Slavery routes – a short history of human trafficking (2/4) | DW Documentary

How did Africa become a hub for the trade in human beings? Part 2 of this four-part documentary series begins as the Middle Ages comes to an end and Portuguese conquerors head for Africa in search of riches.

At the end of the Middle Ages, European powers realized that the African continent harbored a seemingly inexhaustible wealth of resources. The Portuguese were among the first to set out to conquer the continent. They went in search of gold, but they came back with hundreds of thousands of captives to sell as slaves in Europe.

From the coasts of Africa, the Conquistadores sailed on to Brazil, where they established a trading center. There, the Portuguese set up the first colonies that were populated exclusively by slaves. On the island of São Tomé, off of Gabon, they found their most lucrative commodity: sugar cane, and the sugar plantation became the blueprint for the profitable exploitation of the New World.

Part 1: https://youtu.be/InQvC9c-3K8
Part 2: https://youtu.be/v3ppAebUW54
Part 3: https://youtu.be/XMB7CpjIS9s
Part 4: https://youtu.be/yKwXuRAseIc

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This is the story of a world

whose borders and territories
were drawn by the slave trade.

A world where violence,

subjugation, and profit imposed
their own routes-

and forged empires.

Back then, there was no oil.

Slaves were the driving force
behind these emerging empires.

In the 14th century,

Europe discovered that
it was located temptingly close

to one of the planet’s
most important trading regions.

We tend to forget the riches
that were produced back then in Africa.

The Catalan Atlas, whetted
Europeans’ appetite for conquest.

It mapped the winds,
for the benefit of travelers.

It also provided information

on the military strength
of different nations.

And it provided an economic map,

tracing the trading routes
towards Africa and its resources.

A small kingdom was the first

in the rush to seize control
of the coasts of Africa:

Portugal.

In its wake, a new network
of slavery routes was drawn.

At the very beginning,
this was a Portuguese project.

They were coming out of the crusades,

fighting this bitter war
with Muslims to the south.

So, part of the adventure to Africa

was to basically secure themselves

and perhaps also secure
an advantage against Muslims.

Lisbon.

The largest city in Portugal

and the only European capital
on the Atlantic coast.

At the mouth of the Tagus,

the Discovery Monument evokes nostalgia

for a time when the Portuguese
made the world their home.

Carved in stone, some 52 meters
above the water,

the heroes of Portugal,
pioneers of the Conquest,

look triumphantly towards the ocean
that gave them such wealth and prestige.

They are headed by
Prince Henry “the Navigator,”

the architect of a perilous project:

to open up a new trade route
via the Atlantic Ocean.

His aim was to bypass the Muslim rivals
in the Mediterranean

and gain access to Africa's Gold Coast.

In the 14th century,
the Portuguese succeeded

in ousting the Arabs from their territory.

The Kingdom now had free rein
to begin its campaign of conquest.

Promising gold and power,

Henry the Navigator convinced the nobility
to follow him in this adventure.

Henry the Navigator was the crown prince.

This mythical figure,

this great Christian Portuguese prince
was portrayed as very devout.

He started out commanding
a band of raiders:

pirates who took prisoners.

To brave the Atlantic, an ocean few
European sailors had dared to explore,

Prince Henry had a new
and revolutionary kind of vessel.

Caravels:

high-decked sailing ships
that were capable

of battling storms in the open sea.

The Portuguese established a sea route
taking in the coast of west Africa.

Cap Bojador, the islands
of Arguin and Cape Verde.

Each mile covered was a victory
over the Muslims,

who were present on the entire
Northern part of the continent.

Portugal has traditionally
glorified its great explorers-

forgetting that most of them built
their fortunes on the slave trade.

Today, Lisbon is undergoing a facelift.

After the Discovery Monument,

renovation work extended
to the Alfama district.

As construction progressed,

the riches of the first “world city”
have resurfaced.

By chance,

workers uncovered the foundations
of the former commercial harbor.

In the space of one century,

Lisbon became the richest capital
in Europe,

some distance ahead of Paris,
London, or Amsterdam.

Chinese vases, pots from Indonesia,

ornamental glassware from Macao.

And amid the shards of earthenware
from all over the world,

a woman’s skeleton was also found.

Initial DNA tests revealed
that she was an African slave,

buried without a name or gravestone.

The archaeology of slavery,
a relatively recent field,

is exhuming a long untold history:

the fate of the one million Africans
who were shipped off to Europe

between the 15th and 18th centuries.

