Bonazza - Abolitionism and The Persistence of Slavery in Italian States, 1750-1850 (2019)

S T U D I E S
A M E R I C A N
ABOLITIONISM AND
I T A L I A N
THE PERSISTENCE OF
SLAVERY IN ITALIAN
A N D
STATES, 17501850
I T A L I A N
giulia bonazza
Italian and Italian American Studies
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Giulia Bonazza
Abolitionism and the

Persistence of Slavery
in Italian States,
1750–1850
Giulia Bonazza
German Historical Institute
Rome, Italy
Italian and Italian American Studies

ISBN 978-3-030-01348-6 ISBN 978-3-030-01349-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3
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Foreword
Giulia Bonazza’s Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery in Italian

States (1750–1850) offers a radically new perspective on slavery in Italian
states. It represents a significant departure from the established histori-
ography, the majority of which deals with early modern slavery and looks
on Atlantic and Mediterranean slavery as distinct subjects. The studies
on Mediterranean slavery tend to concentrate on either the quantitative
aspects of the slave trade or official registers of cases of captivity in the
specific context of traditional Christian and Muslim societies and econo-
mies. Bonazza revisits these classic themes, but within a new chronology:
1750–1850. She demonstrates that the abolitionist discourse opposing
the Atlantic trade was irreconcilable with the persistence of forms of
slavery in Italian states and that the Mediterranean was not just a foot-
note to the dynamics at play in the Atlantic. At the same time, the form
and function of Mediterranean and Atlantic slavery were markedly dif-
ferent. In effect, the depiction of the status of slaves in Italian states is
part of a long history of representations of working unfree relationships
as well as of social, economic and hierarchical frameworks. The persis-
tence of the phenomenon of slavery for so long after the abolition of the
Atlantic trade indicates the willingness of the Papal States and political
élites to maintain the status quo for the sake of social peace and stabil-
ity. Their priority was not to disturb the established order. Bonazza also
explains how, despite the presence of the abolitionist movement in the
Italian area, together with the introduction of abolitionist laws in certain
regions, the phenomenon of slavery still persisted in certain cases.
vii
viii Foreword
Bonazza’s remarkable treatment of terminology (slaves, captives,

serfs) and her elucidation of the power of words in pre-unitarian Italy
highlight the variety of routes into slavery—war, raid, trade, debt—but
also the multitude of possible exits. Ethnic origin could be an aggra-
vating factor but it was not necessarily a determining factor. Skin col-
our was associated with certain degrading activities but it was rarely the
only reason an individual was enslaved or continued to be held in slavery.
Only a minority of the slaves in the Italian states in the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries were black but racial tensions were clearly present.
Bonazza’s interpretation of the permanence of representations but also
the taxonomy of sources relating to “blacks” leads her to reconceptualise
the traditional break between colonial slavery and metropolitan slavery,
and between slave societies and societies with slaves. Political societies
in Italian cities did not offer equality of opportunity and mobility to all
inhabitants. Slaves were “racialised” and treated differently to freeborn
whites. Bonazza’s reconstruction of the life trajectories of slaves allows
us to rethink the way in which the abolitionist discourse in Southern
Europe has been portrayed. In terms of the atmosphere in Southern
European cities and in the abolitionist campaign generally during the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the relative invisibility of slaves (as
well as of rebellions and territorial segregation) in public spaces, along
with their increasing assimilation, encouraged among jurists, philos-
ophers and wider supporters the erroneous sentiment that in Europe
slavery was only a late manifestation of serfdom or even just a particu-
lar form of domestic serfdom. Bonazza debates this notion of “gentle”
slavery. The forms of violence and of civil exclusion attached to differ-
ent forms of slavery did not always run through the colour line and also
involved other criteria: geographical, religious and ethnic.
What became of the descendants of slaves in Italy? What is the role of
memory of slavery in Italy? To these vast questions, with which special-
ists have been preoccupied for two decades, we find the first answers for
the Italian context in Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery in Italian
States (1750–1850). For Giulia Bonazza, the problem of the scarcity
of memory of slaves must be understood in the context of the absence
of a formal Italian states’ colonial empire in the Early Modern period.
Public memory of slavery revolves around the Italian colonial empire
that came into being in the late nineteenth century. Little attention is
paid to slavery and slaves in Italian cities before that point. The study
of slavery cannot be separated from other forms of serfdom, of violence
Foreword ix
and of domination exercised in everyday life between women and men

who share the same spaces and social practices. Recovering the mem-
ory of slavery requires thinking about its history in full, rather than just
dwelling on colonial slavery. Bonazza’s book is an important step in that
direction.
Nantes, France Antonio De Almeida Mendes

Université de Nantes
Preface
This book explores the manifold contradictions involved in the persistence

of slavery in Italy during the Napoleonic and post-Napoleonic period
despite the introduction of legislation abolishing slavery in most of the
Italian states and an ongoing campaign to abolish colonial slavery. The
analysis is double-edged: an empirical archival investigation documenting
the persistence of slavery in six major Italian cities is complemented by a
review of abolitionist laws and the abolitionist intellectual debate. Thus,
Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery in Italian States (1750–1850)
is innovative in two ways. Firstly, it documents cases of slavery in various
Italian cities even after the Napoleonic period, meaning after the point
by which the legal abolition of slavery had occurred across most of Italy.
This finding breaks new ground by demonstrating the persistence of slav-
ery and captivity in this area beyond the chronological limits set by the
existing historiography. Secondly, it presents a critical reassessment of the
transnational abolitionist debate by developing a new understanding of
the important role played by Italian intellectuals in philosophical medita-
tions on colonial slavery and the slave trade, and associated developments
in the Italian public sphere. After the Napoleonic period, the Italian states
(with the exception of the Pontifical States) adopted constitutions mod-
elled on the French constitution, which contained anti-slavery articles;
after the Congress of Vienna, the Italian states, France and Great Britain,
intensified diplomatic efforts regarding the external abolition of the slave
trade. The temporal span chosen (1750–1850) makes it possible to iden-
tify and analyse differences and continuities in attitudes towards slavery
xi
xii Preface
and slavery practices in the wake of these two important juridical and
political watersheds.
This volume presents and discusses cases of slavery uncovered in six
Italian cities—Naples, Caserta, Rome, Palermo, Livorno and Genoa—
during the period in question. These cities have been chosen because
they are situated on the west coast of the Italian Peninsula and—with the
exception of Caserta and Rome—were the sites of significant ports. Their
location meant that they were closely connected to the Atlantic and
North Africa. While the limited number of cases encountered suggests
that, in quantitative terms, slavery may be viewed as a “residual phenom-
enon” during the period under review, the life stories of the individuals
concerned and the forms of slavery practised in these various urban con-
texts were not unlike those typical of the Italian Peninsula in previous
centuries: points of continuity included captivity, the role of privateering,
the link between slavery and serfdom and, finally, baptism as a route to
freedom.
This work also contributes to the study of historical geography and
international politics by investigating the extent to which transna-
tional abolitionism, directed against the practice of colonial slavery by
European powers, brought about a true and immediate suppression of
various forms of slavery in the pre-unitarian Italian states; it also docu-
ments how slavery related to other forms of bondage and forced labour.
The book demonstrates that, despite the grand abolitionist principles
espoused, forms of slavery survived on the Italian Peninsula. It also
classifies the legislative acts abolishing slavery in Italian states, framing
them in the light of international legal norms concerning the abolition
of the various slave trade routes. A final and fundamental contribu-
tion of Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery is that it sheds light
on the connections between the Mediterranean and Atlantic slave trades
and confirms that captivity and slavery existed in both arenas. In con-
junction with its innovative chronology, which resets the traditional his-
toriographical clock, and original methodology, which treats of both
slavery and the abolitionist debate and legal abolitionism, this means that
Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery will add another layer to our
knowledge and understanding of slavery studies, the history of Italy and
contemporary studies of the Mediterranean.
The book is divided into four chapters. After reviewing the current
historiography on the topic and addressing the problem of the definition
of the term “slave” (Chapter 1), Chapters 2 and 3 branch out into the
Preface xiii
two main thematic lenses through which the slavery issue is examined.
Chapter 2 examines the abolitionist debate in the Italian states and dis-
cusses its connections with transnational abolitionism; Chapter 3 focusses
on cases of slavery in the Italian states (1750–1850) discovered during
archival research in Naples, Caserta, Rome, Palermo, Livorno and Genoa.
Chapter 4 considers the memory of slavery and related issues of cultural
heritage—in Italy in particular and in Europe as a whole. Chapter 5 pre-
sents conclusions on abolitionism and the continuity of slavery.
Chapter 1, Historiographical Perspectives, opens by problematis-
ing the absence of a historical memory of slavery in the Italian context.
It then provides an overview of the most important publications on
Mediterranean, Atlantic and African slavery before looking at studies on
slavery in various parts of Italy from the fifteenth to eighteenth centuries.
The chapter discusses the recent historiographical shift from a focus on
the history of slavery in a wider sense to a focus on the history of indi-
vidual slaves, highlighting the importance of life stories and trajectories
and the interconnection between the local and the global. I address the
problem of the definition of different forms of bondage, distinguishing
between slaves, captives and servants. I trace the history of the seman-
tic uses of the vocabulary of slavery in Europe. I discuss both levels of
taxonomy: the categorisation used in recent historiography and how the
terms were used during the period under examination. My own use of
the words “slave”, “captives” and “servants” reflects contemporary his-
toriographical perspectives: in particular, I use Michel Fontenay’s defini-
tion of the difference between a “slave” and a “captive”. In Fontenay’s
view, a slave is a person purchased on the basis of his or her value as
part of the workforce and not on the basis of his or her exchange value,
in contrast to captives, in which case it is precisely the price of the
exchange/ransom which is relevant (Fontenay, Esclaves et/ou captifs.
Préciser les concepts, 16). I simultaneously examine the terminology used
at the time, through an analysis (in Chapter 3) of the categories used in
primary sources, for instance “slave”, “black”, “moor”. I further address
the methodological question of whether possessing a given legal status
is enough to define a “slave”. The chapter ends with a brief contextual-
isation of the six pre-unitarian Italian states in which the six case studies
were conducted, focusing on the 1750–1850 period.
Chapter 2, The Reverberations of the Abolitionist Debate in the Italian
States, is concerned with international treaties and agreements related to
the abolition of the slave trade and of slavery and with juridical abolitions
xiv Preface
of internal slavery in the pre-unitarian Italian states. Both types of aboli-

tions were often imposed by the two main external powers: France and
Great Britain. Different geographical areas were subjected to different
diplomatic influences. For instance, the Papal States were not originally
an abolitionist power because they were allied with Spain and France
against Great Britain; later, when the Anglo-American abolitionist move-
ment became dominant, the Papal States adopted the abolitionist cause
in support of Great Britain and assumed the role of sponsor of aboli-
tionism in Europe. I highlight the contradiction between condemnation
of the Atlantic slave trade and, tangentially, of Mediterranean slavery
and the persistence of slavery in most of the Italian states, in particular
in the Papal States. Pope Gregory XVI promulgated the apostolic letter
In supremo apostolatus, and the Holy See was also involved in the little
known Italian abolitionist campaign. I also analyse the abolitionist debate
in the wider Italian context, discussing the abolitionist argument against
the Atlantic slave trade and slavery as it was presented in Italian news-
papers, annals and books; particular attention is dedicated to an analysis
of articles from the Florentine newspaper Antologia, directed by Giovan
Pietro Vieusseux.
Methodologically, in Chapter 2 I use official juridical sources and dip-
lomatic sources exclusively. As regards the attitude of the Papal States
to the abolitionist debate, I analyse newspaper accounts and, to a more
limited extent, diplomatic records, especially documents concerning
Consalvi’s mission at the Congress of Vienna. In respect of the aboli-
tionist debate in the Italian states, I examine nineteenth-century newspa-
pers and books, principally Civiltà Cattolica, l’Antologia, L’ape italiana,
Giovanni Ferri’s Nuovo giornale dei letterati, Lo spettatore italiano:
preceduto da un saggio critico sopra i filosofi morali e i dipintori de’ costumi
e de’ caratteri (1755–1830) and Andrea Zambelli’s essay (memoria) Sulla
schiavitù de’negri. In particular, my analysis of the Florentine newspaper
Antologia reveals direct links with the written work of the French aboli-
tionist society, Société de la Morale Chrétienne, and translations and cri-
tiques of philosophical works, such as Raynal’s Histoire des Deux Indes.
This provides concrete evidence of the participation of Italian abolition-
ists in European networks involving both newspapers and intellectuals.
It also highlights the fact that Italian abolitionist thinkers of the period
were mainly intellectuals. Enslavement practices in Italian territory, I
conclude, persisted in spite of the abolitionist movement: they were not
invisible, but they were ignored.
Preface xv
Chapter 3, Forms of Slavery in the Italian States, documents the exist-

ence of cases of slavery and captivity in the cities of Naples, Caserta,
Rome, Palermo, Livorno and Genoa until well into the first half of the
nineteenth century. The number of slaves, their living conditions and
religious problems are considered. I highlight how the rite of baptism
can be seen as an expression of the link between slavery and religious
issues in the Italian area. Religious conversion represented an attempt
on the part of mainstream society to integrate these individuals, but it
was also an attempt to persuade or coerce them by confronting them
with the dilemma of deciding between maintaining their “otherness”
(and thus visibility) on the one hand and assimilation on the other.
Significantly, in the cities examined, conversion did not immediately
guarantee legal freedom: it was, however, a way of improving one’s sta-
tus and a step towards eventually obtaining legal freedom. The change of
name involved in baptism led to the creation of a new identity, a process
that demonstrates how interactions between master, state and captives
or slaves could be free or unfree. For example, masters, noble families
and even cardinals gave their own family name to the slave during the
baptismal celebration. Chapter 3 also demonstrates why examining the
trajectories of slaves’ lives is very important, as it allows us to understand
not just the flows of people to the South of Europe from North Africa,
but from different areas bordering on the Mediterranean and from the
Atlantic.
Chapter 4, The Memory of Slavery, focusses on the memory of slavery
and on the analysis of memory spaces in the Italian area. The empha-
sis is on architectural and artistic elements that provide additional con-
firmation of the existence of slavery in the Italian states. The chapter
highlights the long-standing absence of a public memory of slavery in
the Euro-Mediterranean world, while documenting a progressive change
in the perception of the cultural heritage of the memory of slavery even
in the Mediterranean. Finally, I also focus on the problems of taxonomy
and race, and patrimony and the memory of slavery.
Obviously, Mediterranean slavery as a whole differed greatly from
Atlantic slavery in terms of numbers and typological composition.
For example, there was no plantation or chattel slavery tout court.
But this does not mean that a different set of forms of slavery in the
Mediterranean justifies categorisation of Mediterranean slavery as distinct
from others. In reality, the circulation of slaves and captives demonstrates
that all trades were closely intertwined.
xvi Preface
Taken together, these chapters, particularly Chapter 5 on Abolitionism

and the Continuity of Slavery, will conclusively demonstrate that the
international abolitionist campaign of the colonial powers against the
slave trade and slavery did not lead to the immediate and complete sup-
pression of forms of slavery, captivity and forced labour in the Italian
states. Despite their espousal of abolitionist principles, certain forms of
slavery survived in some Italian states well into the nineteenth century,
and the legal abolitions of slavery in these states were mostly imposed
from outside, rather than resulting from internal legal debate.
Rome, Italy Giulia Bonazza

Acknowledgements
This book is the result of 4 years of Ph.D. research and of many

stimulating discussions with my professors, colleagues and friends. It

would not have been possible without their support so now it is a pleas-
ure to finally acknowledge them. I wish to thank my supervisors Myriam
Cottias and Rolf Petri for their fundamental guidance during this cru-
cial formative period and for their great kindness and humanity. A major
acknowledgement is due also to Professor Francesca Sofia for follow-
ing my research with passion from many years. I owe many other debts
of gratitude, including Professor Salvatore Bono, whose publications
were the starting point for this research and whose advice on sources
and the development of the work was invaluable. I am greatly appre-
ciative of the suggestions offered by Professors Giovanna Fiume, Luca
Lo Basso, Wolfgang Kaiser, Rebekka von Mallinckrodt, Antonio De
Almeida Mendes, Lucy Riall, Silvia Sebastiani and Giuliana Boccadamo.
For methodological and bibliographical insights, I thank my colleagues
Cecilia Tarruell, Alessandro Tuccillo, Andrea Zappia, Bruno Pomara,
Michele Bosco, Cesare Santus, Alessandro Capone, Emiliano Beri,
José Miguel Escribano. The year I spent at the Centre International
de Recherches dur les Esclavages (CIRESC) in Paris and my last year as
Max Weber fellow at the European University Institute were enrich-
ing experiences, and I was lucky to work with exceptional colleagues in
both settings, in particular Céline Flory and Laurie Anderson. The feed-
back offered by the Max Weber Programme historians’ working group
was fundamental to writing this book. I would like also to give a special
xvii
xviii Acknowledgements
acknowledgement to Audrey Millet. Among the archivists and librarians

who helped me, Paolo Arduino, Loredana Gazzara, Fausto De Mattia
and Gaetano Damiano were especially kind. I am also grateful for the
support of Megan Laddusaw, Commissioning Editor, and Christine
Pardue, Editorial Assistant, History, at Palgrave Macmillan.
To conclude, I offer my heartfelt thanks to my mother Giovanna, to
my father Angelo and to my sister Sara. Much of the credit for the book
that follows is rightly theirs.
Contents
1 Introduction: Historiographical Perspectives 1
2 The Reverberations of the Abolitionist Debate

in the Italian States 45
3 Forms of Slavery in the Italian States 103
4 The Memory of Slavery 167
5 Conclusion: Abolitionism and the Continuity of Slavery 211
Index 219
xix
Abbreviation of Archives and Libraries
ADF Archives Diplomatiques français

APF Archivio Storico di Propaganda Fide
APMM Archivio del Pio Monte della Misericordia di Napoli
ARC Archivio della Reggia di Caserta
ASDN Archivio Diocesano di Napoli
ASG Archivio di Stato di Genova
ASL Archivio di Stato di Livorno
ASP Archivio di Stato di Palermo
ASR Archivio di Stato di Roma
ASRg Archivio di Stato di Roma (sede di Galla Placidia)
ASV Archivio Segreto Vaticano
ASVR Archivio Storico del Vicariato di Roma
BN Bibliothèque Nationale de France
MAE Biblioteca del Ministero degli Affari Esteri—Farnesina
xxi
List of Figures
Fig. 3.1 Categories of baptisms made by Don Biase Gambaro in Naples

between 1783 and 1845 (Source: Book of Baptisms of Slaves
christened by Rev Parish Priest Biase D. Gambaro, Archivio
Storico Diocesano di Napoli, Cattedrale, 44) 108
Fig. 3.2 Relationship between the number of slaves working on the
construction of the Palace of Caserta and total inhabitants
(Source R. Del Prete and N. Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta.
Le vite, i lavori, il contributo della schiera di lavoratori
musulmani [Roma: Lunaria, 1999], 17–18) 113
Fig. 3.3 Map of the Old Bagno, 1798, A (Source ASL, Governo
Civile e Militare di Livorno (1764–1860), no. 895) 136
Fig. 3.4 Map of the Old Bagno, 1798, B (Source ASL, Governo
Civile e Militare di Livorno (1764–1860), no. 895) 137
Fig. 3.5 “L’imbarco dei galeotti nel porto di Genova” di Alessandro
Magnasco (1740) circa (Source Musée des Beaux-Arts de
Bordeaux) 144
Fig. 4.1 Monumento a Ferdinando I de Medici named of the “Four
Moors” (Source Gastone Razzaguta, Livorno Nostra.
Nascita, Progesso e Grandezza di Livorno, cui fa seguito il
racconto della sua distruzione e la nostalgia di questa città ed
il suo destino, Tirrenia-Belforte, 1948. Photo courtesy of
Andrea Dani Photography) 188
Fig. 4.2 Pietro Gagliardi, Adorazione dei magi (1847) (Source Chiesa
di San Girolamo dei Croati. Photo courtesy of Bruno Brunelli) 193
xxiii
xxiv List of Figures
Fig. 4.3 Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Lechi con attendente by

Giambattista Gigola (around 1801) (Source Private collection,
photograph © Fotostudio Rapuzzi Brescia) 195
Fig. 4.4 Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Manara con servitore
by Giovanni Carnovali detto il Piccio (1842)
(Source C. Caversazzi, Giovanni Carnovali detto il Piccio,
Bergamo, Istituto italiano d’arti grafiche, 1933, tav. XXX) 197
Fig. 4.5 Il ballo dell’ape nell’harem by Vincenzo Marinelli (1862)
(Source Napoli, Ministero per i beni e le attività
culturali—Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte, photograph
© archivio dell’arte | pedicini fotografi) 198
List of Tables
Table 3.1 Slaves registered in the Chivitavecchia dock on 5 February

1803 122
Table 3.2 Captives who arrived in Palermo in 1808 131
Table 3.3 List of the 12 slaves in the Bagno of Livorno in 1790 138
Table 3.4 Number of slaves on Galleys Santa Maria, Raggia,
Capitana and San Giorgio 142
xxv
CHAPTER 1
Introduction:
Historiographical Perspectives
1.1 Recovered Memory
The historical practice of slavery has long been forgotten in the Western,
Arab and Ottoman worlds, and the role of the memory of slavery has
likewise been overlooked. However, a slew of publications on the
Atlantic and other slave trades has prompted Turkish, Moroccan,
Algerian, American and European historians into efforts to reconstruct
this memory. In France, for example, historiographical interest in the
problem of slavery was renewed by the 150th anniversary of the abo-
lition of slavery in 1998. The associated events highlighted the con-
flict between the oubli de l’histoire de l’esclavage and the oubli du passé.1
More recently again, scholars have turned their attention to the aboli-
tionist movements in France and England,2 although Anglo-Saxon his-
toriography did pay attention to abolitionism in the 1980s, led by Robin
Blackburn.3 In Italy, Salvatore Bono, a pioneer in the study of slavery in
the Italian area, writes about the silence of historiography.4 In the same
vein, Grabriele Turi, in his recent Schiavi in un mondo libero, refers to
Oblivion and memories.5 Y. Hakan Erdem highlights the near-total
collective amnesia about Ottoman slavery,6 and Chouki El-Hamel empha-
sises the culture of silence around the history of race and slavery in
Morocco which meant that black Moroccans were either outsiders in
their own communities or completely absorbed by them.7 The problem
of memory is directly linked to the question of how the past is repre-
sented. Every social group makes decisions on what it wishes to be
© The Author(s) 2019 1

G. Bonazza, Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery in Italian
States, 1750–1850, Italian and Italian American Studies,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3_1
2 G. BONAZZA
remembered, and it produces, institutionalises and preserves what is to

become memory and handed down to posterity. Therefore, memory
is the result of a process of selection and it can go beyond the sources
available to the historian.8 But the memory of slavery, previously lost or
ignored, is progressively re-emerging.
1.2 Between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean

Research on Atlantic and Mediterranean slavery has started to appear
more frequently over the last several years. This scholarship has
demonstrated that the variety of trades and forms of slavery shared
common traits: power relationships, the seas, the movement of men
and the agency of the slaves themselves were all central dynamics.9 The
renewed historical interest in Mediterranean slavery was an offshoot
of research on the Atlantic trade, and the two cannot be fully under-
stood if viewed as wholly distinct.10 While my research focuses on
Mediterranean slavery, some of the slaves I study were products of the
Atlantic trade, reinforcing the interconnectedness of the two dimen-
sions.11 An essential starting point is an overview of the key publica-
tions on slavery and captivity in the Italian area and in other European
and extra-European countries from the fifteenth to the nineteenth
centuries.12
Within the last decade, Anglo-Saxon scholars have worked exten-
sively on the economics of the Atlantic trade, especially the British
trade, among them Seymour Drescher,13 Zoë Laidlaw14 and David
Beck Ryden.15 More general reviews of the Atlantic trade include
David Eltis and David Richardson’s Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave
Trade16 and The Atlantic Slave Trade by Herbert S. Klein.17 Robin
Blackburn’s The Making of New World Slavery is fundamental because
of the global and long-term perspective it takes.18 Blackburn’s analy-
sis encompasses the interconnections between the conceptualisation
of modernity and slavery, and from there to the links with imperial-
ism, the Great War and the emergence of totalitarianism. His quanti-
tative methodology links microhistory and macrohistory, such as in
his reflections on capital accumulation and chattel slavery. Blackburn
demonstrates that the Atlantic trade was not simply an affair between
nation states (including the African Kingdoms), as previously assumed
by the Marxist historian Eric Williams,19 but the result of collaboration
between individuals:
1 INTRODUCTION: HISTORIOGRAPHICAL PERSPECTIVES 3
These relationship had emerged in “civil society”, as expression of

