topic 1.5

• The selling of people into slavery had a long history in Africa long before the period of European involvement
• Slaves in Africa had some legal rights and their bondage was not a permanent situation and was almost never an inheritable bondage
• During the period of European involvement, Europeans began establishing forts along the African coast and traded goods for enslaved people, with guns being the most desired goods
• The raiding and conquering of African communities by more powerful African groups increased with the acquisition of guns, leading to an increase in the supply of enslaved Africans
• Europeans found the enslaved Africans to be strange beings with strange customs and languages, but they looked like human beings, which raised moral questions about enslaving them
• Europeans adopted thought systems that proved the inferiority of black people and helped justify purchasing them as enslaved labor, including the biblical story of Noah's curse on Ham's son Canaan
• The Spanish brought enslaved Africans to the Americas in increasing numbers to solve a labor problem, as native Americans made very bad slaves
• Encomienda system of labor


  1. Leading men called encomenderos were granted a portion of land, and all the natives who lived on that land became the coerced labor force

  2. Justified on religious grounds, as the Spanish monarchs had the authority to claim lands and convert the natives, and if they resisted, they could be subjugated or killed
• The encomienda system was not working well for the Spanish because the native Americans kept dying from European diseases and were constantly escaping their slavery
• The Spanish solution was to import African people to replace the native Americans, as the Africans had better immunity and knew the land less than the Spaniards
• By the late 16th century, the Spanish had completely transformed the Americas, and the wealth coming into Spain from the Americas transformed the Spanish economy, but it mainly enriched the nobles
• Groups in the Spanish-controlled Americas


  • Spanish
  • Africans
  • Native Americans
• The Spanish imposed a caste system in the Americas to determine the amount of taxes owed, with those at the bottom paying the highest taxes
• Caste system in the Spanish Americas

  • Peninsulares (Spanish born in Spain)
  • Criollos (Spanish born in the Americas)
  • Mestizos (Spanish and Native American ancestry)
  • Mulattoes (Spanish and African ancestry)
  • Africans
  • Native Americans
• This caste system shaped and influenced colonial societies throughout the Western Hemisphere