16th Century

John Blanke, an African musician, arrives in England as one of the African attendants of Katherine of Aragon. Blanke would play the trumpet for the courts of both Henry VII and Henry VIII at least until 1511.

Juan de Córdoba of Seville becomes the first merchant to send an African slave to the New World under the Spanish authorities.

Spanish and Portuguese bring African slaves to the Caribbean and Central America to replace Native Americans in the gold mines.

A small group of Africans are brought to the court of King James IV of Scotland.

First record of sugar cane being grown in the New World, in Santo Domingo (modern Dominican Republic).

Columbus’s son, Diego Cólon, becomes governor of the new Spanish empire in the Caribbean. He soon complains that Native American slaves do not work hard enough.

King Ferdinand of Spain authorizes a shipment of 50 African slaves to be sent to Santo Domingo, which starts the systematic transportation of African slaves to the New World.

Sir Thomas More in his book Utopia argues that his ideal society would have slaves, but they would not be ‘non-combatant prisoners-of-war, slaves by birth, or purchases from foreign slave markets.’ Rather, they would be local convicts or ‘condemned criminals from other countries, who are acquired in large numbers, sometimes for a small payment, but usually for nothing.’ (Trans. Paul Turner, Penguin, 1965).

Charles V grants his Flemish courtier Lorenzo de Gorrevod permission to import 4000 African slaves into New Spain. From this point onwards thousands of slaves are sent to the New World each year.

The circumnavigation expedition of Ferdinand Magellan sets out from San Lucar de Barameda.

Disease decimates Native Americans, enslaved Africans imported as replacements.

Hernan Cortés captures King Cuahutemotzin, Aztec empire is overthrown and Mexico comes under Spanish Rule.

A major slave rebellion breaks out on the island of Hispaniola.

300 African slaves taken to Cuba to work in the gold mines.

In 1526, a Spanish expedition led by Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón attempted to establish a settlement called San Miguel de Gualdape in present-day South Carolina. The expedition included enslaved Africans, who were among the first Africans to arrive in what is now the United States. This early presence is a significant but often overlooked part of American history.

Hieronymous Seiler and Heinrich Ehinger of Konstanz become the first Germans we know to have become involved in the slave trade.

Earliest records of sugar production in Jamaica, later a major sugar producing region of the British Empire. Sugar production is rapidly expanding throughout the Caribbean region at this time – with the mills almost exclusively worked by African slaves.

Esteban (or Estevanico) becomes the first African slave to step foot on what is now the United States of America. He was one of only four survivors of Pánfilo de Narváez’s failed expedition to Florida. He and the other three took eight years to walk to the Spanish colony in Mexico.

Juan de la Barrera, a Seville merchant, begins transporting slaves directly from Africa to the New World (before this, slaves had normally passed through Europe first). His lead is quickly followed by other slave traders.

Francisco Pizaro massacres the Incas at Caxamalca (modern Caxamarca) and captures King Atahuallpa, an event that marks the Spanish conquest of Peru.

Hernando de Soto lands on the coast of Florida with about 1200 men in his expedition, around 50 were African slaves.

Under the Royal Assent by Commission Act of 1541, a colonial assembly was required to secure the King’s permission unto any colonial statutes and laws.

Jacques Francis, an enslaved African salvage diver, arrives in Portsmouth as part of a team hired to salvage guns from the wreck of the Mary Rose.

Jacques Francis becomes the first known African to give evidence in an English court of law when his Venetian master, Peter Paulo Corsi, is accused of theft by a consortium of Italian merchants based in Southampton.

The Portuguese sailor Fernão de Oliveira, in Arte de Guerra no mar (The Art of War at Sea), denounces the slave trade as an ‘evil trade’. The book anticipates many of the arguments made by abolitionists in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

A small group of Africans from Shama (modern Ghana) are brought to London by John Lok, a London merchant hoping to break into the African trade.

The Italian city of Genoa tries to prevent trading in slaves – not for any humanitarian reasons – but only in an attempt to reduce the numbers of Africans in the city.

Domingo de Soto, in De justicia et de jure libri X (Ten Books on Justice and Law), argues that it is wrong to keep in slavery any person who was born free.

John Hawkins of Plymouth becomes the first English sailor to have obtained African slaves – approximately 300 of them in Sierra Leone – for sale in the West Indies. Hawkins traded the slaves illegally with Spanish colonies, which contributed to increasing tensions between England and Spain.

Tomás de Mercado, a Sevillian Dominican, publishes Tratos y contratos de mercaderes (Practices and Contracts of Merchants), which attacks the way the slave trade is conducted.

The Parlement of Bordeaux sets all slaves – “blacks and moors” – in the town free, declaring slavery illegal in France.

Bartolemé Frías de Albornoz, a Spanish-Mexican lawyer, publishes Arte de los contratos (The Art of Contracts), which casts doubt on the legality of the slave trade.

Paulo Dias de Novães founds the Portuguese colony of São Paulo de Luanda on the African mainland (modern Angola). The colony soon became a major slave-trading port supplying the vast Brazilian market.

Elizabeth, Queen of England, gives a letter of patent to Sir Humfrey Gylberte to discover, find, search out, and view such remote, heathen and barbarous lands, countries and territories not actually possessed of any Christian prince or people.

The United Provinces (modern Netherlands) soon becomes an important slave-trading nation and an aspiring colonial power.

Following the death of King Henry of Portugal, Spain and Portugal are united under Philip II of Spain. Spain thus becomes the most important colonial power – and the largest participant in the slave trade.

First enslaved Africans arrive in Florida.

Elizabeth, Queen of England, signs a charter allowing Charter to Sir Walter Raleigh to discover, search, find out, and view such remote, heathen and barbarous lands, countries, and territories, not actually possessed of any Christian Prince, nor inhabited by Christian People.

The first English colony in the New World is established at Roanoke Island (modern North Carolina), organized by Sir Walter Raleigh and governed by Ralph Lane. It was not successful, and the colonists withdrew in June 1586.

Sir Francis Drake, an English admiral who circumnavigated the globe, sacks the slave-trading settlement of Santiago in the Cape Verde Islands.

Sir Francis Drake was a prominent figure in the late 16th century, known for his privateering and naval exploits. In 1586, he led an expedition that attacked and looted the Spanish settlement of Santo Domingo in the present-day Dominican Republic, as well as Cartagena in modern-day Colombia. He also targeted St. Augustine in Florida.

During his 1585-1586 voyage, Drake’s fleet included African individuals who had been captured from Spanish vessels.

These actions were part of a broader conflict between England and Spain, contributing to the tensions that eventually led to the Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604). Drake’s raids and the broader conflict significantly impacted the political and economic landscape of the time.

A second English colony is founded at Roanoke Island, again organized by Sir Walter Raleigh. When it is revisited by English ships in August 1590, it has vanished without trace.

The failure of the Spanish Armada (an intended Spanish invasion of England, largely destroyed by bad weather) provides a boost for English maritime power and for English colonial ambitions.

Bernard Ericks becomes the first Dutch slave trader.

L’Espérance of La Rochelle becomes the first French ship positively identified as participating in the slave trade.

Philip II of Spain grants Pedro Gomes Reinal, a Portuguese merchant, a near monopoly in the slave trade. Reinal agrees to provide Spanish America with 4250 African slaves annually, with a further 1000 slaves being provided by other merchants.

Queen Elizabeth I of England sends a letter complaining about the number of blacks in the realm by which a group of slaves were rounded up and given to a German slave trader, Caspar van Senden, in ‘payment’ for duties he had performed.

Francis Bacon writes On Plantations which becomes an important early text of British colonial discourse.