Atlantic Slave Trade Essay

Atlantic Slave Trade

The Atlantic slave trade refers to the transportation of black Africans from their homelands to the New World. Although the term does not sound violent, the actual notion comprises many different activities including violent capture, tortures, and mass murder of African people).Even though many understood the immorality and the cruelty of slavery itself, very few could afford to renounce it, because slavery was an inseparable part of 17th-18th century world economy. African slaves not only provided the labor force but also played a fundamental role in the establishment and development of the New World.

Atlantic slave trade was very important for 18 century World Economy, because it was one of the three elements of so-called Triangular trade, a three-way exchange between America, Europe, and Africa. European traders would ship textiles, muskets, and manufactured merchandize to Africa and exchange it for slaves. Then, they would take slaves to the West to Americas and exchange them for cotton and tobacco, and sail home. On each side of the triangular trade ships made huge profits plus they carried different valuable merchandize from both African continent and the New World.

Slavery existed in Africa long before the arrival of Europeans. Slave trading was not looked at in an low standard way it was simply a deal as if trading gold for minerals. Many slaves from Africa had good skills and obtained good knowledge about agriculture and planting. Those skilled slaves and gold were traded for Arab’s salt, cloth, metal and horses by other African slave owners. Slavery then became widespread at the period of economic contact. Private land ownership was largely absent from pre-colonial African societies, and slaves were one of the few forms of wealth-producing property an individual could possess. Slaves were also exported across the desert to North Africa and to western Asia, Arabia, and India. The origin of Atlantic slave trade is mainly...