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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Aristocrats, Slaves, and Peasants: Power and Dependency in the Wolof States, 1700-1850 |
Author: | Searing, James F. |
Year: | 1988 |
Periodical: | International Journal of African Historical Studies |
Volume: | 21 |
Issue: | 3 |
Pages: | 475-503 |
Language: | English |
Geographic terms: | Senegal Gambia |
Subjects: | Wolof slavery History and Exploration Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) |
External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/219452 |
Abstract: | The Wolof Old Regime, as conceived here, describes the period of the Wolof monarchies of Senegambia from the 'War of the Marabouts' to the French intervention in 1861, about two centuries. During this period slavery was the most important factor which set apart this period from that of the early monarchy, and the peasant society that succeeded it. Slavery was not a new element, but it was reinforced in both its political and economic forms in the period of aristocratic reconstruction which followed the religious wars. The 'ceddo' slave warriors are the most important symbols of the period. They policed a society where agricultural slavery played an important productive role, and provided the wealth that allowed the aristocracy to patronize client groups, and to participate in the trade in grains stimulated by overseas commerce in slaves and legitimate goods. Initially slavery caused the patrician elites and the peasantry to lose status and power, but because former slaves were gradually absorbed into the lower order of freemen, slavery indirectly contributed to 'peasantization' and 'seignorialism'. Notes, ref. |