you'd be surprised at how many people believe that slavery didn't exist before america

It’s very rare to see someone talk about slavery like this. A totally unbiased perspective with facts rather than opinions makes this so enjoyable to watch. I just learned 10 times more about the horror of slave trade than I did throughout the entirety of the education system.

This is probably the best informed summary of slavery I have ever read or listened to. A properly global perspective, and very succinctly done.

Not to downplay American slavery at all, or slavery in general, but this just goes to show that slavery occurred almost everywhere in the world, and is still going on today. Yet I see so many people acting as if the American slave trade was some type of uniquely vile thing. Just opens up your perspective a little, which is always a good thing.

Thank you for covering modern slavery. It’s an absolute tragedy people will deny it and demonize slavery as something just one country did, and refuse to acknowledge that it continues to this day.

This should be taught in grade school, too many people are not aware of the real history of slavery. Brief but accurate and to the point.

Best synopsis of slavery and its prohibition that I have ever seen ! In such a short piece there were omissions and mistakes but it was still the best and should be made obligatory viewing for all. Thanks.

Focused way too much on the european slave trade neglecting other slave trades, though still a gem of a video

I'm glad someone is pointing out modern slavery during one of these videos. The cold fact of there being more slaves than ever before is lost as we "abolished" slavery across the world. Even though something is illegal and frowned upon, doesn't mean it doesn't happen. Thank you for being brave enough to point this fact out, as we believe we are more civilized than we actually are as a species. Slavery will never end, we can only hope to limit it as much as possible.

What this tells me is that almost every major civilization practiced slavery

A good introduction, well done, I kept thinking you should have added this or that important element. It is such a complicated history and not at all as portrayed by many.

So rare to find a video that actually portraits reality without a political agenda, thank you Geo History. We still have letters conserved to this between the King of Kongo and Portugal, stating a good relationship between them and his son went to study in Portugal and became a Bishop. Yet some people, mostly Americans, say that the white European started slavery in Africa. We did not start it, we started business with African slavers.

You briefly mentioned berber slave trade but a description of barbary wars would have been great too.

Thank you so much for this. I teach Middle School American History and this video is an absolute blessing for covering the background of slavery outside of our borders.

As a black American, this video helped me escape the matrix and stop being so touchy about this topic. Popular culture makes it seem like our people are the ones ones that had to go through it, when that's not true at all. I am now much less vulnerable to the antics of the left when it comes to things like this, thank you.

There is a dangerously fine line between imagined history and actual history. Unfortunately, the former is becoming so entrenched in the UK these days that it’s creating a highly politicised narrative of self hate - and slavery is at its core. Thank you for addressing the issue in an open, neutral and big picture context. Highly valuable.

It would have been helpful if pre-Columbian slavery in the Americas was addressed, as well as sub-Saharan African slavery, which existed before the Arab slave traders arrived in that region of the world. Also, a look into slavery in East and Southeast Asia from the last few thousands years would also help to show the ubiquitous nature of slavery.

Seriously, I appreciate the accuracy of the video. The attention to detail is very good. For instance, the map is updated to reflect Louis XIV's expansion into the Low Countries; Avignon is shown as a papal enclave in pre-Revolutionary France; the British Union of 1707 is shown; the Mosquito Coast settlements are represented, etc.

Great video. I usually check out on videos like this, but it held my attention for the entire time.

incredible accuracy, details and visuals. thank you!

Man... I was feeling so confident for humanity as major countries started to outlaw slavery one-by-one, only to have the video end with by mentioning that there are now more slaves on earth than at any previous moment. Really puts things in perspective. Humanity can be so incredibly cruel.

I love how you made the frontiers change while the years pass. Those frontier changes were so pleasant to see!

This needs to be educated more in school. Such an important topic in human history.

Imagine watching this for 20+ minutes only to find that slavery is bigger than ever before.

And you would think “slavery” only ends in the history books!!!!! Thank you for such an informative documentary.

The slavs suffered worse slavery historic events then what was depicted in this break down but still A+. I learned more in 10 mins then I did in my entire life in school about this topic.

This had me thinking about the different types of labor that slaver were subjected to and how it affects the populations today, and how we observe slavery different. For example most of America thinks of slavery as "picking cotton/farming", but it was very different all around the world.

“No archeological evidence of an exodus of Hebrews from Egypt.” That is very much not the case. I recommend Inspiringphilosophys content on this topic.

As a Nubian from Northern Sudan, thanks for pointing out the baqt conditions, failure to meet the required number of slaves is what brought down Makuria.