“private” relations and coercions relatively free of direct sponsorship by
the formal political structure of the state…Slavery, personal lordship and
contracted labor […]. The colonial state, at various times and in different
degrees, legally sanctioned, encouraged, end even purported to regulate
such relationship.20
Blackburn’s interpretation of the role of states in the Atlantic trade is

interesting because he identifies them as performing a role similar to that
played by intermediaries in Mediterranean slavery, while the most impor-
tant functions in the Atlantic trade are left to individuals and religious
brotherhoods. He considers the process of colonialism beginning with
early Portuguese and Spanish expansion, the growth of the sugar trade
in Brazil, the war of the Dutch West India Company for Brazil and the
origin of the British and French empires. He concludes by reflecting on
racism and on abolitionist thought.
American scholars have also become increasingly interested in the prob-
lem of slavery and captivity in the Mediterranean, foremost among them
Robert C. Davis21 and Gillian Weiss.22 While Davis limits himself geo-
graphically to the Mediterranean, his openness to the role of the Islamic
world therein is refreshing (including raids by the Barbary States for men
from Mediterranean coasts). The basis of his approach is that slavery was
not a prerogative of Europeans only but also of the Arab world. As sug-
gested by his title, his approach is to counterpoise the Christian and the
Muslim worlds. His focus is on the Italian peninsula, and despite a slightly
fragmented archival investigation, his book represents an important addi-
tion to the historiography because it extends the chronology to 1800 and
takes in Christian slavery in the Barbary States.23
Maintaining our gaze on the Mediterranean, Colin Heywood,
together with Maria Fusaro and Mohamed-Salah Omri, recently edited
a collection of articles in the volume Trade and cultural exchange in
the early modern Mediterranean.24 Anglo-Saxon historiography of
Mediterranean slavery featured historians such as Godfrey Fisher in the
last century and Linda Colley since the turn of the century.25 Fisher,
in the late 1950s, rehabilitated the political role of the Barbary States
in the Early Modern period, demonstrating that they were not simply
states devoted to piracy, but states with strong political structures and
negotiating power. He charted the political and economic relation-
ships between the Barbary States and England until 1712,26 and in an
4 G. BONAZZA
appendix (Mediterranean Passes) provided partial information on these

relationships up to 1830, the year of the French conquest of Algiers.27
Algerian historian Yacine Daddi-Addoun completed his Ph.D. on
the problem of captivity and the abolition of slavery in Algeria. Addoun
argues that European historians have neglected or only superficially
considered the subject of Christian captivity in Algeria. The work that
has been carried out, suggests Addoun, is flawed because it relies on
sources or memories originating from religious congregations and
tending to stereotype the Muslim as exotic or demonic. Therefore, they
do not facilitate an objective evaluation of the phenomenon.28 Actually,
Addoun’s criticism is only partially accurate, given that European histo-
rians have recently concentrated on the relativism of identities more so
than the manifestation of Christian–Muslim divisions in the processes
of slavery. A clear attempt is being made to illustrate the complexity
and non-uniformity of Mediterranean slavery across religious and state
boundaries. This is most productively implemented by reconstructing
and charting the personal biographies of individual slaves because it is
not possible to generalise with sufficient accuracy on the religious char-
acteristics of Mediterranean slavery or the pattern of state involvement.29
European historians are inclined to speak rather of proximate, recipro-
cal, provisional and reiterated slavery. Proximity and reciprocity relate to
Christian–Muslim dynamics. Captivity could be provisional when ran-
soms and prisoner exchanges were factors. And the fact that some slaves
were repeatedly traded must also be taken into account.30
An important contribution on the trans-Saharan slave trade and abo-
litionism in Tunisia is the book The Abolition of Slavery in Ottoman
Tunisia by Isamel M. Montana, which identifies important parallels
between the Atlantic and Saharan slave trades. Montana successfully
demonstrates that Tunisian abolitionism in the first half of the nineteenth
century had its roots in the Islamic legal tradition and was not just a
response to developments in Great Britain.31 Concerning the Ottoman
Empire, Ehud R. Toledano magisterial first book, The Ottoman Slave
Trade and Its Suppression: 1840–1890, appeared in the 1980s. Toledano’s
work remains crucial to our understanding of the different forms of slav-
ery (including military slavery and domestic service), the living condition
of slaves and the complexity of the taxonomy of slavery in the Ottoman
world. It also sheds much light on British foreign policy in the East and
the forces promoting the abolition of the slave trade in the Ottoman
Empire.32
Continental European academia’s growing interest in Mediterranean

slavery—long restricted to the Medieval period despite its prevalence
throughout the Early Modern period—features Maximiliano Barrio
Gozalo, Alessandro Stella, Jocelyne Dakhlia and Wolfgang Kaiser, and
for the Italian area in particular, Salvatore Bono, Giovanna Fiume and
Luca Lo Basso. Gozalo, while concentrating on the Iberian Peninsula,
also takes into account the related dynamics of Muslim slavery in other
Christian countries, especially in Spain, France, Italy and Malta. The
Spanish historian is critical of the traditional historiography of the topic
because it devoted itself only to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
neglecting the eighteenth century.33 Prior to Gozalo, the Algerian his-
torian Moulay Belhamissi was one of the first to analyse the phenome-
non of Muslim captivity in Europe at a point when the study of Christian
captivity was well established. He assumes that this neglect was the com-
bined result of a lack of aptitude among European historians together
with a scarcity of sources.34
Remaining on the Iberian peninsula, a full picture of the problem of
slavery there emerges in Alessandro Stella’s Histoires d’esclaves dans la
péninsule ibérique thanks to the varied sources employed. Marriage acts,
verbal trails and testaments are used to establish statistical and personal
accounts of slavery and slaves’ lives.35 Stella dismantles the historiograph-
ical theory that the slave-man in Europe was an aristocratic luxury, a
dependent plaything rather than a productive part of the labour force in
his own right. In reality, slaves worked in all sectors of the economy: on
the land and in factories, workshops and mines.36 Quantitative data on
the number of slaves in the city of Cadiz and the reconstruction of the
geographical origin of slaves are interesting and useful, data on enfran-
chisement even more so.37 Stella, together with Bernard Vincent and
Myriam Cottias, also studied how slavery is related to other concomi-
tant or consequent forms of servile dependence. Their work covered the
Greco-Roman world, the Arab world, the USA and the Caribbean.38
Aurelia Martín Casares makes a vital contribution to the history of slav-
ery, métissage and abolitionism in Spain in the book Esclavitud, Mestizaje
y abolicionismo en los mundos hispánicos, while José Miguel Lopez’s work
concentrates specifically on Madrid.39
Spanish historian Cecilia Tarruell recently published an article on
Christian captivity in the Mediterranean between the end of the sixteenth
century and the beginning of the seventeenth century. The innovative
part of her research is its analysis of the captivity of return; that is,
6 G. BONAZZA
she calculates the rate of return of Christian slaves to the Iberian Peninsula
after captivity in Northern Africa and identifies the roles which they
assumed on their return.40 Remaining on the Iberian Peninsula, Antonio
De Almeida Mendes is a well-established scholar of the phenomenon of
captivity and slavery in Portugal in the Early Modern period. He pro-
poses an open approach to the analysis of the Portuguese Atlantic and
Atlantic slavery more broadly, using the concepts of circulation, interac-
tion and cross-culturalism. The aim is to go beyond the closed historio-
graphical traditions of strictly demarcated cultural areas, which sometimes
amount to little more than national addendums to the histories of Atlantic
empires.41 In the second half of the sixteenth century, both black men and
captives were common in Portugal. In his article “Musulmans et mour
iscos du Portugal au XVIe siècle”, Antonio De Almeida Mendes debates
the closely related problems of baptism, conversion and slave identity.42
In any case, mouriscos maintained a double identity and used their new
Christian or Muslim name according to circumstances. They established
communities where they settled into their new identities and passed
them on to succeeding generations.43 The article is included in a recent
book on Muslims in European history which does not deal specifically
with slavery but still shows that religion and slavery were strongly linked.
This is clearly demonstrated by the fact that many of the contributions
in the book concern slaves. Mediterranean- or Atlantic-facing European
ports had significant Muslim populations, who were employed in the
ports or on galleys. Oarsmen were not necessarily slaves; they could also
be free Muslims. The majority, however, were originally slaves or captives
of some kind. Muslim slaves were to be found inland too, but in lesser
numbers.44
Wolfgang Kaiser’s Le commerce des captifs. Les intermédiaires dans
l’échange et le rachat des prisonniers en Méditerranée, XV e–XVIIIe siècle
synthesises some of the most important European research on captiv-
ity. In particular, it looks at captivity at the local level, a phenomenon
that often remained hidden. Kaiser’s introduction specifies that the role
of intermediaries in the capture of men in the Mediterranean cannot be
compared to their equivalent role in the Atlantic when it comes to defi-
nitions.45 Another recent addition to the literature is Religion and Trade,
edited by Francesca Trivellato, Leor Halevi and Cátia Antunes. This vol-
ume includes an important contribution by Kaiser and Guillaume Calafat
on the economy of the ransom of captives in the Mediterranean between
the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries.46 The problem of privateering,
first dealt with in his own unique style by Godfrey Fisher, has since
received thorough attention from Salvatore Bono, Michel Fontenay,
Alberto Tenenti and Daniel Panzac.
In Kaiser’s edited volume, other contributions refer to intermedi-
aries and religious institutions that ransomed slaves, such as Giuliana
Boccadamo’s analysis of the Neapolitan Santa Casa della Redenzione
dei Cattivi or Rosita D’Amora’s examination of the Pio Monte della
Misericordia.47 On ransoming in the Italian area, we are fortunate to be
able to rely on the work of Luca Lo Basso on the Genoese Magistrato
per il Riscatto and of Giuseppe Bonaffini on intermediaries and Sicilian
slaves in the Mediterranean.48 Anne Brogini’s article on the ransom
intermediaries active on Malta during the sixteenth and early seven-
teenth centuries demonstrates that only 21% of ransoms were paid
by slaves themselves. Between 1580 and 1630, 42% of ransoms were
paid by shipmasters or merchants. Finally, at the beginning of the sev-
enteenth century 25% of Christian intermediaries were from Venice,
Ragusa, Naples and Sicily. Another 10% were Greek. Malta, because
of its strategic mid-Mediterranean position, was crucial for the ransom
of both Christian and Muslim slaves.49 Andrea Pelizza itemised the
ways Venetians ransomed slaves in Riammessi a respirare l’aria tran
quilla. Venezia e il riscatto degli schiavi in età moderna. Thanks to the
researches on the archival collection of the institution for the ransom of
slaves. Using the archives of the Provveditori sopra ospedali e luoghi pii
(the institution established to effect ransoms) and the Trinitari religious
(whose Venetian priests introduced a new and more successful ransom
method), Pelizza presented a statistical breakdown of Venetian ransom
cases and also looked at processions that followed the repatriation of
freed slaves. Pelizza place the Venetian experience in the Mediterranean
context as well as comparing it with the Ottoman world and with other
ransom procedures in Europe and the Italian states.50 Considering reli-
gious intermediaries specifically, Michele Bosco’s doctoral thesis was enti-
tled “La Santa Obra de la Redención”: modelli e protagonisti del riscatto
dei captivi nel Mediterraneo moderno. Il caso dei mercedari tra Italia e
Spagna while Andrea Zappia’s Ph.D. was entitled Il Magistrato del
riscatto degli schiavi di Genova e le realtà della redenzione nell’Italia sette
centesca: dinamiche, rapporti, artefici.51 On Moriscos in Italian cities, see
Bruno Pomara, I Rifugiati. I moriscos e l’Italia.52
According to Wolfgang Kaiser, Muslim communities were well
represented in the Iberian Peninsula and Italian ports, and Muslims were
8 G. BONAZZA
employed as oarsmen in the galleys. The exclusively urban character of

these groups facilitated their dispersion, and it is therefore more difficult
to identify them. Baptism was the primary mechanism by which slaves
moved away from their original culture. Dakhlia and Vincent refer to
identité labile, négociée.53 Religious conversion and consequential name
changes (and the fact that some converts eventually returned to their
original name) mean that is identifying individuals as members of cer-
tain groups is a challenging task. Our contemporary categories of inte-
gration and assimilation are therefore problematic, because the subjects
were not static and did not always belong to just a single group. The case
of Muslims in Europe, inserted in the macro-group of slaves or captives,
is a case in point. Generalising about macro-groups or coherent religious
communities in Early Modern Europe fails to account for the complex-
ities of religion in that period and the fact that slaves self-identified in a
myriad of evolving ways.54
Slavery also occurred in inland Italian cities such as Ferrara, Mantua
and Bologna, but only in the opening centuries of the Early Modern
period. Giovanni Ricci demonstrates the presence of slaves in the fif-
teenth- and sixteenth-century Ferrara, although they would have been
purchased in Venice. Many bishops were slave owners (among them
members of the Este family and members of Ludovico Ariosto’s fam-
ily).55 The situation in Bologna was studied by Raffaella Sarti in Bolognesi
schiavi dei «Turchi» e schiavi «Turchi» a Bologna tra Cinque e Settecento:
Alterità etnico-religiosa e riduzione in schiavitù.56
A new research group in Rome is concentrating on slavery and reli-
gious conversions.57 Serena di Nepi mined the 1516–1645 regis-
ters of citizenship licenses in the Archivio Storico Capitolino to locate
Restitutionem ad libertatem assigned to baptised slave by Roman nota-
ries. These documents demonstrate not only that slaves often obtained
freedom after baptism, but crucially that the Roman Conservatori
themselves were appointed by the Pope in order to manumit the slaves
according to an explicit papal instruction.58 Di Nepi tells the stories of
itinerant slaves such as Hierardus, his Chinese origins camouflaged by his
Turkish name, probably adopted after being forced to convert to Islam.
The news of probable liberation in Rome inspired him to escape, and he
was duly baptised in the Holy city. Di Nepi also reflects on the House
of the Catechumens in Rome and on the condition of galley oarsmen.
It seems that oarsmen were quite happy to be baptised in the hope of
freedom, but it was not always granted.59 In fact, baptism was not a
guarantee of freedom, but a preparatory step. At an institutional level,

Roberto Benedetti’s investigation of the legal standing of slaves in
Rome unearthed important decrees and laws regulating the relation-
ships between slaves and oarsmen. Referring specifically to the period
of interest in the present volume, Benedetti discovered a 1753 decree
prohibiting the renting of rooms or workshops to Civitavecchia’s galley
slaves.60 In 1760, this decree was extended so that convicts and others
condemned to be oarsmen could not sign any contract. This precaution-
ary measure was prompted by a fear of contraband smuggling, especially
of tobacco. Sodomy in the galleys was common and was also punisha-
ble. Benedetti suggests that it is more difficult to reconstruct the jurid-
ical position of domestic or public slaves than galley slaves. The use of
slaves as domestic servants was still approved by authorities at the begin-
ning of the nineteenth century.61 Benedetti’s research, while restricted
to the Papal States, opens interesting paths for a juridical history of slav-
ery in pre-unitarian Italian states.62 This history has not been written yet,
largely because of the scarcity of source material. Nonetheless, one of the
aims of my research is to piece together the juridical picture of slavery in
pre-unitarian Italian states.
The research publication of the Fondo per gli Investimenti della
Ricerca di Base (FIRB) Oltre la guerra Santa project (in which Di Nepi
and Benedetti’s articles appeared)63 demonstrates Italian historiogra-
phy’s contribution to the European historiography of slavery and reli-
gious conversions. Giovanna Fiume’s article, L’impossibile riscatto di
Aly del Marnegro, “turco vero” and the “Quaderni Storici” issue Fiume
edited (ten years after the publication of a previous edition entitled
La schiavitù nel Mediterraneo), furthers this contribution.64 The new
issue calls explicitly for intensified study of “Mediterranean captiv-
ity and slavery, and connected problems, such as abjuration and reli-
gious conversions”.65 This statement demonstrates that religious
conversions, identified through baptismal and ecclesiastic sources,
have become fundamental to improving our understanding of slavery
in the Mediterranean. The case of Aly, in Ferrara, is important in this
sense. The Inquisition regarded Aly as a renegade Christian but he
was of Turkish birth and claimed to be of the Muslim religion so the
Inquisition did not have any jurisdiction over him. Aly’s ransom was
missed, showing how the religious element was sometimes a ploy dis-
guising commercial and financial interests, typical of the économie de la
rançon referred to by Fiume.66
10 G. BONAZZA
Marco Lenci’s Guerra, schiavi, rinnegati nel Mediterraneo presents

an exhaustive overview of the institutional and military offices of the
Barbary States in the context of Mediterranean slavery.67 Demonstrating
how Mediterranean slaveries were interconnected with other forms of
extra-Mediterranean slavery, Fabienne P. Guillén and Salah Trabelsi’s
work in Les esclavages en Méditerranée. Espaces et dynamiques écnomiques
covers the Medieval period to the nineteenth century and Europe to
Russia and sub-Saharan Africa. The extension of the borders of research
on Mediterranean slavery echoes David Brion Davis’ Challenging the
boundaries of slavery.68 For example, Alessandro Stanziani’s article on
slaves and captives in Russia and Central Asia from the sixteenth to nine-
teenth centuries aims to demonstrate that the “Oriental world” (quot-
ing him) not only had many Kholopy (servants) but also many slaves
with Russian origins within the boundaries of the Ottoman Empire, the
majority of them women.69 Stanziani aims to demonstrate that the posi-
tion of the Kholopy cannot be equated to slavery or normal. Rather, it
was a temporary form of dependence—formes de mise en asservissement
temporaire—that was similar to the engagé in European colonies.70
Stanziani, through a philological-linguistic analysis, recalling the steps of
the institutional and juridical itinerary of this group, concludes that the
opposition between captive and slave established by the historiography
is not always valid and is applicable only in certain geographical contexts:
“c’est aussi dire que la limite entre esclave et captif est mobile et négociable
entre les propriétaires d’esclaves et les élites institutionnelles. L’issue de ces
négociations change suivant le contexte historique”.71
My aim is to propose an analysis of slavery in various geographical and
cultural contexts, in order to demonstrate the similarities but also the differ-
ences of the phenomenon in respect of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic.
The problem of slavery in the Mediterranean must be viewed in the wider
context of other forms of slavery and without being confined by predeter-
mined parameters and benchmarks. Taking a vast swathe of time and space
allows for fuller clarification of the fragmented panorama of Mediterranean
slavery. We usually refer to the concept of décentrement notionnel (notional
decentralisation), given that we resort to comparative analysis of the dynam-
ics of capture, trade, commerce and finance that concern the subjugation of
strangers.72 Starting from this important historiographical juncture, in the
book I will focus specifically on the problem of conversion and baptism of
slaves, on the connection between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic and
on the different forms of slavery in the period 1750–1850.
1.3 From the History of Slavery

to the History of the Slave
As we observed previously, recent publications on slavery in the

Mediterranean indicate a growing interest among historians in the his-
tory of individual slaves—and a concomitant fall-off in enthusiasm for
broad surveys—as a means for connecting the local and the global.73
The case of Aly from Marnegro is a prime example. Historical analysis
is gifting an increasingly central role to the individual, irrespective of
socio-economic determinisms. The influence of microhistory is evident
here as is the concept of agency as promoted in Subaltern Studies.74 Since
the 1970s and 1980s, the historiographical tendency to microhistory in
Europe and especially in Italy, and to Subaltern Studies in the Indian sub-
continent, has produced pioneering results.75 The recognition of auton-
omous character and the singularity of behaviours and circumstances,
while adding to complexity of historiographical problems, allows for
a better understanding of the role of individuals and subaltern groups
in history. Their influence on historical processes is not simply a binary
matter of controller-controlled or society-individual.76
In my chronological and geographic sphere of interest, however, it
is rare to find memories or direct testimonies of slaves between the late
eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries and the sources I use are offi-
cial ones, produced by the Catholic Church or by the State. Evidence,
whether in the form of an autobiographical document or a register of
baptisms, is mediated through the historian’s bias and conscious or
unconscious wish to find a certain version of the past. A source in itself is
not a mirror of the reality of its time. It is produced by historical societies
in order to paint for the future a particular picture of themselves. The
historian must be critical of the sources.77 Giovanna Fiume, even when
referring to juridical sources, assumes that “historians and judges equally
have to deal with facts that they do not bear witness to directly, and that
they encounter only through the mediation of others”.78 We also have
to consider hegemonic memories and counter-memories, especially those
referring to controversial pasts or to facts that are difficult to reconstruct.
We must negotiate between conflicting memories. Memory is intrinsi-
cally linked to the shape of power, which is why historians have to con-
sider the commemorations and the institutional silences of their own
times and also how memory has been transmitted between the past and
the present, as well as how it was originally formed in the past itself.79
12 G. BONAZZA
On Subaltern Studies, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak makes the following

argument:
The language employed seems to constitute an effort to recognize that

the vision of the subaltern, his will and presence, cannot be anything other
than a theoretical pretense aimed at legitimising the project of interpre-
tation. The awareness of the subaltern cannot be recovered, and “it will
probably never be recovered”. If I could speak in the slightly esoteric reg-
ister of French post-structuralist language, I would say: “for us the thought
[in this case the thought of subaltern awareness] is here a perfectly neutral
name, a textual white, the necessarily indeterminate index of a coming era
of difference.80
In Europe in the late 1980s, Bertolomé and Lucile Benassar quoted

François Furet81 (who in the 1960s had addressed the problem of rein-
tegrating the subaltern classes into history and reconstructing their social
history)82:
Modern history reinstates him (the lower class man) in the human story
only in the statistical sense, but he remains silent …the lower classes […]
illiterates, and the marginalised […] have left few traces in the written
history of precapitalistic societies, usually produced by a country priest or
by a philanthropic intellectual.83
One of the outcomes is André Zysberg’s attempt to chart the life con-
ditions of 60,000 convicts in French galleys between 1680 and 1784.84
Despite the production through research of a significant volume of new
quantitative data on European slavery, it remains difficult to put for-
ward national or continental estimations of the phenomenon. Spanish
scholars have made the most progress in this regard, but Italian histo-
riography still lags behind. The only historian to propose quantitative
data for Italy is the pioneer of slavery studies, Salvatore Bono. Bono
approximates that between 1.5 and 2.5 million people lived in an
unfree condition in Europe between 1500 and 1700.85 In his recent
book Schiavi—in which he analyses Mediterranean slavery in the con-
text of the slave market, slave life, conversions and returns to free-
dom—Bono estimates the involvement of around 7 million people in
the Mediterranean trade, including European slaves, Africans of colour,
Muslims and others between the sixteenth century and the nineteenth
century.86
Recently, however, in a case study of Livorno, Guillaume Calafat and

Cesare Santus too proposed that slaves accounted for 10% of the entire
urban population between 1600 and 1750.87 While we have moved
on somewhat from this approach, looking instead to individual cases
and seeking to reconstruct life trajectories, quantitative methods retain
their value. Current research on Mediterranean slavery emphasises cul-
tural aspects that better demonstrate the phenomena of hybridism and
exchange than a master and subject binary approach, including in the
colonial dimension with all its conflicts. We no longer use the word “cre-
olization” to refer to metissage on Mediterranean coasts. But Atlantic
colonialism and nineteenth-century imperialism are not necessarily com-
parable to the episodes of Mediterranean colonialism and conquest.
While Venetian expansionism in the Levant and Ottoman expansion-
ism did not have the dimensions of British and French activities, they
did carry imperial qualities, including internalisation of the master-ruled
dynamic. However, in the Mediterranean area the relationship between
Western Europe and the Barbary States in terms of privateering and cap-
tivity was always reciprocal.88
Tracing life histories is important also in order to understand that
not all the Muslims in the Italian area were slaves and that, as a con-
sequence, baptismal sources alone are not enough to conclude on the
basis of an original Arab name that we are dealing with a slave, although
the word “slave” is generally used.89 There is no equivalent for slaves or
unfree people in the Italian area of the memoir produced by Olaudah
Equiano—the nearest we can find are epistolary sources. In any case,
multiple sources are necessary to reconstruct a full biography or even
meaningful fragments of a life. Alì the Turk and many others represent
only a small cohort in the work that remains to be done on the great
mass of slaves in the Italian area. For this reason too, this book cov-
ers a broad chronology, from the mid-eighteenth century to the mid-
nineteenth century.
1.4 A Problem of Definition: Slaves, Captives

and Servants
Slavery, captivity and serfdom are words that we use commonly in his-
torical research, even if they are continuously questioned by historians
of slavery in every period. The meaning of these words has changed over
time, and while there are clearly connections between ancient slavery and
14 G. BONAZZA
colonial slavery, they are by no means identical. Nonetheless, the slav-

ery of the ancients, especially that of the late Roman Empire, was closely
replicated by some forms of serfdom in the Early Medieval period and
then in the Early Modern period. Therefore, some questions arise: What
is slavery? Who is a captive? What is serfdom?
In the context of the Mediterranean in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries, it is not always clear from the sources which form of “slavery”
we are dealing with. The juridical status of a slave, for instance, should
theoretically have a strict definition. During the period when juridical
abolitions were taking place, however, the juridical status of slaves was
in flux. The varied taxonomy employed in the sources is a further com-
plicating factor, making it tricky to pinpoint slaves. This awkwardness is
accentuated by the fluctuations inherent in a time of great change, dur-
ing which slavery seemed set to be eradicated. Quoting the exemplary
words of Arnaldo Momigliano in Moses I. Finley’s Schiavitù nel mondo
antico:
What the majority of researchers are now trying to do, is to describe the
situation of slaves in the context of individual societies, and to understand
how it was possible to separate slaves from freemen. This means, in turn,
understanding the degrees and types of slavery.90
This statement dates back around thirty years but remains extremely cur-
rent. The problem is not simply a philological one, but demands a full
understanding of who slaves really were and the forms of coercion they
suffered.
In the book, I apply Fontenay’s definition of the difference between
slave and captive, according to which the purchasing of the slave is based
on the usage value of his labour as opposed to his trade value, while the
exchange/ransom price is the key point in the context of the captive.
For this reason, we refer to the prix de la liberté of the captive, because
everything revolves around the ransom. The prisoner in this case does
not play a passive role; rather, he tries to facilitate the ransom in any way
possible and will sometimes implant himself in the new society if this is
the best way to achieve freedom or better living conditions. Therefore,
we could deduce that captivity is a transitory condition of slavery, from
which the slave, theoretically, will be freed by intermediaries, whether
redemption institutions, private interests or relatives. The captive is obvi-
ously a unit of labour when he is enslaved, if only a temporary unit.91
In the analysis of the cases of slavery I found, I prefer to use the

generic word “slave”, although I sometimes list cases of captives, because
rarely can I be sure that these captives were later freed. Specifically in
Rome and Naples, I found many cases of baptised slaves who were sub-
sequently inserted in their new community as servants, or who remained
as slaves and were employed in various tasks, for example as soldiers in
Sant’Angelo Castle or as labourers on the Civitavecchia building site. In
order to better understand the historical evolution of the word “slave”
and its meaning in relation to serfdom and captivity, I will start with the
first appearance of the word itself in European language. A slave in the
Roman world was a servus, and in the Early Middle ages, when slaves
were mainly prisoners of war, the same word servus was used in the slave
trade.
The word sclavus spread in the Italian area from the twelfth century,
carrying the nowadays generic meaning of slave, in order to define the
Slavic origin of many slaves in the late Middle Ages.92 The philological
origin of the word has been extensively debated, as Charles Verlinden
demonstrated in summarising the various positions adopted by histori-
ans and philologists on this point. According to A. Brachet, the word
sclavus was documented in the tenth century in reference to Slavic slaves,
specifically prisoners taken by Charlemagne. From the tenth century, the
word acquired the meaning of servant, without distinction of nation-
alities. The historian A. Scheler assumes that the word originated with
Slavic prisoners enslaved by Ottone the Great, while G. Koertin argues
that it came from Byzantine Greek.93 Other scholars dated its appearance
to thirteenth-century France and noted it as deriving from the late Latin
sclavu =slave. Beyond the theoretical enslavement of Slavic populations
by Germans, it is thought that the word acquired its current meaning
when Venetians started to plunder people from Slavic territories.94 It
could well originate from the Byzantine Greek “sclavus”, which referred
to slaves sold in Eastern markets: juridically, these were just bodied, tà
sómata in Greek, owned by a master. Slaves did not have a juridical per-
sonality, according to a timeless organisational matrix, even if they occa-
sionally had some rights.95
In the ancient world too, it was difficult to understand what a
slave was and what distinguished a slave from a non-slave employee.96
According to the ancients, slavery had not always existed and was not
present in all the known world. There were two regions in central Greece
(Locris and Fokida), for instance, where slavery was not practised until
16 G. BONAZZA
the second half of the fourth century B.C. Of the many words that were
commonly used in Greece in order to identify a slave, dmōs was the
most used in Homer’s era but disappeared thereafter. Only two Greek
words specifically identify the slave: doulos and andrapodon. The for-
mer expresses juridical opposition to free status, while the latter literally
means “man with paws”. Other words identify free men and women who
are in a dependent position, specifically the servant (therapōn) and the
domestic worker (oiketēs).97
In the Latin lexicon, the words servus and mancipium identify the
slave. Only mancipium has a juridical value and identifies the property
rights of another person.98 Therefore, in the ancient world, a man could
be a slave but also possess the juridical status of freeman, such as in the
case of the iloti in the Spartan territories. So, it is difficult to discern slav-
ery from serfdom. In the ancient world, slaves usually came from abroad.
Another peculiar element was the adoption of the master’s name, even if
the slave did not take the patronymic or the surname. The name would
sometimes indicate membership of an ethnic group.99 Furthermore,
according to Athenian jurisprudence on serfdom, the slave, given that
he did not have a juridical personality, could not give legal testimony,
although slave testimony was admitted into proceedings in certain excep-
tional circumstances. For example, if the family where a slave worked was
accused of a homicide or a crime, the slave, being part of the family, was
also charged. In this case, he could swear according to a sacred right,
rather than a juridical right, as a member of the house.100 The hiring of
slave labour from a third party was a common phenomenon in Athens.
In the fourth century B.C., there were a great number of slaves living
outside their masters’ houses. They performed independent activities
while making an annual payment to their master. The hiring of slaves for
external work also occurred in Greek-Roman Egypt, although slavery
in Hellenistic Egypt, especially in the countryside, was very different to
Athenian slavery.101
In the Greek world, war and piracy were important in the supply
of slaves/prisoners, but commerce was the greatest source of slavery.
Among the models in place were communitarian serfdom and mobile
slavery. Local populations, with Greek or non-Greek origins, who were
enslaved by bordering Greek communities, composed the first group.
Mobile slavery, on the other hand, involved people uprooted from
their original communities: they were owned objects without any right
or protection. Frequently, slaves belonging to this group were named
“barbarians”.102 According to the French historians Jean Andreau and

