Description
This book offers a rare glimpse into the slave trade on the Atlantic in the 18th century from an African perspective, this is the story of two princes, slave traders themselves, who were betrayed into slavery by African competitors.
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In 1767, two "princes" of a ruling family in the port of Old Calabar, on the slave coast of Africa, were ambushed and captured by English slavers. The princes, Little Ephraim Robin John and Ancona Robin Robin John, were themselves slave traders who were betrayed by African competitors--and so began their own extraordinary odyssey of enslavement. Their story, written in their own hand, survives as a rare firsthand account of the Atlantic slave experience.
Randy Sparks made the remarkable discovery of the princes' correspondence and has managed to reconstruct their adventures from it. They were transported from the coast of Africa to Dominica, where they were sold to a French physician. By employing their considerable language and interpersonal skills, they cleverly negotiated several escapes that took them from the Caribbean to Virginia, and to England, but always ended in their being enslaved again. Finally, in England, they sued for, and remarkably won, their freedom. Eventually, they found their way back to Old Calabar and, evidence suggests, resumed their business of slave trading.
"The Two Princes of Calabar" offers a rare glimpse into the eighteenth-century Atlantic World and slave trade from an African perspective. It brings us into the trading communities along the coast of Africa and follows the regular movement of goods, people, and ideas across and around the Atlantic. It is an extraordinary tale of slaves' relentless quest for freedom and their important role in the creation of the modern Atlantic World.Commendation Quotes:
This is a remarkable account of remarkable events. Of the millions of Africans ensnared by Atlantic slavery, a mere handful returned home. Randy Sparks' vivid exposition is about two African princes, slaves and slave traders, who found their way back to Africa. It is a tumultuous story but given persuasive coherence by Sparks' forensic researches and arresting prose. What he has produced is a finely-crafted miniature: a glimpse, via the lives of two men, into the broader contours of the enslaved Atlantic. The result is a literary treat which raises as many questions as it answers, and which provokes, instructs - and entertains.
Product Details
ISBN-10: 0674013123
EAN: 9780674013124
Binding: Hardcover
Published Date: March 2004
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Misc. Category: History -Atlantic Slave Trade
Writing Origin: England , Nigeria
Language: English
Product Dimensions: 2.16 cms x 20.68 cms x 13.56 cms
Number of pages: 208 pages
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