It should be mentioned that the Mamluks did also secure a lot of their mamluks from Central Asia. The ruling classes were either Turkic (Bahri) or Circassian (Burji) depending on the era

Great video. Could have used more on the North American and South American native slave systems. They weren’t mentioned at all yet, specifically the Haida and Aztecs

The only omission I see is that there is no mention of the efforts of the American and Royal Navy squadrons to interdict the slave trade.

Would have been nice to learn about the slave trade of the far east as well. Interesting and informative video!

A fascinating history. And well done on showing today's slave numbers which so many remain ignorant about.

Incredibly interesting and good perspective. I'm passing this on to others.

Great presentation overall but I wish there was as much detail on slavery before 1600 as after. Slavery still continues in many forms.

Cant believe my eyes when this is a video not just shorts. Luv ur videos so much. Huge fan!

This was well done. We don't need to be talked down to like little children the bare facts say so much more. Horrific that this not only still happens but is getting worse.

Great video! Really well done. I would have liked to have seen a little more history in Asia before the 20th century but still a lot of ground covered!

Pretty good video. To cover the subject thoroughly, it would probably take hours of video or a whole series of thick books.

By the late 19th century, when much of Islamic Central Asia was conquered by the Russian Empire, the region was home to tens of thousands of slaves. Most of these slaves were Shiʿa Muslims from northern Iran, though the slave trade also ensnared many Russians, Armenians, Kalmyks, and others. Slave labor was especially commonplace in the Sunni Muslim domains of Khwarazm and Bukhara, where enslaved people constituted a substantial proportion of all agricultural workers, domestic servants, and soldiers. Slaves also labored in many other roles, and an individual slave could be tasked with a variety of jobs. Slaves served, for example, as concubines, craftsmen, miners, herdsmen, entertainers, blacksmiths, calligraphers, and even, in rare instances, as government officials. Before the 16th century, the majority of the slaves in Central Asia-defined here as the region extending from the eastern shores of the Caspian Sea through Xinjiang, China, and from southern Siberia to northern Iran-seem to have been trafficked to the region from India. This changed in the 16th and 17th centuries, as a significant number of Iranian war-captives were brought north and enslaved during the course of numerous armed conflicts between the Central Asian Uzbeks and Iranian Safavids. Many of these slaves evidently labored on the region’s rapidly expanding agricultural estates. In the 18th and 19th centuries, frequent Turkmen raids into northern Iran resulted in tens of thousands of Iranian Shiʿas being captured and funneled into a booming slave trade in Khwarazm and Bukhara. Further north, a much smaller number of Russians were seized and sold into slavery by Kazakh nomads along the steppe frontier. Eden, J. Slavery in Islamic Central Asia. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Asian History.

Great video, I do think there was a missed opportunity to discuss how the slave trade actually shaped African kingdoms though. Kongo for example became incredibly rich off of the trade and their entire society warped to support it. When the abolitions happened they basically collapsed as a result. There are really interesting youtube videos on it! A recent one by Kraut: "Why Saudi Arabia is doomed" (ignore the name) was really good.

Haiti wasn't declared a republic. It was an Empire and Jean-Jacques Dessalines I was its Emperor.

This blew my mind. Thank you for sharing.

"an EMPTY BROWSER HISTORY TELLS a lot more than a full one" -Sun zu

This is also missing the enslavement of native Americans by other native Americans, China having the largest slavery market in history, etc

"in total, women represent about 70% of the world's slaves." me: dancing to the sick beats

Nice presentation, thank you. A couple of pieces missing, in my view:- 1) Serfdom (and it's equivalents, 'untouchables' etc) which is a form of slavery 2) Internal slavery - espcially china and within africa. (Uigars excepted). Slave 'culturally external trade' is covered but not 'within cultures'.

I wonder why the fuck they can't teach stuff like this at school. Only took 10 minutes, objective and relevant information, very easy to follow and remember. Teachers should seriously take an example from these kind of videos. Thanks for this quality material!

Amazed to see someone explain about slavery beyond the 1800s The term slave and slavery is now gone, but the practice still exists, just with different names

Slavery is something much like war and rape We will never get rid of. But we have immensely decreased it. Its as old as humanity. People have been enslaving defeated opponents or innocent people for thousands and thousands of years. In my country in congo we have many work slaves sadly

Fails to mention that the islamic world has been not only the biggest user of slavery, its most brutal enforcer (castration, massacres) and is still using it today, both sexual and for work. That's the most important information about slavery.

