The Transatlantic Slave Trade Trivia Questions

Slavery existed in Africa long before the Transatlantic Slave Trade began. Internal African slavery and the trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean slave trades predate the Atlantic trade by centuries.

The Transatlantic Slave Trade began in the mid-1400s with Portuguese voyages and continued actively until the 1860s, spanning more than four centuries overall.

Historians estimate about 12.5 million Africans were forcibly taken from Africa during the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

The U.S. Congress banned the importation of enslaved people effective January 1, 1808, as soon as the Constitution allowed. The law made participation in the international slave trade a crime.

The overwhelming majority of enslaved Africans were taken to the Americas (primarily Brazil, Caribbean, and mainland colonies). Only a very small number reached Europe, mostly as domestic servants.

The Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves in Confederate states but did not address the international slave trade. The Transatlantic Slave Trade had been illegal in the U.S. since 1808 and was largely suppressed by the 1860s.

Brazil received about 4.9 million enslaved Africans, far more than any other country. The United States received roughly 388,000, a small fraction of the total.

While some African polities participated as suppliers, the Transatlantic Slave Trade was driven and organized by European traders and colonial powers. African kingdoms were coerced or complicit, not the primary operators.