Browse

Slavery

The ruins of Great Zimbabwe's elliptical building
Review

Internet African History Sourcebook

The site provides broad chronological and geographic coverage, with a particularly impressive list of sources for ancient Egypt and Greek and Roman Africa. It is a gateway to an abundance of information.
Handwritten document in Spanish
Source

Renunciation case against Gertrudis de Escobar, Mexico, 1659

This document is the proceedings of an 1659 Inquisition case brought against a 14 year old girl. The girl, named Gertrudis de Escobar, was accused of the crime of renouncing God. Gertrudis de Escobar was the child of a black person and a white person, termed at that time a mulata.

Title page for The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano
Teaching

Long Teaching Module: Children in the Slave Trade

From the 16th to the 18th centuries, an estimated 12 million Africans crossed the Atlantic to the Americas in the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Used on plantations throughout the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean, enslaved Africans were shipped largely from West Africa.

Painting of a crowded medieval scene centering on a battle
Review

Internet Medieval Sourcebook

The great advantage of this site is that primary sources have been assembled and categorized by a trained medievalist and active teacher, so that they are appropriate for a wide range of introductory history courses.
Title page for The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano
Teaching

Short Teaching Module: Childhood and Transatlantic Slavery

Especially useful in helping to place slavery in a world history perspective is one of the first slave narratives, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano or Gustavus Vassa the African, originally published in 1772.

thumbnail of the text
Source

British Empire: Travel Narrative, Mary Kingsley

Mary Kingsley (1862-1900) is one of the best known British women to have visited West Africa during the period historians call the Age of New Imperialism. Her early life gave no indication of her future renown.

thumbnail of the text
Source

Cultural Contact in Southern Africa: Law, Slave Women and Children

Although marriage was not forbidden between Europeans and slaves or other non-Europeans, it was quite rare and entailed a drop in social status for the European. Nevertheless, sexual relationships occurred—sometimes coerced, sometimes by mutual agreement.

thumbnail of the text
Source

Cultural Contact in Southern Africa: Law, Alcohol Sale

The following law suggests that slaves and Khoikhoi were considered particularly prone to alcohol addiction. There is some anecdotal evidence that this was a common stereotype held by Europeans at the Cape.

thumbnail of the text
Source

Cultural Contact in Southern Africa: Will, Laurens Verbrugge and Beletje Frederikszoon

Laurens Verbrugge and Beletje Frederikszoon were ordinary people from Holland who settled in Stellenbosch (near Cape Town) and took up farming there. Though not wealthy, they did own slaves and had sufficient property that they felt the need to draw up a will when Beletje became ill.

Source

The Pennsylvania Gazette: U.S. Vigilance (13 December 1797)

The Haitian uprising stoked the fears of whites in the United States that a similar uprising would occur among enslaved populations in their country.