African Male Slaves Experienced Untold Hardship During the slave trade era
African Male Slaves Experienced Untold Hardship During the slave trade era As a form of punishment, enslaved males were either castrated or mutilated. It was done to take away any iota of male pride that they had and to show the white man’s dominance. Castration became a regular practice for the slave traders because it was believed that castrated boys and men worked faster, were more efficient and posed no threat. The enslavers could leave them with their families, without any fear that they would have affairs with their wives back at home. Castration involved the removal of the testicles and in extreme cases, the penis was cut off altogether. The main targets were young boys within the ages of 9 to 12. Over the 13 centuries of the Arab slave trade in Africa, unknown numbers of Africans were enslaved and shipped to the Middle East. "The Caliphate in Baghdad at the beginning of the 10th Century had 7,000 black eunuchs and 4,000 white eunuchs in his palace." The Arab slave...