A few small but noteworthy things this video doesn't mention: 1. In the 13th century or so, people of Slavic origin enslaved in Eastern Europe were common enough in the Mediterranean world that the words for "Slave" in a number of languages, including both Spanish and English, are likely derived from the word Slav (both via medieval Latin, a common Lingua Franca across Europe at the time). 2. Prior to the Portuguese sailing down the coast of Africa and establishing trade relationships, it was fairly common for Portuguese merchants to turn pirate and engage in slave raiding on the North African coast when they deemed ports ill-defended. Slave raiding was also one of the first things they attempted when they reached the area of the Senegal River and further south, but they were largely unsuccessful due to underestimating local warriors. Ultimately they switched to engaging with local kings as politely as possible, which enabled them to establish peaceful trading relationships, including those which would develop into the slave trade. 3. The trade of slaves to the Gold Coast by the Portuguese actually predates the development of plantation slavery in their own colonies; their main goals in Africa were obtaining gold and spices, so despite their initial attempts at slave raiding (and their limited transport of African slaves to Portugal early on), it was only later that they began to view African slaves as a primary commodity to get from Africa. 4. In the Spanish and Portuguese American colonies, Native American slaves were for a brief window more common than African ones, though due to a mix of factors African slaves became much more common through the 16th century. It's sometimes assumed that this was simply because Native American slaves were more likely to die of Old World Diseases, but that's not the whole picture; it also related to ideological factors (there was a belief that Christians should not be enslaved, and some people believed that since Native Americans had never had the chance to convert before, they should be allowed to learn about Christianity before enslavement, while pagan and Muslim Africans were believed to have had their chance already, due to the presence of Christians in some parts of Africa). African slaves also didn't totally replace Native ones; in some circumstances (like in the silver mines of South America), African slaves actually died at faster rates than native ones, so Natives remained the majority. In others, Africans became the majority of slaves, but Natives remained a minority. Through the 17th century, Native Americans were often enslaved in British North America, and shipped to the Caribbean to be sold far from their homelands (as keeping them as slaves locally was believed to risk escape or rebellion). As late as the 18th century, native Americans still made up a large share of slaves in some parts of South America, and a small minority in many more. 5. African slaves made up the majority of people who crossed the Atlantic for much of the early colonial period, often serving as de-facto settlers in the European colonies, as European owners converted them to their own brand of Christianity, taught them European languages, and employed them in tasks such as converting other slaves, growing food, and building settlements, rather than just cash crop production. 6. The Triangle Trade heavily impacted African value systems between the 16th and 19th centuries. The concept of slavery was common throughout Africa, but it didn't work quite like the system of chattel slavery employed in the America. In Africa, land was plenty due to relatively low population density (except in some regions like the Gold Coast), so land itself had no value. Instead, value was held in having people to work the land. As such, owning lots of slaves was like owning lots of land in Europe (as such, slaves were a bit like European serfs; unfree, but not property on the same level as cattle - they had some rights). The triangular trade changed this in many places (though not all); European goods carried a level of prestige, and so shows of wealth stopped being in owning a lot of slaves, instead shifting to having many European goods, while humans were devalued. In the long run, this gave rise to larger changes, like some societies becoming much more warlike, as warfare was the best way to obtain slaves to sell for European goods. The ramifications were dire, but the shift would have been too gradual for most people to notice how unstable it was making their territories (the Kingdom of Benin (which I have a video about on my channel, if anyone is interested) is one exception; they banned the export of male slaves in the 1520s, likely to avoid depleting their own enslaved population). 7. The UK did not abolish slavery completely in 1833; they made an exception for domestic slavery in the British East India Company's holdings That form of slavery would only be abolished in 1843. The abolition of slavery in the UK would also go into effect gradually, with the final slaves being freed by 1865.

Very informative. It's rare to see a historical account of slavery that isn't pushing a political agenda. Very well put together and presented. Everyone should watch this.

Thank you for providing this information. It is possible to cite some of your sources for additional research? I bet it took a long time to research this comprehensive video so I think it would be valuable to show the amount of work it takes. In addition it would allow views to indulge in additional sources if they wish. Lastly, it would strengthen the validity of the video, which is always great thing to have. Again thank you.

Pretty good but you skipped over a lots of stuff that is not European. Slavery in the Turkey, Saudi Arabia ended in the 1960's. You skipped over slavery in India, hardly mentioned the slavery in Central Asia. Not even mentioned slavery in pre-Columbian Americas.

I'm glad he mentioned WW2. A lot of people have never heard of the Gulags in the Soviet Union.

Excellent video, it puts a lot of history in a different light.

Many comments trying to add their piece as know it alls, whilst still congratulating you for the video..👍 I call that a win in todays internet.

Best non-political video on slavery I've ever seen should be shown in classes, to the point and only facts, thanks.

Thank you for an informative video on such a topic! Looked at a new angle at labor relations. Astonishing that slavery is thousands of years old, and is still present in modern world.

I was very surprised that no mention at all was made of Russian serfdom, which only ended in 1861. However, despite that omission, a fascinating video and very informative.

I hope you'll make a video that explains how the institution of kingship, monarchies, etc, happened. That is something that boggles my mind.

