Mapping the Atlantic World

By the eighteenth century, the port cities of the Atlantic were truly interconnected. This had not

always been the case. The map in Figure 1 (created circa 1507, published 1516, and based on a map created in 1500) is the first known document containing the name America. 52 The world in this estimation was a small one, centered on Europe, with some awareness of Africa and Asia. America – the New World – had been on the European radar for about fifteen years. The Western edge of the thin sliver of land they called America was noted only as “incognita” – unknown. What lay beyond the waterways of the Eastern seaboard was a question not yet answered for the Europeans looking westward.

The maps excerpted in this section span from 1507 to 1797, a nearly three-hundred-year period wherein the Atlantic world became a region interconnected by economics, politics, and people. This

geography was understood distinctly by people of differing countries and time periods; it was riddled with myth, error, and political meaning. By considering the changing cartography and comparing it to previous and contemporary iterations, we can follow the understanding of the Atlantic world in the European imagination and politics. While much of the Atlantic world was peripheral to the machinations of Europe, these kingdoms and colonies became intrinsically tied to a world broader than themselves. This map is based on a map made in 1500 by Italian sailor and explorer Amerigo Vespucci, commissioned by the Medicis of Florence.

FIGURE 1 – Universalis Cosmographia, 1507, Public Domain

German mapmaker Martin Waldseemüller named America after Vespucci’s first name. The map is

centered on Europe but includes detail on the kingdoms and rivers of Africa and Asia. The newly christened America is presented as essentially empty and seemingly unpopulated, encouraging European ambitions for colonisation. 53 The

Spanish Islands in the Caribbean are noted, but John Cabot’s 1497 encounter of North American shores are essentially absent, reflecting the lack of shared information between those encountering the Americas.

Figure 2 is the third printing of a Dutch map first published in 1608, more than one

FIGURE 2 – Nova Totius Terrarium, 1621, Public Domain

hundred years after Figure 1. 54 In this time, the Americas have grown drastically from the earliest European conceptions of them. Perhaps most significant is the extensive colonisation of South America, evidenced by

the detailed place names, rivers, and mountains. These markers are, in large part, still absent in the interior of North America. The Gulf of St Lawrence seems to run deeper into the continent, even connecting through to Hudson’s Bay, but New France, as well as Newfoundland and Labrador, are present. North America still includes no reference to Indigenous peoples but for a few place names. A canoe resting off the southeast coast of South America acknowledges the presence of Indigenous peoples on the continent, which by this time had fallen within the grasp of the Spanish and Portuguese. On the other side of the Atlantic, Africa’s interior has also become significantly more detailed and its sense of scale improved.

FIGURE 3 – Americae Descriptio Nova Impensis, 1652, Public Domain

This third map is an English map

from 1652. The English did not have an

official surveying agency until 1795, so English maps from this period were created by

commercial mapmakers and then compiled by the government. 55 In fact, this map precedes Charles II’s 1672 command to gather maps to create an authoritative picture of the American coast. 56 This proclamation specifically called for detail about waterways and ports along the coast, for it was on the North American coast that English colonising efforts would focus. 57

The focal point of this map, however, is the Caribbean. Roanoke, which had been

prominent on earlier maps, had fallen from significance in English cartography following the failure of Raleigh’s settlement; here it is

relegated to a small label for Croatoan Island. 58 As with the previous map, there is no indication of Indigenous presence in North America, which is largely dominated by the Spanish territory of New Mexico and Quivira –

indeed the continent is labeled America Mexicana. Again similar to the previous map,

South America does include indication of Indigenous peoples – a sketch of a small hut with two figures occupies the interior of Brazil. 59

Another interesting feature of this map is the presentation of California (or New Albion) as an Island. California’s existence had originated as a mythical island populated by Amazons and

griffins, but exploration soon established it as a real location and peninsula as it appears in Figure 2. 60 By 1622, the misconception that California was an island had again spread to cartographers; this would not be cleared up until the eighteenth century. 61

Figures 4 & 5 are presented together for purposes of comparison: Figure 4 is a French map published in 1718; Figure 5 is an English map published a year later in 1719. Figure 4 is not a full map of the Americas like Figure 5, so the comparison is imperfect, but the detail of the Louisiana waterways is significant to Franco-British relations in this period.

The French defined their possession

of Louisiana the way they had long claimed

territory – through the breadth of river basins. 62 The Mississippi River basin made the claiming of land simple and extensive and allowed the French to join the territories of New France and Louisiana in a display of domination over the continent. 63 Of course, this trend threatened the now growing English settlements on the

Atlantic coast, which were now surrounded by the enemy on one side and the ocean on the other.