Raymond Descat, ancient societies were slave societies and not societies
with slaves. This characterisation was based on the number of slaves in
societies and the continuous renewal of those numbers.103
In the Roman world, slavery was a well-established practice, but the
debate is open on how slavery became serfdom or servitude in the latter
period of the Empire. Historiography asserts that slavery endured in the
early Middle Ages. Marc Bloch suggested that slaves seemed to be more
numerous at this point than in the first phase of the Empire, and many
subsequent historians have confirmed his thesis.104 In fact, in the Italian
area in the fourth century, there was a change in agriculture from an
owner-occupier model to tenancy arrangements, but the change was not
so marked that it negated the need for slave labour. Great landed estates
included manors where both slaves and free salaried manpower worked.
From the seventh century, the slave trade was supplied not only by
external wars, but from internal “stocks” procured through kidnapping
and featuring victims of poverty. In late antiquity, the false notion of a
scarcity of slaves probably rested on evidence of “domiciled” or “with
a house” slaves (casarii), who were therefore better treated. Masters
thought that better living conditions would lead slaves to procreate in
greater numbers.105 The question of how slaves and dependent workers
were assimilated and transformed into land servants during the Middle
Ages remains unanswered. As we mentioned, slaves sometimes lived on
landed estates (casarii) but they could also be free renters of the land
(coloni). Coloni notionally became slaves (or servi terrae, land servants)
at the end of the fourth century, because they were subjected to growing
pressure from landowners and the State to pay tax, the aim being to limit
their freedom of movement.
These definitions are brief because the terminology of the juridical
norms themselves is unclear and because every small area had its own
peculiar forms of slavery.106 For example, the word mancipium was used
to identify slaves in the late Empire but it also had a broader significance.
In the Digesto, it meant slave but also included coloni. In the late Empire,
Coloni were legally free and could sell their sons and wives as slaves. In
turn, these sons and wives would regain their freedom after a set time. A
man could even enslave himself in order to find a job.107
Medieval servants were men tied to the land, according to nineteenth-
century historiography, and they descended directly from the coloni of
the late Empire. Land servitude actually differed from slavery because
18 G. BONAZZA
the servant was not completely at the disposal of his master, and it also
differed from the colonato, because the land servant was not directly tied
to the land, as Marc Bloch mistakenly assumed. Verlinden demonstrated
that slaves were not simply substituted by land servants; slaves continued
to exist and they were different from land servants who, in turn, were
different from coloni.108 Forms of serfdom in medieval Italy were spe-
cific. For example, in the eighth and ninth centuries in Lombardic Italy
there were trade slaves and punishment slaves, and they were mainly
domestic workers employed in the house of the master.109 The price of
the slave changed according to his estimated labour value. Liutprando
maintained the king’s to confiscate a woman who married along with her
slave husband.110
On the market of slaves and captives in the medieval Mediterranean,
the historian Youval Rotman asserts that it is not possible to dis-
cern slaves and captives in terms of their use value or exchange value,
as can be done for the Early Modern period.111 From the eighth cen-
tury, Byzantium granted itself monopoly of the slave trade in the
Mediterranean, blocking the selling of slaves to Arab merchants. Arabs
were forced to compensate for the loss of this option with piracy.
Therefore, slaves were pillaged not for an exchange or for their ransom
value, but really for their value as manpower. Moreover, in the Middle
Ages it seems that a slave was more worth than a captive, so it was more
convenient to sell a captive as a slave rather than begin a negotiation
for a ransom.112 Ransom values should be calculated in relation to the
purchasing power of the Byzantine market and of Fatimid Egypt, which
were not comparable to the purchasing power of religious brotherhoods.
In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, Franciscans, Trinitarians and
Mercedarians started to play a role as intermediaries in ransoms between
the European powers and cities in North Africa.113 Yann Moulier-
Boutang dates the first use of “black” captives to 1453 and the conquest
of Constantinople by the Venetians. Before the Atlantic colonies became
the main destination for black slaves, they would be used alongside free
workers to cultivate sugar in the Mediterranean islands of the Venetian
Empire.114
The landscape of serfdom and slavery was as varied in the Middle
Ages as it was in the Early Modern period. It is important to remember
the difference between serfdom and slavery, even if it was largely theoret-
ical. Servants could not be purchased on the market; rather, they estab-
lished themselves in an agricultural area and ensured their continuing
presence by having their children follow in their footsteps. Their agri-

cultural product went primarily to the landowner but it also sustained
them and their offspring. Therefore, their productivity had to be greater
than that of the slave, whose working hours and services were fixed.
According to the Marxist anthropologist Meillassoux, however, slavery
was more profitable than serfdom: “Slavery accumulation and growth
depend on capture and purchase capacities, there are variables (such as
war and trade) that allow for a more flexible and rapid pace of reproduc-
tion and (human) resources’ growth than natural population growth”.115
My research covers cases of slaves and captives under the generic term
“slave”. I will also quote many semantic expressions from the sources,
including Turkish, Moor, Black and Levantine and explain their nuances
as far as possible. The historical semantic of slavery is fundamental to go
further in research on slavery: “On the other hand, taking the variety of
words used to refer to slaves into account, it is possible to draw conclu-
sions on the social standing of slaves and their relation-ship with other
groups”.116
1.5 Slavery in a Local Setting: The Case of the

Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Rome, Genoa and Livorno
The numerous publications on slavery in the pre-unitarian Italian states
have a common trait: they end their coverage with the eighteenth cen-
tury, rarely venturing into the nineteenth century or fully considering its
archival sources, perhaps under the impression that slavery was largely
eradicated. These studies also lack an appropriate institutional-juridical
context, with the exception of the articles of Raffaella Sarti and Roberto
Benedetti.117
The aim of this book is to build on the existing literature, which often
concentrates on the Early Modern period,118 in order to demonstrate the
continued existence of cases of slavery into the first half of the nineteenth
century. These cases, while limited in number, should not be neglected.
In the context of geopolitics, it is important to understand if the inter-
national abolitionist campaign against the overseas slavery of the colo-
nial powers, produced in the pre-unitarian Italian states an effective and
immediate suppression of the various forms of slavery.119 My hypothe-
sis is that forms of slavery survived for an extended spell in the Italian
area as well as in other territories. In this sense, the aim is to identify
whether there was a connection between the juridical abolition of slavery
20 G. BONAZZA
in Italian states and international juridical rulings on the abolition of the

various slave trades.120
Archival research on the Kingdom of Sicily, Kingdom of Naples and
after Kingdom of the Two Sicilies covered Palermo, Naples and Caserta.
The historiography of slavery in Sicily features Matteo Gaudioso, who
in the late 1970s published La schiavitù domestica in Sicilia dopo i nor
manni.121 Gaudioso’s book retraced the juridical progress of slavery
and included some analysis on the first half of the nineteenth century.
Gaudioso’s key assertion was that slavery in Sicily was not abolished
because of royal orders but came to a more organic end.122 He notes
that in 1812 a Giunta di Presidenti met in order to deliberate on the
conditions of a slave of the Prince of Petrulla, and that a case of slav-
ery seems to have been perceived as a rarity. Gaudioso suggests that
the judges dealing with this case in 1812 were working only from pub-
lic memory as opposed to personal experience. The only other case of
slavery he cites was in Messina in 1790 but archival sources demonstrate
that slavery could not be considered as a rarity at this point; for exam-
ple, there were 55 Algerian slaves in Palermo in 1808.123 In the preface
to the first edition of his book, Gaudioso refers to D’Avolio’s work. In
1888, D’Avolio estimated that slaves accounted for between 1 and 1.5%
of the Sicilian population in the sixteenth century.124 Maurice Aymard
noted that the proportion of slaves in a given locality varied from 1 to
10% in the mid-sixteenth century. Salvatore Bono too, looking at differ-
ent Sicilian cities, supported Aymard’s findings.125 So these figures are
all quite consistent. Giuseppe Bonaffini’s examination of the Sicilian mis-
sion in Algiers in the early nineteenth century is interesting not only for
his research on the archival collection of the Redenzione dei cattivi (the
institution that managed the ransom of Christian slaves in the Barbary
States), but also because it demonstrates the continuance of the bilat-
eral privateering war up to 1811.126 In particular, Bonaffini refers to the
capture by the frigate “Venere” of an Algerian xebec with 62 men on
board in 1808. Bonaffini focuses on Christian slaves in Algiers, however,
so he does not consider the Sicily situation.127 Following Bonaffini’s
lead, Fabrizio D’Avenia studied Sicilian slaves in the Barbary regen-
cies in the period 1800–1830.128 Among the other historians who have
analysed the problem of slavery in Sicily, we must consider the work of
Mirella Mafrici, Giovanni Marrone and the already quoted Giovanna
Fiume. Fiume has concentrated on the Palermitan deputation and on
the Redenzione dei Cattivi, and recently on some letters produced
by captives themselves. However, she too focused mainly on Christian

rather than Muslim captivity.129
The leading authority on slavery cases in Naples is Giovanna
Boccadamo.130 In Tra Croce e Mezzaluna, she reconstructs the landscape
of slavery in Naples using the data collected by Verlinden and Monti
from Holy Office trial sources and baptismal registers. The majority of
cases dated from the late sixteenth century to the late seventeenth cen-
tury. After 1664, it seems that competences on baptisms were trans-
ferred to the parish priest of the cathedral were no longer the concern
of the Arciconfraternita della dottrina Cristiana.131 Boccadamo uti-
lised a baptismal register, which Gennaro Nardi had worked on in the
1960s, to address questions of slavery in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries.132 Boccadamo also located another register starting in 1803
and continuing into the twentieth century; she notes five cases of
nineteenth-century slavery featuring black slaves but the actual numbers
(as we will see later in this book) were much higher.133 Rosita D’Amora
recently published on the ransom of Christian slaves thanks to the Pio
Monte della Misericordia of Naples, especially ransoms in the geographi-
cal territory of the Ottoman Empire. And while my work does not focus
on the Christian slavery, D’Amora’s work reveal the full richness of the
archival collection of this private Neapolitan institution. It has been use-
ful for finding cases of slaves in Naples too.134
The historiography of slavery in Caserta is summarised, the histori-
ography of slavery in the Palace of Caserta is summarised by Ugo Della
Monica, while Maurizio Crispino covers Muslim slaves and Riccardo del
Prete and Nathalie Jaulain completed a project financed by the European
Commission for the European Voluntary Service, namely Schiavi a
Caserta. La vita, i lavori, il contributo delle schiere di lavoratori musulm
ani by.135 In the Palace of Caserta, there was a dedicated slave quarter,
the Ercole quarter, and slaves had their own chapel. Sources I reviewed
give the names of baptised slaves and detailed descriptions of their work
and earnings. For example, Volume Decimo 2º Delle Cautele del Sig. D
Mattiangelo Forgione Tesoriere del Real Stato di Caserta per l’anno da
Settembre 1780 a tutto Agosto 1781 contains “Nota de Schiavi che hano
travagliato in questo Real Boschetto in aver assistito alla Gran Peschiera
Nuovo Canale, e Castello del dì 27 Agosto a tutti lì 2 novembre 1780
Caserta” (Annotation of the slaves who worked in this royal enclave,
participating in the great fishery, the new channel and the castle from
22 G. BONAZZA
August 27 to November 2, 1780, Caserta).136 This facilitates detailed

research on this geographical area.
Slavery in Rome and Civitavecchia—within the Papal States—is inves-
tigated in the broader context of Mediterranean slavery.137 Research ini-
tiated by Salvatore Bono on slavery in Rome in the Early Modern period
has recently been taken up by others. With the exception of Wipertus
Rudt de Collenberg, however, scholars have still not paid due attention
to the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.138 The sources held in
the Casa dei Catecumeni (House of the Catechumens) in Rome, how-
ever, reveal that twelve Muslim slaves were baptised between 1801
and 1815, while eighteenth-century registers indicate at least 306 bap-
tisms. It was mostly men who were baptised (284 compared to 22
women), and 25 baptisms involved free men: so, 281 slaves were bap-
tised in Rome during the eighteenth century.139 The peculiarity of slav-
ery in Rome is closely linked to religion and conversions specifically.
Conversions show how the dominant promoted integration on the one
hand and coerced slaves on the other: the purpose could be to highlight
difference or to force a change of religion even if it was only superficial
and hid a continuing devotion to the original faith. After all, the concept
of identity itself is ephemeral, to quote Bernard Vincent and Jocelyne
Dakhlia, making it necessary to go “beyond identity”.140
Serena di Nepi’s work on Rome and Civitavecchia mainly focused on
the identification of slavery cases up to the end of the seventeenth cen-
tury. Roberto Benedetti added a juridical dimension to his contributions
but he does not deal with the nineteenth century.141 Finally, Domenico
Rocciolo too, in the wake of De Collenberg, proceeded from the sources
in the House of Catechumens in Rome. He refers to the wish of a
Civitavecchia slave, Alì from Tunis, to be baptised in 1725.142
Looking to Genoa, we must acknowledge Luigi Tria’s volume from
the mid-twentieth century as well as the research of Giulio Giacchero
and a conference contribution by Salvatore Bono from Rapporti Genova-
Mediterraneo-Atlantico nell’età moderna.143 Bono furnishes proofs of
the capture of 46 slaves on an Algerian xebec by a Genoese Capitana
ship. Another 58 prisoners were taken in 1788 but according to Bono,
there were only 68 Algerian and Tunisian slaves in Genoa when they
obtained freedom with the proclamation of the Democratic Republic.144
The archival collection Magistrato delle galee, housed in Genoa’s
State Archives, reveals that there were around 160 slaves, at least until
1793.145
Finally, for Livorno, the last geographical area I analysed, relevant

literature includes part of Renzo Toaff’s chapter in a collection edited
by Salvatore Bono and an article by Cesare Santus. But no attention
has been paid to slavery in late eighteenth-century Livorno. Santus
concludes his study in the seventeenth century, and Toaff also focused
mainly on the seventeenth century, making only brief references to the
eighteenth century.146 Santus, however, did shed new light on the role
of the Inquisition in Livorno’s bagno (slave prison); at the end of the
seventeenth century, the Holy Office appointed a commissioner to the
bagno. In converting slaves, Capuchin missionaries could discipline oars-
men at tribunals of faith. Santus further details some aspects of everyday
life, such as the presence of enchained slaves. But Bono asserts that the
condition of the Muslim slaves in Livorno was not as bad as in other
Italian states. Francesco Pero highlights a case of a slave in Livorno in
1758 in Curiosità Livornesi.147 In order to contextualise cases of slavery
in Livorno in my period of interest, including the Napoleonic era and
the Restoration, Daniela Manetti and Luca Lo Basso’s respective contri-
butions provide valuable insights into the international dynamics at play
in the Mediterranean and Livorno’s role therein.148
To conclude this overview of the traditional historiography of slavery
and the introduction of new perspectives, I want to summarise the aims
of this book and to signpost how it will make an innovative contribu-
tion to the field by highlighting and analysing previously unknown but
verifiable cases of slavery in the Italian area in the latter half of the eight-
eenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century. These cases
will be presented from both a Mediterranean and transnational perspec-
tive. Finally, I will reconstruct, as far as the sources permit, the juridical
context of the juridical abolitions of slavery in the Italian area and of the
bilateral treaties on the abolition of the Mediterranean trade between the
Italian Pre-Unitarian states and the European powers.
Notes
1. Myriam Cottias, “‘L’oubli du passé’ contre la ‘citoyenneté’: troc et
ressentiment à la Martinique (1848–1946),” in Cinquante ans de
départementalisation, ed. Fred Constant and Justin Daniel (Paris:
L’Harmattan, 1998), 295–299.
2. Nelly Schmidt, Abolitionnistes de l’esclavages et réformateurs des colonies,
1820–1851. Analyse et documents (Paris: Karthala, 2000).
24 G. BONAZZA
3. Robin Blackburn, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery (1776–1848)

(London: Verso, 1988).
4. Salvatore Bono, “Schiavi in Europa nell’età moderna. Varietà di forme e
di aspetti,” in Schiavitù e servaggio nell’economia europea secc. XI–XVIII
[Serfdom and Slavery in the European Economy: 11th–18th Centuries],
ed. Simonetta Cavaciocchi (Firenze: Firenze University Press, 2014),
309–335, 315.
5. Gabriele Turi, Schiavi in un mondo libero. Storia dell’emancipazione
dall’età moderna a oggi (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2012), 21–56.
6. Hakan Y. Erdem, Slavery in the Ottoman Empire and Its Demise, 1800–
1909 (Basingstoke and London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1996), xviii.
7. Chouki El-Hamel, Black Marocco: A History of Slavery, Race, and Islam
(Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 3.
8. Paolo Jedlowski, “Memoria e interazioni sociali,” in Memoria e Saperi.
Percorsi transdisciplinari, ed. Elena Agazzi and Vita Fortunati (Roma:
Meltemi editore, 2007), 37.
9. Myriam Cottias, Elisabeth Cunin, and Antonio De Almeida Mendes,
ed., Les traites et les esclavages. Perspectives historiques et contemporaines
(Paris: Karthala, 2010); Olivier Pétré-Grenouilleau, Les traites négrières.
Essai d’histoire globale (Paris: Gallimard, 2004); see also by the same
author: “Flux et reflux, permanences et mutations à travers les âges,”
in Dictionnaire des esclavages, ed. Olivier Pétré-Grenouilleau (Paris:
Larousse, 2010), 35–40.
10. Jocelyne Dakhlia and Bernard Vincent, ed., Les musulmans dans l’histoire de
l’Europe, vol. 1, Une intégration invisible (Paris: Albin Michel, 2011), 10.
11. On the interconnections between Atlantic and Mediterranean slavery,
see José Antonio Martinez Torres, “L’esclavage en Méditerranée et
dans l’Atlantique nord (1571–1700). Brève histoire et comparaison,”
in Les esclavages en Méditerranée. Espaces et dynamiques économiques,
ed. Fabienne P. Guillén and Salah Trabelsi (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez,
2012), 141–150; N. Matar, British Captives from the Mediterranean to
the Atlantic, 1563–1770 (Leiden: Brill, 2014); S. Hanb and J. Schiel,
ed., Mediterranean Slavery Revisited (Zürich: Chronos Verlag, 2014).
12. We will return to the definitions of slavery and captivity. See, in this
respect, Michel Fontenay, “Esclaves et/ou captifs. Préciser les con-
cepts,” in Le Commerce des captifs. Les intermédiaires dans l’échange et le
rachat des prisonniers en Méditerranée, XV e–XVIIIe siècle, ed. Wolfgang
Kaiser (Rome: École française de Rome, 2008), 28–29.
13. Seymour Drescher, Econocide: British Slavery in the Era of Abolition
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1977/2010).
14. Zoë Laidlaw, Colonial Connections 1815–45: Patronage, the Information
Revolution and Colonial Government (Manchester and New York:
Manchester University Press, 2005).
15. David Beck Ryden, West Indian Slavery and British Abolition, 1783–
1807 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).
16. David Eltis and David Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade
(New Haven and London: Yale University, 2010).
17. Herbert S. Klein, The Atlantic Slave Trade (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2010).
18. Robin Blackburn, The Making of New World Slavery, from the Baroque to
the Modern, 1492–1800 (London and New York: Verso, 1997/2010).
19. Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (1944), trans. Luca Trevisani,
Capitalismo e schiavitù (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1971).
20. Blackburn, The Making of New World Slavery, 7.
21. Robert C. Davis, Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters: White Slavery in the
Mediterranean, the Barbary Coast, and Italy, 1500–1800 (New York:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2003).
22. Gillian Weiss, Captives and Corsairs: France and Slavery in Early Modern
Mediterranean (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011).
23. Davis, Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters, 3–26. In his PhD thesis, Yacine
Daddi-Addoun criticised Davis’ approach. From Daddi-Addoun’s per-
spective, Davis’ level of indignation and frustration with the post-
colonial approach that compared the living conditions of white slaves to
those of other categories of the European population or convicts was
not merited: Yacine Daddi-Addoun, L’abolition de l’esclavage en Algérie:
1816–1871, PhD thesis under the supervision of Professor Paul Lovejoy,
Toronto, York University, March 2010, 47.
24. Maria Fusaro, Colin Heywood, and Mohamed-Salah Omri, Trade and
Cultural Exchange in the Early Modern Mediterranean, Braudel’s
Maritime Legacy (London and New York: Tauris Publishers, 2010).
25. Godfrey Fisher, Barbary Legend: War, Trade and Piracy in North Africa,
1415–1830 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957); Linda Colley, Captives:
Britain, Empire and the World, 1600–1850 (London: Jonathan Cape,
2002).
26. Fisher, Barbary Legend, 270–287.
27. Fisher, Barbary Legend, 326–327.
28. Daddi-Addoun, L’abolition de l’esclavage, 40–63.
29. See also the recent conclusion by Salvatore Bono in his article, “Schiavi
in Europa nell’età moderna. Varietà di forme e di aspetti,” 335.
30. See, for example, Giovanna Fiume, “L’impossibile riscatto di Aly del
Marnegro, ‘Turco vero’,” Quaderni Storici 140 (2012): 386. On rec-
iprocity, see Salvatore Bono, “Schiavi maghrebini in Italia e cristiani
nel Maghreb. Proteste e attestazioni per la reciprocità di trattamento,”
Africa 49 (1994): 331–351.
31. Ismael M. Montana, The Abolition of Slavery in Ottoman Tunisia
(Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2013), Chapters 6–7.
26 G. BONAZZA
32. Ehud R. Toledano, The Ottoman Slave Trade and Its Suppression: 1840–
1890 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1982), 9.
33. Maximiliano Barrio Gozalo, Esclavos y Cautivos. Conflicto entre la
Cristiandad y el Islam en el siglo XVIII (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y
Léon/Consejéria de Cultura y Turismo, 2006), 9.
34. In fact, the author speaks about a “manque de sources…C’est ainsi
qu’un voile pudique recouvre à ce jour, un drame de trois cents ans,
cimbien poignant par les douleurs ressenties, les misères engendrées
et les déchéances physiques et morales supportées par des milliers de
gens de ce pays. On ne peut se contenter de quelques allusions, sans
grand profit, et etre inondé de toute une littérature toujours à la mode
rabachant sans cesse la captivité des chrétiens. L’Histoire a souvent
manqué d’objectivité et de juste mesure quand il s’agit de rapports
algéro-européens,” Moulay Belhamissi, Les captifs algériens et l’Europe
chrétienne (1518–1830) (Alger: ENAL, 1988), 10. Already in 1964
Salvatore Bono wrote: “Besides the Christian slavery in Barbary states,
there was Muslim slavery in European states, although it was on a much
smaller scale. Sources are few, however, and it has been overlooked in
the hiostoriography”; Salvatore Bono, I corsari barbareschi (Torino:
ERI, 1964), 11.
35. Alessandro Stella, Histoires d’esclaves dans la péninsule Ibérique (Paris:
Editions de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, 2000).
36. Stella, Histoires d’esclaves, 13. Salvatore Bono supports the same thesis
on the employment of slaves in productive activities: he dates the dis-
covery of the phenomenon by historiography to the 1970s and 1980s.
See Bono, Schiavi in Europa, 309–335.
37. On these issues, see Chapter 2, “Devenir esclave,” in Stella, Histoires
d’esclaves, 43–79.
38. Myriam Cottias, Alessandro Stella, and Bernard Vincent, Esclavage et
dépendances serviles (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2006).
39. Aurelia Martin Casares, Esclavitud, Mestizaje y abolicionismo en los mun
dos hispánicos (Granada: Editorial Universidad de Granada, 2015); José
Miguel López García, “El mercado de esclavos en Madrid a finales del
antiguo régimen, 1701–1830,” Historia Social 85 (2006): 45–62.
40. Cecilia Tarruell, “La captivité chrétienne de longue durée en
Méditerranée (fin XVIe-début XVIIe siècle),” Cahiers de la Méditerranée
87 (2013), http://cdlm.revues.org/7175 (consulted on 14 June
2015). See also her PhD thesis, Circulations et échanges en méditerranée
occidentale: la monarchie hispanique, la France et la Barbarie à l’épo
que de Philippe II, under the supervision of Professor Bernard Vincent
(EHESS) and Professor Andrés Robres of the Unversidad Autonoma
de Madrid, 20 November 2015. I want to thank Cecilia for interesting
exchanges on the problem of Mediterranean slavery and for her advice

during my time at the EHESS.
41. Antonio De Almeida Mendes, “Le premier atlantique portugais entre
deux Méditerranées (XVe–XVIe siècles). Comment les Africains ont
développé le Vieux Monde,” in Les esclavages en Méditerranée, ed.
Guillén and Trabelsi, 152.
42. Antonio De Almeida Mendes, “Musulmans et mouriscos du Portugal
au XVIe siècle,” in Les musulmans dans l’histoire de l’Europe. Tome I.
Une intégration invisible, ed. Jocelyne Dakhlia and Bernard Vincent
(Paris: Albin Michel, 2011), 143–158.
43. De Almeida Mendes, “Musulmans et mouriscos du Portugal au XVIe
siècle,” 155.
44. Dakhlia and Vincent, “Introduction,” in Les musulmans dans l’histoire de
l’Europe, ed. Dakhlia and Vincent, 11.
45. Wolfgang Kaiser, ed., Le Commerce des captifs. Les intermédiaires dans
l’échange et le rachat des prisonniers en Méditerranée, XVe–XVIIIe siècle
(Rome: École française de Rome, 2008), 4.
46. Wolfgang Kaiser and Guillaume Calafat, “The Economy of Ransoming
in the Early Modern Mediterranean: A form of Cross-Cultural Trade
Between Southern Europe and the Maghreb (Sixteenth to Eighteenth
Centuries),” in Religion and Trade: Cross-Cultural Exchanges, ed.
Trivellato, Halevi, and Antunes, 108–130.
47. Giuliana Boccadamo, “I ‘redentori’ napoletani: mercanti, religiosi,
rinnegati,” in Le Commerce des captifs, ed. Kaiser, 219–230; Rosita
D’Amora, “Il Pio Monte della Misericordia di Napoli e l’Opera della
Redenzione dei Cattivi nella prima metà del XVII secolo,” in Le
Commerce des captifs, ed. Kaiser, 231–250.
48. Luca Lo Basso, “Il prezzo della libertà: l’analisi dei libri contabili del
Magistrato per il riscatto degli Schiavi della Repubblica di Genova
all’inizio del XVIII secolo,” in Le Commerce des captifs, 267–282;
Giuseppe Bonaffini, “Intermediari del riscatto degli schiavi siciliani nel
Mediterraneo (secoli XVII–XIX),” in Le Commerce des captifs, 251–266.
49. Anne Brogini, “Intérmediaires de rachat laïcs et religieux à Malte aux
XVIe et XVIIe siècles,” in Le Commerce des captifs, 47–63.
50. Andrea Pelizza, Riammessi a respirare l’aria tranquilla. Venezia e il
riscatto degli schiavi in età moderna (Venezia: Istituto Veneto di Scienze,
Lettere ed Arti, 2013), IX–XXII.
51. Michele Bosco, Ragion di Stato e salvezza dell’anima. Il riscatto dei
cristiani captivi in Maghreb attraverso le redenzioni mercedarie (1575–
1725), PhD thesis under the supervision of Professor Lucia Felici
(Università di Firenze) and Professor Wolfgang Kaiser (EHESS), 27
April 2017. See also the PhD thesis of Andrea Zappia, Il Magistrato del
riscatto degli schiavi di Genova nel Settecento. Pratiche, reti, intermediari,
28 G. BONAZZA
under the supervision of Professor Luca Lo Basso (Università di

