Colonial Period and Enslavement

The Arrival of Europeans:

Christopher Columbus: An Italian explorer sponsored by Spain, who arrived in the Caribbean in 1492, marking the beginning of European colonization in the Americas.

Colonization:  The process of settling among and establishing control over Indigenous peoples in an area.

Conquistadors:  Spanish conquerors who claimed territories in the Americas, often through violence and exploitation.

Europeans brought new diseases (like smallpox) that devastated the Indigenous populations.

Establishment of Spanish and French Colonies:

Hispaniola:  The island now known as Haiti and the Dominican Republic; initially colonized by Spain, then split with France in 1697.

Treaty of Ryswick:  The 1697 agreement where Spain officially ceded the western third of Hispaniola to France, which named it Saint-Domingue.

Saint-Domingue would become one of the world’s wealthiest due to its plantation economy based on enslaved labor.

 Enslavement and The Plantation Economy:

Plantations: 

Large farms specializing in crops like sugar and coffee, reliant on enslaved labor

Middle Passage: 

The forced journey across the Atlantic, during which millions of Africans were brought to the Americas as part of the transatlantic slave trade.

Sugar Economy:

Saint-Domingue was the world’s leading sugar producer, generating enormous wealth for France while enslaved people endured brutal conditions.

The Cultural and Social Impacts:

  Vodou: Resistance:

A syncretic religion developed by Enslaved people preserved African

enslaved Africans in Haiti, blending African traditions as acts of cultural resistance, a

spiritual practices with elements of Catholicism. practice crucial to the survival of Afro-Haitian identity.

Resistance and Rebellion:

Maroons: 

Enslaved individuals who escaped plantations and formed independent communities in mountainous regions.

Slave Rebellions: 

Frequent uprisings occurred as enslaved people resisted the brutal plantation system, foreshadowing the Haitian Revolution.