The connection between Christianity and social standing can be explained as granting legitimacy.  Without entering into the debate of which sort or denomination of Christianity was important; for this essay we accept Christianity in all its different manifestations. 

            To open, reading the narrative of Equiano, our author often calls into question the morality of the actions he is exposed to by “good Christens.”  But most importantly, the author relates his hopes for freedom after his baptism.  We read of shipmates and friends all eager to see Equiano released now that Christianity has entered his life.  His master goes through some rather desperate measures in order to secure his departure from England prior to docking to prevent his liberation.  As long as Equiano remained in his station of an unchristian his slavery was seen as normal and his proper or accepted state in life.  His joining the body of Christ made that state, at least in Europe, near of impossible to maintain.  But what had changed, had he suddenly been born into a new understanding, did he experience a vision of some kind, maybe a heavenly messenger explained his need to be saved in this religion of his captures.  In reality he was slowly educated over weeks of private lessons with friends of his master. 

            Adding to the statement of Christianity as the basis for social status was in great part the Peabody article.  Therein Sue Peabody cites an attorney saying “equal to us” and “French, born the subject of our monarch; our equal, as much by humanity as by the religion that he professes; and citizen because he lives with us and among us[1].”  The French court recognized former slave Boucaux’s innate humanity on the same level as his membership in the Christian faith.  While the opposing counsel cited his black race and prior slave status; recognition of acclimatizing to European values and joining the European faith won the court opinion over property rights.  This is not to commend the French as some glowing humanitarian legal system; however, it does, I believe, point out that the French recognized the corrupting influence of slavery and so allowed the practice only in the colonies.  Though egalitarian ideals prevailed in the case of Boucaux; we learn references to black race and slave status were interchangeable in the law and discourse of the case[2]. 

            Furthermore, in the writing of Brown, I see religion as the basis of almost the entire trade from its inception to the abolition.  The clergy saw no issue with spreading the faith on the backs of Africans and they even cited the doctrine of Paul and of Augustine to justify themselves[3].  What then we experience is one culture claiming moral high ground to exploit another culture.  Whether these claims were true in the hearts and minds of the traders is impossible to know today.  Yet Brown raises an interesting point I had not considered prior to reading.  Brown notes the confrontations Christian Europe had experienced with the Islamic Middle East and from these wars he presses the Europeans allied being Christian as an identity.  Christian membership brought one certain duties to the community but also certain rewards and benefits[4].  Christians had held “heathens” prisoner, tortured them, broken oaths and slaughtered civilians during the crusades.  This identity as other humans, they were not racists in our modern sense so much as religious bigots.  The Christians hated or disregarded the rights of those not of their religion, joining into that religion, even if not sincerely, would raise the social status of an individual or even a family. 

            I feel that this thinking of assigning social value through the acquisition of a Christianity is furthered by both Boulle’s and Garzina’s article.  Though these authors place similar importance on the religious as key to a higher social standing both make clear that life improved once this similarity was present.  Boulle focuses on the holy sacrament of the time and speaks mainly of baptism and marriage as gateways or rituals the Africans recognized.  Algning these new rituals to their former life they were able to more readily accept them and incorporate themselves into the advantages of a Christian existence.  Garzina looks heavily toward slave naratives, finding the glorious irony of Christianity lifting the morality of the captive Africans by slavery and abuse. 

            Here again Brown enters into the stage; I believe that for some of the slave traders their desire to convert tribal Africans and “save souls” and “reform the heathen” was out of genuine desire to aid.  I believe that this trade was partially fueled by the good intentions and well-meant beliefs of good people.  We must be slow then to fully judge all traders and its participants as these evil racist money grubbing capitalists.  Did these also exist? Of course.  Yet here it stands Christianty bears some of the blame for the inception of slavery, and its continuation.  The credit also goes to Christianity for its aboition and the escape of many Africans from slavery while they were in Europe.  It is Christians who fight for the rights of baptized Africans and Christians who fight for the legal end of the trade; be fringe or mainstream, as Hudson points out, most denominations got on the abolition bandwagon.

            Finally, in our reading of Walvin I see none of this debate in the pages we were assigned.  Though I believe in further research of his work, that he will also fall in the idea that the prior relationships that Europeans had with non-Christians formed the foundation of the trade.  If they are heathen then our Christian laws and Christian morality does not apply.  If they are willing to convert then, with learning and “proper” lifestyle choices then the savage and tribes and heathen could join “higher” or “advanced” society as Europeans knew it.

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[1] Peabody, Sue. “Race, Slavery, and the Law in Early Modern France.” Historian. 56:3(1994)503

[2] Ibid 503

[3] Brown, Christopher Leslie. Christianity and campaign against slavery and the slave trade. Cambridge University Press. 2008. 518

[4] Brown, Christopher Leslie. Christianity and campaign against slavery and the slave trade. Cambridge University Press. 2008, 518.

Essay One

Through the readings a consistency rose in the Mediterranean tracks.  African people were part of everyday life and they were not a new thing of interest.  However, the art of the African changes dramatically.  In Kaplan’s article we are exposed to early images of Africans in turbans trumpeting the arrival of a monarch.  This image, we are told, is later borrowed by another King looking to unify the Italian Kingdom[1].  Also it is generally known how the North Africans controlled the whole of Spain and had great impact on styles of architecture and art of that Area.  However the picture given in the readings is slavery or absence.  Our authors all seem to agree that Spain came into existence following the “liberation” or “conquest” of Ferdinand, what picture existed in Moorish Spain. 