FIGURE 4 – Le Cours de Mississipi, Public Domain

FIGURE 5 – New Map of America from Latest Observations, Public Domain

It is for this reason that we see the that the English territories along the Atlantic seaboard –

Nova Scotia to Carolina and the tip of modern day Florida -- are all connected as a single possession in Figure 5, while New France and Louisiana are noted separately. 64

A final item of note on Figure 4 is the presence (and in parts, lack thereof) of indigenous peoples. Compared to the maps previously examined in this article, Figure 4’s interior North America is populated by various indigenous peoples, represented in sketches throughout the region.

This map captures a transitional period in French cartography of North America – it contains the detailed waterways characteristic of the eighteenth century, but has not yet moved to the representation of the land as open and free for the taking. 65 Mid-eighteenth

century French cartography would begin to eliminate the representations of the Indigenous populations to encourage exploration and settlement. 66

FIGURE 6 – Regni Mexicani, 1759, Public Domain

Much of this article has discussed the cartographic developments of North America, largely because the Spanish colonisation and mapping of South America occurred swiftly over the sixteenth century. Figure 6 is included to demonstrate the deeply complicated political landscape of the West Indies and the Caribbean alone. The territory of the Western Atlantic was subject to competing claims and changing sovereignty for centuries,

FIGURE 7 – Map of America or The New World, 1797, Public Domain

and Figure 6 (a German map dating to 1759) shows the variety of sovereignty over the Caribbean alone. It also shows the reasons for this ongoing conflict -- the illustrations on the right hand side indicate the immense wealth of the region. 67 Also included are the sailing routes of Spanish galleons in the Gulf of Mexico.

Figure 7 is the final map included in this article. It is an English map published in 1797 by William Faden, geographer to King George III. 68 It is the most similar to our modern day maps, featuring comprehensive and to-scale representations of both the East and Western coasts of the Americas. Indeed, even the continents

have been divided into North and South America. What was New France has fallen under British rule, and the United States of America is independently represented. California is no longer depicted as an island, and the interior of North America is not populated by imagined lakes as in Figure 5. The political landscape is incomplete. The nineteenth century would see independence movements throughout South and Latin America, but, by the end of the eighteenth century, it is only the western interior of North America that has not yet been surveyed and represented cartographically.

REBECCA KIRKHAM HISTORY MAJOR

South Carolina

Bahamas

Jamaica Chesapeake

COST OF SLAVES FOR THE NEXT OWNER IN CURRENT USD

How did human beings justify commodifying and selling one another during the slave trade? The answer is fairly simple and well known: money. A lot of money. Some might wonder, just how much money might slave traders have made? An analysis of slave trading records demonstrates that the slave trade was truly a get-rich-quick method for many people. Other than the costs associated with waging war against one another, Africans expended no money to collect their commodity. Then they sold their newly captured slaves to slave traders for various products equivalent to around $1000 current USD. European traders, the next link in the supply chain, purchased slaves at the aforementioned rate, paid an insurance cost in

Europe, and set sail for the Western Atlantic. In the first leg of the triangle trade, these traders arrived in Africa from Europe with cargo including gunpowder, rice, linens, and rum.

As the traders purchased slaves from the

African coast, ship captains were careful to choose healthy slaves who could withstand weeks on board the vessels while the Saint Vicent Saint Lucea Essequibo British | Duch | French Guianas Tobago

~$11,500 – $14,000

~$9,500 – $11,500

~$7,500 – $9,500

~$7,000

Higher Cost African Posts

~$1,000 – $3,500

~$0 (Capture)

Saint Lucea

Atlantic Crossing (insurance)

Sterra Leoune

traders navigated the coast of Africa, adding slaves a number at a time until the ship reached capacity, or close to capacity. Traders assessed slaves for their age, health, gender, and physical capabilities before they loaded them in close quarters on vessels.

Wydah

Depending on where the vessel landed in the Western Atlantic, traders sold their slaves for anywhere between $7,000 (very low) and $11,000. The average sale price for a prime male during this time was $10,538.98 current USD. For a vessel of 150 slaves, assuming 120 slaves survived the passage (such as the Brig The Nelly) at $8,500 (adjusted since all would not be prime males), traders were making $1,020,000 (before paying the ship’s captain and surgeon).That is a profit of roughly $720,000. To understand this further, seamen working aboard the ship were paid about $275 current USD per month to scrub the putrid slave decks while the slaves were permitted above for fresh air. This map truly puts into perspective the grand scale of the transatlantic slave trade and the amount of money that circulated through its structures. This excludes the value of slaves to their final owners. Thus, while these observations do not justify the moral dimensions of the slave trade, they make clearer the motivations behind it and why so many people were willing to turn a blind eye to its horrors.

