Christian Slave, Muslim Master

March 14, 2004 9:02 AM

Christian Slave, Muslim Master: A new book claims over 1 million white Europeans where enslaved by North Africans between 1500 and 1800. Entire villages de-populated and pressed into slavery from Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Britain, Ireland and Iceland. While the numbers are smaller than the 10 to 12 million Africans sent to North America it is a little known tragic story of Africans subjugating Europeans.
posted by stbalbach (15 comments total)

Sue for reparations!
posted by Postroad at 9:31 AM on March 14, 2004

damn, postroad beat me to it
posted by keswick at 9:32 AM on March 14, 2004

Geez, couldn't you find a better main link than two booksellers with no reviews posted, one of whom lists it as unavailable? A trivial google of the main title turned up a WashTimes posting of a Reuters article, a Newswise article and a History News Network reprint of a Guardian article on the first page of results.
posted by billsaysthis at 9:34 AM on March 14, 2004

*Puts on Nat X wig*

Fight The Power!
posted by jonmc at 9:41 AM on March 14, 2004

The two "main" links contain actual text from the source work. The last link contains the wire article in full, which the WashTime and Newswire and History News links contain short hand versions of and are redundant.
posted by stbalbach at 9:49 AM on March 14, 2004

billsaysthis, the first link to the Palgrave site has a link to a PDF that has the contents page, first chapter, and the index of the book.

And thanks, stbalbach! Interesting stuff.
posted by carter at 10:07 AM on March 14, 2004

...unorthodox methodology...the absence of detailed written records such as customs forms...statistics which are not real..."His figures sound a bit dodgy and I think he may be exaggerating."...

sounds quite speculative to me.
posted by dash_slot- at 10:07 AM on March 14, 2004

Okay, my bad, beat me with a stick but I still don't like links to bookstores as the main efforts of a post.
posted by billsaysthis at 10:15 AM on March 14, 2004

hey just watched spartan :D wheels within wheels!
posted by kliuless at 10:21 AM on March 14, 2004

MeTa
posted by clavdivs at 11:13 AM on March 14, 2004

Sue for reparations!
posted by Postroad at 11:31 AM CST on March 14

That's rascist.
posted by the fire you left me at 12:37 PM on March 14, 2004

Racist? I thought it was funny.
posted by pandaharma at 1:57 PM on March 14, 2004

That's rascist.

Great, a neurotically PC dyslexic.
posted by jonmc at 2:24 PM on March 14, 2004

pandaharma, as always, one person's joke is another's insult.
posted by billsaysthis at 4:07 PM on March 14, 2004

Has anyone pointed out that this amounts to 3,000 european captives per year? In an era where it was not uncommon for a captured city to have all the men killed and all the women and children sold into slavery, that 1 million people would have ended up as slaves over a 300 year period is not particularly surprising. A much larger number were, no doubt, outright killed during this period in any number of european wars that went on.

Assuming two generations of slaves would be functional at any one time, that would mean about 100,000 slaves were serving in any given year over that 300 year period (a 40-year useful life of a slave) to serve all of North Africa.
posted by deanc at 9:35 PM on March 14, 2004