Title of Artwork: “The Slave Market”
Artwork by Jean-François Portaels
Year Created 1853
Summary of The Slave Market
People buy and sell slaves at a slavery marketplace. In the history of slavery, slave markets were a major phenomenon.
Trade in slaves was common during the Ottoman Empire’s mid-14th century, when slave markets known as “Esir” or “Yesir” were set up throughout the country. In the 1460s, Sultan Mehmed II “the Conqueror” is said to have set up the first Ottoman slave market in Constantinople, possibly where the former Byzantine slave market had stood. As described by Nicolas de Nicolay, the potential buyers could inspect the slaves, who ranged in age and gender.
All About The Slave Market
For about two centuries between 1500 and 1750, the Crimean Khanate traded approximately 2 million enslaved people from Russia, Poland, and Lithuania with the Ottoman Empire and other countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Trade and slave markets in Caffa became one of the most important and well-known in the ancient world.
Bantu people who live in Somalia are descended from Bantu groups that settled in Southeast Africa after the initial expansion from Nigeria/Cameroon and whose members were later captured and sold into the Arab slave trade.
In Zanzibar’s slave market between 1800 and 1890, between 25,000 and 50,000 Bantu slaves are thought to have been sold. Tanzanian, Mozambican, and Malawian slaves from the Majindo and Makua ethnic groups accounted for the majority of the enslaved Africans in the slave trade. They are known as the Mushunguli Bantu collectively because Mzigula, a Zigua tribe word for “people” inspired the term (the word holds multiple implied meanings including “worker”, “foreigner”, and “slave”). When Bantu adults and children (collectively referred to as “jareer” by their Somali masters) were bought on the slave market, they were only going to be used to do undesirable work on the plantation grounds.
In the towns of the Arab World, enslaved Africans were sold. One thousand seven hundred slaves were brought to Mecca by pilgrims from Takrur in 1416, according to al-Maqrizi. The major slave markets in North Africa were in Morocco, Algiers, Tripoli, and Cairo. Many of the items on sale were available only at souks or in the open to the public.
This product was thoroughly inspected by potential buyers, who observed the health of a person who was frequently seen naked with his or her wrists tied tightly in front of him or herself. eunuchs and concubines were traded in the privacy of one’s own home in Egypt’s capital city. The price of a slave depended on the quality of his or her skin. British research ship Ternate’s commander, Thomas Smee, visited Zanzibar and wrote a detailed account of the market:
European slave markets like Genoa and Venice became increasingly important after the 14th century plague decimated much of Europe’s working population, which fueled demand for slaves from these markets.
When the Mercado de Escravos in Lagos, Portugal, opened in 1444 for the sale of imported African slaves, it was considered the first slave market in Portugal. Slaves from northern Mauritania arrived in Portugal for the first time in 1441. One fifth of the selling price of slaves imported to Portugal was taxed by Prince Henry the Navigator, a major sponsor of the Portuguese African expeditions. More than a tenth of Lisbon’s inhabitants were African slaves by the year 1552. Second half of the 16th century, the Crown relinquished control of the slave trade and the focus of European slave trade shifted from Europe to tropical colonies in the Americas, especially in the case of Portugal. Gold was exchanged for one third of the slaves in the 15th century, when they were sold on the African market.
Information Citations
En.wikipedia.org, https://en.wikipedia.org/.