Bight of Benin

West Central Africa

COST OF SLAVES FOR THE NEXT OWNER IN CURRENT USD RESEARCH METHODS PULLOUT

Is there a way to represent the cost of a slave in a way that clarifies how much a slave was worth at every step of the way? That is the question that prompted this research project. I needed a visual representation easy for the average person to understand, something that could communicate the profit made by selling people, and the value people placed on a human life. The data for this project came from various primary sources within the slave trade records from Liverpool, 1754-1792 in the British Online Archives. These included invoices, accounts, letter books, papers, and other miscellaneous documents. I chose the timeframe 1770-1780 because there were many resources available for this decade. This period also included the incident of The Zong insurance scandal, which I was interested in investigating. While reading the Liverpool documents, I carefully recorded any values that I came across for the sale or purchase of a slave in an excel spreadsheet, including the amount sterling per head and the location of the transaction. Once I was satisfied that I had gathered as much information as possible from these primary sources, I moved to the online Slave Voyage Database. This database represents decades of individual and teamwork; it includes tens of thousands of primary sources. I downloaded all the data recorded between 1770 and 1780. I then isolated the columns that included data on the average sale price of a slave and location of the sale (although I knew it may be higher than the prices I recorded from the Liverpool records because this database represented only ‘prime males’). After comparing the data in this spreadsheet to the one I had created based upon the Liverpool slave trade database, I was confident that the results were consistent. The only generalization I had to make was to assume that prices in the primary sources were often lower because they were not ‘prime male’ sales. Thus, I conceded that I would need to map a wide value range for each location to account for the fact that no transaction price was guaranteed, and sales could change according to demand/condition of the person.

My next challenge was to establish the cost of a slave in Africa along the African coastline. In my understanding, most slaves sold to traders along the coast were prisoners of war or were captured in war. This means that the captors did not have an investment cost (aside from human life/weaponry/ etc., which is not recorded here). While reading the Liverpool documents, only one source mentioned the cost of a slave at 13 pounds sterling. This was not sufficient data. The data seen in

the map was derived from a journal called, “What did Africans Get for Their Slaves,” that used primary sources to record the various goods that were traded for slaves. I took these values (including about 200 pounds of gunpowder, 230 gallons of rum for a prime male, etc.) and crossreferenced them with accounts in the primary documents from the Liverpool records. The outcome varied significantly between 5 and 15 pounds sterling. I allowed this value to be general in my mapping. Finally, many shipping records and letters to captains recorded three locations at which slaves were stronger and worth more. These included St. Louis (Senegal), West Central Africa, and Wydah. While these locations did not have specific values, I deemed it important to note.

Using research from The Zong, a well-researched incident where a captain ordered live slaves to be thrown overboard during a disease outbreak in order to claim insurance money, I established an approximate value for a slave during the crossing. Since this comes from one claim, it cannot be given too much importance. Nonetheless, it is consistent with the values recorded for slave sales that would encourage someone to take insurance money instead of a low sale.

While it would have been possible to represent the quantities in pound sterling, I felt that the relevance would have been lost for contemporary audiences. Using a simple online conversion tool, I was given the conversion value in both CAD (1:316.3) and USD (1:236.3) on March 10, 2020. My choice to use USD was to make the map more globally relevant, as CAD loses its comparative relevance once the information crosses a border.

For the mapping process, I had to work between generalization and precision, making sure that the data was not dangerously precise nor so general it lost its meaning. I drew wide polygons along the shoreline to make it easier for the reader to recognize the prices along the shorelines. Truly, trade was not happening many kilometers inland, as these buffers may suggest, but directly on the shoreline. However, I opted not to only colorize the shoreline for fear that the color would be too small to see. Unfortunately, the map is limited in scope because certain areas, without color, did not have data available for mapping. However, using a specific data frame that focused the area to the immediate Atlantic world reduced the visibility of these limitations. Representing the data in this manner satisfies my research question by representing the cost of a slave in a way that clarifies the financial value of a slave at every step of the way.

OLIVIA KNULL INTERNATIONAL STUDIES MAJOR

50 FOR GOT TEN POLITICS slaves & politics, the political implications of the slave trade the iroquois confederacy & the emergence of american democracy acadia n expulsion the impact of wars of empire b ourb on reform s the politics of a declining empire