Did African societies trade enslaved people?

Answer 1

You have to realize that Africa,just like Europe,is not a country.It's a continent made made up of different countries and ethinc groups.So you have to understand that the "Africans" were not selling "their fellow countrymen" (for the most part,though some condemned criminals would get traded as an alternative to execution),"their brothers and sisters","their own people"etc.. When white traders asked the ethnic groups on the coast (like Ashanti,Oyo,Dahomey,Bakong,etc.they couldn't meet anyone in the interior) to to trade captives,they accepted because not only was it about money(as many people seem to believe that it was only about greed),but also a chance to get rid of their enemies and to expand their kingdoms,and the whites were giving them guns to capture people.There was also an arms race called the gunslave cycle where ethnic groups who were in trade with whites were scared that they would not be able to protect themselves from other trading ethnic groups if they didn't have enough guns(it was easier to attack another group with guns rather than spears) .That's something that white traders can be blamed for. Also,people in those days did not have a concept of race that they would have later on.(European countries at war didn't think they were fighting their own people either) And Africans,contrary to popular belief, were not the only race where people "sold their own race" to another race.White people in Europe sold other whites to Arab Abbasids. And Africans,contrary to popular belief,were not the only race to practice slavery,white slavers used other whites prior to using blacks.Also while "Africans sold Africans" These whites sold,bought,traded,transported and shipped and held whites,so they did alot more to their race than blacks did to theirs.Most people insist that Africa was the only continent to have slavery yet the word slave comes from slav,so obviously things weren't always so peachykeen with whites in Europe.Most "slavery" in Africa,just like Europe,was debt payments and prisoners of war.There really wasn't slavery comparable to the chattel plantation slavery that white slavers had in the Americas.Since whites were practicing slavery on other whites in Europe I really don't understand what point alot of people are making when they say "Africans had slavery in Africa before whites ever came there".Slavery is still in existance on all continents,including Europe,not just Africa(though it's nothing like American plantation slavery).

Answer 2

Yes, many Africans sold other Africans to trade for rum from the Europeans; also for their own protection to keep from being enslaved, themselves, they gave up their prisoners.

Answer 3

They didn't.

Rather some Africans sold other Africans in to slavery. They did it for money. Just as Greek and Romans sometimes sold other Europeans into slavery.

Answer 4

Which of the following civilizations built the largest stone city in southern afica

Answer 5

Yes they did. For Greed.

Answer 6

for money and for riches

Answer 7

African Merchants.

Answer 8

Yes