Source: Merrick Whitcomb, ed., “The Gold of the Indies — 1559,” Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History, The Department of History of the University of Pennsylvania from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, June 2007.
The Big Business of Slave Trading
. . . When in 1517 Bishop Bartolomeo de Las Casas advocated [supported] the encouragement of immigration to the New World by permitting Spaniards to import African slaves, the trading of humans in the New World formally began. Las Casas was so determined to relieve Indians of the onerous [difficult] burden of slavery that he recommended the enslavement of Africans. (Later, he so deeply regretted having taken this position that he vigorously renounced it.) The ban against the use of Africans was removed, and Charles II issued licenses to several Flemish traders to take Africans to the Spanish colonies. Monopoly of the trade went to the highest bidders. Sometimes it was held by Dutch traders, at other times by Portuguese, French, or English. As West Indian plantations grew in size and importance, the slave trade became a huge, profitable undertaking employing thousands of persons and involving a capital outlay of millions of dollars. By 1540 the annual importation of African slaves into the West Indies was estimated at 10,000. . . .
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Source: Franklin and Moss, From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans, Alfred A. Knopf from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, August 2008.
According to Franklin and Moss, what was one reason enslaved Africans were imported to the “New World” by Europeans?
. . . Large-scale sugar plantations, established first in Brazil and, after 1645, in the Caribbean islands, were enormously profitable. Plantations in Cuba gave more than a 30 percent return on capital investment; those in Barbados returned 40 to 50 percent. These islands became societies whose economies relied heavily on the labor of African captives. In 1789, one-third of the population of Cuba was comprised of Africans. Between 1730 and 1834, up to 90 percent of the populations of Jamaica, Antigua, and Grenada were Africans. In Brazil in 1800, half the population was African. . . .
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Source: Willie F. Page, Encyclopedia of African History and Culture, Volume III, Facts on File from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, August 2008.
According to Willie F. Page, what was one impact of the arrival of Africans on Brazil and on the Caribbean Islands?
. . . Long-Term Effects. The trade in African slaves brought about the largest forced movement of people in history. It established the basis for black populations in the Caribbean and in North and South America. At the same time, it disrupted social and political life in Africa and opened the door for European colonization of the continent. . . . The shift in European demand from gold, foodstuffs, and such products to slaves changed the relations among African groups and states. The prices Africans received for slaves made it more profitable for them to take captives from their neighbors than to establish networks for producing and selling other goods. In this way the slave trade encouraged strong states to raid weaker states for slaves. As a result, many African societies were torn by organized slave wars and general banditry. Successful slave-raiding and trading societies formed new states that were dominated by military groups and constantly at war with their neighbors. . . .
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Source: John Middleton, ed., Africa: An Encyclopedia for Students, Volume 4, Thomson Learning from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, August 2008.
Based on this excerpt from Africa: An Encyclopedia for Students, state two effects of the slave trade on Africa.
… At the time [1450s] that the Portuguese and the Spaniards set out to establish a sugar industry on the Atlantic islands they controlled, sugar was still a luxury, a medicine, and a spice in western Europe. The peoples of Greece, Italy, Spain, and North Africa were familiar with sugar cane as a crop and, to some extent, with sugar itself as a sweetener. But as sugar production in the Mediterranean waned [decreased], knowledge of sugar and the desire for it waxed [increased] in Europe. The movement of the industry to the Atlantic islands occurred when European demand was probably growing. Individual entrepreneurs were encouraged to establish sugar-cane (and other) plantations on the Atlantic islands, manned with African slaves and destined to produce sugar for Portugal and other European markets, because their presence safeguarded the extension of Portuguese trade routes around Africa and toward the Orient.…
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Source: Sidney W. Mintz, Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History, Penguin Books (adapted) from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, January 2013.
According to Sidney Mintz, what was one way western Europeans used sugar?
… Sugar grows best where heat and water are plentiful all year round. The Mediterranean is therefore less than ideal. Even the southern Mediterranean has a cool season in the winter and a dry season in the summer. With the European maritime revolution beginning in the fifteenth century, Europeans had easy access to the Atlantic islands, and some of them had a far better environment for sugar cultivation.…
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Source: Philip D. Curtin, The Rise and Fall of the Plantation Complex: Essays in Atlantic History, Cambridge University Press from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, January 2013.
Sugar Crosses the Atlantic
Based on this excerpt by Philip D. Curtin and the information on this map, what was one reason for the expansion of sugar production into the Atlantic islands and into regions of the Americas?
… The sugar industry was established in northeast Brazil [by the Portuguese] in the 16th century and it brought great prosperity to the region until competing sources of sugar were created in the Caribbean by the French (Haiti) and the British (Jamaica) in the eighteenth century. The sugar industry consisted of sugarcane plantations and plants for processing the sugarcane into sugar. The sugarcane plantations [in Brazil] were worked by slaves brought from the Portuguese-controlled areas of southern Africa (Angola and Mozambique).…
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Source: Thayer Watkins, “The Economic History of Brazil,” online at San José State University from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, January 2013.
According to Thayer Watkins, what were two changes that occurred in the Americas as a result of the establishment of the sugar industry?
… It all began in Española [Hispaniola] with sugar, which was already a profitable plantation crop in the Canaries and Portugal’s Atlantic islands in the fifteenth century. Columbus himself had shipped sugar from Madeira to Genoa in 1478, and the mother of his first wife owned a sugar estate on that island. He brought sugar cane with him to Española in 1493, and the cane grew well in American soil. But the growth of the sugar industry was painfully slow until Charles V intervened, ordering that sugar masters and mill technicians be recruited from the Canaries, and authorizing loans to build sugar mills on Española. There were thirty-four mills on the island by the late 1530s and sugar was one of the two staples of the island’s economy (the other being cattle ranching) until the latter part of the sixteenth century.…
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Source: Alfred W. Crosby Jr., The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492, Greenwood Publishing (adapted) from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, June 2013.
According to Alfred W. Crosby, what was one effect of Spanish colonization on the island of Española?
… Growing sugar cane became a large business. At first, Native Americans were forced to work on sugar plantations, large estates run by an owner or overseer. They were treated cruelly, and many died. The Spanish then brought slaves from Africa to do the work.
A new social structure developed. People born in Spain made up the highest social class. Those of European descent born in the colonies were next. People of mixed European and Indian or African descent were in the middle. Native Americans and people of African descent were in the lowest classes.…
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Source: Guide to the Essentials of World History, Prentice Hall from the NYS Global History and Geography Regents Exam, June 2013.
Based on this document, what were two changes in the Americas that resulted from interactions with the Spanish?
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