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Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Research Paper

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Around the mid-fifteenth century, the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade began. When the Portuguese moved away from their interests of selling gold, they turned to an asset that would gain them more money, slaves. By the seventeenth century, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was fully established, and hit its milestone by the end of the eighteenth century. There were three stages to the Trans-Atlantic TradeStage, every stage played a role in a journey that was cost-effective for merchants. “As a commercial and economic enterprise, the slave trade provides a dramatic example of the consequences resulting from particular intersections of history and geography. It involved several regions and continents: Africa, America, the Caribbean, Europe and the Indian …show more content…

“For two hundred years, 1440-1640, Portugal had a monopoly on the export of slaves from Africa. It is notable that they were also the last European country to abolish the institution - although, like France, it still continued to work former slaves as contract laborers…” (The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade). The duration of the slave trade, four centuries, was majority resulting in Portugal transporting over 4.5 million Africans. The trade was dispatched in three ways. In the first stage of the Triangular Trade, manufactured goods were taken from Europe to Africa: cloth, spirit, tobacco, beads, cowrie shells, metals goods, and guns. In order to obtain slaves, and expand empires, the guns were used to its advantages. The manufactured goods were then exchanged for African slaves. In the second stage of the Triangular Trade, slaves were being shipped over the Atlantic to make it to the Americas. Once the Africans were transported to the Americas successfully, they were then sold throughout the entire continent. In the last stage of the Triangular Trade, America and Europe were connected. Slave traders returned to Europe with produce from the slave-labor plantations: cotton, sugar, tobacco, molasses and rum. (Transatlantic Slave

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