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The Moresby Treaty was an anti-slavery treaty between Sayyid Said , Sultan of Muscat and Oman and Fairfax Moresby , senior officer of Mauritius, on behalf of Britain in September 1822.

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86-701: Initially composed of six articles, the purpose of the treaty was to limit the Indian Ocean slave trade by preventing the importation of slaves to British holdings in India and the Indian Ocean from land ruled by Omani Arabs in East Africa. The treaty barred the sale of slaves to Christians of any nationality, recognized the sultan’s jurisdiction over the waters near the East African coast, allowed for

172-588: A 10- and 8-year-old pair of Javanese Christian girls to family in Singapore, but enslaving them instead. Muslim men sometimes sold their own wives into slavery while on pilgrimage to Mecca, after pretending to be religious to trick the women into marrying them. The slave trade continued into the 20th century. Slavery in Saudi Arabia , Yemen , and the United Arab Emirates did not end until

258-602: A Syrian Arab girl from Damascus who was held as a slave of a black African governor in Mali . Ibn Battuta engaged in conversation with her in Arabic. The black man was a scholar of Islam named Farba Sulayman. He was openly violating the rule in Islam against enslaving Arabs. Syrian girls were trafficked from Syria to Saudi Arabia until shortly before World War II. They were married to Arab men in order to legally bring them across

344-530: A date can be assigned is his reference to the death in AD ;23 of Juba II , king of Maurousia ( Mauretania ), who is said to have died "just recently". He probably worked on the Geography for many years and revised it steadily, but not always consistently. It is an encyclopaedic chronicle and consists of political, economic, social, cultural, and geographic descriptions covering almost all of Europe and

430-757: A descriptive history of people and places from different regions of the world known during his lifetime. Although the Geographica was rarely used by contemporary writers, a multitude of copies survived throughout the Byzantine Empire . It first appeared in Western Europe in Rome as a Latin translation issued around 1469. The first printed edition was published in 1516 in Venice . Isaac Casaubon , classical scholar and editor of Greek texts, provided

516-469: A descriptive history of people and places from different regions of the world known during his lifetime. Additionally, Strabo authored historical works, but only fragments and quotations of these survive in the writings of other authors. Strabo was born to an affluent family from Amaseia in Pontus (in present-day Cappadocia ) in around 64   BC. His family had been involved in politics since at least

602-597: A few runaway slaves did join the revolt, the majority of the participants were Arabs and free Zanj. He believes that if the revolt had been led by slaves, they would have lacked the necessary resources to combat the Abbasid government for as long as they did. In Somalia, the Bantu minorities are descended from Bantu groups who had settled in Southeast Africa after the initial expansion from Nigeria/Cameroon. To meet

688-411: A harmonized 5% import duty for any merchandise entering into his empire. He abolished export duties. Thirdly, he took advantage of Zanzibar's and Pemba's fertile soil to establish plantations of coconut and cloves. Fourthly, he revitalised and extended the "old Arab-caravan trade" with mainland East Africa to acquire slaves and ivory. He signed “commercial treaties with western capitalist countries, such as

774-544: A number that grew to c.  4000 during the 18th century, and 3700 during the period 1800–1870. William Gervase Clarence-Smith writes that estimating the number of slaves traded has been controversial in the academic world, especially when it comes to the slave trade in the areas of the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea . When estimating the number of people enslaved from East Africa , author N'Diaye and French historian Olivier Pétré-Grenouilleau estimate 8 million as

860-417: A primarily Muslim zone of the Indian Ocean, was at this point considered legal but prohibited on the eastern side. To enforce this rule, warships were given the authority to confiscate ships carrying slaves in illegal waters east of the line and punish the captain in the same manner as a pirate, by "death without the benefit of clergy ". The only exemption to this regulation provided for ships that had gone past

946-598: A small scale across the Indian Ocean (and sometimes the Red Sea ). Slave trading in the Red Sea around the time of Alexander the Great is described by Agatharchides . Strabo 's Geographica (completed after 23 CE) mentions Greeks from Egypt trading slaves at the port of Adulis and other ports in the Horn of Africa . Pliny the Elder 's Natural History (published in 77 CE) also describes Indian Ocean slave trading. In