Genova), 19 April 2017.
52. Bruno Pomara, I Rifugiati. I moriscos e l’Italia (Firenze: Firenze
University Press, 2017).
53. Dakhlia and Vincent, “Introduction,” in Les musulmans dans l’histoire de
l’Europe, ed. Dakhlia and Vincent, 25.
54. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin
and Spread of Nationalism (London and New York: Verso, 2006), on
the religious communities, see especially, 12–19.
55. Giovanni Ricci, “Les derniers esclaves domestiques. Entre Ferrare,
Venise et Mantoue (XVe–XVIe siècle),” in Les musulmans dans l’histoire
de l’Europe, 448–449.
56. Raffaella Sarti, “Bolognesi schiavi dei «Turchi» e schiavi «Turchi»
a
Bologna tra Cinque e Settecento: Alterità etnico-religiosa e riduzione in
schiavitù,” Quaderni Storici 107 (2001): 437–473.
57. The group’s research findings have recently been published in the review
of the History Department of Rome’s Sapienza University: Serena Di
Nepi, ed., “Schiavi nelle terre del papa. Norme, rappresentazioni, prob-
lemi a Roma e nello Stato della Chiesa in età moderna,” Dimensioni e
problemi della ricerca storica 2 (2013): 2–271.
58. “Specifically, Pio V’s 1566 decree, already referred to, and a preceding
motu proprio published by Paolo III in 1535 but revoked in 1548”;
Serena Di Nepi, “Le Restitutiones ad libertatem di schiavi a Roma in
età moderna: prime note su un fenomeno trascurato (1516–1645),”
Dimensioni e problemi della ricerca storica 2 (2013): 27. On the motu
proprio, see Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna. Galeotti,
vu’ cumpra, domestici (Napoli: Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane, 1999),
482–484.
59. Di Nepi, “Le Restitutiones ad libertatem di schiavi a Roma in età mod-
erna: prime note su un fenomeno trascurato (1516–1645),” 41–44.
60. Roberto Benedetti, “Servi introvabili e schiavi visibili. Un’analisi delle
fonti giuridiche dello Stato della Chiesa (secoli XVI–XVIII),” in Schiavi
nelle terre del papa, ed. Di Nepi, 70.
61. Benedetti shows that Monsignor Alessandro Lante’s decree of 11 April
1806 resembles the regulation of the galleys issued a century before.
The only difference was the introduction of different domestic servitude
rules for Christian convicts and Muslim slaves. Convicts could not be
employed as domestic servants, although there were dispensations to the
decree. Benedetti used the State Archives of Rome, collection Camerale
III (Civitavecchia), b. 827, in “Servi introvabili e schiavi visibili,” 80.
62. Raffaella Sarti made a first attempt to reconstruct the juridical situ-
ation in various Italian states: R. Sarti, “Tramonto di schiavitù sulle
tracce degli ultimi schiavi presenti in Italia (secolo XIX),” in Alle rad
ici dell’Europa. Mori giudei e zingari nei paesi del Mediterraneo occiden
tale, vol. 2, sec. XVII–XIX, ed. Felice Gambin (Firenze: SEID, 2010),
281–297.
63. Progetto FIRB (2010–2014), Oltre la guerra Santa, location: Scuola
Normale Superiore di Pisa.
64. Giovanna Fiume, ed., “La schiavitù nel Mediterraneo,” Quaderni Storici
107, no. 2 (2001): 323–642.
65. Fiume, “Premessa,” in La schiavitù nel Mediterraneo, 333.
66. Fiume, L’impossibile riscatto di Aly del Marnegro, “turco vero”, 385–424.
The case of Aly raïs from Ferrara is also referred to at the beginning
of Bartolomé Bennassar and Lucile Bennassar’s majestic, Les Chrétiens
d’Allah. L’historie extraordinaire des renégats (XVIe–XVIIe siecle) (Paris:
Perrin, 1989), 78–109.
67. Marco Lenci, Corsari. Guerra, schiavi, rinnegati nel Mediterraneo
(Roma: Carocci, 2006).
68. Guillén and Trabelsi, ed., Les esclavages en Méditerranée; D. Brion
Davis, Challenging the Boundaries of Slavery (Cambridge and London:
Harvard University Press, 2003).
69. Alessandro Stanziani, “Esclaves et captifs en Russie et en Asie centrale
(XVIe–XIXe siècles),” in Les esclavages en Méditerranée, espace et dynami
ques économiques, ed. Guillén and Trabelsi (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez,
2012), 195–212.
70. Stanziani, Esclaves et captifs, 196.
71. Stanziani, Esclaves et captifs, 195
72. Guillén and Trabelsi, Introduction, 3.
73. See the chapter entitled “Lo schiavo e gli schiavi” in Turi, Schiavi in un
mondo libero, 89–123.
74. On microhistory, see G. Levi, L’eredità immateriale. Carriera di un eso
rcista nel Piemonte del seicento (Torino: Einaudi, 1985). On agency and
Subaltern Studies, see Ranajit Guha and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak,
Subaltern Studies. Modernità e (post)colonialismo, ed. Sandro Mezzadra
(Verona: Ombre Corte, 2002).
75. Marianna Scarfone, “La storiografia subalterna in prospettiva globale,”
Memoria e Ricerca, 40 (2012): 39.
76. For a reflection on the role of the individual in contemporary histori-
ography, see Christian Delacroix, “Acteur,” in Historiographies, ed.
Delacroix et al., 651–663.
77. Paolo Sorcinelli, Il quotidiano e i sentimenti. Viaggio nella storia sociale
(Milano: Bruno Mondadori, 1996), 6–7.
78. Giovanna Fiume, La vecchia dell’aceto. Un processo per veneficio nella
Palermo di fine Settecento (Palermo: Gelka, 1990), 16.
30 G. BONAZZA
79. Anna Lisa Tota, “Memoria, patrimonio culturale e discorso pubblico,” in

Memoria e Saperi. Percorsi transdisciplinari, ed. Elena Agazzi and Vita
Fortunati (Roma: Meltemi editore, 2007), 104–105.
80. Gayatri C. Spivak, “Subaltern Studies: decostruire la storiografia,” in
Subaltern Studies. Modernità e (post)colonialismo, ed. Sandro Mezzadra,
Ramachandra Guha, and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (partially trans.)
(Verona: Ombre Corte, 2002), 115.
81. B. Benassar and L. Benassar, Les Chrétiens d’Allah, 11. Translation from
French to English by the author.
82. Subjective renewal certainly characterises British social history from the
1960s, and E. P. Thompson is credited with inaugurating “History from
Below,” in The Making of the English Working Class (Harmondsworth:
Penguin, 1963/1968).
83. B. Bennassar and L. Bennassar, Les Chrétiens d’Allah, 11.
84. Andrea Zysberg, Les galériens. Vies et destins de 60.000 forçats sur les
galères de France 1680–1748 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1987).
85. Bono, “Schiavi in Europa nell’età moderna. Varietà di forme e di
aspetti,” 311. Bono in the last book, Schiavi, provides the number of
2,525,0000 slaves in Europe, 73.
86. Bono, Schiavi. Una storia mediterranea, 75.
87. Guillaume Calafat and Cesare Santus, “Les avatars du ‘Turc’. Esclaves et
commerçants musulmans à Livourne (1600–1750),” in Les musulmans
dans l’histoire, 481.
88. Dakhlia and Vincent, “Introduction,” 14–17.
89. Marina Caffiero, “Juifs et musulmans à Rome à l’époque moderne, entre
résistance, assimilation et mutations identitaires. Essai de comparaison,”
in Les musulmans dans l’histoire de l’Europe, 594.
90. Arnaldo Momigliano, “Presentazione,” in La schiavitù nel mondo antico,
ed. Moses Finley (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1990), XIII.
91. Michel Fontenay, “Esclaves et/ou captifs. Préciser les concepts,” 16.
92. Francesco Panero, Schiavi servi e villani nell’Italia medievale (Torino:
Paravia, 1999), 31.
93. Charles Verlinden, L’origine de Sclavus =esclave, Union Académique
International, Bruxelles, Belgique, 1942, http://hdl.handle.
net/2042/2834 (consulted on 2 February 2016), 97.
94. Verlinden, L’origine de Sclavus = esclave, 100. On the relationship between
Venice and the Slavs in the eighteenth century, see L. Wolff, Venice
and the Slavs: The Discovery of Dalmatia in the Age of Enlightenment
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001).
95. Myriam Cottias, “Esclavage et mondialisation,” in Dictionnaire des mon
dialisations, ed. Cynthia Ghorra-Gobin (Paris: Armand Colin, 2012).
96. Jean Andreau and Raymond Descat, Gli schiavi nel mondo greco e
romano, trans. Alessandro Pandolfi (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2009), 9.
97. Andreau and Descat, Gli schiavi nel mondo greco e romano, 14.
100. Louis Gernet, “Aspetti del diritto servile ateniese,” in Schiavitù antica
e moderna. Problemi, Storia, Istituzioni, ed. Livio Sichirollo (Napoli:
Guida Editori, 1979), 67.
101. Iza Biezunska-Malowist, “Il lavoro salariato degli schiavi nell’Egitto gre-
co-romano,” in Schiavitù antica e moderna. Problemi, Storia, Istituzioni,
ed. Livio Sichirollo (Napoli: Guida Editori, 1979), 111.
102. Yvon Garlan, “Guerra, pirateria e schiavitù nel mondo greco,” in La schi
avitù nel mondo antico, 10.
104. Charles Richard Whittaker, “I porci di Circe: dalla schiavitù alla servitù
della gleba nel basso Impero romano,” in La schiavitù nel mondo antico,
133.
105. Whittaker, I porci di Circe, 147.
106. Alessandro Cristofori, “Lavoro libero e non libero nel mondo romano:
quale libertà?,” in Libertà e coercizione: il lavoro in una prospettiva di
lungo periodo ed. Giulia Bonazza and Giulio Ongaro (Palermo: New
Digital Frontiers, 2018).
109. On the lexicon of dependence and serfdom in this source (servants,
mancipium, massaro, aldion, esclaves), see Laurent Feller, “Autour de
la liberté personnelle au VIIIe siècle: les dépendants des Totoneschi,” in
Les transferts patrimoniaux, III, ed. Stefano Gasparri and Maria Cristina
La Rocca (Padova: 2003) at the moment available in the on line review
“Reti Medievali,” 8–9.
110. Laurent Feller, “Autour de la liberté personnelle au VIIIe siècle: les
dépendants des Totoneschi,” 13.
111. Youval Rotman, “Entre marché d’esclaves et marché de captifs en
Méditerranée Médiévale,” in Les esclavages en Méditerranée, 25.
112. Rotman, “Entre marché d’esclaves et marché de captifs en Méditerranée
Médiévale,” 45.
113. Rotman, “Entre marché d’esclaves et marché de captifs en Méditerranée
Médiévale,” 39.
114. Yann Moulier-Boutang, De l’esclavage au salariat. Économie Historique
du salariat bridé (Paris: Puf, 1984), 133.
115. L’accumulation et la croissance esclavagistes dépendent des capac-
ités de capture et d’achat, c’est-à-dire de variables (la guerre, le com-
merce) qui permettent un rythme de reproduction et d’accroissement
des effectifs plus souple et plus rapide que la croissance démographique.
32 G. BONAZZA
Claude Meillassoux, Anthropologie de l’esclavage: le ventre de fer et d’ar

gent (Paris: Puf, 1986), 94.
116. Juliane Schiel and Stefan Hanβ. “Semantics, Practices and Transcultural
Perspectives on Mediterranean Slavery,” in Mediterranean Slavery
Revisited, 15. On taxonomy, see also E. Natalie Rothman, Brokering
Empire: Trans-Imperial Subjects Between Venice and Istanbul (Ithaca and
London: Cornell University Press, 2012).
117. Raffaella Sarti, “Tramonto di schiavitù sulle tracce degli ultimi schiavi
presenti in Italia (secolo XIX),” in Alle radici dell’Europa. Mori giudei
e zingari nei paesi del Mediterraneo occidentale, vol. II, sec. XVII–XIX,
ed. Felice Gambin (Firenze: SEID, 2010), 281–297. Benedetti, Servi
introvabili e schiavi visibili.
118. See, for example, Giovanna Fiume, Schiavitù mediterranee. Corsari, rin
negati e santi di età moderna (Milano: Bruno Mondadori, 2009); Bono,
Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna.
119. On the various forms of slavery, see Turi, Schiavi in un mondo libero,
especially “Lo schiavo e gli schiavi,” 87–123. On captivity and coerced
labour, see, among others, Kaiser, Le Commerce des captifs; Cottias,
et al., ed., Esclavage et dépendances serviles; Bono, Schiavi musulm
ani nell’Italia moderna; E. Dal Lago, Agrarian Elites: American
Slaveholders and Southern Italian Landowners, 1815–1861 (Baton
Rouge and London: Louisiana State University Press, 2005).
120. A first attempt to reconstruct the juridical developments of the nine-
teenth century has been undertaken by Raffaella Sarti in “Tramonto di
schiavitù,” 289–291.
121. Matteo Gaudioso, La schiavitù in Sicilia dopo i normanni. Legislazione,
dottrina, formule (Catania: Musumeci, 1979)
122. Gaudioso, La schiavitù in Sicilia dopo i normanni, 25.
123. ASP, Redenzione dei Cattivi, n. 298.
124. Corrado Avolio, La schiavitù domestica in Sicilia nel secolo XVI
(Firenze: Tip. cooperativa, 1888), 16–17, quoted in Bono, “Schiavi
in Italia: maghrebini, neri, slavi, ebrei a altri (secc. XVI–XIX),” Storia
Mediterranea 19 (2010), 251.
125. Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna, 23–27.
126. Giuseppe Bonaffini, Missioni siciliane ad Algeri nel primo ottocento
(Palermo: Ila Palma, 1987).
127. Bonaffini, Missioni siciliane ad Algeri nel primo ottocento, 11.
128. Fabrizio D’Avenia, “Schiavi siciliani in Barberia: ultimo atto (1800–
1830),” Clio 1 (2002): 135–159.
129. Mariella Mafrici, Mezzogiorno e pirateria nell’età moderna (secoli XVI–
XVIII) (Napoli: Edizioni scientifiche italiane, 1995); Giovanni Marrone,
La schiavitù nella società siciliana dell’età moderna (Caltanissetta-Roma:
S. Sciascia, 1972); Giovanna Fiume, “Lettres de Barbarie: esclav-

age et rachat des captifs siciliens (XVIe–XVIIe siècle),” Cahiers de la
Méditerranée 87 (2013), http://cdlm.revues.org/7255 (consulted on
31 July 2015).
130. Giuliana Boccadamo, “Tra Croce e Mezzaluna. Storie di schiavi,” in
Integrazione ed emarginazione. Circuiti e modelli: Italia e Spagna nei
secoli XV–XVIII, ed. Laura Barletta (Napoli: Cuen, 2002), 309–355;
Id., “Schiavi e Rinnegati Capresi fra Barberia e Levante,” in Capri e
l’Islam. Studi su Capri, il Mediterraneo, l’Oriente, under the direction
of Associazione Culturale Oebalus (Capri: Edizioni La Conchiglia,
2000), 93–247; Id., “La redenzione dei captivi,” in Il Pio Monte
della Misericordia di Napoli nel quarto centenario, ed. Mario Pisani
Massamormile (Napoli: Electa, 2003), 101–121.
131. It is important to remember that in Naples, unlike in Rome and Venice,
there was no House of the Catechumens to prepare individuals to receive
the sacrament of baptism. On the Roman institutions, see Wipertus
Hugo Rudt de Collenberg, “Le baptême des musulmanes esclaves à
Rome aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles. Le XVIIe siècle,” Mélanges de l’Ecole
française de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée 101, no. 1 (1989): 9–181;
Caffiero, Juifs et musulmans à Rome; for Venice, Pietro Ioly Zorattini, I
nomi degli altri. Conversioni a Venezia e nel Friuli Veneto in età moderna
(Firenze: Olschki, 2008).
132. The register is still at the disposal of scholars: ASDN, Cattedrale, 44,
Libro degli infedeli adulti battezzati in questa cattedrale ed in altre
chiese di Napoli. It contains the Libro de Battesimi de Schiavi bat
tezzati per mano del Rev Paroco D. Biase Gambaro. Così dentro questa
Catedrale di Napoli come fuori di essa cominciato dall’Anno 1680, nel
quale il sudetto Parroco pigli possesso di questa Arcivescoval Parocchiale.
This book of slaves was found in the Archives of the Parish of the
Cathedral of Naples. The real names remained unknown as a name-
plate on the parchment was simply inscribed Battesimi adulti I-18 aprile
1742–9 marzo 1861; this information is in Gennaro Nardi, “Due Opere
per la Conversione degli Schiavi a Napoli,” Asprenas 13, no. 2 (1966):
190. Giovanna Boccadamo assumes that she did not discover this reg-
ister and refers to the quoted article by Nardi: Boccadamo, Tra Croce e
Mezzaluna, 351.
133. Boccadamo, Tra Croce e Mezzaluna, 355.
134. Rosita D’Amora, “Some Documents Concerning the Manumission of
Slaves by the Pio Monte Della Misericordia in Naples (1681–1682),”
Eurasian Studies 1 (2002): 37–76.
135. Ugo Della Monica, “La fatica degli schiavi musulmani nella sontuosità
della reggia,” in Alle origini di Minerva trionfante. Caserta e l’utopia
34 G. BONAZZA
di S. Leucio. La costruzione dei Siti Reali borbonici, ed. Imma Ascione,

Giuseppe Cirillo, and Gian Maria Piccinelli (Roma: Pubblicazione
degli Archivi di Stato, 2012), 333–346; Maurizio Crispino, “Schiavi
musulmani alla Reggia di Caserta. Documenti d’Archivio,” in Presenza
araba e islamica in Campania, ed. Agostino Cilardo (Napoli: Istituto
Universitario Orientale, 1992), 223–236; Riccardo Del Prete and
Nathalie Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta. Le vite, i lavori, il contributo della
schiera di lavoratori musulmani (Roma: Lunaria, 1999).
136. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, V. 1042, Peschiera, fos. from 1 to 51.
137. Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna; Fiume, ed., “La schia-
vitù nel Mediterraneo,” Quaderni Storici 107, no. 2 (2001): 323–642;
Guillén and Trabelsi, ed., Les esclavages en Méditerranée.
138. See Di Nepi, ed., “Schiavi nelle terre del papa. Norme, rappresentazi-
oni, problemi a Roma e nello Stato della Chiesa in età moderna,”
Dimensioni e problemi della ricerca storica, no. 2 (2013): 2–271;
Wipertus Rudt de Collenberg, “Le baptême des musulmanes esclaves à
Rome,” 9–181.
139. Rudt de Collenberg, “Le baptême des musulmanes esclaves à Rome,”
23–24.
140. Dakhila and Vincent, Les musulmans dans l’histoire de l’Europe, 25.
141. Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna; Di Nepi, Le Restitutiones
ad libertatem di schiavi; Benedetti, Servi introvabili e schiavi visibili;
see also the nineteenth century publication by Alberto P. Guglielmotti,
Storia della marina Pontificia dal secolo ottavo al decimonono, vols. 1–6
(Roma: Tipografia tiberina, 1862).
142. Domenico Rocciolo, “Fra promozione e difesa della fede: le vicende
dei catecumeni e neofiti romani in età moderna,” in Ad Ultimas Usque
Terrarum Terminas in Fide Propaganda. Roma fra promozione e difesa
della fede in età moderna, ed. Massimiliano Ghilardi, Gaetano Sabatini,
Matteo Sanfilippo, and Donatella Strangio (Roma: Edizioni Sette Città,
2014), 147–156.
143. Luigi Tria, Le schiavitù in Liguria, ricerche e documenti (Genova: Società
Ligure di Storia Patria, 1947); Giulio Giacchero, Pirati barbareschi,
schiavi e galeotti nella storia e nella leggenda ligure (Genova: SAGEP,
1970); Salavtore Bono, “Schiavi musulmani a Genova (secoli XVI–
XVIII),” in Rapporti Genova-Mediterraneo-Atlantico nell’età moderna,
ed. Raffaele Belvederi (Genova: Tip. Gotica Padova, 1990), 85–102.
144. Bono, Schiavi musulmani a Genova, 96. Andrea Zappia’s MA the-
sis demonstrates the presence of 217 slaves, 181 of whom were phys-
ically fit to row in 1783; Zappia, Rapporti diplomatici e commerciali
tra la Repubblica di Genova ed il Nord Africa sul finire del XVIII secolo,
Università di Genova, supervisor Luca Lo Basso, a.a. 2010–2011.
The data I collected on the Genoese galleys confirm that in 1793 there
were between 30 and 40 slaves in every Genoese galley: S. Maria, S.
Giorgio, Raggia, Capitana; therefore, we can estimate around 160
enslaved men, ASG, Magistrato galee, n. 159.
145. ASG, Magistrato galee, n. 159.
146.
Renzo Toaff, “Schiavitù e schiavi nella Nazione Ebrea di Livorno
nel Sei e Settecento,” Rassegna Mensile di Israel 51, no. 1 (January–
April 1985): 82–95; Cesare Santus, “Il ‘Turco’ e l’inquisitore. Schiavi
musulmani e processi per magia nel bagno di Livorno (XVII secolo),”
Società e Storia 133 (2011): 449–484; on slaves in Livorno, see Bono,
Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna, 226–232; on Caphuzin phat-
ers in Livorno, see Bono, 243; beside these, in other pages of the book
the author refers to slaves passing through Livorno. See also the entry
“La schiavitù” in Marco Lenci, Corsari. Guerra, schiavi, rinnegati nel
Mediterraneo (Roma: Carocci, 2007), 7–164.
147. Francesco Pera, Nuove curiosità livornesi (Livorno and Firenze: Bastogi,
1899), 307–308.
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CHAPTER 2
The Reverberations of the Abolitionist

