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AMBACA SOCIETY AND THE SLAVE TRADE c. 1760–1845

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 March 2005

JAN VANSINA
JAN VANSINA
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin–Madison
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Abstract

The slave trade in Angola, specifically in the district of Ambaca, transformed the social organization of its inhabitants at the grass-roots level by introducing an ever increasing quantity of coveted commodities and by providing credit in counterpart for pawnship. The trade provoked both the emergence of a new structure, the corporate matrilineage and the apparition of a new elite, when colonial chiefs coopted their commercial rivals, including local leaders who had efficiently used the assets of their corporate matrilineages to further their individual ambitions.

Keywords

Angolaslave tradesocial organization
Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 46 , Issue 1 , March 2005 , pp. 1 - 27
Copyright
© 2005 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

This essay was written in honor of Philip C. Curtin. I thank Dr. Evá Sebestyén, Dr. Tom Spear and the readers of this journal for their comments on this paper. In addition Dr. Sebestyén also graciously allowed me access to the documents in her possession. Place names are spelled as they appear in the sources – hence ‘Ambaca’ and not ‘Mbaka’. Ethnonyms are spelled in their own language but with omission of their prefixes except for Ambundu and Ovimbundu (rather than Mbundu in both cases) in order to avoid confusion. Words in Kimbundu (the language of the Ambundu) are always cited with their prefixes in the singular and without the preprefix -o.