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Article: Slave Trade
- Article from:
- Dictionary of American History
- Author:
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SLAVE TRADE
SLAVE TRADE.
The widespread enslavement of diverse peoples for economic and political gain has played a fundamental role throughout human history in the development of nations. Ancient Greek and Roman societies operated by using slave labor, as did many European countries in the modern period. As early as the Middle Ages, Mediterranean cities were supplied with "Moorish" black slaves from Muslim countries in North Africa. By comparison, the "slave trade" is a term which has grown to be associated specifically with the "transatlantic" or "triangular" trade that spanned four centuries (roughly between 1518 and 1865), involved three continents (Europe, Africa, and the ...