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1032-491: A valuable source of information on the ancient world of his day, especially when this information is corroborated by other sources. He travelled extensively, as he says: "Westward I have journeyed to the parts of Etruria opposite Sardinia; towards the south from the Euxine [Black Sea] to the borders of Ethiopia; and perhaps not one of those who have written geographies has visited more places than I have between those limits." It

1118-527: A very rocky mountain, called the Trojan mountain; beneath it there are caves, and near the caves and the river a village called Troy, an ancient settlement of the captive Trojans who had accompanied Menelaus and settled there. Strabo commented on volcanism ( effusive eruption ) which he observed at Katakekaumene (modern Kula , Western Turkey). Strabo's observations predated Pliny the Younger who witnessed

1204-582: Is "... pro-Roman throughout the Geography. But while he acknowledges and even praises Roman ascendancy in the political and military sphere, he also makes a significant effort to establish Greek primacy over Rome in other contexts." In Europe , Strabo was the first to connect the Danube (which he called Danouios) and the Istros – with the change of names occurring at "the cataracts," the modern Iron Gates on

1290-486: Is an Arabic title for Lord) Said made deliberate efforts to "revive old Arab-caravan trade" with mainland Africa, which became the major source of slaves. Said bin Sultan took six major initiatives which facilitated growth and expansion of his commercial empire. He firstly introduced a new currency “Maria Theresa Dollar” to supplement the exiting “Spanish Crown”, which simplified commercial activities. Secondly, he introduced

1376-490: Is not known when he wrote Geographica , but he spent much time in the famous library in Alexandria taking notes from "the works of his predecessors". A first edition was published in 7 BC and a final edition no later than 23 AD, in what may have been the last year of Strabo's life. It took some time for Geographica to be recognized by scholars and to become a standard. Alexandria itself features extensively in

1462-431: Is proper,' he observes in continuation, ' to derive our explanations from things which are obvious, and in some measure of daily occurrences, such as deluges, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and sudden swellings of the land beneath the sea; for the last raise up the sea also, and when the same lands subside again, they occasion the sea to be let down. And it is not merely the small, but the large islands also, and not merely

1548-642: Is unknown. The European slave trade in the Indian Ocean began when Portugal established Estado da Índia in the early 16th century. From then until the 1830s, c. 200 slaves were exported annually from Mozambique; similar figures have been estimated for slaves brought from Asia to the Philippines during the Iberian Union (1580–1640). According to Francisco De Sousa, a Jesuit who wrote about it in 1698, Japanese slave girls were still owned by India-based Portuguese (Lusitanian) families long after

1634-569: The Byzantine and Sasanian empires entered into slave trading in the 6th century AD, it became a major enterprise. Cosmas Indicopleustes wrote in his Christian Topography (550 CE) that Somali port cities were exporting slaves captured in the interior to Byzantine Egypt via the Red Sea. He also mentioned the import of eunuchs by the Byzantines from Mesopotamia and India. After

1720-838: The Colombo fortress in Dutch Ceylon . Bali and neighbouring islands supplied regional networks with c.  100,000–150,000 slaves 1620–1830. Indian and Chinese slave traders supplied Dutch Indonesia with perhaps 250,000 slaves during the 17th and 18th centuries. The East India Company (EIC) was established during the same period; in 1622 one of its ships carried slaves from the Coromandel Coast to Dutch East Indies . The EIC mostly traded in African slaves but also some Asian slaves purchased from Indian, Indonesian and Chinese slave traders. The French established colonies on

1806-533: The East African slave trade, involved the capture and transportation of predominately black African slaves along the coasts, such as the Swahili Coast and the Horn of Africa , and through the Indian Ocean . The areas impacted included East Africa , Southern Arabia , the west coast of India , Indian ocean islands (including Madagascar ) and southeast Asia including Java . The source of slaves

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1892-637: The Muslim empire and claimed "tens of thousands of lives in lower Iraq". The Zanj who were taken as slaves to the Middle East were often used in strenuous agricultural work. As the plantation economy boomed and the Arabs became richer, they began to consider agriculture and other manual labor work as demeaning. The resulting labor shortage resulted in an increased slave market. It is certain that large numbers of slaves were exported from eastern Africa ;

