Trade items as evidence for slave trade : the case of firearms in Madagascar at the Musée du quai Branly (original) (raw)

2021

Abstract

Madagascar, 1700. The Sakalava king, Andriamandisoarivo, loved exhibiting his collection of firearms to European merchants. He already had four warehouses fully packed with muskets which he received in exchange for slaves. Nonetheless his demand for firearms, ammunition and gunpowder seemed insatiable. Indeed, the rise to power of the Sakalava kingdom in the eighteenth century was intimately linked to their military superiority thanks to a regular slave trade with European merchants. The European slave trade on Madagascar represented an important maritime commerce during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Slaves were exchanged for Mexican silver, Indian cloth, Mascarene arak and especially European muskets. These military items, which were also imbued with important symbolic value could only be obtained through the European slave trade. As such they assured the political and economic hegemony of the coastal communities like the Sakalava and the Betsimisaraka communities. Items with a direct link with slavery and the slave trade in European museums are rare. The Musée du quai Branly in Paris holds not only dozens of firearms, some richly adorned, but also powder containers as well as statues and photographs of individuals with muskets underling their societal importance. These are silent witnesses of the European slave trade on Madagascar as they are synonym for the infamous slave-firearm cycle which increased the “enslaveability” of the Malagasy people . As such they merit to be more explicitly used in European museums to raise our awareness about the mechanics slave trade, not only as a commercial exchange but also to underline its political and social consequences for the Malagasy society.

Rafaël Thiébaut hasn't uploaded this conference presentation.

Let Rafaël know you want this conference presentation to be uploaded.

Ask for this conference presentation to be uploaded.