Latest / The Atlantic Slave Trade: Empire Built on Human Suffering — Fexingo History / The Slave Trade in Mozambique: Portuguese and Prazeiros
Transcript
- Lucas: So far in this series, we've covered the Atlantic slave trade from West and West-Central Africa pretty thoroughly. But there's another huge chapter that often gets overlooked: the slave trade out of southeast Africa, specifically Mozambique. For centuries, the Portuguese ran a brutal system there that fed slaves into both the Indian Ocean and Atlantic markets. Luna: I don't think we've touched on that at all. What made Mozambique different? Lucas: Well, the geography is key. Mozambique has a long coastline on the Indian Ocean, and the Portuguese had been there since the late 15th century, long before they got heavily into the Atlantic trade. They established settlements like Ilha de Moçambique, which became a major hub. But the real engine of the slave trade in Mozambique was something called the prazos — huge land grants in the Zambezi Valley. Lucas: These prazos were essentially feudal estates. The Portuguese crown would grant a piece of land to a settler, who then had the right to exploit the African population living there. The system was supposed to be like Portuguese manorialism, but in practice, it became a violent extractive enterprise. The prazeiros, as they were called, controlled vast territories and thousands of people, demanding tribute in ivory and slaves. Luna: Prazeiros — were they Portuguese settlers, or mixed-race? Lucas: Both, actually. Over time, many prazeiros were of Goan or Afro-Portuguese descent, and they often married into local African elite families. They developed a distinct culture, speaking Portuguese but also local languages like Sena. They were essentially warlords, maintaining private armies of African slaves and freemen. By the 18th century, the prazos dominated the Zambezi Valley and were the main source of slaves for the Portuguese. Lucas: The slaves from Mozambique were shipped to two main destinations. One was the French plantation islands in the Indian Ocean — Réunion and Mauritius, then called the Mascarene Islands. The French needed labor for their sugar and coffee plantations, and the Portuguese were happy to supply it, despite competition from the French themselves. The other destination was Brazil, especially after the 18th century, when the Atlantic trade really took off. Luna: So Mozambique was feeding both the Indian Ocean and Atlantic slave trades at the same time? Lucas: Exactly. And the numbers are staggering. Estimates suggest that about a million slaves were exported from Mozambique between the 16th and 19th centuries, with a huge spike in the 19th century. For comparison, that's similar to the number taken from the Bight of Biafra. Yet it's much less studied. Lucas: Now, the people who were enslaved came from various groups. Two of the most important were the Yao and the Makua. The Yao, in particular, were both victims and intermediaries. They lived inland, around Lake Malawi, and they became major slave traders themselves, capturing people from other groups and selling them to the Portuguese on the coast. They also traded ivory, which was often carried by the same caravans. Luna: So the Yao were essentially collaborators in the trade? Lucas: To some extent, yes. But it's complicated. The Yao were under pressure themselves from more powerful neighbors, like the Maravi Empire, and they saw the slave trade as a way to gain firearms and protect their own communities. That's a pattern we've seen throughout this series — the gun-slave cycle. But it's also important to remember that the majority of slaves were captured through warfare and raiding, often by states that were not initially involved in the trade. Lucas: One of the most dramatic developments in the region came in the 19th century with the rise of the Gaza Empire. This was a Nguni state, similar to the Zulu, that emerged south of the Zambezi under a leader named Soshangane. He was a general under Shaka Zulu, but after a power struggle, he fled north with his followers and conquered a huge territory in what is now southern Mozambique and Zimbabwe. Luna: Soshangane — I've heard of the Gaza Empire, but not in the context of the slave trade. Lucas: Right. The Gaza Empire became a major player in the slave trade, but in a different way. Soshangane's warriors raided neighboring peoples, capturing slaves that they either kept as laborers in their own economy or sold to Portuguese traders at coastal ports like Lourenço Marques, which is modern-day Maputo. The Gaza Empire's military power made them a force to be reckoned with, and the Portuguese had to negotiate with them rather than simply dominate them. Lucas: The slave trade in Mozambique continued well into the 19th century, even after the British banned the Atlantic trade in 1807. The Portuguese were officially against the trade, but they did little to stop it. In fact, the trade actually increased in the 1820s and 1830s, as the demand for labor in Brazil and on the Mascarene islands remained high. The British navy tried to intercept slave ships off the coast of Mozambique, but the coastline is long and full of hiding places. Luna: So the British suppression efforts weren't very effective there? Lucas: Not really. The Portuguese colonial authorities in Mozambique were often complicit, and the slave trade was a major part of the economy. Even after Brazil banned the slave trade in 1850, the trade from Mozambique continued, now directed towards the French islands and the illegal trade to Cuba. The last documented slave ship from Mozambique to the Americas arrived in Cuba in the 1860s. Lucas: One of the most notorious prazeiros in the late period was a man named João de Sousa, who controlled a large prazos called Massangano. He fought off Portuguese attempts to control him and continued trading slaves well into the 1880s. It's a reminder that the slave trade wasn't something that just ended neatly with a law — it persisted in the shadows for decades. Luna: What about the legacy of the slave trade in Mozambique today? Lucas: It's a deep and painful legacy. The slave trade depopulated large areas, disrupted societies, and created cycles of violence that lasted for generations. The prazos system also laid the groundwork for later colonial exploitation under the Portuguese, who used forced labor on plantations well into the 20th century. Today, there are places in Mozambique where the memory of the slave trade is still very present, like the Island of Mozambique, which has a chapel built by slaves and a museum dedicated to the slave trade. Lucas: But it's also a history that is often overlooked. When people think of the slave trade, they think of West Africa, the Middle Passage, the Americas. But the slave trade from southeast Africa was just as brutal and just as consequential. It shaped the history of Mozambique, the Indian Ocean world, and the Americas in ways we are still uncovering. Luna: It's a reminder that the slave trade was truly a global system, not just an Atlantic one. Lucas: Absolutely. And that's why it's so important to tell these stories. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time.