Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters: White Slavery in the Mediterranean, The Barbary Coast, and Italy, 1500-1800 (Early Modern History: Society and Culture)

This book reveals facts about the history of slavery of which most people are totally ignorant. It places events into chronological order and traces slavery before the more widely known Atlantic Slave Trade.

Slavery is a very sensitive subject, no matter who is being enslaved. Davis explains the causes and the reaction of slavery on its victims . We normally assume slavery was of the African native by the rich Northern Americans,however, the author reveals that there was a big market in white slaves by Middle Eastern enslavers. This trade stretched from Iceland to Tunisia to Ireland. Some of the enslaved were reluctant to return many died in the service of their captors. The trade seemed to be a cash cow to some smaller nations for several years. Not an easy read and the book is expensive but interesting.

This book is written without any polemical intent, it is pure historical research. Yet it shows light on a very important aspect of how the muslim world interacted with Europe. It also shows a new light on slavery as a whole, and it is important to teach this aspect of things that have generally been forgotten / hidden in European history manuals.

A detailed and in-depth study of a phenomenon which is little known in contemporary Europe, and perhaps should be more widely understood. For instance, the whole North African colonial adventure by France makes more sense when you understand that the European slave trade was only permanently halted when the French invaded Algeria and Tunisia. Also, the theological justifications for the enslavement of non-Muslims is even now being discussed on broadcast and print media throughout the Middle East at the present time.Davis' book is thick with facts and analysis which provide an absorbing insight into the economic and social impact of this unpleasant trade. The lack of a human narrative might put casual readers off, but it is definitely worth making an effort to grasp the subject matter, but there is nevertheless plenty of objectively presented examination of personal accounts of the cruelty and barbarism of the slave-takers and owners. Tantalisingly, Davis touches on the possibility that many of the European converts to Islam who so enthusiastically enslaved their former compatriots, and who wore their own Islam so lightly, may have included homosexuals escaping Church persecution, given that many of these European renegades were alleged to have sexually abused their male captives.Davis also cautions against contrasting the European slave trade with the trans-Atlantic variety. Indeed, as early as the seventeenth century savants were asking how, if it was wrong for a Muslim to enslave a Christian, it could be right for a Christian to enslave a pagan African.If I have a complaint about this book it was that Davis limits his analysis to the Turkish vassal states in Barbary, whose slaving, while it occasionally reached out to the British Isles and beyond, predominantly attacked the Mediterranean coasts of Europe. The Moroccan slavers, who more frequently attacked Britain and Ireland, are not covered.

We all know about the triangular Atlantic trade. But the Muslims also did a lively African slave trade. Islam's Black Slaves: A History of Africa's Other Black Diaspora. "Christian slaves" is about the Mediterranian slaving. Both Muslims and Christians took and used slaves. This book is about the Muslim part of that misbehavior.

Great Service and very interesting book.Advise anyone who likes the full picture and context about a subject which is generally treated in a two dimensional way to have a read of this book

Interesting study of an important and neglected chapter of European history! Very well written.

An extraordinarily interesting book on an almost unknown and a little explored subject. Very factual, rather than a story.

The historical account of this era is fascinating. Well written and what a different account than that offered by mainstream media and academics. Slavery had nothing to do with race and had everything to do with exploiting vulnerable people by more powerful people. Terrifying exercise in thought and imagination putting myself in the shoes of the priests, travelers, explorers, fisherman and villagers who were raided by these pirates for hundreds of years.