Debate in the Italian States
At the end of the eighteenth century, European abolitionist campaigns

were designed to put a halt to the trade of captives and slaves. As the
nineteenth century progressed, their ambition expanded to the total
abolition of slavery. Abolitionists were aware that in order to make slav-
ery and the slave trade illegal, it would be necessary to modify national
laws initially, followed by international laws. The historiography of abo-
litionism has focused mainly on Anglo-Saxon and French anti-slavery
campaigns, but the juridical steps that eventually resulted in the aboli-
tion of slavery, involved many European countries during the nineteenth
century. Among these, the pre-unification Italian states and, post-1860,
the unified Italy, have received scant attention. In reality, a transna-
tional debate on abolitionism involved the whole of the Italian region,
and some Italian states abolished slavery from a juridical point of view.
Italy signed up to international treaties and the Papal States played a fun-
damental role not only regionally, but also in the broader transnational
abolitionist debate. Frequently, juridical abolitions did not mean an
immediate end of slavery, and the problem of the illegal slave trade and
slavery endured for an extended period in both the colonies and around
the Mediterranean Sea.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3_2
46 G. BONAZZA
2.1 From the First Abolition of Slavery

to the Brussels Anti-slavery Conference
The transatlantic slave trade was important to the commercial and economic
interests of the colonising, imperialist European countries in the eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries. Thus, the abolition of the international slave trade
was a diplomatic problem for the great European powers. Firstly, it was a
bilateral issue between France and England and secondly, between these two
countries and other European and non-European states.1
In 1792, Denmark became the first European country to abolish slav-
ery, while Spain was the last to embrace abolition, in 1886. After Denmark,
the French Revolution provided the framework for the next instalment
of abolition. On the 16th of Pluviôse, year II (in the French republi-
can calendar Pluviôse was “the rainy month” of January–February—
the equivalent date in the Gregorian calendar is 4 February 1794), the
Montagnard-led National Convention announced the abolition of slav-
ery in France. However, the internal dynamics of the French and Haitian
Revolutions and their effects on France’s most prosperous colony, Saint
Domingo (now Haiti), were the decisive factor here, rather than the inter-
national anti-slavery debate.2 In fact, the majority of participants in this
debate wished to pursue a gradual abolition of slavery, following the exam-
ple of Great Britain. In any case, Napoleon soon re-established slavery in the
colonies (1802), revoking the edict issued by the Montagnard Convention.3
Between 1820 and 1840, France re-established the Code Noir on the
jurisdiction on slaves. After the revolution, this was a step backwards to
the practices of the ancien régime.4 Nineteenth-century French aboli-
tionists favoured an immediate end to slavery, as opposed to the grad-
ual British approach. France abolished the trade in 1831, but it was
not until 1848 that leading campaigner and undersecretary of State
within the Navy Ministry, Victor Schoelcher, endorsed what he had
come to regard as definitive and permanent abolition. The historiogra-
phy of abolition refers to the immediacy of French abolition because,
unlike the Anglo-Saxon policy, France supported projects for the lib-
eration tout court (without qualification) of the slave.5 With the intro-
duction of the Abolition Bill in 1807, Great Britain, the great paladin
of the international abolitionism of slavery, abolished the slave trade
itself. The Abolition Bill forbade the buying and selling of people, espe-
cially on African coasts.6 It was not until the Slave Emancipation Act of
1833, however, that Great Britain established the basis of freedom for
2 THE REVERBERATIONS OF THE ABOLITIONIST DEBATE … 47
its existing slaves. The process was far from instant. The Act would take
effect only in 1838, after a five-year period of apprenticeship of the slave.
The first world convention against slavery met in London in 1841.7
Denmark prohibited the slave trade from 1803, but did not liberate the
slaves in its Caribbean colonies until 1848. From 1813, Sweden adhered
to the abolition of the trade, and from 1814 the Low Countries did the
same.8
The juridical turning point for international abolitionism was the law
prohibiting the slave trade ratified by the Congress of Vienna (1814–
1815) on 8 February 1815 and signed by Austria, France, Great Britain,
Prussia, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Russia.9 From the diplomatic point
of view, the European plenipotentiary delegates reached the conclusion
that the trade had to be abolished.10 The prohibition was based on a
widespread conception of European civilisation that was incompatible
with the continued toleration of slavery; the influence of that section
of public opinion that pronounced itself against the trade, especially in
Great Britain, was explicitly recognised.11 However, this was still a radical
move and there was no universal agreement across the continent on what
was the right approach to take.
Abolition was rooted in the French and Anglo-Saxon movements.
During the Congress, Great Britain led the drive for abolition although
the policy was publicly represented as a joint Anglo-French initiative.
Britain’s Lord Castlereagh had already secured the support of France’s
Foreign Minister Charles Talleyrand for the proposed measure by offer-
ing certain compensations. Prior to the Congress, the Treaty of Paris (30
May 1814) had not only redrawn French borders to those of January
1792, it had also catered for the restitution by the English of French col-
onies, especially Guadalupe. England retained only Tobago, Saint Lucy
in the Antilles, the Ille de France (Mauritius), Rodrigues, the Seychelles
in the Indian Ocean and Malta.12
France’s part in the deal obliged it to prohibit the trade for five years,
and in exchange, it required an island in the Western Indies or a mone-
tary compensation for French settlers. Under British pressure, Ferdinand
VII of Spain also had to declare his opposition to the trade. The Catholic
powers (France, Spain and Portugal) were actually quite reticent to sup-
port abolition. The British plenipotentiaries also courted the spokesper-
son of the Papal States, Consalvi, in order to obtain the support of the
Catholic Church in the battle against slavery, but Consalvi could not be
seen to act against the allied Catholic powers.13
48 G. BONAZZA
France, Spain and Portugal responded cautiously to the proposed uni-

versal abolition of the trade. In any case, the application of the legislation
would naturally be dictated by the individual concerns and circumstances
of the different states involved. France finally adhered totally to the treaty
only when Napoleon, returned briefly from exile on Elba Island, wished
to ingratiate himself with the British. His adoption of the terms was swiftly
cancelled by the restored Bourbon monarchy.14 In fact, between the
Congress of Vienna and 1831, many slaves were imported to the French
colonies in the Antilles.15 Great Britain tried to enact the same diplomatic
policy with the reluctant Spain and Portugal. In 1817, Spain and Great
Britain signed a treaty according to which Spain should have stopped pur-
chasing slaves in Africa from 1820. Portugal accepted a similar offer. The
exchange involved procrastination on implementation of the terms, as well
as £400,000 for Spain and £300,000 for Portugal. Despite such agree-
ments, France, and especially Spain and Portugal, continued to trade
clandestinely in slaves until the end of the nineteenth century. The debate
among the European powers was limited to the trade while the question of
the abolition of slavery itself remained too delicate to tackle at this level.16
The rule on the abolition of the slave trade, as ratified by the
Congress of Vienna, was the foundation of contemporary international
humanitarianism. Its repercussions for global markets would closely coin-
cide with British interests—British policy was not accidental. Traditional
historiography viewed the Congress of Vienna as a political negotiation
that redrew the European map and restored the pre-Napoleonic politi-
cal order. The anti-slavery plans of Great Britain, however, and the inno-
vative elements introduced to diplomatic relations, looked more to the
wider world than around Europe and were without precedent in conti-
nental or international history.17 According to Fabian Klose:
Although the Vienna declaration was not legally binding, it could be used
well to exert moral pressure in later negotiations. Therefore, it may be
referred to as one of the first important documents in history for interna-
tional humanitarian law.18
Specifically, the British abolitionist campaign focused on political and

diplomatic negotiations based on three interconnected elements: the
creation of an international political order; the establishment of an inter-
national legal order; and the foundation of a moral order that should be
shared among the new independent Atlantic states.
From this perspective, the anti-slavery battle was necessary not only
for the integration of the new American states in the international sys-
tem, but also for the reconfiguration of the relationships among these
states themselves. Britain understood that the old motherland-colony
relationship could not function in the same way anymore. The free cir-
culation of goods between states would be preferable, even if these
states were indirectly controlled.19 Britain tried to control the access of
European states to the slave trade through its maritime supremacy, and
the problem became more compelling after the emergence of newly
independent countries in South America, such as Venezuela in 1811.
The Latin America revolution led by Simón Bolivar was also highly rel-
evant.20 In the Atlantic world, the two main goals of the British were
to prevent the establishment of a colonial presence by European powers
and to control the commercial and maritime power of the USA in the
Americas.21 The stabilisation of the relationships in the Atlantic world
was the pre-condition for new British colonial and imperial expansion
in other parts of the world. The epicentre of the British Empire moved
from the Americas to Africa, Asia, North America and the Pacific area.
Britain had to face the rise and expansion of a second wave of slavery
after the abolition of the trade. The southern states of the USA, Cuba
and Brazil became the new producers of slaves, and this change in pro-
duction became fundamental in the expansion of the global economy
and for the redefinition of the division of labour.22 From an interna-
tional perspective, the second wave of slavery did not involve a slave
trade in the way that it had previously, as slavery was now “nationalised”
within the borders of the states. In this context, Britain supported the
independence of the Latin-American countries because it transformed
Spain and Portugal into clients of this market. Portugal stood to lose
its previously monopoly and Brazilian independence in 1822 removed
its imperial justification. British pressure also soon forced independent
Brazil to abolish the trade. Brazil signed a treaty with Britain by which
it initially undertook to halt the trade south of the Equator, before
embracing complete abolition.23 Spain’s interests in the trade were
less significant than those of Portugal but its government showed lit-
tle inclination to respect international treaties. In 1817, Spain officially
abolished the trade north of the Equator. In 1820, it expanded the ban
to the south.24 Despite its rhetoric, Spanish officials protected the ille-
gal trade and Cuba acted as its sorting centre. But the greatest obsta-
cle to British power remained the USA. America had multiple interests
50 G. BONAZZA
in the trade. The sudden abolition of slavery by Lincoln in 1865, how-

ever, in the exceptional circumstances of the American Civil War, suited
British foreign policy. Its diplomatic and foreign policy had always been
based on the respect of the sovereign principles of each state. In particu-
lar, Slaveholding elites remained firmly in control of National Affairs.25
National elites had to solve problems surrounding issues such as slav-
ery, race and property. British liberalism was successful in inserting the
anti-slavery and abolitionist debate into the international moral order.
Abolition of the trade and then abolition of slavery itself had to become
a marker of “civilisation”, although the anti-slavery movement carried
with it the seeds of a moral and cultural system of inequality.26
The influence of the Catholic powers meant that Britain, wish-
ing to maintain international credibility, partly directed the abolitionist
campaign against the slave trade in Northern Africa. In 1816, the lawyer
James Stephen published a pamphlet entitled An Inquiry into the Right
and Duty of Compelling Spain to Relinquish her Slave Trade in Northern
Africa. This focused the battle against the Mediterranean trade on
Spain. The Catholic powers were critical of contradictory British policy
which exclusively emphasised abolition of the Atlantic slave trade. Britain
ignored the situation in the Mediterranean Sea, because it was not inter-
ested in the ransoming of Christian slaves in the Barbary States. Britain
should have challenged Barbary piracy not only for humanitarian reasons
but to enforce its moral authority and to build trust.27
The Spanish government would have withheld its support for the
fight to abolish the Atlantic trade if Britain did not eventually assist in
the liberation of the European slaves. Spain understood that British
motivations were not humanitarian but revolved around campaigns to
increase its political power at an international level.28 This was the back-
ground to the British Admiralty’s 1816 decision to Lord Exmouth on
a diplomatic mission to North Africa. Negotiation led to the liberation
of more than a thousand Sardinian, Sicilian, Neapolitan, Genoese and
German slaves, in the name of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and of
the Kingdom of Sardinia too. A separate treaty with Tunis and Tripoli
outlined that prisoners had to be treated as such and not as slaves. The
new humanitarian standard was that the liberation of men should not be
based on ransoms. Initially, Exmouth’s mission was not well received in
his own country where, military expenses for abolitionist purposes were
frowned upon by public opinion. Nonetheless, his success was a triumph
for government. From that moment onwards, Britain did not hesitate
to use its military forces in pursuit of the global abolition of the slave
trade.29
The 1834–1835 writings of the Société française pour l’abolition de
l’esclavage reveal dissatisfaction with the inadequacy of the treaties signed
in Vienna. The abolition of the trade was denounced as solely theoret-
ical and the upsurge in piracy was decried. In 1838, Lord Glenelg, the
British Minister for the Colonies, quoted a French treaty on human traf-
ficking that was supported by Denmark, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany,
the Kingdom of Sicily and the Kingdom of Sardinia and Belgium, while
Russia, Austria and Prussia promised their future support.30 Sweden
abolished slavery in 1847, and the Low Countries did likewise in 1863.31
In the German territories and in Switzerland, with the exception of
the Swiss-based Groupe de Coppet, there was no anti-slavery move-
ment with an international dimension in the first half of the nineteenth
century. The Swiss Groupe de Coppet agitated at an international level
for the abolition of slavery. Its position was that even if laws were issued
at a national level and abolitionist societies were characterised as national
societies, anti-slavery and abolitionism was a transnational phenomena.
Another anti-slavery society was created in Germany at the beginning
of the 1848, but it soon disappeared. Another society was established
in Switzerland in 1858, which was quite a late stage in the abolitionist
programme.32
Portugal abolished slavery in 1875. Spain followed suit in 1880,
after the Cuban revolution (1868–1878), adopting a progressive aboli-
tionist policy, on the model of Great Britain. The Patronato law ended
slavery in 1886. The USA’s abolition of slavery in 1865 had influ-
enced European states33 Great powers, through diplomatic agreements,
imposed abolition within the national frontiers of smaller countries;
among these, Greece introduced a constitutional abolition of slav-
ery with one eye on the Ottoman Empire. Walachia and Moldova
(latter-day Romania) prohibited the enslavement of gypsy minorities in
1855–1856.34
After the Congress of Vienna, another fundamental step forward
for the international abolitionist crusade took place at the Congress of
Verona (1822). The Congress discussed five specific points: the black
slave trade; piracy in the American seas and in the Spanish colonies; east-
ern conflicts between Russia and the Sublime Porte; the role of Italy;
and, finally, the dangers posed by the Spanish Revolution for France
and the rest of Europe. Delegates from London, Saint Petersburg,
52 G. BONAZZA
Berlin, Vienna and Paris participated in the Congress, as did represent-

atives of Naples, Rome, Tuscany, Parma, Modena, Piedmont, Milan,
the Lombard states and Venice. France played an important role as a
counterweight to the British.35 The French supported the British only
in respect of the joint campaign against the “immoral trade”. France
rejected the price attached by Britain to the Africans transported in
French ships, despite the abolition of the trade, because they viewed it
as an undervaluation. Moreover, according to France, European nations
would never really engage in putting an end to the trade for purely
moral and religious reasons. France argued that Great Britain was the
only country that could do without the trade, because it had continually
transported a surplus of slaves to its colonies throughout the eighteenth
century.36
The Duke of Wellington, the British delegate, who had also attended
the Congress of Vienna, affirmed that at this point, all the nations bar
Portugal had prohibited the black trade. However, he claimed that
France overlooked cases of piracy and trafficking of men. In defence of
France, the Duke of Chateaubriand argued that French public opin-
ion remained keenly aware of what had happened during the rebellion
of Saint Domingo, when many white settlers were killed. Neither did
French national pride gladly accept a measure championed by the British
government. Fundamentally, French public opinion was not ready for
abolition, but Chateaubriand suggested it would still subscribe to the
abolitionist clause of the Congress of Vienna. Wellington, by his side,
proposed a resolution that would obligate government to make a con-
certed and genuine effort to abolish the trade. He sought the death pen-
alty for those perpetuating the trade. In the end, only Courts of Mixed
Commission were established. They involved delegates from relevant
countries and were located at strategic points for the commerce of slaves,
including Freetown, Havana, Luanda and Kingston. They were tasked
with seizing vessels, equipment and goods, as well as with freeing slaves.
Courts could only impose penalties on traders of the same nationality.
France, the Kingdom of Sardinia and, until 1862, the USA, did not sup-
port the imposition of harsher penalties.37
France should have registered all its slaves but did not always do so.
Spain bore much responsibility for the prevalence of piracy. Spain was at
risk of losing its colonies, so many European powers were cautious in
expressing a judgement on its foreign and slavery policy.38 After relin-
quishing control of “black trade” and choosing to abolish the slave trade
and slavery, Britain could not permit other European powers to continue
the trade. Beyond the current historiographical debate, which still largely
concerns how convenient or not abolition was for Britain, contemporary
testimonies indicates that some powers readily accepted its advantageous-
ness from a mercantilist perspective.39
The first important international conference, among the steps in
direction of abolitionist, was the Berlin Conference (1884–1885), even
if the main focus of the conference was not the slavery problem but free-
dom of commerce in the basin and river of Congo. One of the points
in the conclusive acts of the conference was to assist in the suppression
of slavery, “and especially the Slave Trade”. The General Act committed
the European powers acquiring coastal territory on the African continent
to notify all other powers of their claim and establish an authority as was
necessary to ensure protection of vested rights on these territories and,
where applicable, free trade.40
Finally, Cardinal Lavigerie convened an international meeting on slav-
ery in 1888. It led to the Brussel international conference, which was
facilitated by the Belgian government from 2 November 1889 to 2 July
1890. The 1888 bulletin of the Brussel anti-slavery society shows that
the Cardinal played a crucial role at an international level. A speech by
Lavigerie inspired the Brussels conference, which drew all the leading
European powers even as they engaged in a frenzied competition for col-
onies. Germany, Austria, Hungary, Denmark, Spain, the USA, France,
Great Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Persia, Portugal, Russia, Sweden,
Norway, Turkey, Zanzibar, Congo and Belgium all attended.41
The Congress was one of the last steps, after the Congresses of Vienna
and Verona, in reaching an international consensus on abolition in the
nineteenth century. At the end of the 1880s, new anti-slavery societies
with a pronounced Catholic complexion were established in Belgium,
Germany, Switzerland and Italy. For this reason, the Cardinal also tried
to establish associations in Spain, with the support of Pope Leone XIII.42
The newspaper of the French anti-slavery society published correspond-
ence between Cardinal Lavigerie and the presidents of its national
committee, along with other news on international anti-slavery policy.
The prominence of the international dimension of the campaign was
that such that it almost amounted to a sort of pan-European crusade. It
reached a point where it actually obscured other important elements in
public and political life and could be used to camouflage some agendas.43
Undoubtedly, imperialist policy, and particularly the scramble for Africa,
54 G. BONAZZA
defined European abolitionist discourse.44 The aim was to identify,

highlight and analyse internal African trade so as to capitalise on exist-
ing circuits and exploit new opportunities. The main trade arteries ran
to Arabia and the Persian Gulf. An international body was established in
Zanzibar to report on the slave trade and its proponents. An office ded-
icated to the repression of the trade was established in Brussels and until
1914, it coordinated international efforts. Pope Leone XIII donated
300,000 Francs to this cause.45
In a letter written by Cardinal Lavigerie in Algiers on 22 July 1890,
as the Brussels conference was concluding, he referred to the convoca-
tion of a free Congress of the anti-slavery societies that was discussed
in Lucerne. It started with a homage to Leopold II, King of Belgium,
who acted as patron to the Pope and the Cardinal in sponsoring the
event. It also refers to the Berlin conference, at which the Free State of
Congo was created and gifted to Leopold’s Belgium. This was not the
only such sphere of influence established by Europeans in the Congo
basin.
All the Powers exercising rights of sovereignty or an influence on the terri-

tories have to preserve Native populations and to improve their moral and
material living conditions, and to contribute to the suppression of slavery
and especially of the slave trade: they will protect and favor, without dis-
tinction of nationality or of culture, all the institutions and companies,
the religious, the scientists or charities, created and organised for these
purposes.
Toutes les Puissances exerçant des droits de souveraineté ou une influence
dans lesdits territoires s’engagent à veiller à la conservation des popula-
tions indigènes et à l’amélioration de leurs conditions morales et matéri-
elles d’existence, et à concourir à la suppression de l’esclavage et surtout
de la traite des noirs : elles protégeront et favoriseront, sans distinction de
nationalité ni de culte, toutes les institutions et entreprises, religieuses, sci-
entifiques ou charitables, crées et organisées à ces fins.
Article number nine was similarly explicit:
According to the principles of the jus gentium, such as they are recognised
by the signatory powers, the slave trade was forbidden, and the operations
on land or on sea which supply slaves must be considered as forbidden, the
Powers which will exercise rights of sovereignty or an influence in these
territories that are parts of the bond of Congo, have to declare that they
will not serve or not market slaves whatever race they are. Each of these
powers makes a commitment to use all the means at his disposal to end
this business of the trade and to punish those who continue trading.
Conformément aux principes du droit de gens, tels qu’ils sont recon-
nus par les Puissances signataires, la traite des esclaves étant interdite, et
les opérations qui, sur terre ou sur mer, fournissent des esclaves à la traite
devant être également considérées comme interdites, les Puissances qui
exerceront des droits de souveraineté ou une influence dans les territoires
formant le bassin conventionnel du Congo, déclarent que ces territoires
ne pourront servir ni de marché ni de voie de transit pour la traite des
esclaves de quelque race que ce soit. Chacune de ces Puissances s’engage à
employer tous les moyens en son pouvoir pour mettre fin à ce commerce
et pour punir ceux qui s’en occupent.46
The source reporting the proceedings of the conference in Berlin pro-

vides a good illustration of how the fight against the black trade and for
the elimination of slavery was conducted. At the same time, it demon-
strates the determination of the European powers to establish not only a
myriad of “charitable” missions in African regions but also a host of pri-
vate enterprises. It is a clear indicator of the scramble for Africa that was
about to unfold. In Chapter 12, Cardinal Lavigerie quoted the words of
Leone XIII:
There is neither Pagan nor Jew, Barbarian nor Schytian, slave nor free man,
but Jesus Christ is everything in everybody (Coloss. III, 11). Because we
were all baptized in the same spirit, to be a unique body, either Jews or
Pagans, either slaves or free, and we were all washed in the same spirit.
(1 Cor. XII, 19.) (3)
The Pope was inspired by the doctrine of Gregorio XVI, who wrote the
apostolic letter In Supremo Apostolatus (1839), condemning the trade,
and referring to the law of nations.47 Therefore, Leone XIII appointed
the Cardinal to gather the European powers and not only in order to
definitively stop the black trade.
We have invited, he said, and deeply engaged all the governments in

an effort to put an end to the hideous trafficking known as the Black
Trade, and we will use all the means at our disposal to stop this plague
that continues to dishonor humanity. The African continent is the
main theatre of this trafficking and the main arena of slavery, so in this
56 G. BONAZZA
letter we also recommend that the Missionaries who preach the message
of Saint Évangile dedicate all their strength and life to this sublime work of
redemption. But especially you, Mr Cardinal, whom we depend on for suc-
cess. We recognize your zeal and intelligence. We acknowledge what you
have achieved up to now, and we trust that you will not flinch from this
mission, until you have achieved your grand objectives.
Nous avons, disait-il, invité et vivement engagé tous les gouvernements à
mettre un terme au hideux trafic appelé la Traite des Nègres, et à employer
tous les moyens pour cette plaie ne continue pas davantage à déshonorer le
genre humaine. Et puisque le continent africain est le théâtre principal de
ce trafic et comme la terre propre de l’esclavage, dans cette même Lettre
Nous recommandons aussi à tous les Missionnaires qui y prêchent le Saint
Évangile, de consacrer toutes leurs forces, leur vie même, à cette œuvre
sublime de rédemption. Mais c’est sur vous surtout, Monsieur le Cardinal,
que Nous comptons pour le succès. Nous connaissons votre zèle actif et
intelligent. Nous savons tout ce que vous avez fait jusqu’à ce jour, et Nous
avons la confiance que vous ne vous lasserez pas, avant d’avoir mené à
bonne fin vos grandes entreprises. (1)
Lavigerie invited France, England, Germany, Spain, Sicily, Milan and

Rome to Bruxelles.48 Zanzibar, Turkey and Persia also participated in
the conference. Most importantly, Great Britain, the leading champion
of abolition, enthusiastically embraced Lavigerie’s request. Lavigerie
referred regularly in his speech to the Anti-slavery Society. The powers
agreed on the most effective methods to combat the trade within Africa
and summarised them in seven points: first, the gradual organisation of
administrative, juridical, religious and military services in the African
territories under the sovereignty or the protectorate of the “civilised”
nations; second, the gradual conquest by the European powers of terri-
tories and trade stations; third, the construction of roads and railroads;
fourth, the insertion of steamboats; fifth, the establishment of the tele-
graph; sixth, the organisation of expeditions and moving caravans. The
last point related to the importation of guns and ammunition and their
role in the trade. Restrictions were imposed, given the extensive prof-
its reaped by the European powers from the sale of weapons during the
nineteenth century.
In the late nineteenth century, then, after the Congresses of Vienna
and Verona, imperialists who also wore an abolitionist hat, wrapped
themselves in the guise of moral and religious philanthropists in order
to veil their fair economic motivations for intervention in Africa.
To conclude, the anti-slavery movement, and then abolitionism, in spite

of the powerful intellectual and juridical substance that supported them,
were dogged by significant constraints. The sequence of congresses and
treaties that ran from Vienna to Brussels demonstrates that the slave
trade was never completely eradicated in the nineteenth century, and
that the overriding factor in determining the interplay between policy
and action were the diplomatic interests of the great powers. According
to figures compiled by David Eltis and David Richardson, at least one
million slaves were transported to the Americas in violation of inter-
national rules during the nineteenth century, a period we consider as
abolitionist.49
2.2 Abolition in the Italian States:

External Impositions
Prior to the unification of Italy, the legal codes of the various Italian
states did not usually deal explicitly with slavery. Rather, they tended
to concentrate on the kidnapping of women and minors. Only dur-
ing the Napoleonic period did the legal codes begin to address slavery
directly. It is useful to trace the chronology of the liberation of slaves in
the pre-unitarian states and to compare the timing with official juridi-
cal process of abolition. Occasionally, slaves were liberated by Napoleon
himself or by his troops to public acclaim and in the absence of any
abolitionist legislation. In the post-Napoleonic period, slavery could be
re-established, but the French influence remained strong in the juridi-
cal codes of most of the states during the Restoration period. But some
cases of slavery endured even where the legal code expressly forbade it.50
Theoretically, changes to the law had put an end to slavery in the
Italian states. In practice, slavery persisted in some cases until the mid-
nineteenth century (as we shall see in some detail in the next chapter). A
case has been identified in Naples in 1845, for instance.
The Ligurian Republic liberated the last of its slaves on 14 July 1797,
when the Jacobin insurgents destroyed its arsenal port. The chains of
68 North-African slaves were broken and they were permitted to return
home.51 Giulio Giacchero described the liberation of the 68 slaves as
happening before the “Messianic reforms” of the French, meaning
before the introduction of new decrees.52 The liberation of Genoese
slaves in the Barbary States, dated to 3 September 1805, was dependent
on a Napoleonic decree abolishing the enslavement of Christians.53
58 G. BONAZZA
Slaves were liberated in Livorno too; when Napoleonic troops reached

