African Americans

Historical Deceptions: The Slave Trade

Among the many deceptions that were used to justify the enslavement of Africans is the lie that Africans did not have a culture and civilization in Africa prior to their capture. In reality, the people of west Africa, the origin of most enslaved Africans, had a rich and varied history and culture long before the arrival of European and other slavers. Geographically, west Africa protrudes into the Atlantic Ocean, providing ample sea transportation and merchant opportunities, as well as inland forests and tropical savannas that lie between the deserts and the ocean. The original inhabitants of this region were primarily the present-day people of Hausa, Yoruba, Igbo, Mandingo, Fantin, and Ashanti. The earliest west Africans were skilled hunters and gatherers, who also had a wide variety of political arrangements including cities, states, kingdoms, and other organizations, each with individual languages and culture. Village life around 2500 b.c.e. grew into cites, eventually developing into empires and kingdoms.

The historic Songhai Empire and the kingdoms of Benin, Congo, and Mali were dominant, with monarchs leading complex political and social structures, and having governance capabilities over hundreds of thousands of subjects. Ghana was an ancient empire and a wealthy kingdom that supplied gold to north Africa and Europe between the 9th and 11th centuries. Africans were especially skilled in such subjects as medicine, mathematics, and astronomy. For centuries, west Africans traded with Europeans through merchants in north Africa. The Portuguese were the first traders to sail along the west African coast in the 15th century, and they were followed by the Dutch, British, French, and Scandinavians. Africans made fine luxury items in bronze and traded gold, ivory, spices, seeds, and tools from village to village, state to state, and continent to continent.

For several decades prior to the involvement of the Portuguese and Europeans in African exploration, the Arabs, including fierce Muslim zealots, waged religious wars against African villagers. The Muslim zealots captured many west Africans, hauling and dragging them across the Sahara Desert into Arabia. In the many years of war between the Arab Muslims and African Christians, the Africans were without modern weaponry. As a result, the empires and great kingdoms of west Africa fell to continuous Muslim attacks. Throughout this period of wars and conflicts, both Christians and Muslims captured and enslaved one another for religious reasons.

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