1978-811: The Persian Gulf using wood imported from India. These shipbuilding activities go back to Babylonian and Achaemenid times. Gujarati merchants evolved into the first explorers of the Indian Ocean as they traded slaves and African goods such as ivory and tortoise shells. The Gujaratis participated in the slavery business in Mombasa , Zanzibar and, to some extent, in the Southern African region. Indonesians were also participants, and brought spices to trade in Africa. They would have returned via India and Sri Lanka with ivory, iron, skins, and slaves. After

2064-501: The Swahili Coast and sea routes during the 9th century (see Sultanate of Zanzibar ). These traders captured Bantu peoples (Zanj) from the interior in the present-day lands of Kenya , Mozambique and Tanzania and brought them to the coast. There, the slaves gradually assimilated in the rural areas, particularly on the Unguja and Pemba islands. Muslim merchants traded an estimated 1000 African slaves annually between 800 and 1700,

2150-475: The 1636 edict by Tokugawa Japan had expelled Portuguese people. The establishment of the Dutch East India Company in the early 17th century resulted in a quick increase in volume of the slave trade in the region; there were perhaps up to 500,000 slaves in various Dutch colonies during the 17th and 18th centuries in the Indian Ocean. For example, some 4000 African slaves were used to build

2236-636: The 1960s and 1970s. In the 21st century, activists contend that many immigrants who travel to those countries for work are held in virtual slavery The East African slave trade flourished greatly from the second half of the nineteenth century, when Said bin Sultan , an Oman Sultan, made Zanzibar his capital and expanded international commercial activities and plantation economy in cloves and coconuts. During this period demands for slaves grew drastically. The slaves were needed for local use mainly to work in plantations in Zanzibar and for export. Sultan Seyyid (seyyid

2322-710: The 19th century to European plantations in the Western Indian Ocean. Strabo Strabo ( / ˈ s t r eɪ b oʊ / ; Greek : Στράβων Strábōn ; 64 or 63 BC – c.  24 AD ) was a Greek geographer , philosopher , and historian who lived in Asia Minor during the transitional period of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire . He is best known for his work Geographica ("Geography"), which presented

2408-491: The 1st century CE, Periplus of the Erythraean Sea advised of slave trading opportunities in the region, particularly in the trading of "beautiful girls for concubinage." According to this manual, slaves were exported from Omana (likely near modern-day Oman ) and Kanê to the west coast of India. The ancient Indian Ocean slave trade was enabled by building ships capable of carrying large numbers of human beings in

2494-526: The 1st century, the export of black Africans from Tanzania, Mozambique and other Bantu groups became a "constant factor". Under the Sasanians, Indian Ocean trade supported not only the transport of slaves, but also of scholars and merchants. The Muslim world expanded along trade routes, such as the silk route in the 8th century. As the power and size of the Muslim trading networks grew, merchants along

2580-554: The Aegean Sea. Around 25 BC, he sailed up the Nile until he reached Philae , after which point there is little record of his travels until AD 17. It is not known precisely when Strabo's Geography was written, though comments within the work itself place the finished version within the reign of Emperor Tiberius . Some place its first drafts around 7 BC, others around AD 17 or AD 18. The latest passage to which

2666-524: The Aristotelian Xenarchus and Tyrannion who preceded him in teaching Strabo, Athenodorus was a Stoic and almost certainly the source of Strabo's diversion from the philosophy of his former mentors. Moreover, from his own first-hand experience, Athenodorus provided Strabo with information about regions of the empire which Strabo would not otherwise have known about. Strabo is best known for his work Geographica ("Geography"), which presented

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2752-686: The Chinese emperor with two Seng Chi (Zanj) slaves as gifts in 614. 8th and 9th century chronicles mention Seng Chi slaves reaching China from the Hindu kingdom of Sri Vijaya in Java . The 12th-century Arab geographer al-Idrisi recorded that the ruler of the Persian island of Kish "raids the Zanj country with his ships and takes many captives." According to the 14th-century Berber explorer Ibn Battuta ,

2838-565: The Comorian Archipelago to ports on the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, Swahili Coast, Zanzibar and the Horn of Africa. From 700AD to 1600AD, an estimated two to three thousand East African and Malagasy slaves were trafficked annually from the Indian Ocean coast to slave ports along the Red Sea and Southern Arabia. By the mid-1600s, this number had increased to five to six thousands slaves trafficked each year from Madagascar alone (not including

