ding economy, found themselves helpless. A ruler
who would not provide the Europeans with the slaves they desired was then
bypassed by all the European traders. Besides losing the revenue from
this trade, his own military position was weakened. Any ruler who did not
trade slaves for guns could not have guns. Without guns, he would have
difficulty in protecting himself and his people. Any ruler or people who
could not provide adequate self-defense could be captured and sold into
slavery. Once begun, the Africans found themselves enmeshed in a vicious
system from which there seemed to be no escape. The only possibility for
escape would have been the development of some kind of African coalition,
but each petty ruler as too concerned with his own power to be able to
contemplate federated activity. European greed fed African greed, and
vice a versa.

In the beginning, African slaves were carried back to Portugal and other
parts of Europe to be used as exotic domestic servants. In some cases,
they were also used as farm laborers. Parts of Portugal were suffering
from a distinct shortage of farm laborers, and Africans filled the void.
At the beginning of the sixteenth century, in some sections of rural
Portugal as much as one third of local population was African in origin.

Even so, European labor needs could not support much of a slave trade for
long. The enclosure system was under way, changing farming techniques,
and it had created a labor surplus. However, at the same time, emerging
capitalism financed explorations in Africa, Asia, and the western
hemisphere. African sailors were involved in most of these explorations
including Columbus's voyage in 1492. New World gold provided the economic
basis for even more rapid European expansion. When the New World came to
be viewed by the hungry capitalists as having a potential for
agricultural exploitation, New World labor needs expanded astronomically.
At first these needs were filled by surplus labor from Europe or by
exploiting the local Indian populations. When these labor sources proved
to be inadequate, the exploitation of slave labor from Africa was the
obvious answer.

While the Portuguese were the first to reach the shores of West Africa
and the first to bring African slaves back to Europe, neither they nor
the Spaniards ever dominated the slave trade which followed. In 1493, as
European exploration of the world moved into high gear, the Pope
published a Bull divi