Merchants Build a Transatlantic Trade Network
Trace the triangular trade network connecting the Americas, Europe, and Africa, and explain how the slave trade was embedded in colonial commerce in Grade 8 history.
Key Concepts
Colonial merchants developed a complex trade network connecting the Americas, Europe, and Africa. This system became known as the triangular trade . Ships carried raw materials like sugar and tobacco from the Americas to Europe, where they were exchanged for manufactured goods like cloth and guns.
European traders then sailed to West Africa to trade these goods for captured African people. The horrific, forced journey across the Atlantic Ocean was called the Middle Passage . Millions of Africans endured unimaginable suffering on this voyage before being sold into slavery in the colonies.
Common Questions
What was the triangular trade?
The triangular trade was a shipping system connecting the Americas, Europe, and Africa where raw materials, manufactured goods, and enslaved people were exchanged across the Atlantic.
How were enslaved people part of the triangular trade?
Ships carried enslaved Africans across the Middle Passage to the Americas, where they were sold to work on plantations producing raw materials exported to Europe.
What goods were traded in the colonial triangular trade?
Ships carried raw materials like tobacco and sugar from America to Europe, manufactured goods from Europe to Africa, and enslaved people from Africa to the Americas.