Slave trade

 Portuguese participation in slave trade in Tanzania. Participation the act or state of participating, or sharing in common with others;,

Slave trade,Was the capturing, selling, and buying of enslaved persons. Slavery has existed throughout the world since ancient times, and trading in slaves has been equally universal. the procuring, transporting, and selling of human beings as slaves, in particular the former trade in black Africans as slaves by European countries and North America. According to Vernet T,(2012).European traders found it easier to do business with African intermediaries who raided settlements far away from the African coast and brought those young and healthy enough to the coast to be sold into slavery. The majority of those sold into slavery were destined to work on plantations in the Caribbean and the Americas, where huge areas of the American continent had been colonized by European countries expecially Portuguese. These plantations produced products such as sugar or tobacco, meant for consumption back in Europe. Therefore, from this, Zanzibar became definitely subject to Portugal in the year 1503 or 1504. In 1504 a fleet of thirteen of the largest ships built in Portugal touched Mozambique and Malindi on the outward trip, and Kilwa and Mozambique on the return. On the 22nd July,1505, Dom Francisco d'Almeida arrived at Kilwa and made a settlement there. He built a fort and deposed Emir Abraham, setting up in his place one Mohammed Ankoni. He preserved the native form of government, but installed Pedro Ferreira Fogaqa as captain, and Francisco Coutinho as magistrate. This form of government seems to have been in principle very like that adopted by the European nations to-day in their African and other possessions. Kilwa remained the headquarters of the Portuguese until 1509, when it was determined to transfer the garrison to Sofala. In I508 a governorgeneral was appointed to reside at Mozambique. In 1508 Dom Duarte de Lemos was appointed governor of the provinces of Ethiopia and Arabia, and set out on tour to collect the tribute from Mafia, Zanzibar and Pemba, which was in arrears. Mafia submitted, and the people of Pemba escaped to Mombasa, leaving nothing in their houses. In the year 1519 the Arabs of Zanzibar captured and massacred certain shipwrecked sailors belonging to the expedition of Don Gorge d'Albuquerque, and three years later the king complained to the Portuguese of the revolt of the Kirimba Islands, which were under his domination, and refused to pay tribute to him. The Portuguese therefore duly reduced the islands to subjection to the Island of Zanzibar again. In 1528 Mombasa also became unruly, and as Nunoda Cunha called at Zanzibar on his way to assume the Governor-Generalship of India, the king approached him, and he determined to subdue Mombasa with the aid of armies from Zanzibar, Malindi and other places. He took the town and reduced it to entire subjection, causing the inhabitants to pay tribute. With this victory the Portuguese rule of the whole of the coast was consolidated, and became one of four governments depending on a vice-royalty, the others being Malacca, Ormuz and Ceylon. After these events Zanzibar remained in alliance with the Portuguese, and ceased to be tributary. Many of the Portuguese occupied plantations, and a church was established in which a Brother of the Order of St. Augustine officiated. This period which have considered, up to the events just described, covers the rise and stabilization of Portuguese rule on the east coast of Africa. Between the early sixteenth century and the first half of the eighteenthcentury the Swahili were widely involved in slave trading networks. Mostcaptives came from northwestern Madagascar and were destined to filldemands for servile labor in Arabia, the Persian Gulf, and the Swahili city-states.

The following are are the evidences which show portuguese participation in slave trade in Tanzania:

The slaves were almost certainly employed on agriculture in Pemba,Two accounts, dated 1671 and 1673 respectively, mentionthe presence of slaves working on plantations of coconut trees and otherfruit trees. According toBocarroO,(1960).mentionsthat the Portuguese introduced slaves to Pemba for cultivation, but imported slaves were also employed. In particular a ratherimportant servile population might have occupied the islands of Pembaand Zanzibar. Perhaps this might be explained by the fact that the Swahili communities of those islands lacked contact with the mainland populations,so they had fewer mainland clients than the other city-states. Furthermore,the two islands were very fertile, particularly Pemba, which specializedin rice cultivation, and they traded agricultural products to Mombasa andother Swahili coast towns. According to Bocarro,O.(1960), who wrote around1634, the Pemba Swahili, like the Portuguese. In a rather confusing account, it states that some Portuguese,Shiraz, and Nabahani had settled on the island in the early seventeenthcentury. Each group came with numerous slaves who were settledon the agricultural lands of the island. It should be noted that these slaveswere inherited along with the properties, which clearly indicates that theywere actual slaves, not assistants or helpers. Sothis  an account shown the introduction of a kind of slave mode of productionon the island. So this show the Portuguese participation in slave trade in Tanzania

