Azores were Black slaves

[Manaia Alofa]

"Actually, it was from a very scholarly, well recognized, history of Atlantic
slavery that I learned that most people in the Azores were Black slaves.
When I asked on the Azores list 10 years ago they didn't mention upper crust
people or French or English people living there."
....

The above is of another forum that I am on now of which I am now "stunned" as to what to make of now.

Please to enlighten me - can anyone?

And I believe the reference as to the "Azores list" is the Rootsweb AZORES list which this forum was made possible because we of this forum left that list!

--Manaia

[eric edgar]

Manaia,

 

There's nothing to make of it. It's just ridiculously ill-informed statement. I've attached a study of the DNA of Flores to give a clear picture of the genetic make up of the islands.

 

Eric Edgar

[Marr...@cs.com]

In a message dated 9/1/2008 2:06:05 AM Eastern Daylight Time, nobla...@gmail.com writes:

"Actually, it was from a very scholarly, well recognized, history of Atlantic
slavery that I learned that most people in the Azores were Black slaves.
When I asked on the Azores list 10 years ago they didn't mention upper crust
people or French or English people living there."
....

The above is of another forum that I am on now of which I am now "stunned" as to what to make of now.

Please to enlighten me - can anyone?

And I believe the reference as to the "Azores list" is the Rootsweb AZORES list which this forum was made possible because we of this forum left that list!

--Manaia

There were certainly slaves in the Azores, but they were a tiny minority, unlike Virginia before the Civil war that had more slaves than whites. The vast majority of the people in the Azores did not own slaves and the vast majority of those who did had one, two or three slaves. Figuring out how many slaves were in the Azores is much easier than finding out how many Jews lived in the Azores. Why? Because the slave owners made sure that their slaves and the children of slaves were baptized. Thus one finds many entries that go like this:

Maria, daughter of Inês, slave of Captain Simão Dias, and of an unknown father, was baptized ....

In the case of adult slaves being baptized, some of the records say what part of Africa the slave was from. There have been some historians who state that the aristocrats from the Azores who accompanied the Captain Donatory to fight the Moors in Africa, brought back slaves with them.

In 1648 my 8th great grandfather, Matias da Costa, was born in Ginetes to Úrsula, the slave of Maria Ferreira, widow of Gaspar Fernandes. In 1679 the same Matias "slave of the heirs of Maria Ferreira," married Isabel Carvalho, a free woman, daughter of António Costa and Maria Carvalho.

Ironically, Úrsula's mistress, Maria Ferreira is the daughter of another of my ancestors, Margarida Ferreira and her husband Gaspar Gonsalves.

Although slaves in the Azores were very few, we must not forget that for a while Portugal was the leading slave trader in the world. In posts to the Portugal list, this discussion has often been met with outrage and outright denial despite the irrefutable historical evidence. Pinheiro Chagas writes that in the mid 16th century, in Lisbon
with a population of 100,000, there were 10,000 slaves!

I hope this helps.

John Miranda Raposo

[Guida Leicester]

Hi All, Very fascinting conversation.  Below is written by James Guill.  Note 2nd paragraph especially: "It is thought too that maybe the name for the Azore islands came from this statement written by Martin Behaim, the maker of the Nuremburg globe of 1492: "All birds found in the islands by the first settlers were so tame that they came to the hand like hawks." Another theory is that the word "raca" or "raka," meaning bird of prey in Arabic, was translated to the Portugese acor. Raca appeared in an Arab manuscript designating an island, or islands, in the same location as the Azores.  The first settlers were a mixed group of people from the Portuguese provinces of Algarve and Minho.  Also, Madeirans, Moorish prisoners, black slaves, French, Italians, Scots, English, and Flemings were among the early settlers.  There were petty criminals, Spanish clergy, Jews, soldiers, government officials, European merchants and sugar cane growers.  Almost all Azoreans are Catholic, but there are Protestants and a few Jews among the population." The Azores were a crossroads and stop off point for many from North, South, East and West.  A "borderlands."  I love this kind of history--all kinds of folks who we never hear about in history books made history...not just noblemen, who wrote history. Guida --- On Mon, 9/1/08, Marr...@cs.com <Marr...@cs.com> wrote:

[Nicole Rodriques]

I don't know anything about the claim about the Azoran population, but
I've often found it interesting that the Portuguese influence on slave
trade is practically hidden. I personally have always accepted the
fact that I am Portuguese and yes, the Portuguese did pretty much
bring the slave trade (which was already going on between african
tribes) to the European world. I also accept that on the other side of
my family during a certain time, all the males of health and age were
confederate soldiers, and most of my ancestors owned slaves as
evidenced in wills and censuses.

A person cannot undo what was done in the past, being outraged at the
truth will not change it.

I still find it really odd that although I knew about the Portuguese
involvement in the slave trade from an early age (you tell a bookworm
kid that her family is from a country she's never heard of and let her
loose in a library, you'll see what happens), but I was never actually
TAUGHT about it until I took American History in college. That
textbook was the first to mention the Portuguese did anything more
than have a few very important explorers and wouldn't help Christopher
Columbus.

If I let wild theories come into play, I could say that the textbook
writers want a scapegoat about the slave trade and feel that Portugal
is too small and unknown to the average student, so they need to use a
bigger "more important" country like Spain or England. And of course
stress the slavery in the US which in reality was relatively small in
comparison to other areas in the Americas. But like I said, thats just
a wild theory I came up with.

[rpim...@peoplepc.com]

Hi All,

 

I find this most interesting as I have had DNA testing done on my dad’s maternal line. His haplogroup is L2 which associated with Africa. While I have been able to trace his line back I am still working on it and hope to get back to it this fall when work slows down.

 

So Far the oldest known maternal ancestor is Victoria Beneviedes b. abt 1713 daughter of  Jose Fernandes and Isabel Rodrigues who married Antonio Martins on 22 Dec 1731 in Sao Jose, Ponta Delgada.

 

Rick

 

Richard Francis Pimentel

Epping, New Hampshire, USA

Researching Sao Miguel, Acores for, Pimentel (Costa), Carvalho, Teixeira, Rocha

[Cheri Mello]

Out of 54 people who had the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) tested that are in the Azores project housed with FamilyTree DNA (FTDNA), 4 or 7% are in the L mtDNA haplogroup.

Cheri