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218 PERIOD 2 • The Early Modern World, 1450–1750

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AP EXAM TIP slave labor — was an ancient practice. In the absence of a Native American popula-
You must understand the tion, which had been almost totally wiped out in the Caribbean or had fled inland in
demographic features Brazil, European sugarcane planters turned to Africa and the Atlantic slave trade for
and impact of the an alternative workforce. The vast majority of the African captives transported across
transatlantic slave
system in both the the Atlantic, some 80 percent or more, ended up in Brazil and the Caribbean. (See
Americas and Africa. “Commerce in People: The Transatlantic Slave System” in Chapter 6.)
Enslaved people worked on sugar-producing estates in horrendous conditions.
The heat and fire from the cauldrons, which turned raw sugarcane into crystallized
sugar, reminded many visitors of scenes from Hell. These conditions, combined with
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AP
disease, generated a high death rate, perhaps 5 to 10 percent per year, which required
SOURCING AND plantation owners to constantly import more enslaved people. A Jesuit observer in
SITUATION 14
How does the image 1580 aptly summarized the situation: “The work is great and many die.”
provide clues about the More males than females were imported from Africa into the sugar econo-
perspective of the artist? mies of the Americas, leading to major and persistent gender imbalances. None-
Was the artist more likely theless, enslaved women did play distinctive roles in these societies. Women made
for or against the
institution of slavery? up about half of the field gangs that did the heavy work of planting and harvesting

Plantation Life in the Caribbean This painting from 1823 shows the use of slave labor on a
plantation in Antigua, a British-ruled island in the Caribbean. Notice the overseer with a whip
supervising the tilling and planting of the field. (© British Library Board. All Rights Reserved/Bridgeman Images)
Uncorrected proofs have been used in this sample.
Copyright © Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. For review purposes only. Not for redistribution.

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