor in expanding the slave trade networks in the Atlantic. As discussed by Timothy P. Grady in the book The Atlantic World 1450-2000, “explorers from Portugal, Spain and other European nations expanded the geographic knowledge southward along the coast of Africa and westward across the Atlantic shores of the Americas”. The urge for this exploration was triggered by the fall of Constantinople in May 1943, the last vestige of the Roman Empire, to the Muslim Turks which shook the fortitude of the European countries and the Christian faith. The expansion of the Ottoman Empire around the Mediterranean region deprived European merchants of the lucrative trade routes along the Silk Road to the East. The threat of lost communication and trade routes across the Mediterranean into China, India and other regions of eastern Asia and lost access to silk and other precious commodities carried along this route, forced Europeans to explore alternate trade routes to Asia by turning westward for new opportunities. Discovery of new routes west of Europe through the Atlantic, led to European arrival off West coast of Africa in the late fifteenth century.
The Atlantic slave trade, between the fifteenth and the nineteenth centuries, was the largest forced migration in the history of mankind. This migration was distinct from others of the kind, in terms of its begrudging nature, record breaking mortality rates and the alienation of generations from their roots. This essay aims to explore the various factors that led to the development of Atlantic slave trade - political, technological, social and economic. It also analyses the profitability of the trade from the viewpoint of the various stakeholders entangled in this epic trade network – kings, slave traders and middlemen, planters and ordinary consumers. POLITICAL FACTORS The yearning of the Europeans especially Portuguese, Spanish, British and the Dutch for exploration, colonisation and imperialism was a major factor in expanding the slave trade networks in the Atlantic. As discussed by Timothy P. Grady in the book The Atlantic World 1450-2000, “explorers from Portugal, Spain and other European nations expanded the geographic knowledge southward along the coast of Africa and westward across the Atlantic shores of the Americas”. The urge for this exploration was triggered by the fall of Constantinople in May 1943, the last vestige of the Roman Empire, to the Muslim Turks which shook the fortitude of the European countries and the Christian faith. The expansion of the Ottoman Empire around the Mediterranean region deprived European merchants of the lucrative trade routes along the Silk Road to the East. The threat of lost communication and trade routes across the Mediterranean into China, India and other regions of eastern Asia and lost access to silk and other precious commodities carried along this route, forced Europeans to explore alternate trade routes to Asia by turning westward for new opportunities. Discovery of new routes west of Europe through the Atlantic, led to European arrival off West coast of Africa in the late fifteenth century.
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