GoPinheiro
Pro
Lmao, how do you even rationalize this with the fact that at some point, in certain regions, there were more enslaved people than slave owners? Or, the fact that there were and still are natives with brown and darker skin? Wouldn't this defeat your theory? Because, more people, from the same skin color, concentrated as slaves, also means that it is more likely for revolts to happen...
Lol, the fact is, the demand of enslaved Africans was based on their skills, especially skills related to iron smelting, gold extraction, agriculture, textiles and healthcare.
For instance, before the industrial revolution, the richest economies depended mostly on mineral resources like gold and also on their agricultural output, not on technological services, like we see now. Europeans found huge arable lands in the Americas, and were not really good at agriculture themselves(If you do your own research, you will find out that no major crop was domesticated in mainland Europe. Most, like 99.9%, of what they eat, was domesticated by other groups).
So, to be more specific...Beans, domesticated in the Americans, are similar to Cow-pea Beans, domesticated by Africans. Corn, domesticated in the Americas, is similar to Millet and Sorghum, domesticated by Africans. Tomatoes, domesticated in the Americas, are similar to African Eggplants(Also called Bitter Tomato). Sweet Potatoes, domesticated in the Americas, are similar to Yams. European wanted to compete with China, in the rice market. Rice was only domesticated in Asia and West Africa. I mean, the list goes on…Plus the knowledge of Coffee (One of the biggest commodities at the time). At the time of the colonization of the Americas, coffee had already spread from the Ethiopian highlands to the Sahel.
And the same applies to gold. The Americas was full of gold and people from the Sahel were experts in gold extraction.
To summarize, the people they found, natives, were really good at it but, they were less resistant to old world diseases. So, enslaved Africans became the main option due to being more resistant to diseases and also having similar knowledge as far as minerals and agriculture. Enslaving Native Americans was super common. However, it wasn't common for them to survive with the same rate as enslaved Africans.
By the way, yesterday, I forgot to post this. Up until the late 19th century, they were still selling and transporting enslaved Mayans around the Americas.
Mexico identifies submerged wreck of Mayan slave ship
Researchers Identify Mexican Wreck as 19th-Century Maya Slave Ship
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Researchers Identify Mexican Wreck as 19th-Century Maya Slave Ship
Spanish traders used the steamboat to transport enslaved Indigenous individuals to Cuba
www.smithsonianmag.com