Italian cities, they took it upon themselves to free slaves. Napoleon,
therefore, even though he re-established slavery in the French colonies
in 1802, adopted the policy of liberation in the pre-unitarian Italian
states.54 In the case of the Papal States, the House of the Catechumens
of Rome (the archives of which indicate the continuing presence of
slaves in the nineteenth century), was closed after the creation of the
Roman Republic (1798–1799). Pio VII reopened the House of the
Catechumens in 1800, and it continued its activities after the inclusion of
Rome in the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy. Later, during the Restoration
period, the House maintained its work and the last verifiable cases of
slaves being baptised there date to 1825.55 “Jacobin” constitutions, tak-
ing inspiration from revolutionary examples and from the Napoleonic
code of 1804 (which covered the entire Kingdom of Italy during the
French period), proclaimed that “no one can sell himself or to be sold
and/or they affirmed that it was possible to be hired for a service for
someone else only for a period of time – not lifelong – or for a specific
task”.56 Therefore, slavery was formally outlawed until 1814 and the
demise of the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy.
Napoleonic influence was minimal in the Bourbon Kingdom of Sicily,
and it was not until 1819 that a French-like code abolished slavery there;
although feudalism had only been abolished by the 1812 constitution.57
The Code of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (1819) could punish by
imprisonment anyone who arrested, detained or kidnapped any person.
Article 75 of the Austrian Penal Code of 1803 condemned anyone who
“without knowledge, and consensus of the authority in charge coerce
someone, through force or trickery, in order to consign him to a foreign
authority”.58 The penalty was five to ten years imprisonment. The term
could extend to twenty years if the life of the victim was endangered or
his freedom was permanently inhibited. This went beyond kidnapping
and the code defined these circumstances as amounting to a condition of
“slavery”. The Lombard-Venetian region followed the Austrian example
and abolished slavery in 1816.59
In the Kingdom of Naples, the penal laws issued by Giuseppe
Bonaparte (1808) were even more explicit in their dealings with slavery.
Article 104 defined coercion as: “1. The selling of compatriots and of
any free man to pirates, and to barbarians where slavery is practiced; 2.
The stealing of those wandering men, who are known under the name
of gypsies”.60 Therefore, for the first time, penal laws specified according
to the Roman juridical model some particular types of slavery, involving

masters and slaves. Moreover, this article suggests that slavery was no
longer legal in the Kingdom of Naples. In fact, the Napoleonic invasion
led directly to the abolition of slavery in the Kingdom of Naples. This is
a prime example of how the influence of foreign codes helped to impose
more specific laws regulating the forms of slavery which still existed in
the Italian states. After the Napoleonic intervention, Naples subscribed
to the international treaties on the abolition of slavery in 1839.
In Naples, the first laws against both feudalism and slavery were
issued with the introduction of the Napoleonic Code (1809).61 The
Napoleonic Code for the Kingdom of Italy (1811) prohibited specific
types of abduction, such as “illegal arrests and kidnapping”. Specifically,
it provided for punishment of those who “arrested, detained or kid-
napped anyone”, but the word slave was not used.62
The first Italian state penal code that was an internal innovation rather
than an external imposition by invading forces was the Grand Duchy of
Tuscany’s (1853). It covered crimes against personal freedom and private
tranquillity in a single chapter. Article 358 was dedicated to these issues:
1. Who, for any reason that led to another crime, unjustly seized
another person, against his will, or also if the person is consenting,
under fourteenth years old; is at fault of kidnapping (…)
2. And if the kidnapper gave the person, who he seized, to a foreign
naval or military institution, or enslaved him, he will be punished
by imprisonment for five to twelve years.
Article 2 referred explicitly to slavery. The clarity of the wording was

certainly influenced by international abolitionist thought. In 1837, the
Grand Duchy of Tuscany had subscribed to an English and French treaty
which allowed for the inspection of Tuscan ships in order to suppress the
slave trade.63 Tuscan law clearly referred to the measuring men for trade,
which evidently still occurred there in the mid-nineteenth century. The
rule was more generic than that of the Kingdom of Naples, which spe-
cifically mentioned pirates and Barbary States in terms of Mediterranean
as well as Atlantic trade. Neither did the Tuscan version make any ref-
erence to violence or fraud. According to the jurist Gianluca Ciampa, it
is interesting to note that at the beginning of article 1, the expression
“for any reason” extended the range of the law: seizing a person for any
reason was kidnapping. However, there was a clause which allowed for
60 G. BONAZZA
differentiation in respect of motivation: a sexually motivated kidnap-

ping or one related to a marriage of some kind were distinguished from
slave trade kidnappings. A further clause citing special circumstances was
probably intended to cater for international jurisdictional conflicts: when
cases involved countries where slavery was not illegal, Tuscan law would
not be applied.64
In 1827, in the context of privateering, Carlo Felice of Savoia issued a
penal code for the Mercantile Navy, including two articles on pillaging.65
International laws banned privateering in 1856, coinciding with the end
of the Crimean War66 Previously, privateering had been declared ille-
gal in 1792, during the French Revolution, but its standing was almost
immediately restored. Legislation on maritime plundering began to
emerge in some pre-unitarian states, including the Kingdom of Italy
(1805) and the Kingdom of Naples (1807).67 In such instances, what
had been privateering was now piracy.
During its 1882–1853 sittings, the Sub-Alpine Parliament debated
the price of slaves around the African coast and the problem of piracy. In
particular, from February to April 1853, Deputies Domenico Farini and
Paolo Farina debated the need for an anti-slavery law. Farini argued that
the slave trade had ground to a halt after the Congress of Vienna. Since
there were no slaves in Piedmont, he saw no need for legislation on the
topic. On the contrary, Farina pointed out that the trade still flourished in
certain places, highlighting in particular what he considered as the con-
tinued existence of slaves in Russia. He supported measures recently pro-
posed by an anti-slavery project that would liberate any slave who arrived
in Piedmont or was present on a ship flying the Piedmontese flag. Farini’s
reply reveals much about how slavery was understood at the time:
Deputy Farina confuses two distinct things, servitude and slavery, and he
further confuses these with the black trade. In the countries where servi-
tude exists, if a plot is sold, it is sold with the servants working on it; but
there is not a trade and a market of men, and certainly not the slave trade.
Now, with a law aimed to impede the trade, we want to declare that there
are no slaves in Piedmont. Deputy Arconati is right in saying that this arti-
cle could lead one to suppose that in Piedmont we still need to affirm the
abolition of slavery.68
This disagreement between Farina and Farini shows that there was no
unanimous definition or interpretation of slavery in the mid-nineteenth
century. They could not even agree on whether or not slavery existed
in Piedmont. Farina’s assessment of the local situation was probably the

more accurate given that a law introduced just the previous year had
affirmed in its first article that a slave was automatically liberated once he
set foot on the national territory or on a ship flying the national flag. The
second article was equally explicit:
It is forbidden for any citizen, even in a foreign country, to own, buy or

sell slaves, to help or to participate, directly or indirectly, in any commerce
like this under the penalty of losing all political and civil rights […].69
The regulation of coercion in the 1889 Code, the Zanardelli Code of

the Kingdom of Italy, naturally drew from the pre-unitarian codes but
it was heavily influenced by the proceedings of the Congress of Berlin
in 1884 when Italy subscribed to newly shaped international norms on
the abolition of slavery. Anti-slavery legislation was still evolving during
the government of Prime Minister Francesco Crispi. This was the point
at which Italy signed important agreements with England on the defin-
itive abolition of the trade. The process by which the Italian states and
then the unified Italy involved themselves in the international treaties of
the nineteenth century can be traced step-by-step through diplomatic
documents. On 22 November 1816, for example, Sardinia subscribed
to rights of inspection that had been agreed as the final item at the
Congress of Vienna on 9 June 1815.70 The Code of the Mercantile
Navy, in Chapter 5 (On the Slave Trade), article 335, states that: “The
trade and any other commerce of slaves with ships with the national flag
will be repressed with the penalties established in this chapter, whatever
will be the nationality of the guilty party”. Article 333 read as follows:
If a trade episode would happen, the captain or the owner and the over-
lord, or whoever fulfilled this role, even if not registered in the crew list,
and those who had equipped or made equipped the ship with the aim to
make it adequate for the trade or for any other commerce of slaves, will be
punished with temporary penal servitude […].71
The Italian-British anti-slavery agreement of 1889 was extensive in

scope and provided perhaps the most interesting reflection on the defi-
nition of slavery offered at the time. In ambiguous fashion, article 5
stated that “the crime of trade will be considered as committed if a slave
will be treated as such in the ship”.72 The implication is that slavery was
62 G. BONAZZA
characterised as a condition with varying levels. The article contained

further evidence of this thinking:
If on board there will be a slave or slaves who are not butlers in service or
employed in the licit businesses of their masters, or slaves employed bona
fide in the navigation of the ship; or if on board chains for slaves, tools
or handcuffs, or special strata of mud or sand as pallets for slaves will be
found; […] If it will be demonstrated that a slave or slaves, who are not
the ones specifically excluded in this article, or one or more of the objects
described are or has been on board during the travel in which the ship was
captured, this fact will be considered as a prima facie proof that the ship
was used for the trade.73
Two types of slaves are depicted here, one of them a type of domestic
slave in the service of ship owners. This type might be better understood
as servants rather than slaves, and the contemporary European usage of
the term “master” was in the context of servants rather than slaves. The
differentiation inherent in the article, however, makes it apparent that this
law targeted the slave trade specifically. As for those in the domestic field,
it is more likely that they were servants rather than slaves who were the
property of the masters concerned. We cannot fully exclude the possibility,
however, that the legislation was drafted with an eye to domestic slaves.
The agreement covered cooperation for the suppression of the slave
trade and it was signed on 14 September 1889 by the Italian plenipoten-
tiary Tommaso Catalani and by his English counterpart Robert Arthur
Talbot Gascoyne Cecil, Marquis of Salisbury. Reciprocal responsibility
consisted of the right of inspection of the ships of the respective states.
Article 7 specified that if an inspected ship was confiscated or otherwise
penalised, there was no right to compensation for losses or damages.74
At the close of the nineteenth century, then, the formal abolition of slav-
ery around the Italian regions, in both an internal and an international
sense, clashed with the reality of continuing forms of slavery.75
2.3 Combating Atlantic Slavery: The Persistence

of the Phenomenon in the Papal States
In the first half of the nineteenth century, and particularly so from the
time of the Congress of Vienna, the Papal States actively participated in
international abolitionist policy, and maintained an anti-slavery position,
repeatedly condemning the black trade. However, from the juridical
point of view, the position of the Church remained ambiguous, and it

seems that slavery was not prohibited within the Papal States until the
nineteenth century, although some regulatory measures had been
adopted even under the ancien régime.76
French and Anglo-Saxon anti-slavery sentiment was shaped by the
Christian religions. French Protestantism was most heavily engaged
in the abolitionist battle during the years of the constitutional monar-
chy (1815–1848), while French Catholicism contributed only through
individual actors at the close of the eighteenth century, such as the
Abbot Grégoire, an Enlightened Catholic. In the nineteenth century,
the French Catholic Church was not on the front line of the war against
slavery. The Neo-Testamentary and Humanistic trends were exceptions
to this rule.77 The hierarchy of the French Church was ultramontane
and reactionary. Only occasionally did it align itself wider French polit-
ical opinion. The first real French anti-slavery contribution recalled the
role of the churches and it was embodied by the Société de la Morale
Chrétienne (1821), formed mainly by Protestants.78 Anglo-Saxon aboli-
tionism was far more committed and engaged. Protestant contributors
were highly influential, especially the radical Quaker movement. Quakers
were a highly spiritual and moral sect and were initially marginalised in
Britain before finally becoming quite popular in the North American
colonies. Therefore, Quakerism sprouted the ideological roots of both
the British and American abolitionist movements.79 In Pennsylvania,
from 1688, the Quaker community condemned the purchasing of slaves.
From 1774—thanks to the efforts of Benjamin Rush and the French-
born Anthony Benezet—it established the principle of exclusion from
the community of participants in the black trade and those who refused
to liberate slaves. In An Historical Account of Guinea—a pamphlet cir-
culated in London in 1772—Benezet proclaimed that it was time to
liberate the slaves in the Americas.80 The Quaker “saints” who met in
London in 1787 in the Clapham sect made an important contribution
to the development of the abolitionist movement in Britain.81 Thus,
churches played a fundamental role in the campaigns against the black
trade and for the abolition of colonial slavery. Despite this, the Roman
Catholic Church was slow to regulate the circumstances of the slaves
(a majority of whom were Muslim) within its state and on Papal galleys.
The Church took its first official stance on slavery when Pope Niccolò
V awarded Portugal the right to enslave “infidels” with the seal of
Romano Pontifex on 8 January 1454. In 1534, Clemente VII issued a
64 G. BONAZZA
motuproprio granting freedom to baptised slaves who sought refuge

in specific areas of Rome. In 1535, another motuproprio, this time by
Paolo III, ratified the power of the Senate of Rome to declare the free-
dom of slaves and grant the rights of Roman citizens. Paolo III actually
rescinded this law at the end of his papacy. It was restored by Pio V, but
with the qualification that the slave had to convert and be baptised to be
eligible to benefit.82
In 1639, Pope Urbano VIII criticised the King of Portugal and Spain
for enslaving Indians and threatened excommunication. Benedetto XIV
was similarly critical of Brazil. But slaves were still kept in Rome until at
least 1753, when a decree of the Sea Commissioner prohibited the rent-
ing of the slaves in the workshops at the port of Civitavecchia. It was not
until 1760 that the use of slaves on galleys and in dock was prohibited.83
The Regulation of the convicted to the galleys, and to the public works,
issued on 11 April 1806, demonstrates the persistence of such practices,
however. This legal document reviewed regulations dating back to 19
December 1705 on different treatment of Christian convicts and Muslim
slaves in domestic servitude. For example, slaves could not stay overnight
outside the galleys and could not have Christians at their services, while
Christians could not stay overnight in the shacks of the slaves. Christian
and Jewish convicts could leave their assets to the heirs, but Muslims
could not pass on an inheritance.84
Moving to the Atlantic arena, Pio VII signalled his intentions in a let-
ter to the King of France in 1814. It gave advance notice of the alle-
giance of the Church to the abolitionist powers—first and foremost
England—during the Congress of Vienna.85 The first clear papal denun-
ciation of the black trade was Pope Gregorio XVI’s apostolic letter of
December 1839, In Supremo apostolatus. An encyclical from Leone XIII
in 1888 committed the Church to the anti-slavery campaign underway
in Africa.86 In 1814, Pio VII had condemned the ignoble commerce and
addressed not just royalty but all religious and lay people:
[…] religion itself demonstrates to us that it disapproves of, and curses this
ignoble commerce, in which Africans are used and sold such as they are
not men but simply animals. They are addressed to a miserable life of hard
labour that leads them to death. For this reason all the world recognize
rightly that among the great rights that this saintly religion brings to the
world, there is also the fact that the condition of slavery has to be sup-
pressed or its practice softened.87
This letter sought to deny the fact that the Roman Church was
aligned with the Catholic powers and sought instead to highlight the
Church’s Anglophile, credentials just before the Congress of Vienna.
Furthermore, within the Papal States, Pio VII abolished all French civil
laws, with the sole exception of the mortgage system.88 Just before the
Restoration, then, and on the abolition of the trade, the Church was
clearly demonstrating its characteristic duplicitous streak.
On the one hand, the Church’s plenipotentiary, Consalvi—an expert
diplomat and delegate to the Congress of Vienna—wished to seek an
open consensus. On the other hand, the most fervently conservative and
reactionary cardinals of the Roman Curia prioritised territorial restitu-
tions and wished to turn the clock back to pre-Napoleonic times. They
were particularly concerned that the agreements of 1801 be rendered
null and void. Consalvi had a strong grasp of the new climate and under-
stood that the Church could only build consensus by modifying existing
arrangements, not by declaring them null and void. During his mission
in Paris, he was able to secure the traditional leadership of the Pope over
national churches. From Paris, Consalvi went to London in order to lay
the groundwork for the Congress. He established a good relationship
with Castlereagh, who agreed to lift the ban on Catholic participation in
political life. In exchange, Consalvi pledged support for the British cause
of abolition of the trade. Reactionary Catholic elements were displeased
by this drift towards Britain and away from the Catholic powers.89
The Church’s internal political rift was overcome during the papacy
of Gregorio XVI. In Supremo Apostolatus, his apostolic letter of 1839,
invoked his predecessors who had condemned slavery (Clemente I,
Paolo III, Urbano VIII, Benedetto XIV, Pio II, and Pio VII), and pro-
claimed that to honour Jesus Christ, believers should not have any truck
with the market in black people or any other human being.90 The let-
ter was posted in front of the Curia of Rome, the Basilica of the Prince
of the Apostles, the Apostolic Chancellor’s office and Campo de’ Fiori.
Leone XIII’s 1888 encyclical was of a similar tone. It too invoked the
popes who had opposed slavery and it assumed a universal abolitionist
role for the Church. This was no longer just a matter for the King of
France or the other European powers. Even Brazil responded with an
expression of support for the Church in the abolitionist crusade. It seems
that the Church was symbolically appointed to the position of hon-
est broker or mediator of the international movement. Moreover, the
66 G. BONAZZA
encyclical had a theological significance and emphasised what we would

now call human rights. Commenting on the origins of slavery, the Pope
dated the rights of the individual back to the Greco-Roman era and
described the emergence of slavery around this time as aberrant. He con-
trasted the treatment of slaves in the pagan and Christian worlds; in the
former, it was “cruel” and “shameful”, while in the latter it was much
milder, largely because of the benign influence of the Church, which had
long sought to eradicate the plague of slavery.91
Thus, the Papal States took a leading role in fighting the slave trade in
the nineteenth century, and the Church was perhaps the main sponsor of
the campaign by century’s end. This was notwithstanding the fact that
there were confirmed cases of slavery in Rome in 1807, and we cannot
discount the possibility of some sporadic instances thereafter. Raffaella
Sarti refers to the case of Alessandro Guiccioli, a Pontifical subject who
lived in Ravenna and who legally owned legally two black men. In 1824,
Guiccioli moved to Venice, where slavery has been illegal since 1816,
so it is likely that the status of the two black men had to be changed.92
This case is a further example of the continuing acceptance of slavery in
the Papal States two decades into the nineteenth century. So, there were
still slaves in Rome only seven years before the Congress of Vienna and
they remained in the Papal States even after the Congress of Vienna, as
confirmed by the Guiccioli case. There was a stark contradiction between
support for universal rights externally but not internally.
2.4 The Abolitionist Network in the Italian

Context: The Influence of the Anglo-French
Abolitionist Debate
Juridical abolitions of slavery had their foundations in the eight-
eenth-century anti-slavery debate and nineteenth-century abolition-
ism. The anti-slavery culture that emerged between 1750 and 1850 was
transnational rather than national and it was not confined to Europe.
During the French Revolution, French anti-slavery was heavily influ-
enced by American developments and anti-slavery thinking was shaped
by rebellions such as that in Saint Domingo.93
Nineteenth-century abolitionist culture was, however, strictly linked
to both the notion of “European civilisation” and to the relatively recent
rise of the nation state.94 Abolitionism was simultaneously counterpoised
by, and connected to, the theory of colonisation. The imperial vocation
of Europe was supported by prominent philosophies such as the abso-

lute value of civilisation and the concept of equality within the nation
state, but these ideas also allowed for the domination of “others” and
“deviants”. Only through conquest could civilisation be bestowed on
non-European cultures.95
Late nineteenth-century juridical doctrine and the Conference of
Berlin justified colonial ventures on the premise that they centred on the
occupation of empty territory. When a colonial space was not empty, the
source of legitimacy was the supposed inability of natives to use resources
in the proper fashion.96
The definition proposed by the African historian and theologian
Alphonse Quenum may be incomplete, but it underlines the complexity
of the relationship between abolitionism and the evolution of the eco-
nomic interests of slave traders:
Le mouvement abolitionniste paraît avoir été la résultante d’un phénomène

dialectique: la résistance des esclaves qui a souvent été occultée par bien
des historiens, la prise de conscience de milieux éclairés et l’evolution des
intérêts économqiues des États qui pratiquaient la traite.97
The abolitionist movement appears to have been the result of a dialectical
phenomenon: [it involved the convergence of] the slaves’ resistance, which
was often occulted by many historians, the Enlightenment and the evolu-
tion of the economic interests of the states which managed the trade.
The last point is the decisive one: whatever about theoretical debates,
when the system of slavery no longer suited the interests of states, its
days were numbered. The exact process and chronology remain to be
confirmed, but this was the crux of the matter.
The evolution of international abolitionism—at the levels of both pub-
lic opinion and high politics of the political level—was closely related to
notions of what was civilised or not. While slavery came to be denounced
as uncivilised, military imperial intervention in Africa in the latter half of the
nineteenth century was in the cause of civilisation.98 According to Myriam
Cottias, the exclusionary notion of civilisation established itself at the end
of the eighteenth century, as much in France as in England, with the aim of
defining a homogenous social context, and differentiating “others”.99
The first and more significant abolitionist campaigns were the inter-
dependent French and British efforts. The British campaign, in par-
ticular, exported its policies and principles to much of Europe.100
68 G. BONAZZA
Another movement, which sprung up during the second phase of abo-

litionism, was to be found in Spain. Other branches of the movement
which became more forceful later in the nineteenth century, such as the
Italian wing, have yet to be fully considered by historians.101
European abolitionist cultures did not have a national imprint, but
arose from a complex combination of political interactions between
countries, religious issues and from élite intellectual exchanges.
Historiography for some time asserted that British abolitionism drew its
energy primarily from public opinion and that it was a bottom-up move-
ment, whereas its French counterpart was characterised as top-down and
élitist. In reality, there was no common or mass European anti-slavery
mood. Abolitionism was the preserve of individual personalities and
small cohorts.102 The first abolitionist society was established in London
in 1787—the Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Granville Sharp
was the driving force behind it. The Société des Amis des Noirs appeared
in Paris a year later, thanks to Jacques-Pierre Brissot and others.103
Initially, the two societies collaborated. In fact, Thomas Clarkson and
William Wilberforce, members of the London Society, stayed in Paris
so much that they requested French citizenship.104 The two groups
acted differently, however: the French body thrived with the National
Assembly and was inspired to adopt a radical approach by the French
Revolution; the British programme envisioned gradual dismantling of
the apparatus of slavery. The upheavals in the colony of Saint Domingo
and the abolition of slavery proclaimed by the Montagnard Convention
in 1794 drove a wedge between the two associations. The more conserv-
ative British did not look kindly upon the French management of the
colonies, especially after Haiti’s revolution and declaration of independ-
ence in 1804.105 After the Abolition Bill of 1807 and the establishment
of the African Institution, Britain renewed its abolitionist campaign.
The Treaty of Paris (1814), particularly the clause that the French
would abolish the trade within five years, facilitated reconciliation. The
Congress of Vienna had a wider international scope and British aboli-
tionism shared common values and religious affinities with Protestant
networks across Europe. In France, Protestantism supported the estab-
lishment of the Société de la Morale Chrétienne (1822) and the Société
Française pour l’Abolition de l’esclavage (1834).106 Some élitist groups
became more active and the measures taken by the British Colonial
Office were adopted by the French Minister of the Navy. Personalities
such as Tocqueville and Lamartine pressed for immediate abolition.
Another group, including Hippolyte Passy and Charles de Rémusat, pro-

moted a more gradual approach.107 Before Schoelcher’s 1848 abolition-
ist measure, then, France was home to a militant anti-slavery movement
featuring labour petitions and a significant abolitionist consensus: “tout
le monde aujourd’hui est abolitioniste, ou prétend l’être”. “all the world
is abolitionist today, or claims to be”.108 As the century progressed,
demonstrating commitment to abolition became a matter of political
rivalry and reputation and this was evident at the Brussels Conferences in
1889–1990.
Italian abolitionism has not been studied closely because the pre-uni-
tarian Italian states did not have a colonial empire. Italian colonialism
did not begin in earnest until the first half of the 1880s, twenty years
after the unification of the Italian state.109 The first anti-slavery society in
Italy was established in Palermo only in 1888, thanks to the dynamism of
Cardinal Lavigerie in Europe and the efforts of Pope Leone XIII on the
home front.110 Alessandro Tuccillo is the only scholar to have recently
dealt with the intellectual history of the Italian eighteenth-century
anti-slavery movement. He approached it as a “non-colonial anti-slavery
movement”.111 Unlike the British and French abolitionist movements,
which were closely associated with dominant figures including William
Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson, Abbé Grégoire and Victor Schoelcher,
the Italian movement, particularly in the nineteenth century, was not
spearheaded by unique personalities. Rather, it was more the sum of its
intellectual parts: while Tuccillo will feature strongly in analysis of eight-
eenth-century anti-slavery philosophical thought, the primary focus
here is on nineteenth-century abolitionism as manifest in the worlds of
academia, literature and journalism. I will highlight the role of intel-
lectuals including Lodovico Menin, Giovan Pietro Vieusseux, Andrea
Zambelli and Giovanni Ferri. It is not the biographies of these men that
are important but the arguments they put forward in newspaper articles,
teaching courses, annals of economic statistics and books. These sources
will be used to identify and understand the “Italian” contribution to
abolitionism.
Italian states were deeply influenced by the Enlightened French
anti-slavery movement, but Italian thinkers also contributed to the inter-
national debate. The existence of abolitionism within the Kingdom of
Naples and Enlightened Neapolitan culture is demonstrated. Gaetano
Filangieri in La Scienza della legislazione (1780–1791) stridently crit-
icised colonial slavery, defending the abstract nature of human rights.
70 G. BONAZZA
Filangieri’s work prompted Benjamin Constant to publish a Commentaire

sur l’ouvrage de Filangieri. Constant remarked that:
Les bords affreux du Sénégal ne seraient pas devenus le marché où les