2924-807: The Comoros) to the Middle-east by non-European Muslim slave traders (Swahili, Comorian, Arab, Hadrami, Omani and Ottoman). Some historians estimate that during the 1600s as many as 150,000 Malagasy slaves were exported from Boeny in Northwest Madagascar to the Muslim World including the Red Sea Coast(Jeddah), Hejaz (Mecca), Arabia (Aden), Oman (Muscat), Zanzibar, Kilwa, Lamu, Malindi, Somalia (Barawa), and possibly Sudan (Suakin), Persia (Bandar Abbas), and India (Surat). Given

3010-561: The Euxine [Black Sea] was so great, that its bed must be gradually raised, while the rivers still continued to pour in an undiminished quantity of water. He therefore conceived that, originally, when the Euxine was an inland sea, its level had by this means become so much elevated that it burst its barrier near Byzantium, and formed a communication with the Propontis [Sea of Marmara], and this partial drainage had already, he supposed, converted

3096-695: The Japanese consul Miyagawa Kyujiro said these Japanese women were taken by Malay and Chinese men who "lead them off to wild and savage lands where they suffered unimaginable hardship." One Chinese man paid 40 British pounds for 2 Japanese women, and a Malay man paid 50 British pounds for a Japanese woman in Port Darwin, Australia after they were trafficked there in August 1888 by a Japanese pimp, Takada Tokijirō. The buying of Chinese girls in Singapore

3182-613: The Mascarane Islands from 1670 until 1848. In all, Europeans traders exported 567,900–733,200 slaves within the Indian Ocean between 1500 and 1850, and almost that same number were exported from the Indian Ocean to the Americas during the same period. The slave trade in the Indian Ocean was, nevertheless, very limited compared to c.  12,000,000 slaves exported across the Atlantic. Some 200,000 slaves were sent in

3268-481: The Mediterranean and Near East, especially for scholarly purposes, was popular during this era and was facilitated by the relative peace enjoyed throughout the reign of Augustus (27 BC – AD 14). He moved to Rome in 44 BC, and stayed there, studying and writing, until at least 31 BC. In 29 BC, on his way to Corinth (where Augustus was at the time), he visited the island of Gyaros in

3354-614: The Mediterranean: Britain and Ireland, the Iberian Peninsula, Gaul, Germania, the Alps, Italy, Greece, Northern Black Sea region, Anatolia, Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa. The Geography is the only extant work providing information about both Greek and Roman peoples and countries during the reign of Augustus. On the presumption that "recently" means within a year, Strabo stopped writing that year or

3440-696: The Persians bought in India: Persees, Ientews (gentiles [i.e. Hindus]) Bannaras [Bhandaris?], and others." brought to Bandar Abbas via ship from Surat in 1628. In the 1760s, the Arab Syarif Abdurrahman Alkadrie enslaved other Muslims en masse while raiding coastal Borneo in violation of sharia , before he founded the Pontianak Sultanate . Raoul du Bisson was traveling down the Red Sea when he saw

3526-620: The Red Sea (presumably Jeddah) where they were sold to Arab Muslim traders to be further sold and enslaved in Mecca, Medina, Mocha, Aden, al-Shihr and Kishn. At different times and to varying degrees, Portuguese, French, Dutch, English and Ottoman merchants were known to have taken part in the Malagasy slave trade too. The slave trade was taking place in the eastern Indian Ocean well before the Dutch settled there around 1600. The volume of this trade

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3612-661: The Romanian/Serbian border. In India , a country he never visited, Strabo described small flying reptiles that were long with snake-like bodies and bat-like wings (this description matches the Indian flying lizard Draco dussumieri ), winged scorpions, and other mythical creatures along with those that were actually factual. Other historians, such as Herodotus , Aristotle , and Flavius Josephus , mentioned similar creatures. Charles Lyell , in his Principles of Geology , wrote of Strabo: He notices, amongst others,

3698-716: The Sharif to replace the drowned concubines. Emily Ruete (Salama bint Said) was born to Sultan Said bin Sultan and Jilfidan, a Circassian slave concubine (some accounts note her as Georgian ) a victim of the Circassian slave trade . An Indian girl slave named Mariam (originally Fatima) ended up in Zanzibar after being sold by multiple men. She originally came from Bombay. There were also Georgian girl slaves in Zanzibar. Men in Egypt and Hejaz were customers for Indian women trafficked via Aden and Goa. Since Britain banned

