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Owners of Black Slaves - ARABS/MUSLIMS (First Owners of Black Slaves) - Hidden History
This is one of those subjects which is avoided in EU History considering schools and even Univiersities, why? Because It's not Political correct to speak TRUE HISTORY in Europe. Europeans are portrayed as major Devils "guilty" for almost everything bad on this world including ownership of slaves, but is that true? Ofcourse not.
Before I write anything I want to say that this thread is not ment to be offensive toward Arabs here or anyone who reads it, this is History, this are facts, and just like I opened a thread about British crimes against Humanity in other thread, in this thread we will see what kind of crimes against Humanity Arabs committed when it comes about black slaves.
Over 28 Million Africans have been enslaved in the Muslim world during the past 14 centuries While much has been written concerning the Transatlantic slave trade, surprisingly little attention has been given to the Islamic slave trade across the Sahara, the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. By some calculations the number of victims of the 14 centuries of Muslim slave trade could exceed 180 million.
While the European involvement in the Transatlantic slave trade to the Americas lasted for just over three centuries, the Arab involvement in the slave trade has lasted fourteen centuries, and in some parts of the Muslim world is still continuing to this day. A comparison of the Muslim slave trade to the American slave trade reveals some interesting contrasts.
One of the biggest differences between the Arab slave trade and European slaving was that the Arabs drew slaves from all racial groups. During the eighth and ninth centuries of the Fatimid Caliphate, most of the slaves were Europeans (called Saqaliba), captured along European coasts and during wars.
Aside from those of African origins, people from a wide variety of regions were forced into Arab slavery, including Mediterranean people; Persians; people from the Caucasus mountain regions (such as Georgia, Armenia and Circassia) and parts of Central Asia and Scandinavia; English, Dutch and Irish; and Berbers from North Africa.
Some historians estimate that between A.D. 650 and 1900, 50 to 70 million people were enslaved by Arab slave traders. Others believe 150 - 180 million enslaved Africans alone had been delivered through the trans-Sahara route alone to the Islamic world in last fourteen centuries.
Dr. John Alembellah Azumah in his 2001 book, The Legacy of Arab-Islam in Africa estimates that over 80 million Black people more died en route.
PAY ATTENTION;
While two out of every three slaves shipped across the Atlantic were men, the proportions were reversed in the Muslim slave trade. Two women for every man were enslaved by the Muslims.
While the mortality rate for slaves being transported across the Atlantic was as high as 10%, the percentage of slaves dying in transit in the Transsahara and East African slave trade was between 80 and 90%!
Arabic-Muslim atrocities; The Arab slave trade typically dealt in the sale of castrated male slaves. Black boys between the age of 8 and 12 had their scrotums and penises completely amputated to prevent them from reproducing. About six of every 10 boys bled to death during the procedure, according to some sources, but the high price brought by eunuchs on the market made the practice profitable.
Some men were castrated to be eunuchs in domestic service and the practice of neutering male slaves was not limited to only Black males. "The calipha in Baghdad at the beginning of the 10th Century had 7,000 black eunuchs and 4,000 white eunuchs in his palace", writes author Ronald Segal in his 2002 book, Islam’s Black Slaves: The Other Black Diaspora.
While almost all the slaves shipped across the Atlantic were for agricultural work, most of the slaves destined for the Muslim Middle East were for sexual exploitation as concubines, in harems, and for military service.
While most slaves who went to the Americas could marry and have families, most of the male slaves destined for the Middle East were castrated, and most of the children born to the women were killed at birth. A comparison of the Muslim slave trade to the American slave trade reveals some interesting contrasts. While two out of every three slaves shipped across the Atlantic were men, the proportions were reversed in the Muslim slave trade. Two women for every man were enslaved by the Muslims, in next picture (as on many other pictures about that time), we can see slave market in Morocco;
While Christian Reformers spearheaded the antislavery abolitionist movements in Europe and North America, and Great Britain mobilized her Navy, throughout most of the 19th Century, to intercept slave ships and set the captives free, there was no comparable opposition to slavery within the Muslim world.
