African-American History - African Origins

African Origins

The majority of African Americans descend from slaves, most of whom were sold into slavery as prisoners of war by African states or kidnapped by African, Arab, European or American slave traders. The existing market for slaves in Africa was exploited and expanded by European powers in search of free labor for New World plantations.

The American slave population was made up of the various ethnic groups from western and central Africa, including the Bakongo, Igbo, Mandé, Wolof, Akan, Fon and Makua amongst others. Over time in most areas of the Americas, these different peoples did away with tribal differences and forged a new history and culture that was a creolization of their common pasts and present.

Studies of contemporary documents reveal seven regions from which Africans were sold or taken during the Atlantic slave trade. These regions were

• Senegambia, encompassing the coast from the Senegal River to the Casamance River, where captives as far away as the Upper and Middle Niger River Valley were sold;
• The Sierra Leone region included territory from the Casamance to the Assini River in the modern countries of Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire;
• The Gold Coast region consisted of mainly modern Ghana;
• The Bight of Benin region stretched from the Volta River to the Benue River in modern Togo, Benin and southwestern Nigeria;
• The Bight of Biafra extended from southeastern Nigeria through Cameroon into Gabon;
• West Central Africa, the largest region, included the Congo and Angola; and
• The region of Mozambique-Madagascar included the modern countries of Mozambique, parts of Tanzania and Madagascar.

Origins and Percentages of African Americans imported into British North America and Louisiana (1700–1820)