"A HIDDEN EMPIRE: IBADI CONTROL OF THE TRANS-SAHARAN AND INDIAN OCEAN SLAVE TRADES, c. 760-1055 CE"
Kristina Richardson, University of Virginia.
Online and in person at New York University's Hagop Kevorkian Centre, 50 Washington Square S, New York 100012
Wednesday, February 8th, 6:30pm EST
Part of the NYU Silsila Spring 2023 Program
Under Ibadi Muhallabid rule of Ifriqiya in the late 8th century CE, Ibadi merchants settled in the Sahara and Sahel, introduced local communities to Islam, and dominated the trans-Saharan slave trading networks. In this talk, Professor Richardson will make the novel argument that when Muhallabi governors simultaneously ruled the province of Sind in the late 8th century, they deployed the same strategies of settlement, conversion, and economic expansion along the Swahili Coast, where they developed a lucrative trade in East African slaves. In short, the early Islamicate history of Black African enslavement is largely an Ibadi story and an exceptional one at that, for the scale of what became the 1200-year trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean slave trades probably exceeded that of later European merchants in the early modern Atlantic.
Full details of the event and a link to register as an attendee, either online or in person, can be found at:
Only registered attendees will be able to access or attend this event in person.
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