As a woman I'm reminded about how happy I am to live a free life, so sad for the countless others who couldn't and can't. Seriously, this video put things into perspective for me. Thank you!

One of the most interesting slavery documentaries I have seen. Totally unbiased and sticking to facts rather than the most recent history on slaves which tends to be the more generic focus on the subject. Super interesting as well with linking the year counter at the top.

Wish you would’ve talked about slavery in the new world before the arrival of Europeans, the Aztecs were particularly brutal, and when the Spanish came these slaves changed hands from the Aztecs to Spain, forming the basis of the caste system in new spain

I love the bangers in the background while learning about history

I really love the fact that you included white slaves too. Youngsters often think all slaves were black, not knowing that it's originally Slavic people, where the word slave comes from. I would maybe add the serfs in Russia, since it's also a form of slavery, where serfs could only be bought if you buy a land. Also love the fact that you included political and economical slaves. Wouldn't it be marvelous if the woke culture would fight to free today slaves instead of fighting for pronounces.

Very informative. Only minus is the Far East (China, Japan, etc) being left out until the end of the video. Would have liked to know about the origin and development there as well.

Good video, so sad how something like this can happen

Excellent short video documentary, hopefully it makes people think more about the problem even today.

This video is entirely Eurocentric and ignores slavery that existed in subsaharan Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and East Asia for over a thousand years

Very important for people to see these days. I’m shocked and appalled at the amount of people brainwashed into thinking slavery only happened in America

Fascinating stuff. A lot of this I had no idea. Excellent work.

excellent high level historical review for better context. Case in point as to how a criminal evil can get established, worsen and spread, and become deeply economically, socially, and politically ingrained. An yet it was stopped because of the courage of those who were repelled by the cruelties and similarly for those who spoke up and put a stop to animal cruelties that were part of the fabric of those hideous days dominated by ignorance, vulgarity, and disregard.

Many do often forget or are ignorant to the fact that slavery is older than civilized government. This is an important video.

Good to finally have a video on the slavery done by nations throughout the ENTIRE history, not just the Atlantic one. However, you did forget the large amounts of Europeans being enslaved by Arabs

Great video, very informative, please continue making such content, youtubers like you should have millions of subs! Keep up and never stop king

We normally tend to link slavery and africa, but this video is very educational. Awesome!

Sumerian Executive: Okay, get this- We make people work, wait for it, and we DON'T pay them. Sumerian CEO: Give this man a raise!

Its surprising how many of these events seemed disconnected before this video. Thank you for the education 🙏 🙌

Gotta respect a channel like this! More details the better

Simply the best and most effective way of teaching people about the history of slavery and its current status. There is nothing one can do to a person than robbing the person his or her dignity.

nice video, but leaves out a huuuuuge amount of history about slavery in Africa before Europeans got there and Asia in general. kind of eurocentric tbf. also keep in mind, some of the first slaves in the americas were actually not from africa but european. Quite often prisoners were taken from the home country to colonies as work force in the new world.

Great video, but I wish that some of the famous slave uprisings had more time given to them. Some of them weren't even mentioned, like the Spartacus uprising. I especially love this one because of the TV show and it's astonishing how many of its crazy parts that seem like fiction are said to be true.

The trial over the Zong's lost "cargo" and pursuit of the insurance claim against Lloyd's of London is dramatized in the movie "Belle" :) It's a fantastic movie imo :)

Great video! You missed Dutch Brasil though. Pretty important as it’s the start of serious Dutch involvement in slave trade.

Friend: "i have a Business idea" His Business idea:

Awesome perspectives! It's such an emotionally charged topic... nice work!

This video was amazing, it really highlights the brutality of it all in a digestible way

In America, we're only taught about the Atlantic-African Slave Trade as if it was the first and only time slavery existed.

That was fascinating. Thank you.

a lot of history here

Slavery is/was a global problem. As someone who loves history I always associated slavery when it first comes to mind to the Ottoman Empire. Probably because of the Jannisery(sp), them and the Egyptian Mamluk Dynasty.

Other than attempting to insinuate that European/American wealth is in some significant manner attributable to the enslavement of Africans and/or the slave trade, this was a very accurate and informative video.

TFW it’s 1970 and the video is still not over for two more minutes.

A informative overview of the topic. Thanks for posting.

Extremely informative and very, very depressing. Thank you for making this.

I'd like to see a breakdown on todays slavery situation in more detail than a 20 second clip and get more awareness out there.

Wow it was quite sad but still interesting to fit my own great-grandfather into this timeline. He was digging for coal for the Russians during WW II, because he was of German origin and they were afraid he would join the Nazis. He barely survived and miraculously found his wife again and two generations later, here I am. Crazy world.