Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The East African Slave Trade

Episode Date: March 6, 2026

Most people are familiar with the transatlantic slave trade, which enslaved over ten million people over a period of centuries. Fewer people are aware of the other African slave trade, which was centered in Eastern Africa along the Indian Ocean. It was centuries older, lasted decades longer than the Atlantic slave trade. While the systems differed, the human costs were equally staggering. Learn more about the East African Slave Trade on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.  Sponsors Quince Go to quince.com/daily for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order! Mint Mobile Get your 3-month Unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com/eed Subscribe to the podcast!  https://everything-everywhere.com/everything-everywhere-daily-podcast/ -------------------------------- Executive Producer: Charles Daniel Associate Producers: Austin Oetken & Cameron Kieffer   Become a supporter on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/everythingeverywhere Discord Server: https://discord.gg/Ds7Rx7jvPJ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/everythingeverywhere/ Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/everythingeverywheredaily Twitter: https://twitter.com/everywheretrip Website: https://everything-everywhere.com/  Disce aliquid novi cotidie Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most people are familiar with the transatlantic slave trade, which enslaved over 10 million people over a period of centuries. But fewer people are aware of the other African slave trade, which was centered in East Africa along the Indian Ocean. It was centuries older and lasted decades longer than the Atlantic slave trade. And while the systems were different, the human costs were equally staggering. Learn more about the East African slave trade on this episode of everything everywhere daily. Fear is the virus is trending on TikTok. Vaccines are poison.

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Originating from ancient localized networks, it saw significant growth after the 7th century with the expansion of Islamic commerce. The trade reached its greatest extentity during the 18th and 19th centuries, finally ending in the early 20th century due to a combination of European imperial actions and international anti-slavery efforts. Slavery existed in Africa, as it did all over the world, long before external trade networks formalized it. Indigenous forms of bondage across the continent were varied and were often distinct from the chattel

slavery that would later emerge through contact with Arab and European traders. In most African societies, slavery was embedded in the broader system of social hierarchy and obligation. Slaves were typically acquired through warfare, or as, for crimes like debt or serious offenses against the community, or through ritual tribute systems. Crucially in many African cultures, slaves were not simple property. They could own goods, marry, have children, who are often born free, and in some cases rise to positions of considerable authority. In the Sahel kingdoms like Mali and Songhai, royal slaves sometimes commanded armies

or administered entire provinces, wielding more power than many free subjects. slavery in these societies also functioned as a form of social absorption. Captives taken in war were often integrated into households and kin networks over generations. The distinction between slave and subordinate family member was often fluid. In stateless societies, slavery served to bind outsiders, people without kin networks, into the social fabric, albeit at the bottom of it. That being said, it would be wrong to romanticize pre-trade African slavery. Harsh plantation-style slavery did exist in some regions, particularly in parts of West Africa and the eastern Swahili coast. The suffering of enslaved people was real and widespread, but the scale and

brutality intensified dramatically once demand for enslaved labor from outside Africa entered the pitcher. The East African slave trade is one of the oldest and longest-running forced migration systems in human history, predating the transatlantic trade by nearly a thousand years. The trade's roots lie in the expansion of Islam across the Arabian Peninsula and the Persian Gulf in the 7th century. Arab and Persian merchants had long navigated the Indian Ocean using monsoon winds, trading with the East African coast. They called the region Zanj, meaning black and Arabic. As Islamic civilization expanded and its economies grew, demand for enslaved labor increased sharply. The first documented large-scale movement of enslaved Africans into

the Arab world dates to around the 7th and 8th centuries. And it should be noted that Europeans did take part in the East African slave trade as well. However, the vast majority of the slave trade in this region was conducted with the Islamic world. The primary method of enslavement was armed raiding. Arab merchants and their African allies organized large, well-armed caravans that penetrated deep into the African interior. Villages were attacked at night or dawn, men who resisted were killed, and women, children, and surviving men were bound and marched to the coast. The violence of the raids was immense.

For every person enslaved, estimates suggest that several more died resisting or fleeing. Captured people were forced marched hundreds of miles to the coast, often in neck yokes, with inadequate food and water. mortality on these overland marches was catastrophic. Historical account suggests that for every enslaved person who reached the coast alive, one or more died on the journey. The explorer David Livingston, who witnessed these caravans in the 1860s, described the routes as littered with bones and bodies.

By the 10th to 12th centuries, a string of city-states had emerged along the East African coast. Kilwa, Mombasa, Melindi, Zanzibar, Fala and others. These Swahili cities, blending Bantu-African and Arab Islamic cultures, became the commercial hubs of the Indian Ocean world. They exported ivory, gold, iron, and enslaved people to Arabia, Persia, India, and even as far away as China. The primary market of the East African slave trade was Zanzibar, which, under the Omani Sultanate, became the largest slave market in the Indian Ocean region. At its peak in the 19th century, between 40,000 to 50,000 enslaved people passed through Zanzibar every year.

At the market at Stonetown was a scene of profound human degradation, with enslaved people being publicly inspected, separated from family members, and sold to the highest bidder. The business proved lucrative, and merchants traveled across the Indian Ocean, carrying goods such as ivory, shells, and enslaved people. As empires in the Middle East, such as the Islamic Caliphate and the Byzantine Empire, grew and developed, the slave trade became a primary source of wealth for them. Just as slavery existed in Africa prior to the trade, so too did slavery exist in the Middle East prior to the East African slave trade. The practice of slavery in the Middle East had previously consisted of enslaving eastern and central Europeans, mostly Slavic people.