Européens vont trafiquer à vil prix des droits inviolables de l’humanité…
La seule Pennsylvanie n’a plus d’esclaves. Le progrès des lumières nous fait
espérer que cet exemple sera bientôt suivi par le reste des nations.112
The hideous shores of Senegal would not have become a market for
trafficking if Europeans were not selling inviolable human rights for the
cheapest price…Only Pennsylvania does not have slaves anymore. The
progress of the Enlightment thinkers makes us hope that this example will
soon be followed by the rest of the nations.
Abolitionism in the Kingdom of Naples peaked with the publica-

tion by Salerno’s Matteo Galdi of Del Commercio dei Negri. Galdi was a
patriot and exile in the liberated Milan during the Napoleonic interlude,
and later became a diplomatic agent in Aja. In the essay Dei rapporti
politico-economici tra le nazioni libere (1798), he proposed the diffusion
of a new colonial model without slavery.113 The mobility of these intel-
lectuals demonstrates that the contextualisation of abolitionism within
national borders is reductive and that a transnational perspective is more
appropriate and illuminating.114 Tuccillo himself made the argument that
it was important to recognise that anti-slavery thinking was not a feature
of the Anglo-American and French models of abolitionism only.115
In the Kingdom of Naples, Montesquieu’s Esprit des Lois (1748)
was among the most widely disseminated of the Lumières’ essays.116
Montesquieu was somewhat equivocal in his position on slavery: in
Chapter 3 of book 10, Chapter III, On the right of conquest, he wrote:
“from the right to kill during the conquest, politicians deduced the right
to enslave; but the consequence is as badly founded as the cause”.117 In
Chapter 15 of book 12, On the liberation of the slave when he accuses the
master, there is a reflection on the right of the slave to testify. Under
Emperor August, slaves were sold in public but had to right to complain
publicly about their master. Under Emperor Tacito, however, slaves were
prohibited from any form of public testimony.118 Montesquieu’s previ-
ous anti-slavery stance seems to be contradicted by his claims in book
15, How the rules of civil slavery are related to climatic factors. The the-
ory proposed, in a rather forced fashion, is that freedom and slavery are
factors of the climate.119 Montesquieu’s conflicted thinking illustrates
the dominance of the notion of the coloniser’s superiority and natural

right to dominate and enslave. There was little direct mainstream chal-
lenge to this philosophy until the publication in 1789 of The declaration
of the rights of the man and of the citizen. While Montesquieu asserted
that slavery and the slave trade ran contrary to reason and to justice, he
knew that Europe could not renounce a system that was fundamental
to its material progress.120 In Chapter Two of book 15, Montesquieu
considered the origin of the “du droit de l’esclavage chez les jurisconsultes
romains” (the laws of slavery under Roman jurisprudence) in the context
of individual, civil and natural rights. From this perspective, he argued
that the Roman introduction of slavery ran counter to these rights. In
respect of the law of nations, prisoners of war could not be killed so they
were enslaved. The title servus referred to the Emperors’ practice of sell-
ing captivos instead of killing them. In respect of civil rights, a freeman
could not sell himself. In respect of natural rights, Montesquieu denied
the legitimacy of the right to kill in war and the idea that enslaving a
man was a proper alternative to killing him. So, the transformation of
an enemy into a captive and a slave was a contravention of both civil
and natural rights. A slave could be detained only under family law, by a
master.121
Ermenegildo Personè, a jurist and politician from Lecce, wrote
Reflections on the Spirit of the Laws in response to Montequieu.122
Personé was particularly critical of Montesquieu’s interpretations
of Roman legal opinions on slavery. According to Personè, enslave-
ment was a symptom of the piety of Roman jurisconsults because ene-
mies should really have been killed under the laws of war.123 The realist
Personè accused Montesquieu of idealism and further disagreed with his
depiction of British-style mixed government as the best form of gov-
ernment. Personè supported absolute monarchy and largely rejected
Enlightenment positions. He was especially critical of Antonio Genovesi
and the so-called Southern Enlightenment, which promoted the techni-
cal sciences and the civil economy. Personè’s criticisms of Montesquieu
should be viewed in the light of his opposition to the emerging trends of
modern commercial society.124
Thomas Hobbes too, in Chapter 8 of the De Cive (1642), namely
The rights of masters over servants, affirmed that enslavement was legiti-
mated by the laws of nature.125 In war, the natural law was that the van-
quished could save his own life by pledging total obedience to the victor.
72 G. BONAZZA
In natural law, then, slavery could be based on either a free choice (vol-
untary self-enslavement) or coercion. Hobbes refined this doctrine to
suggest that a population would be willing to sacrifice some of its nat-
ural freedoms if this guaranteed it some protection against the threats
inherent in the State of Nature. In practice, this meant that membership
of a society entailed delegation of the right to exercise certain powers
to a monarch or institution. For Grozio and Pufendorf, meanwhile,
pacifism represented a challenge to the natural order. According to the
Roman conception of rights, slavery was basically illegitimate, because
a man could not transfer his freedom.126 John Locke tackled the ques-
tion of slavery in Chapter 4 of the Second Treaties on Civil Government.
According to Locke, the natural condition of a man is to be free, but
the freedom is available to a member of society through respect for the
laws of the State. Given that a man has no power over his own life, he
cannot enslave himself through contract or consensus. Submission under
threat of death had no standing for Locke and he legitimated suicide in
case of slavery. He considered slavery to represent a state of war between
conqueror and prisoner because there could be no contract between
them.127 Locke differentiated between serfdom and slavery. He regarded
the serf as a freeman who sold his service for a salary for a defined period
under contractual terms which might demand total obedience. He
viewed the slave as a prisoner of a legitimate war, naturally subject to the
absolute domain and to the arbitrary power of his master. Slaves were
outside civil society, so they did not have property rights.128
While liberalism opposed absolute power and legitimated the right
of resistance, it still justified colonial slavery; in colonial contexts, con-
quest automatically involved slavery, whereas in the European context,
mutual understanding guaranteed freedom.129 Locke was a shareholder
in the Royal African Company, so he supported colonial settlement. In
the Second Essay, in place of laws he advanced motivations linked to nat-
ural rights as justification for colonial depredations. Indians, for instance,
were subject to colonisation because they were inferior and unskilled,
ignorant of the concept of property and without the wherewithal to use
money properly. God himself offered development opportunities and
property rights to those who could benefit from them and prevent the
world from being “common and uncultivated”.130 Grozio wrote of bar-
barians and pagans in much the same terms. The USA’s Declaration of
Independence (1776) and Constitution (1787) were based on the ten-
ets of contemporary liberalism. The preamble to the Constitution stated
that all men are equal, although article 1 differentiated between free per-
sons and the rest, the rest being slaves.131
Neapolitan anti-slavery theorist Ferdinando Galiani, in his essay Della
moneta, used coins as a guide to sketch a history of the slave trade from
the time of the discovery of gold and silver to the eighteenth century.
He reflected on the fact that once Neapolitans abandoned the system
of serfdom, they treated Indians and Africans in an even more barbaric
way. His conclusion was that “a population cannot enrich itself with-
out oppressing and ruining another”.132 Enlightened Neapolitans lik-
ened the living and working conditions of the local rural poor to slavery.
Antonio Genovesi compared the “uttentotti” (hottentots) in the village
of Bartolomeo Intieri in Massa Equana to the savages depicted in the
literature of the day.133 In Lezioni di commercio (1765–1767), Genovesi
drew parallels between the slaves of the Greek-Roman world and mod-
ern colonial slaves. In introducing his ideas on the dependencies between
nations, he highlighted the subordination of the Kingdom of Naples to
other powers, and he proposed a reformation project in order to solve
this inequitable relationship. His vision was along the lines of schemes
developed for colonies with the aim of reducing their dependence on the
imperial power.134 Ermenegildo Personè’s Sulla Diocesina (1777) con-
centrated on Mediterranean slavery:
this holy law did not abolish our enslavement by Islamics, and
Idolatrouses; neither did Islamic law stop us enslaving them; therefore,
slavery is now more common than it was twenty or thirty centuries ago.135
Contemporary philosophical treatments of privateering and the

Mediterranean slave trade show that commerce in men was increasing
rather than decreasing, including in Naples. In contrast to Genovesi,
Personè asserted that Christianity did not abolish slavery. Personè was
one of the few scholars who dealt with the topic of Mediterranean slav-
ery, which often lurked unnoticed in the shadow of colonial slavery.136
Nineteenth-century Italian studies of Mediterranean slavery tended
to concentrate on Christian slaves in the Barbary States rather than on
Atlantic slavery.
For example, in 1843, Giovanni Giuseppe Ghisotti wrote an essay
entitled Notizie sulla schiavitù nell’Algeria e sull’Algeri Moderno, describ-
ing the living conditions of Christian slaves.137 At the beginning of the
nineteenth century, Algiers was described as a refuge of pirates, who
74 G. BONAZZA
spread terror among Christians in the Mediterranean. Ghisotti distin-

guished between government-owned and private-owned slaves. The
former were bound by iron rings around their feet, were mistreated and
imprisoned. The latter, depending on the humanity of their owner, could
enjoy good living conditions and they occasionally even had the option
of returning to their place of origin.138 Coffee houses were frequented
by Moors, Jews and Christians and in the back streets and alleys it was
common to encounter Moors, Bedouins, Arabs, Spahis, Kabyli, Jews
and Europeans from every country. It was a multicultural environment.
Spanish Trinitarian religious handled the ransom of Christian slaves and
priests and monks frequented prisons.139
Reflections on the black trade and Atlantic slavery were mainstays
in journals, annals and essays. For example, in 1838, in the Universal
Annals of Statistics of Milan, a review of Agenore de Gasparin’s Schiavitù
e Tratta essay was published. Its central point was the persistence of
the trade post-abolition. De Gasparin argued that the colonial pow-
ers believed in the necessity of abolition but that the objections of slave
owners were difficult to overcome. The British apprenticeship abolitionist
scheme was considered as successful: in 1840 Jamaica, Saint Lucy, and
Saint Christopher abolished slavery. De Gasparin held up the British col-
onies as a model for the French.140 Among his proposals was the intro-
duction of savings banks which would provide slaves with the means to
purchase goods or even their own freedom. He also mooted the pro-
vision of education and the creation of a civil status for slaves.141 To
incentivise masters to liberate slaves, he suggested remuneration of one
quarter of the value of the slave to the liberator. The freed slave should
be presented with a house and garden. By 1858, the number of slaves
in the French colonies was only in the hundreds and the idea was that
direct liberation in this fashion would help to preserve the colonial sta-
tus quo by removing the threat of destabilizing rebellions such as that in
Saint Domingo in 1791.
The Italian states’ reception of Montesquieu’s philosophy on slav-
ery is recorded in nobleman Andrea Zambelli’s Sulla schiavitù de’
negri. Zambelli opens with an account of the horrors of fifteenth- and
sixteenth-century Portuguese and Spanish colonialism. His real criticism
of Spain was its failure to exploit the economic opportunities presented
by conquest in as fulsome a manner as the powers which introduced the
cultivation of new cash crops in plantations (including Portugal, Holland,
France and England).142 Zambelli, quoting Montesquieu, raised the
topic of religious conversion. The primary justification cited for coloni-

sation resided in a religious matrix. Europeans wished to export their civ-
ilisation by converting heathens. Concern for Christianity, genuine and
otherwise, was placed front and centre, camouflaging the realpolitik of
European economic interests. Following the exposition of a catalogue
of the standard racial prejudices directed against black people regard-
ing physical features and intellect (Africans allegedly lacked intelligence
because they placed more value on glass than gold), Zambelli pondered
the reality of these stereotypes: “Is it not enough that Blacks have a form
similar to us in order to have the same intellectual capacities? What is
the relationship between morality and color?”143 Zambelli was particu-
larly interested in how economists viewed the economic practices of
black African men. Humanity generally (as idealised in the shape of “civ-
ilised” European men) had moved on from satisfying only organic needs
to artificial needs. According to economists, however, the inhabitants of
the arid lands of the “Nigrizia” (“Africa”) were only on the first rung of
the economic evolutionary ladder.144 Unlike these economists, Zambelli
believed that blacks would be able to equal whites and to surpass them.
According to Zambelli, blacks were sensitive in poetry, in music, in dance
and in love; blacks were more soulful than whites. Black slaves had also
demonstrated their political strength during instances like the Haitian
revolution (after a slave uprising in Hispaniola, slave owners had to cede
control of part of the island to their former slaves).145 Zambelli refers to
the work of an unnamed Dutch author, who wrote the Discorsi moderni
sulla schiavitù dei Negri. This shows the circulation of abolitionist ideas
around Europe. The Dutch author compared the conditions endured by
slaves to those experienced by European peasants, but Zambelli was too
well-informed and too committed to abolitionism to equate serfdom to
slavery.146
The terrible treatment of slaves in both the Atlantic colonies and the
Barbary States was clearly documented in Giovanni Ferri’s 1822 book,
Lo spettatore italiano: preceduto da un saggio critico (in particular in the
chapters La schiavitù, I lamenti dello schiavo, Il principe schiavo and Gli
schiavi in Barberia).147 This work conveyed the testimony of two Italians
who witnessed the long-term maltreatment of black slaves by whites
Colonisers were untouchable and the horrors of slavery shamed the
two white Italians. They do note some redeeming features, such as the
story of an African prince who was kidnapped and enslaved but eventu-
ally liberated on account of what they described as his “great spirit”.148
76 G. BONAZZA
Of course, one could interpret this story as indicating the presence of

class issues within the slavery system. Cruelty against enslaved women
in Barbados, especially in the city of Bridgetown, is also highlighted.
English soldiers were apparently shocked by the treatment meted out to
slave women. One case involved a woman suffering from fever and ulcers
who was put out to die on the street so that she did not infect other
slaves.149 In a review published in the Milanese journal l’Ape italiana
on Discorso sullo Stato della schiavitù nelle isole delle Indie Occidentali by
Reverend Robert Hall in 1824, the primary focus was the condition of
slaves in the British estates in the Western Indies. He petitioned for the
liberation of slaves.150
Ferri’s Lo spettatore italiano, as mentioned above, made numerous ref-
erences to slaves in the Barbary States. Christian slaves were mistreated
and their only cause for hope was the possibility that the Trinitarians
might pay a ransom for them. As many as 1 in 8 enslaved Christians
were state-owned.151 The Gazzetta di Milano of Saturday, 14 September
1816—during the period of the Kingdom of Lombardy and Venice—
reported on the expedition of Britain’s Lord Exmouth to Algiers and the
ratification of the abolition of Christian slavery.152 The report contained
extracts from a letter written by Exmouth in his role as British chief
commander in Algiers. Giovanni Falconer, Consul of the British King in
Tuscany, was also closely involved. Article 1 of the peace treaty agreed
between Algiers and the reigning Prince of Tuscany formalised the abo-
lition of Christian slavery; article 2 detailed how the slaves should be
returned home; and article 3 choreographed the restitution of the money
already deposited by Redenzioni, and especially the sum paid by the King
of the Two Sicilies. In total, there were around 1000 Christian slaves in
the Barbary States. Officials from Livorno revealed that Exmouth and
the Bey of Algiers had not settled matters without resorting to mili-
tary exchanges. Exmouth was wounded in the face and 146 British
died, while another 700 were wounded. The Bey commanded 60,000
Arab troops and 18,000 janissary. The British Navy’s influence in the
Mediterranean in the mid-nineteenth century meant that Exmouth left
Algiers with 1050 freed slaves.153
A speech by Clemente Caunes in the general assembly of the Leeward
Isles on 7 March 1798 attracted significant attention. His comments
on the abolition of the black slave trade (as opposed to slavery) were
reported in the Nuovo Giornale dei Letterati.154 According to Caunes,
who was a settler, it was in the interests of owners themselves to abolish
the trade and only the commercially ignorant supported its continuance.
He wished to incentivise reproduction in the colonies rather than hav-
ing young slaves dying needlessly. One of his main aims was to reduce
the death rate among slaves, starting with the provision of appropriate
medical care. Caunes claimed that the high turnover of slaves led to sig-
nificant inefficiency on Jamaican plantations and he identified two con-
tradictory vices as characteristic of Jamaican slave masters: stinginess and
prodigality. Penny-pinching settlers purchased too few slaves and too few
tools for the volume of sugarcane they were processing.155 Continuing in
this fashion, with an ever-changing workforce, was pointless. Production
would have been more profitable with white workers and the newest
machines.156 Caunes’ opposition to the slave trade is interesting because
it was based not on morality or philanthropy but on pure capitalist eco-
nomics. A distinct but closely related concern of Caunes’ was the preser-
vation of social stability and he was partly motivated by the wish to avoid
revolution.157
In the mid-nineteenth century, the debate on the abolition of the
slave trade received widespread press coverage, as we saw with the Nuovo
Giornale dei Letterati. The Antologia—an important Florentine journal
of science and literature established in 1821 by Giampietro Vieusseux—
carried ongoing commentary on abolitionism. It featured, for instance,
articles on the slave trade in Zanzibar. The African island was the first
market for slaves being transported to Cuba and Brazil. Britain never
managed to impede the traffic on this route. Zanzibar heaved with a
steady stream of slaves, wealthy masters and their mainly Indian mid-
dlemen.158 The Moral and Political Sciences section of volume 4/1821
of the Antologia reviewed the posthumous 1820 edition of Guillaume-
Thomas François Raynal’s Histoire des deux Indes (which was preceded
by the 1770, 1774 and 1780 editions).159 This is an indicator of the
prevalence of the debate. Raynal reportedly predicted the loss of colo-
nies in the Americas because European domination was both unjust and
unsustainable. The introduction to Raynal’s piece looked to the East:
“European Turkey seeks liberators”. The abolition of the slave trade had
changed the colonial system, which now had to prioritise the export of
European norms to Africa. It becomes increasingly apparent in popular
commentary that criticism of the slave trade was based not just on ethi-
cal objections but also on concern that it had started to run counter to
the public interest.160 Europeans understood that the African exterior
was likely to be their most fruitful testing ground. Britain experimented
78 G. BONAZZA
with colonial settlements in Sierra Leone, the twin aim of which was to
simultaneously civilise Africa and abolish the slave trade. The universi-
ties joined the project: in 1785 Cambridge announced a prize for the
best contribution on the topic of slavery and the commerce in human
beings. The winning dissertation was written by Thomas Clarkson of the
London Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade and the soon-to-be
Governor of the Sierra Leone colony; he had a close ally in William
Wilberforce. In 1788, Granville Sharp sponsored an expedition of
39 settlers to establish a colony in Sierra Leone. An association of 21
prominent supporters successfully lobbied Parliament to authorise the
formation of a company that would have special privilege for 31 years,
starting from July 1791. Obviously, proponents of the slave trade were
excluded.
Clarkson was Governor of the Society until 1792. He was deter-
mined to improve the settlers’ treatment of the local population in
Sierra Leone. Not only were slave traders resistant to Clarkson’s new
approach—the abolitionist groups in charge of the new Society also
opposed him. His truest supporters were the local chiefs.161 By the time
Willian Dawes succeeded Clarkson as Governor in 1792, the locals had
become disillusioned with the project and sought refuge in the terri-
tories of independent chiefs. The outbreak of war between France and
Great Britain in 1794 did not help the political process initiated by
Clarkson in Siera Leone; the settlement came under attack from both
British and French forces. In 1808, the Abolitioniä Liberal Company
was forced to cede control of the settlement in Sierra Leone to the
British Government, and continuous depopulation led to the establish-
ment of a colonial police. Coercion was employed against challengers to
British rule.162 In 1814, the capital of the colony was inhabited by 2000
“blacks” who were deemed fit to work. There were an additional 3000
slaves who had been captured elsewhere. On April 1820, a further 6000
slaves were transported to the colony on British war vessels. These slaves
were treated very differently than their predecessors, however, and for
the better. On arrival, they were presented with a house and a plot of
land in a local village and they were also maintained for one year at the
expenses of the British Government. Children were schooled by a pas-
tor-teacher until they came of marriageable age163 Vieusseux Antologia
reported that the Society of Friends was established in Sierra Leone in
1813, thanks to Captain Paolo Cuffee. The Society maintained close
relations with its London counterpart and exported rice, wood, ivory
and coffee to London. But it did not trade in spirits, gunpowder or war
tools. The London Society financed the shipping in order to encourage
the settlers to cultivate goods that could be exported. Part of this scheme
was the idea that the pace of the abolition of the slave trade would
match the pace of the exploitation of new territories in Western Africa.
Sometimes, slaves from New Scotland were brought back to Sierra
Leone in order to repopulate the territory and in the hope that better
conditions would increase their productivity.164
About the dynamics between the Italian area and the Barbary
States, in the Antologia there were three articles which appeared in the
Antologia under the title Prospetto del commercio di Tripoli d’Africa e
delle sue relazioni con quello dell’Italia, dealt with the dynamics between
the Italian and Barbary States.165 The first of the three pieces was pub-
lished in 1827 and referred to the annual trafficking of 2500 blacks
between Tripoli, Tunis, Egypt and the Levant. A small number of slaves
remained in Tripoli, at the service of the Muslim inhabitants. Christians
who lived in Tripoli could not purchase black slaves.166 Slaves from
inland Africa were categorised and priced accordingly in Tripoli: eunuchs
cost between 350 and 400 sceriffi (Ottoman gold), equivalent to
between 650 and 700 Spanish pieces of eight; adult males cost between
90 and 100 pieces of eight, whereas a boy of between 10 and 18 years
old was valued at 70–80 pieces of eight; a younger child cost from 40–50
pieces of eight; the price of women reflected their perceived beauty and
could range from 120–150 pieces of eight; girls cost between 90 and
100 pieces of eight.167 In 1828, the second article in the series included
slaves in a list of export goods.168 In 1830, the third article specified
export duty of 40,000 dollars of Spain on slaves “from nigrizia”.169
Alongside the Antologia, the international debate on the slave trade
was the subject of close attention in the wider Italian press. While the
Italian states did not themselves possess colonies, they were interested
in the course of the argument and its impact on transatlantic trade as
well as on the more immediate Mediterranean trade. The journal extracts
and operettas considered above, especially Lo spettatore italiano, clearly
demonstrate that question of slavery and its future had deeply engaged
“Italian” public opinion. It is noteworthy, however, that none of these
writings referred to the phenomenon of slavery in Europe, much less in
the Italian regions, and outside of Gazzetta di Milano little enough refer-
ence was made to Christian slavery in the Barbary States.
80 G. BONAZZA
In the second half of the nineteenth century, the academic world

demonstrated growing awareness of the debate about the slave trade;
Professor Lodovico Menin of the University of Padua, in Sulle cause che
resero finora infruttuose le misure prese per abolire la tratta dei Negri, e
come tale scopo si potrebbe raggiungere (1859) “Failed efforts to abolish
the black trade”—reflected on changes in the trade in the four decades
since the Congress of Vienna. The scourge had not been eradicated.
As well as trade between Africa and America, there was trade between
states in the USA, including between northern and southern states only
a few years before the American Civil War. So, the right of inspection
proposed by the British had never been implemented and the trading of
slaves continued despite legal impediments.170 By this point, Britain had
changed tack in their attempt to suppress the trade: they had abandoned
the claim to the right of inspection; and in tandem with the French, they
had submitted new proposals on surveillance methods to the American
cabinet.171 Menin pointed to the incongruities between British efforts
at prohibition of the trade and the economic exploitation of colonies.
Moreover, he suggested that the abolition of slavery would be disastrous
for the economies of the pro-slavery southern USA, from the cotton
plantations of which Britain also benefited. He suggested that only uni-
versal abolition of slavery across all of the USA would have the desired
effect. Even in this best-case scenario, however, Menin was not optimis-
tic about what was to come:
The Black, as soon as he can reach the cities will approach you at every
step liveried but ragged. He is a servant, fixer, porter, cook, bartender,
everything but a farmer. And he cannot hope for better, because even
where people scream against his slavery, everyone thinks that he is mean,
because they think nature has been stingy with his intellect, or because
they think that during his slavery he forgot to use it. If among these mil-
lions [of Blacks] there would be one who would have thoughts of revenge
and who would create a group intent on revenge rather than on just assert-
ing their rights, what would be the reaction of the Whites?172
Menin had the foresight to worry about poor planning for the future of
the new freemen and the likelihood that it would contribute to social
and racial problems.
The Papal States, led by figures including Gregorio XVI and Leone XIII,
had their say also. The Catholic press represented its constituency alongside
the popular Italian and European press. Civiltà Cattolica dedicated three
numbers in 1866 to the problem of slavery. It developed a unique argu-

ment in Lo schiavo negro nell’America, La Rivoluzione e l’abolizione della
tratta e della schiavitù e L’abolizione della tratta e della schiavitù.173 On
slavery in America, it proposed a system of “legal aid” and pointed out that
unlike some of its detractors, the Church had been campaigning against
slavery since the sixteenth century.174 Moreover, the author argued that leg-
islators proclaiming natural rights as inalienable, and promoting the exten-
sion of citizenship to slaves, were animated by what had long been Church
principles. He compiled a historical list of Portuguese theologians who
expressed anti-slavery opinions, citing Franciscan monks stationed at one of
the first Portuguese colonial outposts in Africa in 1701. They condemned
Christians who owned black slaves, whether baptised or not.175 This refer-
ence to baptism was a riposte to the nineteenth-century critics who accused
the Church of founding the slave trade in the Americas in order to increase
the number of baptised people there.176
The Catholic journal acknowledged Britain as the first fully com-
mitted abolitionist country while also paying homage to the French
lumières. It praised Voltaire, Raynal, d’Holbac and Montesquieu as
fathers of the revolution. The journal of the Society of Jesus made the
case that British abolitionism had been inspired by Gregorio XVI and
that France in turn followed the British example.177 American crit-
ics of the Catholic Church were numerous and vigorous. They were
spearheaded by Abraham Lincoln and Enlightened Protestantism.
The Jesuit journal expressly attacked Lincoln, claiming that his abo-
lition of slavery during the Civil War was simply a method to weaken
the secessionist southern states. The Protestant sects wished to combat
the perception that the Catholic Church was the sole religious advo-
cate of abolitionism and were particularly conscious of the role of the
Pope. The Jesuits countered criticism of the Pope by pointing out that
the Popes had traditionally been the protectors of those missionaries
who had fought the slaves’ cause in the colonies since the sixteenth cen-
tury. Enlightened thinkers regarded Christianity as lethargic, slumbering
through a period of great change and progress. In France, the conduct
of the clergy in the colonies came under attack from liberal Catholics.
Charles de Montalembert, for example, assumed that the clergy in the
colonies had no real power, given that they had to obey the civil authori-
ties. European public opinion looked on the performance of the Church
post-emancipation as mediocre. After Gregorio XVI’s apostolic letter
of 1839, Catholics in the colonies could no longer rest on their laurels
and bide their time. Public opinion was rather sceptical about the real
82 G. BONAZZA
contribution of the Church to abolitionism. Hence the response of the

Civiltà Cattolica and its propaganda on the Church’s record in Africa.178
The Coppet and Sismondi group represent a clear illustration of the
range of the anti-slavery movement and the debate on colonialism.179
From the end of the eighteenth century, both the Société de la Morale
Chrétienne and Comité pour l’abolition de la traite des Noirs convened in
the castle of Jacques Necker in Coppet in Switzerland. Leading political
analysts of the day were regular guests.180 Among these commentators,
Madame de Staël and Jean Charles Léonard Simonde de Sismondi devel-
oped tight relationships with the Société des Amis des Noirs, established in
1788 by Jacques-Pierre Brissot and modelled on Clarkson’s Society for the
Abolition of the Slave Trade.181 Their anti-slavery rhetoric of these groups
became more intense as the XIX century progressed, and particularly
so in the period immediately prior to the Congress of Vienna. Madame
de Staël, in her Considérations sur la Révolution française, which was a
response to Chateaubriand’s Génie du christianisme (1802), declared
that the violence of the Saint Domingo slave revolt was proportional to
the injustices inflicted on the slaves. Her travels brought her to Russia,
where she was deeply affected by what she considered the inhumanity of
serfdom. In 1813, in London, she met the most important Anglo-Saxon
abolitionists: James Mackintosh and William Wilberforce. In 1807, they
had led the two British parliamentary chambers in voting for the abo-
lition of the slave trade. Wilberforce’s books had been translated into
French by Albertine de Staël, while Madame de Staël was active in the
diffusion of abolitionist calls.182
Benjamin Constant and his son Auguste de Staël continued the work
of Madame de Staël in the ten years after the Restoration. Auguste
shaped the Protestant component of the Société de la Morale chrétienne
and led an investigation into conditions for slaves in the city of Nantes,
where the smell of cadaver drifted from ships. The chains on oarsmen
were compared to wreaths of roses.183 Sismondi, before his death in
1842, had encouraged planning for the eventual integration of freed
slaves. In his first book, Tableau de l’agriculture de la Toscane, he sug-
gested that labourers in the colonies (both slaves and servants) would
benefit more from a scheme assisting them to become sharecroppers
along the lines of the Tuscan model rather than from simple liberation
which would probably condemn them to poverty. In 1833, after the abo-
lition of British slavery, Sismondi immediately predicted the imminent
abolition of slavery in the French colonies (1848). In De la condition
dans laquelle il convient de placer les nègres en les affranchissant, a pam-

phlet extract from Revue mensuelle d’économie, he considered the living
conditions of former slaves. Sismondi hoped that they would not have
to cope with same conditions as the Irish peasantry. He hoped for the
creation of a fair contract allowing liberated slaves to become farmers.
His was a lone voice among economists as he argued that the end of slav-
ery required total reconfiguration of the home market rather than just
one-crop production for export. Slaves should become farmers and con-
sumers, wholly integrated into a republican society where there would be
no racial segregation.184 For white slaves in the Barbary States, Sismondi
portrayed the Tuscan agricultural model as the ideal solution. The con-
trast with Antonio Genovesi’s depiction of the peasantry in the Kingdom
of Naples was stark.185 Baron De Staël detailed his travels in Nantes in
1825 in a letter published in both the Société de la Morale chrétienne and
the Antologia.186 He had observed chains and tools of torture on slave
transportation ships. He urged renewed abolitionist efforts and the full
mobilisation of European anti-slavery societies.187
2.5 Between Universal Rights and Realpolitik