This was an extremely brutal,
predatory economy.

The Portuguese would disembark
and, arms in hand,

rush to capture the inhabitants
of these African coasts,

starting with Mauritania and then Senegal,

home to many poor fishermen.

They were captured with nets.

On each mission, dozens would be captured

and loaded on these ships
to be brought back to Europe.

In various locations between
Morocco and Mauritania,

Prince Henry’s mercenaries
kidnapped unarmed civilians.

Deported to Portugal,

these first captives were unloaded
in the first port on the way home:

Lagos.

On this cost line,
one morning in August 1444,

250 men, women, and children

who had been captured
on the Atlantic coasts

were sold to the highest bidder.

It was a major event:

the first spoils brought back
to the country

by the Portuguese Conquistadors.

They had set off on a quest for gold-

but they came back with slaves.

The event was so highly anticipated
that Gomes Eanes de Zurara,

the chief chronicler of the realm,

traveled to the beach in person
to record the event.

The following day,
it was the 8th of August,

early morning because of the heat,

the crews began to work their boats,

unload their captives and take them
ashore as ordered.

Some had their faces down, wet with tears;

some looked at the others
and were groaning with grief;

some looked to high heaven,
fixing their look on it,

shouting aloud up to it,

as if asking the Father
of Nature for help;

others beat their cheeks with their palms,

or threw themselves flat on the ground;

others made lamentation
in a song-like manner

after the custom of their homeland.

And though the words of their language
could not be understood by us,

their sorrow was understood indeed.

A sorrow that increased
when those in charge of dividing them

came and started to split them

one from another to make even groups.

To do this it became necessary
to take children from parents,

wives from husbands,
brothers from sisters.

For kin and kindred no rule was kept,

each captive landed
where luck would have it.

Zurara describes
an extremely brutal scene:

children taken away from their mothers,
screaming, whipping.

Clearly, what he is witnessing
makes him very uncomfortable.

Things changed after that.

They had to justify it.

And he did so
by pointing to this civilization

brought to the savages.

In the early 15th century,

human trafficking was common
throughout the Mediterranean-

in Portugal, but also in the south
of France, Spain, Italy and Sicily.

Most of the slaves came from the Balkans,
in Southern East of Europe

traded via the ports of Cyprus,
Constantinople and Aleppo.

Back then, Africans constituted
a minority within the slave trade.

In Lisbon, these proportions
would soon be inverted.

The first African captives
deported to Portugal

would be followed
by countless thousands more.

The "Street of the Negroes’ well"

one of a few alleys
that are the only reminders

of when this neighborhood,
the Bairro do Mocambo,

included a ghetto reserved for Africans.

1453, the holy war between
Christendom and Islam

resulted in the latter's victory.

Constantinople, the last remnant
of the Byzantine Empire,

fell into the hands of the Ottoman Empire.

The Christian side of the Mediterranean

was now seperated from lands further east

with the movement of slaves
from the Balkans also blocked.

For Christian Europe,

the conquest of the Atlantic
was now vital.

Islam, Christendom clash

had reached stalemate.

And, the whole area where
they had been acquiring slavs,

or slaves, was now
Christianized, or Islamisized.

There was only one region to head for.

Africa becomes associated with slavery

as a result of these developments.

[Music]

Officialy, Muslim leaders
and the Catholic Church

condemned the enslavement of free people.

But in practice, the demand for slaves

did not diminish and justified
continued raids.

[Music]

In these societies, people
were driven by religion.

They weren't fanatics, that
term is probably too modern.

But religious motivations,

conquering Islamic areas to convert them

to Christianity were very important,

since the Papacy supported
Portuguese expansion

by granting rights to colonise.

To take revenge on the Muslims,

Pope Nicholas the Fifth

gave the Portuguese his moral endorsement.

Thanks to the Vatican's support,

they could continue raiding Africa

with complete impunity.

[Music]

Portugal's national archives in Lisbon

are home to the Romanus Pontifex,

a bull issued by the pope

that gave the Portuguese carte blanche

and established a legal framework

for the enslavement of Africa.

[Music]

We had formerly by other letters
of ours granted amoung other things

free and ample faculty
to the aforesaid King Afonso

to invade, search out, capture,

vanquish, and subdue
all Saracens and pagans,

and other enemies of Christ

and to reduce their persons
to perpetual slavery.

"Perpetual slavery".

