Slavery in the Cities of the Slave Trade

This lecture will look at the role of slavery in the cities of early modern European empires. It will focus on the town of St. Louis du Senegal, but will try to set St. Louis in both the larger situation of the entrepots of empire and the specific situation of those communities that produced the slaves that European empires hungered for. It would also look at the way different forms of slavery develop in different productive systems and the way these different systems shape the nature of slavery. I hope to go beyond a simple distinction between elite and non-elite slavery and ask why the urban situation gives slaves more room to develop their potential and exploit the possibilities of their economic and social situation

Martin Klein is Professor Emeritus in the History Department at the University of Toronto