However, as military power grew in Europe, Arab, it effectively halted further Islamic expansion. This restriction cut off previous sources of slaves for Arabs, prompting them to turn their focus towards Africa as an alternative source. One interesting effect of the increase in Islamic trade routes was the spread of Islam wherever the traders went. Many merchants in Africa chose to convert to Islam, as doing so helped them build more contacts, expand their trading influence, and gain favor with business partners. In Islam, it wasn't allowed to enslave other Muslims, and this meant that any East or North African

who followed Islam was safe from being captured and put into slavery. The trade enslave increased dramatically after the 9th century when Arabs took control of the Swahili coast and its sea trade routes. The primary group who were enslaved were the Zanj, a group of Bantu people living on the East African coast. The Zanj were taken for centuries from their homes

and shipped to countries across the Indian Ocean. There were reports of Zanj slaves as far away as China. The African slaves worked as harem guards, teachers, and field workers. Because of these positions, men were often castrated, keeping them safe to be around women and serve as trustworthy servants. The lives of Zanj slaves was terrible. Many were brought into the Arab world to work on plantations, where they did strenuous agricultural labor.

As the slaves took on more and more, agricultural work, other Arabs found it demeaning and refused to take plantation positions leading to the demand for even more enslaved people. There were major differences between the Atlantic and Indian Ocean slave trades. Europeans typically preferred enslaved men to perform physical labor on plantations. Arab merchants focused primarily on slaves for sexual purposes, meaning that they mainly sold girls and women as concubines, harems, or sex slaves. This meant that women were sold for twice the price of men and at a three-to-one ratio. Male slaves were still put into roles with difficult physical labor, often working in fields or as guards.

The process of castration was considered to be a brutal procedure, resulting in many deaths. Multiple uprisings by enslaved Zanish people occurred between 869 and 880, 3.3. specifically in Basra in modern-day Iraq. The rebellion grew to have half a million slaves and claim the lives of thousands of people. However, despite the uprisings, the slave trade continued. The Trans-Saharan Slave System was a massive part of the Arab slave trade. This saw Arabs transport enslaved people from across the Sahara Desert to North Africa or East Africa through trans-Saharan caravans. Most of the enslaved people who went through the Trans-Saharan caravan

were brought from sub-Saharan Africa to countries either in North Africa or the Middle East. The origins of this part of the slave trade can be traced back to the 3rd century BC, where Egyptian kings crossed the Nile to capture prisoners of war, turning them into slaves and sending them north. The Trans-Saharan route continued into the Middle Ages when Arabs acquired slaves through violent raids and sent them across the Sahara Desert on brutal forced marches to be sold at slave markets. The routes across the desert depended on the intended destination.

Some were taken by boat down the Nile River, others were taken to different ports, and others were forced to walk for extremely long periods. To cross the desert, merchants received assistance from local ethnic groups better equipped to survive the brutal scorching conditions. Local groups of nomadic people served as guards, camel drivers, and guides along the way. Despite having these guides, the journey across the Sahara proved deadly as caravans of thousands sometimes disappeared without a trace. The Trans-Saharan route continued long into the 19th and even 20th centuries, with raids continuing to occur, and over a million enslaved people were made to complete the brutal journey across the desert. And during this period, an estimated 66% of all values shipped across the Sahara was made up of slaves.

Many of the initial protections from enslaverant, like having converted to Islam, no longer mattered by the 19th century, as African Muslims who should have been exempt from slave status were captured and sold. The slave trade in the Arab world was alive and thriving long after the transatlantic slave trade had ended, effectively continuing into the 20th century. The end of the slave trade only ended after large amounts of international pressure was applied. This pressure began in 1873, with Great Britain pressuring Zanzibar Sultan to sign a treaty making the slave trade in his region illegal. The British played a massive role in ending the slave trade by making deals with local African rulers, offering protection against slave kingdoms, and capturing slave ships to save the enslaved people on board. The result was a shift in focus elsewhere, moving to islands like Madagascar to get slaves. so while the slave trade was suppressed, it didn't totally end. As for the Trans-Saharan routes, efforts to abolish the slave trade were primarily led by Britain and France.

This was done by France and Britain outlawing slavery in their African territories, making the selling, exporting, and importing of slaves in their territories illegal. Despite outlawing the practice, the slave trade still occurred, with tens of thousands of people still being enslaved and sold. because there was still a market for slaves, there were still people willing to meet the demand. By the mid-20th century, international pressure to end slavery began to really take force. The League of Nations and later the United Nations formed different groups and committees to put pressure on countries where slavery was still practiced.

The East African slave trade is far less well known than the Transatlantic slave trade. Yet it began centuries earlier and continued well into the 20th century. The total number of people enslaved in East Africa was comparable to the number enslaved in West Africa, but over a longer period of time. Nevertheless, both systems represented vast networks of exploitation that caused enormous human suffering and permanently reshaped global history. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Austin Otkin and Cameron Kiefer. Research and writing for this episode was provided by Olivia Ash. Big thanks go to everyone who supports the show over on Patreon.

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