Africa Before Enslavement
This term describes a system in which family relationships organize social, political, and economic life.
What is kinship?
This European country established diplomatic and trading relationships with the Kingdom of Kongo.
What is Portugal?
Before the transatlantic slave trade expanded, Africans and Europeans interacted through activities such as diplomacy, religion, exploration, and this economic activity.
What is trade?
Africans familiar with Iberian language and culture who participated in early European expeditions were sometimes called this.
Who were ladinos?
This European country became an early leader in the expansion of African slave trading along the Atlantic coast.
What is Portugal?
This wealthy Shona kingdom became famous for its massive stone walls and participation in long-distance trade.
What is Great Zimbabwe?
Kongo rulers voluntarily adopted this religion after contact with the Portuguese.
What is Christianity?
True or False: Every African who traveled to Europe during the early period was enslaved.
What is false?
This free African man participated in Spanish expeditions in the Caribbean, Florida, and Mexico.
Who was Juan Garrido?
Portuguese expansion along the African coast helped connect European merchants to existing African ______ networks.
What are trade networks?
This term describes the blending of beliefs or traditions from different cultures.
What is syncretism?
Early interactions between Africans and Europeans challenge the idea that their relationship was originally based only on ______.
What is enslavement?
This enslaved Moroccan-born African became an important guide and translator during Spanish exploration of present-day North America.
Who was Estevanico?
The forced transportation of millions of Africans across the Atlantic became known as this.
What is the transatlantic slave trade?
This Kongo ruler wrote letters protesting Portuguese involvement in the slave trade.
Who is King Afonso I?
Juan Garrido's experiences challenge the assumption that the first Africans in the Americas were only this type of worker.
What are enslaved agricultural workers?
The growing demand for labor in the Americas contributed to the expansion of economies dependent upon ______ labor.
What is enslaved labor?
Explain how Kongo's relationship with Portugal changed over time.
Kongo's relationship with Portugal began through diplomacy, trade, and Christianity but became increasingly strained as Portuguese involvement in the slave trade threatened Kongo's people and political stability.
Explain why understanding African-European contact before the transatlantic slave trade is historically important.
It demonstrates that African-European relationships included trade, diplomacy, religion, and travel before the expansion of racialized chattel slavery.
Compare Juan Garrido and Estevanico. Identify ONE similarity and ONE difference.
Both participated in Spanish exploration of the Americas. However, Garrido participated as a free African man, while Estevanico's experiences occurred within the constraints of enslavement.
Explain how early Portuguese practices contributed to the development of slave-based economies in the Americas.
Portuguese participation in African enslavement and Atlantic trading networks helped establish systems for transporting enslaved Africans and exploiting their labor, practices that later expanded throughout the Americas