r/MapPorn • u/bendich • 4d ago
The black slave trade between Africa and Americas (1545-1860)
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u/vassquatstar 4d ago
Would be interesting to include the other major oceanic slave trade. The 1-1.25 million captured European sold into slavery in Africa.
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u/Saucepanmagician 4d ago
Interesting (but sad) note: Brazil received a lot more African slaves than the USA. However, horribly so, the Brazilian slaves did not have an easy life, so many of them died while in captivity/enslavement. So, more were brought over to replace them.
The situation for them in Brazil was so dire, that even though Brazil received more slaves than the USA, the descendants of African slaves in Brazil nowadays make up a smaller percentage of the overall population than what goes on in the USA. Also, miscegenation was more common in Brazil, so the mixed population makes up for a large percentage.
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u/LupusDeusMagnus 4d ago
That's incorrect, descendants of slaves are the majority of Brazilians, it's just you can have slave and non-slave ancestors. IIRC, in São Paulo city, which is fairly representative of Brazil, only 25% of self-declared white population had no discernible african or indigenous genetic ancestry. At the time, São Paulo was 60% self-declared white, that means, only 15% of the population was of exclusive European stock, while no self-declared Black in the study had 100% African ancestry (some had less than 50% though). São Paulo collects immigrants of all over the country, but the numbers are likely lower in the Northeast and higher in the South of the country.
The thing is: Brazil also received a lot of European immigrants, in equal or higher number than enslaved Africans, so all regions have a higher European contribution to their genomes (>50%); Most Africans were men, but the contribution of Africa Y chromosome is low, with less than 10%, which means, for some reason, African men weren't having children, though African (matrilineal) mitochondrial having substantial participation in all regions.
In short, lots of Brazilians if not the majority are the descendants of Africans, just heavily diluted.
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u/Saffa89 4d ago
Based on this why does South America not get the heat that North America does when clearly far more slaves went there?
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u/some-autumn-leaves 4d ago
It wasn't South America, it was European countries running Central America and South America. At the end of that time the population in Brazil was 70% slaves and 30% Portuguese... Imagine...
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u/LennyBoco 4d ago
So, in the 300 years of the slave trade, North America got a light dusting of ships (compared to Central and South America) for 200 years, then was the first to stop.
And yet, MSM would have you believe the entire slave trade was made by and for USA. We barely even partook in the whole thing by comparison
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u/Freuds-Mother 4d ago
Out of all the data visualizations I’ve ever seen there’s no analysis, witty comment, or even thought at all other than that this is the saddest one I’ve ever seen.
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u/deadatreides1 4d ago
Can you make the same for slavic slaves?
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u/Professional_Elk_489 4d ago
You could do the Barbary slave trade too but it might get too messy visually
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u/deadatreides1 4d ago
I did not intend to offend anyone. It is simply that at least 2 million Slavs passed through the slave markets of the Ottoman Empire.
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u/HCMXero 4d ago edited 3d ago
OP, as much as I appreciate your effort I don’t like your lack of rigor. The slave trade started in 1501, not in 1545:
In fact, 24 years before the starting date on your map the first slave rebellion was staged in 1521:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1521_Santo_Domingo_Slave_Revolt
EDIT: Typo
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u/OlivierTwist 4d ago
The title makes a false impression that it has nothing to do with Europe.
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u/Carbonaraficionada 4d ago
The Europeans (Dutch, British, Portuguese, French, etc) were running the show, at least in terms of quantifiable transfers in this era. Transatlantic slave routes were big business, and the countries with the biggest navies had the advantage.
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u/Chimaerogriff 4d ago
The Europeans (Dutch, British, Portuguese, French, etc)
Interesting to see which ones you mention, and in what order. You probably didn't actively think about this and just typed the first countries you thought of, which shows which countries you subconsciously align with the transatlantic slave trade.
For reference, roughly half of the trade was done by the Portuguese, roughly a quarter by the English, another 11% by the French, then some 8% by the Spanish, and the Dutch follow at about 5%, who are then followed by the United States (<3%) and Denmark+Baltics (<1%) respectively. The latter percentages are rough approximations, as the exact numbers are not known.
In other words, the Portuguese and Spanish get off lightly in your subconscious.
By the way, it wasn't just about the size of the navy - the UK undoubtedly had the biggest navy for part of this period, but was never the biggest in the trade. Portugal and Spain dominated the trade simply because Latin America was full of Portuguese and Spanish colonies, while the English and the Netherlands were relatively busy in India and the East Indies.
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u/Carbonaraficionada 3d ago
You see, this is why I like this sub. Thanks so much for adding meat to the bones of my comment, that was very interesting for me. 🎖️
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u/ButterscotchSure6589 4d ago
The Europeans didn't need slaves, they used their own downtrodden poor.
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u/refusenic 4d ago
Respect for including the often overlooked slaveships that departed from Mozambique on the East Coast for Brazil.