3784-428: The Tigris-Euphrates delta, which had become abandoned marshland as a result of peasant migration and repeated flooding, [and] [ sic ] could be reclaimed through intensive labor. Wealthy proprietors "had received extensive grants of tidal land on the condition that they would make it arable." Sugar cane was prominent among the crops of their plantations, particularly in Khūzestān Province . Zanj also worked

3870-459: The United States of America in 1833, with Great Britain in 1839, and France in 1844. Finally, he invited Asian merchants and experts who dealt with financial matters. It was not until 1873 that Sultan Seyyid Barghash of Zanzibar, under pressure from Great Britain, signed a treaty that made the slave trade in his territories illegal. The British played a significant role in ending slavery in East Africa. They made treaties with African rulers to stop

3956-400: The age of 21, Strabo moved to Rome, where he studied philosophy with the Peripatetic Xenarchus , a highly respected tutor in Augustus's court. Despite Xenarchus's Aristotelian leanings, Strabo later gives evidence to have formed his own Stoic inclinations. In Rome, he also learned grammar under the rich and famous scholar Tyrannion of Amisus . Although Tyrannion was also a Peripatetic, he

4042-475: The area in which the transportation of slaves was considered illegal by moving the endpoint of the Moresby Line west to the Port of Pasni on the Makran Coast . Additionally, the amendment prohibited the sale of Somalis as slaves because, as Muslims , they were considered ‘free men’ by the Omani ruler who was a Muslim himself. It was followed by the Hamerton Treaty in 1845. Indian Ocean slave trade The Indian Ocean slave trade , sometimes known as

4128-434: The best evidence for this is the magnitude of the Zanj revolt in Iraq in the 9th century, though not all of the slaves involved were Zanj. There is little evidence of what part of eastern Africa the Zanj came from, for the name is here evidently used in its general sense, rather than to designate the particular stretch of the coast, from about 3°N. to 5°S., to which the name was also applied. The Zanj were needed to cultivate:

4214-461: The border but then divorced and given to other men. Syrians Dr. Midhat and Shaikh Yusuf were accused of engaging in this traffic of Syrian girls to supply them to Saudis. The Gulf of Bengal and Malabar in India were sources of eunuchs for the Safavid court of Iran, according to Jean Chardin . Sir Thomas Herbert accompanied Robert Shirley in 1627-9 to Safavid Iran. He reported seeing Indian slaves sold to Iran, "above three hundred slaves whom

4300-406: The chief black eunuch of the Sharif of Mecca being brought to Constantinople for trial for impregnating a Circassian concubine of the Sharif and having sex with his entire harem of Circassian and Georgian women. The chief black eunuch had not been castrated correctly so he was still able to impregnate. Bisson reported that the women were drowned as punishment. Twelve Georgian women were shipped to

4386-577: The demand for menial labor, Bantus from southeastern Africa captured by Somali slave traders were sold in cumulatively large numbers over the centuries to customers in Somalia and other areas in Northeast Africa and Asia . People captured locally during wars and raids, mostly of Oromo and Nilotic origin, were also sometimes enslaved by Somalis. However, the perception, capture, treatment and duties of these two groups of enslaved peoples differed markedly. From 1800 to 1890, between 25,000 and 50,000 Bantu slaves are thought to have been sold from

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4472-469: The eruption of Mount Vesuvius on 24 August AD 79 in Pompeii : …There are no trees here, but only the vineyards where they produce the Katakekaumene wines which are by no means inferior from any of the wines famous for their quality. The soil is covered with ashes, and black in colour as if the mountainous and rocky country was made up of fires. Some assume that these ashes were the result of thunderbolts and subterranean explosions, and do not doubt that

4558-527: The escape of many slaves from the city; this was where most slaves in Arabia were located. Muslims often ignored Islamic prohibitions against enslaving other Muslims. Arab slave traders fooled both Javanese Muslims and Javanese Christians, tricking them into sending their children to slavery by lying and promising to escort the children to different places. A 4- and 3-year-old pair of Javanese Muslim boys were enslaved after they were purportedly to be taken to Mecca to learn Islam. An Arab lied, claiming he would take