Two words decreed by the
highest Catholic authority

that amounted to a sentencing
of innocent Africans.

Two words that would justify everything

in the name of god.

[Music]

With the Pope's blessing,

the Portuguese ventured
further and further south

along the coasts of Africa.

Their caravels and strategies were
copied by other European nations,

eager to take control of African
gold and slaves.

Flemish, German, English,
Genoese, and Venetian.

Merchants from across Europe
invested in the Atlantic adventure.

[Music]

It's not as if Africans were passive

towards European merchants

entering villages to collect individuals

and put them in captivity.

African societies had their own
power structures.

They had a capacity for initiative.

They negotiated, discussed the terms

of relations with European merchants.

The tipping point was when the Portuguese

entered the South Atlantic
beyond the equator.

And thus entereda new economic space.

There they came into contact

with the Kingdom of Congo,
which would play a big role.

[Music]

1471

The Portuguese took possession
of an island off the African coast.

Uninhabited, virgin, and fertile,

São Tomé also provided a secure harbor,

one hundred and fifty nautical miles
from the mainland.

It enabled them to keep an eye

on the region's most powerful state,

the Kingdom of Congo.

Congo is an interesting case

of African history, very different

from everywhere else.

When the Portuguese got there
they discovered that there was a king

and that there was
hat they called a kingdom.

And not only that,

it was an area where there was
no Islamic influence at all.

Portuguese entered into relations
with the King of Congo

on virtually an equal basis.

And since they weren’t Muslims,

there was no hostility
on the basis of religion.

And then for reasons I don't think
we fully understand,

the King of Congo

decided that he was going
to convert to Christianity.

And he did, became Afonso the First.

And he welcomed missionaries
from Portugal.

The Portuguese were the only ones

to supply products from
the Mediterranean to King Afonso.

For the first time,

they had established a monopoly
on an African territory.

The Portuguese arrived
in a hierarchical society

where the nobles- in short-

ate more and better than others,

dressed more elegantly than others

and consumed luxury items.

So when the Portuguese arrived
with all these new items.

How shall I put it?

The Kongo aristocracy went totally crazy.

They became infatuated with all of this.

You can sense that the customs
and behavior were changing.

And they did indeed change.

The drawings of the first missionaries
who arrived in Kongo

illustrate this new bartering system.

But gold fever encouraged the Portuguese
to continue their conquest.

They learned that the Akan people’s
gold mines were in El Mina.

For the invaders,

the only way to get their hands
on the precious ore

was to offer the Akans
what they needed most:

slaves to descend into the mines.

As such they became
the Kingdom’s slave-traders.

Gold production,

which had been going on
in West Africa for centuries,

including the area of Guinea,
Mali and parts of Senegal,

but that distance had moved mostly
in the Akan gold fields in Ghana.

And that attracted them,
because gold you know

was buoyant,

it was a measure of wealth.

“El mina” means “the mine."

And they were after the gold
of what they called the Gold Coast.

Because a lot of gold does come
from the interior, right there.

The first triangular
trading system in history

was launched between
São Tomé, the Akan mines

and the Kongo Kingdom.

European goods for slaves in Kongo.

Slaves for gold in Elmina.

The Portuguese used this bartering system

to create an autonomous trading network.

The arrival of the Portuguese
brought about major changes,

because they made the direct
connection between Elmina,

the coast of Kongo, and São Tomé.

It was an interesting triangulation

because the system that
would thrive in the Americas

was first tested out in that region.

This Portuguese crucifix commemorates
the annexation of São Tomé,

which would open a new chapter
in the history of slavery.

It was here that the
Portuguese would create

the first platform for the
mass deportation of captives.

And it is here that a straightforward
slave-trading system would evolve

into a massively profitable
production system:

the sugar plantation.

With thousands of slaves
disembarking on its beaches,

São Tomé became an island
exclusively dedicated to sugar production.

São Tomé and Principe were a laboratory.

Because that’s where
we witness the marriage

of the black man and sugar cane.

In the colonists' eyes,
the two functioned well together.

So we’ll marry the black
man with sugar cane.

The idea was simple:

the island was transformed
into a plantation

where slaves within
easy reach were imported.

Each year, 4,000 slaves arrived
and filled this very limited space.

That means big concentrations.

And so this was the first example
of a black colony and a slave society.

The model became a global system.

On São Tomé time seems to stand still.

Sugar cane was replaced by coffee,

then coffee by cocoa.