The Shape of a Diaspora
The Shape of a Diaspora
The Movement of Afro-Iberians to Colonial Spanish America
This chapter examines how a diverse group of free and enslaved Africans and Afro-Iberians moved back and forth from the Iberian peninsula to the Americas. After discussing the significance of African presence in Iberia, it turns to Afro-Iberian pasajeros a Indias (passenger to the Indies) and their journey between Seville and various parts of the Americas with the help of merchant, ecclesiastical, and other elite patrons. It also considers sailors and soldiers of the Spanish Main who made their way to the Americas and back in regular fashion. By tracing Afro-Iberian roots in the Andes and elsewhere in colonial Spanish America, the chapter reveals some important characteristics of the African Diaspora in the Iberian Atlantic World. It argues that the African Diaspora made a significant impact on the sixteenth-century Spanish Atlantic world, courtesy of Afro-Iberians who were conquistadors, passengers, and laborers in the conquest and colonization campaigns. This means that not all blacks arriving in the early colonial Americas originated in West Africa and the Atlantic Islands.
Keywords: pasajeros a Indias, free Africans, free Afro-Iberians, sailors, soldiers, Spanish Main, Andes, African Diaspora, enslaved Africans, enslaved Afro-Iberians
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