Chapter 17: Africa in the Early Colonial Period

Question 1

creole

Answer 1

West Africans combined European colonizers’ languages with parts of their West African languages and grammatical patterns to create new languages known broadly as creole. In SC and GA creole languages Gullah or Geechee exist, in places where slaves once composed 75% of the population.

Question 2

Gullah

Answer 2

A creole language spoken by some West Africans in SC.

Question 3

Geechee

Answer 3

A creole language spoken by some West Africans in GA.

Question 4

Santeria

Answer 4

Cuban combination of Christian and traditional African religions.

Question 5

Vodun

Answer 5

Haitian combination of Christian and traditional African religions.

Question 6

Candomble

Answer 6

Brazilian combination of Christian and traditional African religions.

Question 7

gumbo

Answer 7

A popular southern US food which has roots in African cooking.

Question 8

polygyny

Answer 8

The practice of taking more than one wife, which was popularized following the boom of slavery in West Africa, which took more than two-thirds of the male population.

Question 9

Saint Dominique

Answer 9

Slave revolts in Saint Dominique led by Toussaint L’Ouverture in the late 18th century brought the end of slavery to the newly independent nation of Haiti.

Question 10

Dahomey

Answer 10

Like the Oyo, the Dahomey was an African city which raided other villages for slaves and sold them to European merchants. The rich got richer, because when a society like the Dahomey exchanged slaves for guns, its raiders easily took advantage of rival societies that had no firearms. Without firearms, it was hard for neighboring groups to resist slave raids, so raiding societies became even richer and more fortified with firearms. Intergroup warfare thus became more common and bloodier as a result of the slave trade.

Question 11

Sunni Ali

Answer 11

Gao regained its independence from the Mali Empire, which had faced unrest among its factions, and in [1464] Sunni Ali became ruler of the Songhay people and began to aggressively conquer territory on both sides of the Niger River and created the Songhay Empire. He was known for repressive policies against the scholars in Timbuktu. Songhay was conquered by gun-wielding Moroccans from northwest Africa.

Question 12

Oyo

Answer 12

Like the Dahomey, the Oyo was an African society that conducted slave raids and became richer from selling their captives to Europeans.

Question 13

barracoons

Answer 13

Captive Africans, swept away from their families, were taken to holding pens in West Africa or “slave castles.”

Question 14

Ile de Goree

Answer 14

This “House of Slaves” was a barracoon on the coast of Senegal.

Question 15

Vasco da Gama

Answer 15

[1498] Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama invaded the Swahili city-states of East Africa, most of which were thriving commercial centers in the Indian Ocean trade. The Portuguese took over trade in Kilwa, Mombasa, and other city-states, throwing the region into a devastating decline.

Question 16

triangular trade/Atlantic trade system

Answer 16

This complex global trading system involved African slaves. European manufactured goods (firearms) → West African slaves → American cash crops (tobacco) → Europe.

Question 17

Niger River

Answer 17

On this river was the Songhay city of Gao.

Question 18

Middle Passage

Answer 18

The grueling journey for slaves across the Atlantic was called the Middle Passage because it was the middle part of the captives’ journey.

Question 19

African Diaspora

Answer 19

Dispersion of Africans outside of Africa.

Question 20

abolition

Answer 20

The end of slavery, pushed for by Enlightenment philosophers like Jean Jacques Rousseau, who wrote passionately about the right to freedom and the need for equality among all human beings.