Naomie Fleurjuste
3/23/12

Midterm
The difference is that, Atlantic slave trade was very important for 18 century World Economy, because it was one of the three elements of so-called Triangular trade, a three-way exchange between America, Europe, and Africa. European traders would ship textiles, muskets, and manufactured merchandize to Africa and exchange it for slaves. Then they would take slaves to the West to Americas and exchange them for cotton and tobacco, and sail home. On each side of the triangular trade ships made huge profits plus they carried different valuable merchandize from both African continent and the New World. Thus, Atlantic slave trade was vitally important for 18th century sailors . The origin of Atlantic slave trade – and slave trade in general – is mainly associated with the shortage of labor in the developing New World. Contemporary European population in the Americas was not sufficient to support the plans of development. Even criminals that were sentenced to labor ran away, and could easily blend into white masses forever. Native Americans were not efficient as slaves either, because they were not that numerous and did not have immunity for diseases brought to the New World by Europeans . In addition, native Americans could easily escape because they knew the land well, their home were close, and they knew how to survive in the adjacent territories . But labor requirements kept growing with the expansion of mining, harvesting, and growing. Thus, Europeans turned to African Continent, Guinea in particular, as a free labor source. Africans were most suitable for labor in the New World, because first, they had immunity for diseases such as measles, smallpox, and mumps. The second main reason was that they were unfamiliar with the territories of the New World,