 

Existence of documents dealing with the use ofslaves on the Swahili coast, According to Vernet T,(2012).two letters written in 1598 by the king and the“Prince” of Pate are quite explicit, stating that the town inhabitants refusedcategorically and fiercely to accept the presence of Portuguese priests inthe city for fear that the priests would convert the “slaves” to Christianity.At this time missionaries did indeed purchase slaves and then emancipated them. According to Pate officials, slaves were meant to help the inhabitantsin cultivation and were thus essential to their prosperity. Suchslaves were certainly not mainland clients, as these latter would have beenIslamized and so would not have been bought by the Portuguese priests. A Portuguese report states that in 1728 the islands of Mombasa, Pemba,and Zanzibar were inhabited by Muslims and pagan “captives” who hadbeen bartered for cloth.Whereby pate is located in the Indian Ocean close to the northern coast of Kenya.

 

Portuguese also obtained slaves from the Swahili north of kilwa. According to Vernet T,(2012). Most of the slaves were destined for Goa or other Portuguese settlements, where they were employed by the Portuguese administration as soldiers or sailors or sold as servants.  For instance between September 1623 and August 1626,Africans were baptized by Augustinian priests in the Portuguese settlement of Muscat: three are described as Katwa, four as Malagasy, the remaining are only mentioned as “Cafres.

The Portuguese have been involved in the slave trade with Arabia. Nevertheless, they doubtless obtained captives on the Swahili coast itself for local use as servants, manpower for the administration, and perhaps agricultural labor. According to Bocarro, O,(1960).The Portuguese living in Swahili Coast around 1630 owned many slaves, Malagasy, Katwa or imported from the Zambezi area.slaves serves  domestic services in the Portuguese  houses as well as in the fields.  Slavesalso serve as bodyguards, sailors, crafts workers, and sailors.  Amongthe Pokomo in Siyu some blacksmiths were slaves.

Descovered of the new world. After Columbus voyages to the New World in 1492, the Portuguese  began the active exploration and exploitation of the newly discovered land in the Americas. Middleton, J. (1992).Portuguese sailors continued to make important discoveries in this new arena as well. Portugal took the principal role during most of the fifteenth century in searching for a route to Asia by sailing south around Africa expecialy in Tanzania. Thus way planted Portuguese developed much slave trade in tanganyika  (present-day Tanzania )

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CONCLUSION

According to Vernet T,(2012).An estimated 4.9 million slaves from Africa were brought to Brazil during the period from 1501 to 1866. Until the early 1850s, most enslaved Africans who arrived on Brazilian shores were forced to embark at East African ports, especially Tanganyika (present-day Tanzania)The transatlantic slave trade began during the 15th century when Portugal, and subsequently other European kingdoms, was finally able to expand overseas and reach Africa. The Portuguese first began to kidnap people from the west coast of Africa and to take those they enslaved back to Europe. Most slaves in Africa were captured in wars or in surprise raids on villages. Adults were bound and gagged and infants were sometimes thrown into sacks. The main reason it took so long to abolish the slave trade was simply because the pro-slave trade lobby had too many important and powerful figures in the establishment It was not until 1909 that slavery was finally abolished in East Africa. , the Swahili coast economy was ready to handle the expansion in the slave trade from the 1770s up until the second half of the nineteenth century. Further, the growth of the plantation economy on Zanzibar and Pemba in the first decades of the nineteenth century intensified demands for slaves; perhaps the roots of this servile labor are older than previously thought. According to author N'Diaye, slavery still exists, albeit in a different form. It is estimated that nearly 40 million people worldwide still live in slavery.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

REFERENCES

Middleton, J. (1992).The World of the Swahili: An African Mercantile Civilization

                        (New Haven, 1992), 204.

Bocarro, O livro das plantas, 2:40; “Jambangomems., An Arabic Chronicleof Pemba,” in J. Gray,                         “Zanzibar Local Histories (Part II),” Swahili 31(1960), 121–22.

Vernet, T,(2012).Slave trade and slavery on Swahili coast 1500-1750.African world                                              pressLescités-Étatsswahili et la puissance omanaise,” 94.