*The Atlantic System & Africa, 1550-1800

*Plantations & Slaves

*English Royal African Co. (RAC) controls African slave trade*Atlantic System becomes world’s premier trading system*Caribbean islands were first to see Europeans, first to lose

native pop.*African slaves and European capital rebuild Caribbean

economy*Sugar plantations form base for economy*Spanish begin to ignore Caribbean in favor of American mainland

colonies*Northern Europeans focus on Caribbean (England, France, the

Netherlands)*1614: English concentrate on Caribbean tobacco trade*Chartered companies/colonies*Dutch West India Co.*Portuguese sugar model exported to Dutch, British, French

Caribbean*African slaves brought to work sugar plantations

*Plantation Life

*1700: French colony of Saint Domingue (Haiti) is world’s largest sugar producer*English establish Jamaica as their top sugar producer

*For profit, plantations need own mills (crushing/processing)*Average plantation size=200 acres *some islands devote all land to sugar production, import food

*Ecological shift, European introduced plants/animals thrive*Plantocracy*Slaves work under harsh conditions*Down period for seasoning*Specialized labor gangs*Long hours*Cruel punishment at hands of drivers

*Free Society

*Plantocratic Social Structure*Large Land Owning Whites*Non-Planter Whites*African slaves

*Slave born children of whites freed—manumission *Sizeable freed black population emerges in Caribbean

*Maroons, slaves who escape and form freed communities in mts.

*The Atlantic Economy

*Based on Capitalism & Mercantilism *Mercantilism produces competition b/w powers

*British and French defeat the Dutch, break their monopoly on Atlantic trade*The Atlantic Circuit*The Middle Passage

*Africa, The Atlantic, & Islam

*Europeans more interested in African trade, not colonies*Africans capture rival Africans, chain them together, march

them to coast, sell/trade them to Europeans*Europeans stuff African slaves onto ships, sell them in

Americas*Also traded for gold, ivory, timber (later rubber)

*Biafra and Angola suffer huge populations losses, large slave market*Islamic traders engage in eastern slave trade, Swahili Coast*European colonies are few*Portuguese Angola connected to Atlantic trading system*Dutch Cape Colony (South Africa)

*Muslim traders bring religion to Sub-Saharan Africa*Songhai (Mali)*Bornu (Sudan)