4644-435: The explanation of Xanthus the Lydian, who said that the seas had once been more extensive, and that they had afterwards been partially dried up, as in his own time many lakes, rivers, and wells in Asia had failed during a season of drought. Treating this conjecture with merited disregard, Strabo passes on to the hypothesis of Strato , the natural philosopher, who had observed that the quantity of mud brought down by rivers into

4730-413: The family's support for Rome might have affected their position in the local community, and whether they might have been granted Roman citizenship as a reward. Strabo's life was characterized by extensive travels. He journeyed to Egypt and Kush , as far west as coastal Tuscany and as far south as Ethiopia in addition to his travels in Asia Minor and the time he spent in Rome . Travel throughout

4816-448: The first critical edition in 1587. Although Strabo cited the classical Greek astronomers Eratosthenes and Hipparchus , acknowledging their astronomical and mathematical efforts covering geography, he claimed that a descriptive approach was more practical, such that his works were designed for statesmen who were more anthropologically than numerically concerned with the character of countries and regions. As such, Geographica provides

4902-400: The installation of a British official in Zanzibar or the mainland, and created the Moresby Line. Among the stipulations was the creation of the Moresby Line. The line ran from the southernmost point of the sultan's territory in Africa – Cape Delgado in Mozambique – through the Indian Ocean to the city of Diu on the coast of India. The transportation of slaves west of the established line,

4988-415: The islands of Réunion and Mauritius in 1721; by 1735 some 7,200 slaves populated the Mascarene Islands , a number which had reached 133,000 in 1807. The British captured the islands in 1810, however. Because the British had prohibited the slave trade in 1807, a system of clandestine slave trade developed to bring slaves to French planters on the islands; in all 336,000–388,000 slaves were exported to

5074-412: The islands, but the continents, which can be lifted up together with the sea; and both large and small tracts may subside, for habitations and cities, like Bure, Bizona, and many others, have been engulfed by earthquakes.' Strabo commented on fossil formation mentioning Nummulite (quoted from Celâl Şengör ): One extraordinary thing which I saw at the pyramids must not be omitted. Heaps of stones from

5160-464: The last book of Geographica , which describes it as a thriving port city with a highly developed local economy. Strabo notes the city's many beautiful public parks, and its network of streets wide enough for chariots and horsemen. "Two of these are exceeding broad, over a plethron in breadth, and cut one another at right angles ... All the buildings are connected one with another, and these also with what are beyond it." Lawrence Kim observes that Strabo

5246-474: The left side into marshy ground, and that, at last, the whole would be choked up with soil. So, it was argued, the Mediterranean had once opened a passage for itself by the Columns of Hercules into the Atlantic, and perhaps the abundance of sea-shells in Africa, near the Temple of Jupiter Ammon , might also be the deposit of some former inland sea, which had at length forced a passage and escaped. But Strabo rejects this theory as insufficient to account for all

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5332-458: The legendary story of Typhon takes place in this region. Ksanthos adds that the king of this region was a man called Arimus. However, it is not reasonable to accept that the whole country was burned down at a time as a result of such an event rather than as a result of a fire bursting from underground whose source has now died out. Three pits are called "Physas" and separated by forty stadia from each other. Above these pits, there are hills formed by

5418-414: The line due to conditions beyond their control including extreme weather conditions. Confusion arose as to who exactly was to enforce this part of the treaty as the English version of the text placed responsibility on the Oman while the Arab text placed the onus on the British. On 17 December 1839 the treaty was expanded in scope, adding three more articles to the original agreement. The extension increased

5504-399: The main supply of slaves to India and the Middle East. Ethiopian slaves, both females imported as concubines and men imported as eunuchs, were imported in 19th-century Iran. Sudan, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zanzibar exported the majority of slaves traded to 19th-century Iran. The principal sources of these slaves, all of whom passed through Matamma, Massawa and Tadjoura on the Red Sea, were

5590-469: The next (AD 24), at which time he is thought to have died. He was influenced by Homer , Hecataeus and Aristotle . The first of Strabo's major works, Historical Sketches ( Historica hypomnemata ), written while he was in Rome ( c.  20 BC ), is nearly completely lost. Meant to cover the history of the known world from the conquest of Greece by the Romans, Strabo quotes it himself and other classical authors mention that it existed, although