Spain's Shakespeare, Miguel de Cervantes, author of my favourite novel, Don Quixote, was probably the most famous victim of the Barbary slave trade. Captured by Muslim pirates on the Mediterranean Sea and taken to Algiers, he remained enslaved for 5 years until he was ransomed by a Catholic religious order, the Trinitarians, and returned to Spain. (You will learn a lot about the Trinitarians in this book.) For this reason, Cervantes includes a short story about the Barbary slave trade in Don Quixote.Nevertheless, many people are surprised to learn that Europeans were enslaved by Africans at all. But the fact is that every race has been enslaved, and every race has practiced slavery. It existed on a large scale in China, India, and the Muslim world. It existed in the Western hemisphere even before the arrival of the first Europeans, and the same is true of sub-Saharan Africa. In fact, for the most part, Europeans bought African slaves from African slave traders, who were eager to sell their fellow Africans into slavery for profit. If Europeans can be singled out for anything regarding slavery, it would be the establishment of the global abolitionist movement, that originated in Europe and was enforced by European colonial powers throughout the world.A couple of years ago, I completed Stephen King's Dark Tower series. The fifth book in that series, "The Wolves of the Calla," is about a town that is routinely raided by hooded wolves on horseback who steal a child from each household, only to return them as a mere shell of their formal selves. Well, that's the Barbary slave trade in a nutshell...Coastal towns on the north Mediterranean, from Italy to France, Spain and beyond, were constantly under threat by Muslim pirates who would steal away loved ones by sea or by land, demanding a considerable sum for their return, often amounting to multiple year's income. Since most people were unable to pay, religious orders like the Trinitarians took up the cause, attempting to ransom as many European slaves from North Africa as possible, although they never managed more than a small fraction of the total in any given year.I did not find this to be a difficult read. If you find the topic interesting, you should find yourself breezing through the book. In the first chapter, Davis considers how many slaves were taken, being over a million. In the second chapter, he describes the process by which slaves were taken and beaten into submission. In the next couple of chapters, he describes the trials and tribulations of European slaves in North Africa, not least of which was the temptation to convert to Islam in order to escape the horror of slavery. Indeed, some of the slaves holders were themselves former Christians, called "renegades." In the penultimate chapter, he describes how donations for the redemption of slaves were collected in Europe. Finally, in a chapter titled "Celebrating Slavery," he describes how returning slaves would be celebrated with elaborate public processions, including fireworks, Mass, and special attention by dignitaries.

For very long centuries Christians were put in slavery in Muslim run countries, and then from 1492 to 1830 pirates of the Ottoman Empire ruling over the North Africa territories organised the capture , the torture and the death of millions of Christians taken at sea or from the villages on the coast of the Mediterranean sea and the English, Irish and Nordic coasts. They had to work or were put in harems. The Barbaresques sold a few men back thanks to the Catholic Church (The Knight of Malta) or the Protestant clergy that managed to free some of them. Women and children were never sold, but kept until they died. Those atrocities were well known for centuries than recently were pushed aside for political reasons, but those horrors have to be put on the front to make people understand better the history of our countries. All that had been very well documented for anyone who wants to know the truth. This book contributes to bring back the true story of those Christians

informative and well put together, and very interesting.

Der Handel mit weißen christlichen Sklaven ist ein heute meist verdrängtes oder unbekanntes Problem, tatsächlich aber war es ein großes Problem das von 1500 bis 1833 dem Fall von Algier andauerte. Mich hatte dieses Buch daher gleich angesprochen. Der Autor ist Professor an der Ohio State University, und leider hat sich dieser lehrbuchhafte professorale Ton auch in dieses Buch eingeschlichen. Es ist ein interessantes Thema, aber man muss sich wirklich dafür interessieren wenn man es lesen will, denn die reine Freude ist es nicht. Zu trocken.Gleich zu Anfang geht es mit Tabellen und Umrechnungsfaktoren los, dann folgen Listen mit den spektakulärsten Beutezügen der Moslemischen Piraten. So etwas gehört in ein solches Buch aber doch bitte in den Anhang. Erst nach diesem Abschnitt geht es mit den Beschreibungen der Sklavenhaltung und der Sklavenjagd los. Wobei immer wieder das Klagelied angestimmt wird wie schwierig doch die Quellenstudien waren.Alles in Allem ein durchwachsenes Buch das ich nur wirklich Interessierten empfehlen möchte, sonst fliegt das Buch nämlich in die Ecke.Mit besten EmpfehlungenJTK