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Captive Passage
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West African Social and Historical Background
The continent of Africa is made up of hundreds of cultures in endless variations. Yet despite the differences, all have grown from very similar origins. These African cultures have developed in surroundings where they flourished for thousands of years.
Long before the arrival of Portuguese explorers along the West Coast of Africa, ancient civilizations had developed and thrived there. Most notable were the empires of Ghana, Mali and Songhai which emerged between A.D. 500 and 1600. Each had strong, ambitious rulers, great military powers, complex political and social systems, and control over abundant wealth, much of which was derived from their rich sources of gold and salt. The kingdoms of Benin and Kongo were important powers in the 15 thand 16th centuries.
The empire of Ghana established a thriving system of trade with Arabs at ports on the Mediterranean coast and with other kingdoms of East Africa on the Red Sea. After the fall of the empire of Ghana in the 13 thcentury, the kingdom of Mali emerged along with the gradual spread of Islam. One of Mali's strongest rulers, Mansa Musa who came to power in 1312, extended the empire from the shores of the Atlantic to the borders of modern Nigeria, and from the margin of the tropical forests northward to the Sahara.
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Different African Nations
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A devout Muslim, Mansa Musa became widely known as a result of his lavish pilgrimage to Mecca after which Mali was considered one of the great empires of the Muslim world, even by the maritime nations of southern Europe. Eventually, conflict between Islam and the traditional religions of West Africa led to internal struggle, disrupting the whole trading network of northern and western Africa.
After the fall of the empire of Mali, the formation of the empire of Songhi began. While over the years African slaves had been traded along the trans-Saharan routes, very few in numbers in comparison to later times,* it was in the 15thcentury under the leadership of Songhi's powerful and ambitious ruler, Askia Mohammed, that the trade in slaves to Europe began on a wide scale basis.
*Basil Davidson - Africa in History
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