5676-444: The only surviving document is a fragment of papyrus now in the possession of the University of Milan (renumbered [Papyrus] 46). Strabo studied under several prominent teachers of various specialities throughout his early life at different stops during his Mediterranean travels. The first chapter of his education took place in Nysa (modern Sultanhisar , Turkey) under the master of rhetoric Aristodemus , who had formerly taught

5762-401: The phenomena, and he proposes one of his own, the profoundness of which modern geologists are only beginning to appreciate. 'It is not,' he says, 'because the lands covered by seas were originally at different altitudes, that the waters have risen, or subsided, or receded from some parts and inundated others. But the reason is, that the same land is sometimes raised up and sometimes depressed, and

5848-417: The quarries lie in front of the pyramids. Among these are found pieces which in shape and size resemble lentils. Some contain substances like grains half peeled. These, it is said, are the remnants of the workmen's food converted into stone; which is not probable. For at home in our country (Amaseia), there is a long hill in a plain, which abounds with pebbles of a porous stone, resembling lentils. The pebbles of

5934-531: The region. Eventually, tens of thousands of captives were being taken every year. Slave labor in East Africa was drawn from the Zanj , Bantu peoples that lived along the East African coast. The Zanj were for centuries shipped as slaves by Muslim traders to all the countries bordering the Indian Ocean. The Umayyad and Abbasid caliphs recruited many Zanj slaves as soldiers and, as early as 696, there were revolts of Zanj slave soldiers in Iraq. A 7th-century Chinese text mentions ambassadors from Java presenting

6020-534: The reign of Mithridates V . Strabo was related to Dorylaeus on his mother's side. Several other family members, including his paternal grandfather, had served Mithridates VI during the Mithridatic Wars . As the war drew to a close, Strabo's grandfather had turned several Pontic fortresses over to the Romans. Strabo wrote that "great promises were made in exchange for these services", and as Persian culture endured in Amaseia even after Mithridates and Tigranes were defeated, scholars have speculated about how

6106-423: The rise and fall of local powers. Beginning in the 16th century, slaves were traded to the Americas , including Caribbean colonies, as Western European powers became involved in the slave trade. Trade declined with the abolition of slavery in the 19th century. Slave trading in the Indian Ocean goes back to 2500 BCE. Ancient Babylonians , Egyptians , Greeks , Indians , and Persians all traded slaves on

6192-453: The routes were motivated to convert to Islam, as this would grant them access to contacts, trade routes and favour regarding trading rules under Muslim governance. By the 11th century, Kilwa , on the coast of modern-day Tanzania , had become a fully-fledged affluent center of a Muslim-governed trade in slaves and gold. Exports of slaves to the Muslim world from the Indian Ocean began after Muslim Arab and Swahili traders won control of

6278-425: The salt mines of Mesopotamia , especially around Basra . Their jobs were to clear away the nitrous topsoil that made the land arable. The working conditions were considered to be extremely harsh and miserable. Many other people were imported as slaves into the region, besides Zanj. Historian M. A. Shaban has argued that the rebellion was not a slave revolt, but a revolt of blacks ( zanj ). In his opinion, although

6364-401: The sea also is simultaneously raised and depressed so that it either overflows or returns into its own place again. We must, therefore, ascribe the cause to the ground, either to that ground which is under the sea, or to that which becomes flooded by it, but rather to that which lies beneath the sea, for this is more moveable, and, on account of its humidity, can be altered with great celerity. It

6450-453: The sea-shore and of rivers suggest somewhat of the same difficulty [respecting their origin]; some explanation may indeed be found in the motion [to which these are subject] in flowing waters, but the investigation of the above fact presents more difficulty. I have said elsewhere, that in sight of the pyramids, on the other side in Arabia, and near the stone quarries from which they are built, is

6536-629: The slave market of Zanzibar to the Somali coast. Most of the slaves were from the Majindo , Makua , Nyasa , Yao , Zalama , Zaramo and Zigua ethnic groups of Tanzania, Mozambique and Malawi . Collectively, these Bantu groups are known as Mushunguli , which is a term taken from Mzigula , the Zigua tribe's word for "people" (the word holds multiple implied meanings including "worker", "foreigner", and "slave"). 14th-century traveler Ibn Battuta met