Even after Britain outlawed the slave trade in 1807 and Europe abolished the slave trade in 1815, Muslim slave traders enslaved a further 2 million Africans. This despite vigorous British Naval activity and military intervention to limit the Muslim slave trade.
Nearly 100 years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in America, and 130 years after all slaves within the British Empire were set free by parliamentary decree, Saudi Arabia and Yemen, in 1962, and Mauritania in 1980, begrudgingly removed legalized slavery from their statute books. And this only after international pressure was brought to bear. Today numerous international organizations document that slavery still continues in some Muslim countries.
Reports on slavery in Sudan, Mauritania for instance needs looking into. Recently, a former slave from the Nuba Mountains of Sudan, Mende Nazer, had her autobiography: “Slave: My True Story” published. Mende Nazer was an alleged slave in Sudan. She was made famous by her transfer to England to serve a diplomatic family.
Genetic evidence does however point to a 2500 year old female mediated gene flow from Africa to Arabia. This means that African woman have been part of the population of Arabia, especially Yemen..
Slaving Routes out of Africa
This points to some form of enslavement due to the dynamics of gender and conquest; conquering men impregnate conquered women. Which proves the Arab slave trade had to be one of the oldest forced exodus of African people out of Africa.
Contrary to popular belief, it was not in the immediate interest of Arab slavers to convert enslaved Africans to Islam, because being Muslim granted the enslaved Africans more rights to manumission. (See Umayyad Calipate) And if the people they were capturing were already Muslim it would "delegitimize" the capture.
Some women stolen from Africa were stolen to serve the infamous Arabian harems (exploited as sex-slaves); their children were born free to Arab fathers, and thus would have been heirs to wealth and status, fully and equally assimilated into the population (good for Arabia, bad for African identity). Their mothers receives the title of "umm walad" (lit. mother of a child), which was an improvement in her status as she could no longer be sold. Among Sunnis, she is automatically freed upon her master's death, however for Shi'a, she is only freed if her child is still alive; her value is then deducted from this child's share of the inheritance. These umm walad, attained "an intermediate position between slave and free" pending their freedom, although they would sometimes be nominally freed as soon as they gave birth.
Some Afro-Arabs rose to great stations by virtue of their Arab fathers. This also added to disassociation with African culture due to the opportunities "being Arab" brought. (similar to the mulatto culture seen in the Caribbean) So we see a diminishing of Africa and a rise of Arabia, at the expense of African identity by the process of enslavement and cultural displacement. The infamous eunuchs were infertile, and the other men who were enslaved would have gradually married non-African women, hence facilitating the absorption of African culture and lineage into an Arab one (acculturation that is a force still at work today). The contrasting differences between racial definitions on the Arabian continent as opposed to Europe assist in blending the majority of Africans stolen from Africa into the general population of Arabia. However, in the West there was no transcending “racial stigmas.” in any way shape or form.
What was Arabic-Muslim view about Black Africans? I will Quote Al-Dimashqi, known Medieval Arab geographer from Damascus (Syria), 13th century; "The Equator is inhabited by communities of blacks who may be numbered among the savage beasts. Their complexion and hair are burnt and they are physically and morally abnormal. Their brains almost boil from the sun's heat" - Al-Dimashqi
Al-Muqaddasi (Known Medieval Arab geographer, 10th century, Jerusalem): "As for the Zanj, they are people of black color, flat noses, kinky hair, and little understanding or intelligence".
ETC...
Mende Nazer (year 2002) reports that she was abducted and sold into slavery in Sudan when she was a child of twelve or thirteen (she doesn’t know when she was born). She lived in a village of the Karko Nuba in the Nuba mountains of Sudan with her family. The village was attacked one night. Mende fled with her family into the mountains.
In the end of this post I will just leave this fact;
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Originally Posted by al-Bosni
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