            I mention this since the picture alters so drastically for this area.  In Italy artists are given Black faces places on equal standing and placing appropriate facial hair, fashion, and facial structure to Africans[2].  Further, I realize our course of study must set some parameters for study, yet in this first section of time the readings no viewpoints came from the south looking up into Europe.  All the authors had as their area of focus Europe down into Africa.  Understanding, we are mostly from a European background but is there not scholarship and sources offering the view of the Moors as they lost power in Spain.  With respect to the Portuguese, we read about their exploits on the western coast of Africa, however Elbl only mentions how the Portuguese benefited for their trading with Western Coast Kingdoms[3].  In Elbl’s research and writing where is the mention of how the kingdoms of Africa benefitted from their cooperation with these new traders.  Did the kings gain military advantage by trading with the Europeans, did the traders add to the cultures they encountered?  As the trading evolves to include slaves, the picture of the African changes to more closely follow this new perception.  Prior art had Africans as warriors and thinkers equal with Europe only culturally different.  Following the growth of the slave population the art began to reflect the African in this new contemporary light.  The picture offered by Fracchia, shows a servant girl, head down and passive.  The dark clothing and separation from the other people in the work add isolation to her existence[4].

            For this period, again it is generally known how sugar and the demand for it formed the political boundaries of the new world.  The fortunes of the major powers rotated around their colonies production.  And this is the history we know so well as studying from the Europe side of the story.  The picture as seen through the eyes of the Northern Europeans, is more stagnant but gives us even less of the relationship between the two continents.  Our authors, Guasco and Vaughan, focusing mainly on England and include evidence from other countries, painting the picture of Africans as servants and slaves.  In many families they were marks of wealth and status among the nobility[5].  The picture provided is of subservient captives content to exist and survive within the new society that they find themselves.  Some even succeed enough to excel and join the propertied class.  Though this is coldly accurate what depth do we understand of these arrangements?  Our authors mention manumission in the course of their writing.  Manumission is the freeing of a slave under certain terms or conditions.  As this freedom is manmade it can be given and removed.  The certainty of the lowest standing in society is the place of the African in northern Europe.  Gone is the tribal hunter and gone is the plains warrior and gone is the spiritual being; identity is replaced with service as a footman or cook or maid.  The old stories of tribal life are used as entertainment for the master’s children[6].

            In our readings, I feel compelled to reiterate that I was unable to see where the scholarship recorded the African view of all these new interactions with the Portuguese, Spanish and English.  We are exposed to the European view of the African and how their views change; we see the standing of the African in European culture and their place in many different states.  We gain a wide view of the European attitude; however, we are left void when we turn our eyes to the actual Africans.  I believe that the scholarship exists; I do not believe we have ignored Africa, yet I feel that the slavery issue has become so all-consuming for historians that as a profession we are becoming apologists and not analysts.  We do not objectively seek this topic, we glorify the slave narrative, diminish the individual master and demonize the society that employed the slavery system.  Yet can we see that in Africa some Kingdoms and tribes grew in power and wealth through this system as well as the Europeans.  Can we see this as objective observers trying to see the good people living inside oppression?  Or is that not possible in an environment so quick to racism in simple discourse and disagreement?

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[1] Kaplan, Paul H D. “Black Africans in Hohenstaufen Iconography.” Gesta. 26, no.1 (1987): 29-36

[2] Ibid

[3] Elbl, Ivana. “Cross Cultural Trade and Diplomacy: Potruguese Relations with West Africa, 1441-1521.” Journal of World History. 3, no.2 (1992): 165-204

[4] Fracchia, Carmen. “(Lack of) Visual Representation of Black Slaves in Spanish Golden Age Painting.” Journal of Iberian and Latin American Studies. 10, no.1 (2004):23-34

[5] Vaughan, Alden T and Virginia Mason. “Before Othello: Elizabethan Representations of Sub-Saharan  Africans.” The William and Mary Quarterly. 3^rd Series, 54, no.1 (1997):19-44

[6] Fracchia, Carmen. “(Lack of) Visual Representation of Black Slaves in Spanish Golden Age Painting.” Journal of Iberian and Latin American Studies. 10, no.1 (2004):23-34

by way of introduction

I am thirty married have a son and trying to finish my bachelors, a lot of life interrupted my university studies. 

My historical education and experience has focused heavily on Europe and the development of the European community, including course work on the Renaissance, Reformation, Roman Empire, Modern Europe and the 19th Century in Europe.  I've studied the French and Russian revolutions and most recently moving to Christian history, both surveying the whole of Western Christendom and also looking into the rise of the christian faith as a governing force of society following Rome. 

Only recently have my studies ventured from Europe into the Atlantic Slave Trade and the Caribbean.

I like studying Europe, that is mostly the reason I choose to take this course topic it allowed me to draw from my comfort zone while doing so online where I am not familiar.  I prefer the traditional class to the online format the connection to the professor an seeing and talking to people.  I feel people are more honest in their commentary and more real when the audience is known and I see people censure themselves more in the online world then in their face to face communication.