Many tribes fought each other, so they would capture people from the other tribe and sell them into slavery. This is not something new in history. In war people have been taken and sold into slavery for centuries. The Greeks used pirates to sell slaves around the ancient world and so did the Romans.
The slave trade in West Africa has a long history, predating the arrival of the Europeans by centuries. Traditionally - and until the end of slavery in the 19th century - the procurers were the local African chiefs and kings, who either acquired slaves by taking prisoners of war, or by making raids into their neighbour's territories with the express purposes of catching people to sell as slaves. Transport within Africa of slaves was often arranged by Arab slave-traders. Until the late 17th century, the Arab countries were also the major buyers/slaveholders. With the rise of sugar and cotton plantations in the Americas the Europeans became the biggest buyers and they established slave-collecting and transportation posts along the West African coast, encouraging traders and offering good prices. This of course was a powerful incentive to local kings and traders to step up their efforts.
Black slavery is essentially prehistoric, since it has been going on for as long as we have had information about Africa. There seems to have been a tradition of thousands of years of inter-tribal warfare with the winners enslaving the losers.Then new winners enslaved the old winners and freed the old enslaved losers. This culture seems to have been an endless cycle for as far back as African history is available. Only recently has African tribal warfare changed to brutally killing rather than enslaving tribal enemies.We know that the Egyptians captured black Nubian slaves in their ongoing series of wars and reconciliations with Nubia to their south, going back to 5000 years ago.Modern black slavery, the Atlantic Slave Trade, was started roughly 300 years ago by Portuguese ship owners who made contact with west coastal African tribes and discovered that the tribes were willing to sell their slaves. There was a serious shortage of agricultural labor in the Americas, especially in South America and the West Indies, so the Portuguese traders made a fortune transporting tribal slaves from Africa to the plantations of the Americas. A relatively small number of black slaves were sold in the North American colonies which became the U.S.A.The Atlantic Slave Trade grew as (1) most other European nations began running slave ships, and (2) inland tribes started bringing their slaves to the coast where they could sell them to the traders, which was followed by even more tribal warfare and outright kidnapping to bring more and more slaves to the west coast to be sold, creating an epic holocaust.I have never seen any evidence of anyone but blacks selling blacks to the Europeans.
furs and lumbers to sell in europe
Serfs were in their own class of people who were not free, but also not slaves. They were not bought or sold, but were bound to the soil they lived on and could not legally leave it. They were in a state of mutual obligation with the lords of the manors. They provided the lords with part of the crop in exchange for their place to live and work and a measure of protection and security. The lord of the manor was not allowed to sell them or move them away, because that would violate his part of the deal.
From slave traders in central Africa.
From slave traders in central Africa.
From slave traders in central Africa.
From slave traders in central Africa.
From slave traders in central Africa
From slave traders in central Africa.
slave traders went to africa because they wanted to get more slaves to sell or trade
Actually there are recorded documents that show that the Native Americans did buy slaves from slave traders, the Cherokee for example were known to buy slaves (African & American slaves). While this was not large scale slavery as practiced by the American's it did exist.
It was not the Europeans that raided the African villages, this was done by other Africans wanting to capture slaves to sell.
The market for West African slaves in creased as Muslim traders bought or seized black Africans to sell in north Africa.
Many tribes fought each other, so they would capture people from the other tribe and sell them into slavery. This is not something new in history. In war people have been taken and sold into slavery for centuries. The Greeks used pirates to sell slaves around the ancient world and so did the Romans.
From slave traders in central Africa.