of Martinique, an island in the West Indies.
BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA Slavery 105
hold services for the families that owned
them. Others worked to make money
for their owners. Some slaves worked in
mines.
Early Slavery
Slavery existed throughout the ancient
world. It was practiced in China before
1200 BC. There were laws about slaves in
the Middle East from about 1750 BC
and in India from about 100 BC.
In Athens, a city of ancient Greece,
about one third of the people were
slaves. In ancient Rome, slaves worked
on farms, rowed warships, did construction
work, or copied out books. In the
later days of the Roman Empire, slaves
on farms eventually became serfs.
In the early Middle Ages, after about AD
500, Europeans took many Slavs (a
people of eastern Europe) as slaves. The
word slave comes from “Slav.” Serfs
slowly replaced slaves in all of Europe.
There were serfs in parts of Europe into
the 1800s.
Enslaved Africans
Slavery also existed in Africa in ancient
times. But the African slave trade across
the Atlantic Ocean began in the early
1500s. European ship captains bought
slaves from African traders. The ships
then usually carried the slaves to Brazil
or a Caribbean island. Conditions on
slave ships were terrible, and many
people died.
Those who survived were sold to owners
in many parts of the Americas. Owners
put Africans to work in mines or on
large farms that grew tobacco or sugar.
The farms needed African slaves to
replace Native American workers. European
diseases had nearly wiped out these
Native Americans.
The first African slaves in North
America arrived in the English colony of
Virginia in 1619. All the British colonies
permitted slavery, but the large farms
that used the most slaves were in the
South. At first, tobacco was the most
important crop. Then, in 1793, Eli
Whitney invented a machine called the
cotton gin. His invention made cotton
easier to process. This led to a huge
demand for African slaves to work on
large cotton farms called plantations.
Ending Slavery
During the 1700s some people in Great
Britain came to think that slavery was
Enslaved Africans had no room to move on a ship that took them across the Atlantic Ocean.
106 Slavery BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA
wrong. They began the abolitionist
movement, an effort to end slavery. Both
Britain and the United States banned the
slave trade in the early 1800s. Starting
with Vermont in 1777, the northern
parts of the United States banned slavery
entirely.
However, the large Southern plantations
continued to rely on slave labor. Some
slaves escaped through a secret organization
called the Underground Railroad,
but the system of slavery survived. In
some states more than half the people
were slaves.
The big issue that divided the United
States was whether slavery would be
allowed in new territories and states.
The Missouri Compromise of 1820
settled the problem for a time. It allowed
slavery in some new territories but not
others. However, the Kansas-Nebraska
Act of 1854 allowed the people in new
territories to choose to have slavery. In
the Dred Scott case of 1857, the U.S.
Supreme Court ruled that the government
did not have the power to ban
slavery in the territories. In 1861 the
American CivilWar began, partly over
the issue of slavery. At the end of the
war, the 13th Amendment to the Constitution
finally put an end to slavery in
the United States.
In Central and South America, as soon
as colonies gained independence, they
often banned slavery. The last country in
theWestern Hemisphere to end slavery
was Brazil, in 1888.
By the late 1800s the British abolished
slavery in India and in the parts of
Africa that they controlled. Slavery
ended in China in 1910.
Some parts of Africa and the Islamic
world practiced slavery well into the
1900s. Although all countries had officially
outlawed slavery by the end of the
1900s, the practice continued in some
parts of Africa and Asia.
#More to explore
Abolitionist Movement • American Civil
War • Dred Scott Decision • Human
Rights • Kansas-Nebraska Act
• Missouri Compromise • Underground
Railroad
Sleep
Many animals, including humans, sleep.
When people sleep, their eyes are closed,
their muscles are relaxed, and they are
usually lying down. Getting enough
sleep is an important part of being
healthy.
Small houses on the grounds of a Southern
plantation were once the homes of slaves.
BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA Sleep 107
Scientists are not sure exactly why people
and other animals sleep. Some scientists
think that sleep is a way for animals to
save energy, because the body uses less
energy when asleep than when awake.
Other scientists think that sleep allows
the body and mind to rest and recover
from the day’s activities. People who do
not get enough sleep may have difficulty
remembering and concentrating.
People need different amounts of sleep
at different times in their lives. A new
baby may sleep for as many as 16 hours
a day by taking frequent naps. A 2-yearold
child usually naps during the day
and sleeps for a longer period through
the night. As children grow into adults,
they usually stop taking regular naps and