6622-465: The slave trade at its source and offered protection against slave kingdoms like Ashanti. The Royal Navy was instrumental in capturing slave ships and freeing enslaved Africans. Between 1808 and 1860, around 1,600 slave ships were captured, and more than 150,000 enslaved Africans were freed. Britain also made suppressing the Atlantic slave trade a part of its foreign policy. Arab Muslim traders also trafficked Malagasy and Comorian slaves from Madagascar and

6708-497: The slave trade in its colonies, 19th-century British-ruled Aden no longer legally received slaves. Those slaves sent from Ethiopia to Arabia were shipped to Hejaz instead for sale. Eunuchs, female concubines, and male laborers were the chief roles of slaves sent from Ethiopia to Jidda and other parts of Hejaz. The southwest and southern parts of Ethiopia supplied most of the girls being exported by Ethiopian slave traders to India and Arabia. Female and male slaves from Ethiopia made up

6794-627: The sons of the Roman general who had taken over Pontus. Aristodemus was the head of two schools of rhetoric and grammar, one in Nysa and one in Rhodes . The school in Nysa possessed a distinct intellectual curiosity in Homeric literature and the interpretation of the ancient Greek epics. Strabo was an admirer of Homer 's poetry, perhaps as a consequence of his time spent in Nysa with Aristodemus. At around

6880-770: The southwestern parts of Ethiopia, in the Oromo and Sidama country. Both non-Muslims and Muslims in Southeast Asia during the end of the 19th century bought Japanese girls as slaves ; they were imported by sea to the region. The Japanese women were sold as concubines to both Muslim Malay men and non-Muslim Chinese and British men of the British-ruled Straits Settlements of British Malaya . They had often been trafficked from Japan to Hong Kong and Port Darwin in Australia . In Hong Kong,

6966-733: The sultans of the Kilwa Sultanate would frequently raid the areas around what is today Tanzania for slaves. The Zanj Rebellion , a series of uprisings that took place between 869 and 883 AD near the city of Basra (also known as Basara), situated in present-day Iraq , is believed to have involved enslaved Zanj who had originally been captured from the African Great Lakes region and areas further south in East Africa . The rebellion grew to involve more than 500,000 slaves and free men who had been imported from across

7052-541: The total number of people transported from the 7th century until 1920, amounting to an average of 5,700 people per year. Many of these slaves were transported by the Indian Ocean and Red Sea via Zanzibar. This compares with their estimate of 9 million people enslaved and transported via the Sahara. The captives were sold throughout the Middle East and East Africa. This trade accelerated as higher capacity ships led to more trade and greater demand for labour on plantations in

7138-408: The unique racial composition of Madagascar, which was populated by a mix of Austronesian and Bantu settlers, the Malagasy slaves included people with Southeast Asian, African and hybrid phenotypes. European traders participated in the lucrative slave trade between Madagascar and the Red Sea as well. In 1694, a Dutch East India Company (VOC) ship trafficked over 400 Malagasy slaves to an Arabian port on

7224-788: Was forbidden for Muslims by a Batavia (Jakarta)-based Arab Muslim Mufti, Usman bin Yahya , in a fatwa . He ruled that in Islam it was illegal to buy free non-Muslims or marry non-Muslim slave girls during peace time from slave dealers, and non-Muslims could only be enslaved and purchased during holy war (jihad). In Jeddah , Kingdom of Hejaz on the Arabian peninsula , the Arab king Ali bin Hussein, King of Hejaz had in his palace 20 Javanese girls from Java (modern day Indonesia ). They were used as his concubines. The Saudi conquest of Hejaz led to

7310-400: Was more relevantly a respected authority on geography, a fact of some significance considering Strabo's future contributions to the field. The final noteworthy mentor to Strabo was Athenodorus Cananites , a philosopher who had spent his life since 44 BC in Rome forging relationships with the Roman elite. Athenodorus passed onto Strabo his philosophy, his knowledge and his contacts. Unlike

7396-434: Was primarily in sub-saharan Africa , but also included other parts of Africa and the Middle East, Indian Ocean islands, as well as south Asia. While the slave trade in the Indian Ocean started 4,000 years ago, it expanded significantly in late antiquity (1st century CE) with the rise of Byzantine and Sassanid trading enterprises. Muslim slave trading started in the 7th century , with the volume of trade fluctuating with

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