European abolitionism emerged from the Enlightenment and peaked
at the Brussels Anti-Slavery Conference of 1889–1890. Of course, slav-
ery, in its various manifestations, has never been completely eradicated.
With significant European collaboration, slavery repeatedly modified
itself into other systems of serfdom or coerced labour. Around Europe
and in Italy, abolitionist intent was regularly expressed in legislation as
well as in the press and through philosophical debate and the establish-
ment of international abolitionist societies. Still, slavery endured. It was
less prominent around the Mediterranean than in the colonies of European
powers because that is what their interests dictated. We tend to distinguish
between the reciprocal arrangements that existed between Europe and
North-African countries, and the transatlantic trade to the Americas. These
fluctuating relationships gave way to a sustained imperialist assault against
Africa (and Asia) at the end of the nineteenth century. While European
statesmen drafted high-minded policy statements invoking liberal tradition
and in the spirit of the French Revolution, proclamations of the equality of
all men and the universality of natural rights always seemed to leave space
for an exception. Realpolitik and the interests of great powers meant that
slaves were often forced into this space and treated as exceptions.
84 G. BONAZZA
Notes
1. Kate Hodgson, “Législation antiesclavagiste européenne, traités inter-
nationaux et changements constitutionnels,” Eurescl, WP1 - Frontiers,
nationalism, feelings of belonging. Cultures politiques européennes de l’an
ti-esclavagisme, 1.
2. Florence Gauthier, ed., Périssent les colonies plutôt qu’un principe!
Contributions à l’histoire de l’abolition de l’esclavage, 1789–1804 (Paris:
Société des études robespierristes, 2002), 14; Nelly Schmidt, L’abolition
de l’esclavage. Cinq siècles de combats XVIe–XXe siècle (Paris: Fayard,
2005), 13; Pierre Serna, “Que s’est-il dit à la Convention les 15, 16
et 17 pluviôse an II? Ou lorsque la naissance de la citoyenneté univer-
selle provoque l’invention du ‘crime de lèse-humanité’,” La Révolution
française, no. 7 (2014) mis en ligne le 03 février 2015: 3–13, http://
lrf.revues.org/1208 (consulted on 11 October 2015).
3. On the “betrayal” of Napoleon and on his colonial policy see Yves
Bénot, La démence coloniale sous Napoléon (Paris: La Découverte,
1992), 81; Jean-Pierre Le Glaunec, L’armée indigène. La défaite de
Napoléon en Haïti (Montréal: Lux, 2014), 49.
4. The Code Noir was a juridical document issued in 1685 during the
reign of Louis XIV. Around sixty articles regulated the jurisdiction on
slaves. Sala-Molins, Le Code Noir, ou le calvaire de Canaan (Paris: Puf,
1987/2007), 7.
5. “Des lenteurs parlementaires françaises aux initiatives individuelles,” in
Schmidt, L’abolition de l’esclavage. Cinq siècles de combats XVIe–XXe siè
cle, 99–215.
6. Roger T. Anstey, “Capitalism and Slavery: A Critique,” in The Atlantic
Slave Trade, Volume IV, Nineteenth Century, ed. Jeremy Black
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), 110.
7. See the entry abolitionnisme in Olivier Pétré-Grenouilleau, ed.,
Dictionnaire des esclavages (Paris: Larousse, 2010), 51.
8. Schmidt, L’abolition de l’esclavage. Cinq siècles de combats XVIe–XXe siè
cle, 119.
9. Lewis Hertslet, ed., A Complete Collection of the Treaties and
Conventions at Present Subsisting Between Great Britain & Foreign
Powers; So Far as They Relate to Commerce and Navigation; to the
Repression and Abolition of the Slave Trade; and to the Privileges and
Interests of the Subjects of the High Contracting Parties (London: T.
Egerton, 1820), tome I, 11.
10. Plenipotentiaries included Lords Castlereagh, Stewart and Wellington for
Great Britain, Talleyrand for France, Don Pedro Gómez Labrador for
Spain, Count Loewenhielm for Sweden, Prince Hardenberg and Baron
von Humboldt for Prussia, Count Nesselrode for Russia and Metternich
for Austria. See “I protagonisti” in Vittorio Criscuolo, Il Congresso di

Vienna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2015), 31–65.
11. Hodgson, “Législation antiesclavagiste européenne, traités internation-
aux et changements constitutionnels,” 1.
12. Criscuolo, Il Congresso di Vienna, 22.
14. Criscuolo, Il Congresso di Vienna, 144–145.
cle, 117–118, 125.
17. Fabian Klose, The Emergence of Humanitarian Intervention: Ideas
and Practice from the Nineteenth Century to the Present (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2016), 91–93.
18. Klose, The Emergence of Humanitarian Intervention, 107.
19. Dale Tomich, “Civilizing America’s Shore: British World-Economic
Hegemony and the Abolition of the International Slave Trade (1814–
1867),” in The Politics of the Second Slavery, ed. Dale Tomich (New
York: State University of New York Press, 2017), 4.
20. Clément Thibaud, “La pureté de sang en révolution. Race et républican-
isme en Amérique bolivarienne (1790–1830),” Le Mouvement Social 3,
no. 252 (2015): 33.
21. Tomich, “Civilizing America’s Shore,” 6.
24. On negotiations between Great Britain, Portugal and Spain, in which
the latter two (Catholic) powers sought immediate abolition of slav-
ery south of the Equator, see Charles Webster, The Foreign Policy of
Castlereagh, 1812–1815: Britain and the Reconstruction of Europe
(London: Bell, 1950), 419.
25. Webster, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh, 1812–1815, 22.
26. Webster, The Foreign Policy of Castlereagh, 1812–1815, 22–25.
27. Klose, The Emergence of Humanitarian Intervention, 109–111.
30. Bibliothèque Nationale de France (hereafter BN), MICROFILM
M-17929, Société française pour l’abolition de l’esclavage N°8, année
1838, Discussion du Parlement. Chambre des Lords – Séance du 20 février
1838.
31. Domenico Losurdo, Liberalism: A Counter-History, trans. Gregory
Elliott (London and New York: Verso, 2011/2014), 17.
32. Alfred Berchtold, “Sismondi et le group de Coppet face a l’esclavage
et au colonialisme,” in Sismondi Européen, ed. Sven Stelling-Michand
86 G. BONAZZA
(Genève-Paris: Slatkine-Champion, 1976), 174. About the transnational

character of anti-slavery see Alessandro Tuccillo, Il commercio infame:
antischiavismo e diritti dell’uomo nel Settecento italiano (Napoli: Clio
Press, 2013), 30–42.
33. See the entry “abolitionnisme” in Grenouilleau, ed., Dictionnaire des
esclavages, 52–53.
34. Hodgson, “Législation antiesclavagiste européenne, traités internation-
aux et changements constitutionnels,” 7.
35. François-René de Chateaubriand, Congrès de Vérone, Guerre d’Es
pagne. Négociations; Colonies Espagnoles (Édition originale) par M. De
Chateaubriand, 1838, 73–75. See the Victorie de Vérone in Serge Daget,
La répression de la traite des Noirs au XIXe siècle. L’action des croisières
françaises sur le côtes occidentales de l’Afrique (1817–1850) (Paris:
Karthala, 1997), 75–78.
36. Emanuele Ghersi, La schiavitù e l’evoluzione della politica coloniale
(Padova: Cedam, 1935), 72.
37. David Eltis and David Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2010), 272.
38. Eltis and Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 81–96.
39. Anglo-Saxon historiography is divided on the short-term economic con-
venience of abolition for Great Britain. For example, David Beck Riden
argued for its convenience in direct contradiction of Seymour Drescher.
See Seymour Drescher, Econocide: British Slavery in the Era of Abolition
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1977/2010); David
Beck Ryden, West Indian Slavery and British Abolition, 1783–1807
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).
40. Matthew Craven, “Between Law and History: The Berlin Conference
of 1884–1885 and the Logic of Free Trade,” London Review of
International Law 3, no. 1 (March 2015): 37.
cle, 288.
42. BN, MFICHE O3-826, Charles Lavigerie (1825–1892) – Lettre de
S. É. le cardinal Lavigerie à MM. les présidents et membres des comités
nationaux de la Société antiesclavagiste. Lettre de son éminence le cardi
nal Lavigerie à MM. Les Présidents et Membres des Comités Nationaux
de la Société Antiesclavagiste à l’Occasion de la Prochaine Réunion d’un
Congrès Libre Antiesclavagiste.
43. BN, MICROFILM O3-826, Charles Lavigerie (1825–1892) – Lettre
de S. É. le cardinal Lavigerie à MM. les présidents et membres des comités
nationaux de la Société antiesclavagiste.
44. Kate Hodgson, “Politique abolitionniste et identités nationales dans
l’Europe du XIXe siècle,” Eurescl, WP1 - Frontiers, nationalism, feelings
of belonging. Cultures politiques européennes de l’anti-esclavagisme, 10.

cle, 289.
46. BN, MFICHE O3-826, Charles Lavigerie (1825–1892) – Lettre de S. É.
le cardinal Lavigerie à MM. les présidents et membres des comités nation
aux de la Société antiesclavagiste.
47. Archivio Segreto Vaticano (from now onward ASV), Acta Gregori Papae
XVI, vol. I–II, 387–388.
48. BN, MFICHE O3-826, Charles Lavigerie (1825–1892) – Lettre de S. É.
le cardinal Lavigerie à MM. les présidents et membres des comités nation
aux de la Société antiesclavagiste.
49. Eltis and Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 271. It
has been calculated that a minimum of 10,702,656 African slaves were
transported to the Americas between 1451 and 1870, see Klein, The
Atlantic Slave Trade, 216–217.
50. See “L’eredità napoleonica” in Alfonso Scirocco, L’Italia del
Risorgimento (Bologna: Mulino, 1990/1993), 12–13.
51. According to Gillian Weiss, the slaves were liberated in 1799, two years
after the establishment of the Ligurian Republic, while Raffaella Sarti
dates their liberation to 1797, Gillian Weiss, Captives and Corsairs:
France and Slavery in Early Modern Mediterranean (Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press, 2011), 235; Raffaella Sarti, “Tramonto
di schiavitù sulle tracce degli ultimi schiavi presenti in Italia (secolo
XIX),” in Alle radici dell’Europa. Mori giudei e zingari nei paesi del
Mediterraneo occidentale, vol. II, sec. XVII–XIX, ed. Felice Gambin
(Firenze: SEID, 2010), 282.
52. Giulio Giacchero, Pirati barbareschi, schiavi e galeotti nella storia e nella
leggenda ligure (Genova: Sagep, 1970), 192.
53. Biblioteca Berio di Genova, Leggi, Decreti ed altre stampe pubblicate a
Genova dal 1797 al 1800, tomo I e II. (V.2.12–V.2.13). Altra lettera
pastorale dello stesso per la liberazione de Schiavi Genovesi per mezzo
dell’Imperatore Napoleone Bonaparte 1805, 3 ottobre (Tomo II)
V.2.13.
54. Salvatore Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna, Galeotti,
vu’cumprà, domestici (Napoli: Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane, 1999), 446.
55. Wipertus Rudt de Collenberg put the date of the last slave baptism at
1807, but I can confirm instances as late as 1825. I do not exclude the
possibility of cases after that point but unfortunately, in the Archivio
Storico del Vicariato of Roma I was not permitted access to later baptis-
mal registers.
56. Sarti, Tramonto di schiavitù sulle tracce degli ultimi schiavi presenti in
Italia (secolo XIX), 289.
88 G. BONAZZA
57. Enrico Dal Lago, Agrarian Elites: American Slaveholders and Southern

Italian Landowners (1815–1861) (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State
University Press, 2005), 53.
58. Gianluca Ciampa, Il delitto di riduzione o mantenimento in schiavitù o
servitù (Napoli: Jovene, 2008), 78.
Italia (secolo XIX), 291.
60. Ciampa, Il delitto di riduzione o mantenimento in schiavitù o servitù, 80.
61. Archives diplomatiques, Courneuve 33MD/14 Ministere des affaires
etrangeres. Memoires et documents, Naples 1830–1849. Accession de
Naples aux traités relatifs à la répression de la traite des Noirs, 1839.
62. Ciampa, Il delitto di riduzione o mantenimento in schiavitù o in servitù, 62.
63. Ciampa, Il delitto di riduzione o mantenimento in schiavitù o in servitù,
82–83.
64. G. Ciampa, Il delitto di riduzione o mantenimento in schiavitù o in ser
vitù, 84.
65. This penal code was dated 13 January 1827 and the articles concerned
were 74–75, Rivista Contemporanea Nazionale Italiana, volume thir-
ty-nine, year twelve, issue CXXXI (Turin, October 1864): 472.
66. Luca Lo Basso, In traccia de’ legni nemici. Corsari europei nel
Mediterraneo del Settecento (Ventimiglia: Philobiblon, 2002), 115; Ida
Fazio and Rita Loredana Foti, “‘Scansar Le Frodi’. Prede Corsare nella
Sicilia del decennio inglese (1808–1813),” Quaderni Storici 143/a.
XLVIII, no. 2 (August 2013): 501.
67. Fazio and Foti, “Scansar Le Frodi,” 501.
68. This debate occurred in Atti del Parlamento Subalpino, sessione del
1852 (IV Legislatura) dal 4 Marzo 1852 al 21 Novembre 1853, raccolti
e corredati di note e documenti inediti da Galletti Giuseppe e Trompeo
Paolo, Documenti vol. VII, 4° delle discussioni della camera dei depu-
tati dal 12 Febbraio al 22 Aprile 1853, Firenze, 1868.
69. Atti del Parlamento Subalpino, sessione del 1852 (IV Legislatura) dal 4
Marzo 1852 al 21 Novembre 1853, raccolti e corredati di note e docu-
menti inediti da Galletti Giuseppe e Trompeo Paolo, Documenti vol. II,
Firenze, Tipografia Eredi Botta, 1867, 963.
70. Biblioteca del Ministero degli Affari Esteri - Farnesina, Atti
Parlamentari XVI Legislatura – Quarta sessione 1890. Camera dei
Deputati, Documenti diplomatici presentati al parlamento italiano dal
presidente del consiglio ministro ad interim degli Affari Esteri (Crispi),
Tratta degli Schiavi, Seduta del 17 dicembre 1889, Roma tipografia della
Camera dei Deputati, 1890, 15.
71. Biblioteca del Ministero degli Affari Esteri - Farnesina, Atti Parlamentari
XVI Legislatura – Quarta sessione 1890, 10.
72. Biblioteca del Ministero degli Affari Esteri - Farnesina, Atti Parlamentari

XVI Legislatura – Quarta sessione 1890, 10.
73. Agreement between Italy and Great Britain for the repression of the
slave trade in Atti Parlamentari XVI Legislatura – Quarta sessione 1890,
78–81, 79–80.
74. Atti Parlamentari XVI Legislatura – Quarta sessione 1890, 78, 81.
75. Ciampa, Il delitto di riduzione o mantenimento in schiavitù o servitù, 86.
Italia (secolo XIX), 290; Roberto Benedetti, “Servi introvabili e schiavi
visibili. Un’analisi delle fonti giuridiche dello Stato della Chiesa (secoli
XVI–XVIII),” in Schiavi nelle terre del papa, 53–80, 54–58.
77. Quenum, Les églises chrétiennes et la traite atlantique du XVe au XIXe
siècle, 219.
78. Nelly Schmidt, Abolitionnistes de l’esclavage et réformateurs des colonies,
1820–1851. Analyse et documents (Paris: Karthala, 2000), 165.
79. David Brion Davis, What the Abolitionists Were Up Against in the
Antislavery Debate: Capitalism and Abolitionism as a Problem in
Historical Interpretation, ed. Thomas Bender (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1992), 21–22; Quenum, Les églises chrétiennes et la
traite atlantique du XVe au XIXe siècle, 201–204.
cle, 136.
81. Olivier Pétré-Grenouilleau, “Les facteurs de l’abolitionnisme occidental.
D’une démarche explicative à une approche compréhensive,” Droits 1,
no. 51 (2010): 92.
82. Benedetti, “Servi introvabili e schiavi visibili,” 54–55.
83. Benedetti, “Servi introvabili e schiavi visibili,” 58.
84. Benedetti, “Servi introvabili e schiavi visibili,” 73.
85. Olivier Pétré-Grenouilleau, La tratta degli schiavi. Saggio di sto
ria globale, trans. Rinaldo Falcioni (Bologna: il Mulino, 2006), 217.
According to John Francis Maxwell, who analysed the development of
the Catholic doctrine on slavery, the beginning of the official stance of
the Church against the black trade in the nineteenth century coincided
with the Congress of Vienna’s declaration of support for international
abolition. See John Francis Maxwell, “Moral theology form: the anti-
slavery society and the campaign against slavery,” Clergy Review 59
(1974): 451–467.
86. ASV, CCLVII, Litterae Apostolicae, Acta Gregori Papae XVI, vol. I–II,
387–38; Cfr. N. Schmidt, Abolitionnistes de l’esclavage et réformateurs
des colonies, 1820–1851, 166; In Plurimis, Lettera Enciclica di Sua
Santità Leone PP. XIII, Roma, San Pietro, 5 maggio 1888, anno undec-
imo del Nostro Pontificato, http://w2.vatican.va/content/leo-xiii/it/
90 G. BONAZZA
encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_05051888_in-plurimis.html (con-
sulted on 23 November 2015).
87. (My translation in the text) Ad interponenda vero hujusmodi officia
religio ipsa nos movet, quae improbat execraturque turpissimum illud
commercium, quo Nigritae, tamquam si non homines sed pura putaque
animantia forent, emuntur, vendutur, ac misserrimae vitae durissimis-
que laboribus usque ad mortem exantlandis dovoventur. Itaque inter
maxima, quae sanctissima eadem religio orbi contulit, bona, servitu-
tis magnam partem abrogatae aut mitius exercitae beneficuim merito
abomnibus recensetur. Quoted in Quenum, Les églises chrétiennes et la
traite atlantique du XV e au XIXe siècle, 235. Serge Daget affirms that
the abolitionist policy of the Church was due to British political pres-
sures, see Petre-Grenouilleau, La tratta degli schiavi, note 13, 218.
88. Sarti, “Tramonto di schiavitù sulle tracce degli ultimi schiavi presenti in
Italia (secolo XIX),” 290.
89. Criscuolo, Il Congresso di Vienna, 132–133.
90. In Supremo apostolatus fastigio constituti, et nullis licet su fragantibus
meritis gerentes vicem Iesu Christi Dei Filii, qui propter nimiam char-
itatem suam homo factus, mori etiam pro mundi redemptione dignatus
est, ad Nostram pastoralem sollicitudinem pertinere animadvertimus, ut
fideles ab inhumano Nigritarum seu aliorum quorumcumque hominum
mercatu avertere penitus studeamus. Quoted in ASV, CCLVII, Litterae
Apostolicae, Acta Gregori Papae XVI, vol. I–II, 387.
91. In Plurimis, Lettera Enciclica di Sua Santità Leone PP. XIII, Roma, San
Pietro, 5 maggio 1888, anno undecimo del Nostro Pontificato, http://
w2.vatican.va/content/leo-xiii/it/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_
enc_05051888_in-plurimis.html (consulted on 23 November 2015).
92. Sarti, “Tramonto di schiavitù sulle tracce degli ultimi schiavi presenti in
Italia (secolo XIX),” 290–291.
93. On the need to analyse anti-slavery from a transnational perspective
see Tuccillo, Il commercio infame: antischiavismo e diritti dell’uomo nel
Settecento italiano, 12.
94. Hodgson, “Politique abolitionniste et identités nationales dans l’Europe
du XIXe siècle,” 1.
95. Costa, Civitas. Storia della Cittadinanza in Europa. La civiltà liberale,
vol. 3 (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2001), 476.
96. Costa, Civitas, 484.
97. Quenum, Les églises chrétiennes et la traite atlantique du XVe au XIXe
siècle, 182.
99. Myriam Cottias, “Civilisations,” in Dictionnaire historique et critique du
racisme, ed. Pierre-André Taguieff, 288–291.
100. The historiography of the differences and similarities between the British

and French versions is extensive: see “L’abolitionnsisme européen dans
la première moitié du XIXe siècle,” that actually analyses essentially the
Anglo-Saxon and French abolitionism. Schmidt, L’abolition de l’esclav
age. Cinq siècles de combats XVIe–XXe siècle, 135–198. On the French
abolitionism see M. Dorigny, ed., Les abolitions de l’esclavage De L.F.
Sonthonax à V. Schoelcher, 1793, 1794, 1848 (Université de Paris VIII:
Presses Universitaires de Vincennes, Éditions de l’UNESCO, 1995);
Patricia Motylewski, La Société française pour l’abolition de l’esclav
age, 1834–1850 (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1998); Lawrence C. Jennings,
French-Antislavery: The Movement for the Abolition of Slavery in France,
1802–1848 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998/2000). On
the anglo-saxon abolitionism see Bender, ed., The Antislavery Debate:
Capitalism and Abolitionism as a Problem in Historical Interpretation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992); Drescher, Econocide:
British Slavery in the Era of Abolition (Chapel Hill: University of North
Carolina Press, 1977/2010); Ryden, West Indian Slavery and British
Abolition, 1783–1807 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).
101. On Spanish abolitionism see Hodgson, “Politique abolitionniste et iden-
tités nationales dans l’Europe du XIXe siècle,” 9.
103. Yves Bénot, La Révolution française et la fin des colonies 1789–1794
(Paris: La Découverte, 1987/2004), 90.
104. Gauthier, Triomphe et mort du droit naturel en Révolution, 1789–1795–
1802, 208.
106. When the Société française pour l’Abolition de l’esclavage was established,
some members of the British and Foreign Antislavery Society, such as
Zachary Macaulay, John Scoble and Cooper, visited Paris. See Schmidt,
Abolitionnistes de l’esclavage et réformateurs des colonies, 84.
107. Schmidt, Abolitionnistes de l’esclavage et réformateurs des colonies, 55.
108. Guillaume de Félice, Émancipation immédiate et complète des esclaves.
Appel aux abolitionistes (Paris: Delay, 1846), 5.
109. Nicola Labanca, Oltremare. Storia dell’espansione coloniale italiana
(Bologna: Il Mulino, 2002), 18.
110. Lorenzo Ettore, “La società antischiavista d’Italia (1888–1937),” Studi
Storici, no. 3 (2012): 693.
111. Alessandro Tuccillo, “Antiesclavagisme sans colonies: illuminismo et
esclavage colonial,” Dix-huitième siècle 1, no. 45 (2013): 629–648.
112. Bejamin Constant referred to the second edition of the French trans-
lation by Jean-Antoine Gauvain Gallois: Gaetano Filangieri, La science
92 G. BONAZZA
de la législation, Paris, Dufart, An spetième 1799 (I éd. 1786–1791),

7 tomes, I, ch. 4, 1, pp. 75–76, quoted in Benjamin Constant,
Commentaire sur l’ouvrage de Filangieri (1822–1824), dans Id., Œuvres
complètes, XXVI, volume directed by Kurt Kloocke et Antonio Trampus,
Berlin-Boston, De Gruyter, 2012, Second part, ch. 2, p. 4 (p. 193).
Extracted from Tuccillo, “Antiesclavagisme sans colonies: illuminismo
et esclavage colonial,” 629. About the chapter on the trade in the
Commentaire sur l’ouvrage de Filangieri, see Berchtold, “Sismondi et le
groupe de Coppet face a l’esclavage et au colonialisme,” 176.
113. Alessandro Tuccillo, Il commercio infame: antischiavismo e diritti
dell’uomo nel Settecento italiano (Napoli: Clio Press, 2013), 13–14.
114. Carlotta Sorba, ed., “Sguardi transnazionali,” Contemporanea VII
(2004): 97–122.
115. Tuccillo, Il commercio infame: antischiavismo e diritti dell’uomo nel
116. Alessandro Tuccillo, “Lumières antiesclavagistes. Le livre XV de l’Esprit
des lois sous le regard du Settecento,” in (Re)lire l’Esprit des lois, ed.
Catherine Volpilach-Auger and Luigi Delia (Paris: Publications de la
Sorbonne, 2014), 157.
117. Charles-Louis de Secondat de Montesquieu, Lo spirito delle leggi, vol. I,
Lib. X, cap. III, trans. Beatrice Boffito Serra (Milano: Rizzoli [1989],
6th ed., 2004), 293.
118. Montesquieu, Lo spirito delle leggi, Lib. XII, cap. XV, 354–355.
119. Montesquieu, Lo spirito delle leggi, Lib. XV, cap. III, IV, V, 403–405.
120. Yves Bénot, “Diderot, Pechmeja, Raynal et l’anticolonialisme,” in
Les lumières, l’esclavage, la colonisation, ed. Yves Bénot (Paris: La
Découverte, 2005), 107.
121. Montesquieu, Lo spirito delle leggi, Lib. XV, cap. II, 402–403.
122. Tuccillo, “Lumières antiesclavagistes. Le livre XV de l’Esprit des lois sous
le regard du Settecento,” 155.
Settecento italiano, 120–121.
124. Tuccillo, “Lumières antiesclavagistes. Le livre XV de l’Esprit des lois sous
le regard du Settecento,” 156.
125. Thomas Hobbes, De Cive, ed. Tito Magri (Roma: Editori Riuniti,
1979/1992), 155–159.
126. A. Tuccillo, Il commercio infame: antischiavismo e diritti dell’uomo nel
127. John Locke, Il secondo trattato sul governo. Saggio concernente la vera
origine, l’estensione e il fine del governo civile, trans. Anna Gialluca
(Milano: BUR, 1998/2007), 91–93.
128. John Locke, Il secondo trattato sul governo, 171.

129. Losurdo, Liberalism: A Counter-History, 23.
132. Della Moneta, libro I, capo I, note 59 in Tuccillo, Il commercio infame:
antischiavismo e diritti dell’uomo nel Settecento italiano, 210.
Settecento italiano, 220. For a comparison of the living conditions of
the peasants in the latifundiums of the Kingdoms of Naples and Sicily
with those of American slaves, see Dal Lago, Agrarian Elites: American
Slaveholders and Southern Italian Landowners, 1815–1861, XV.
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137. Giovanni Giuseppe Ghisotti, Notizie sulla schiavitù nell’Algeria e sull’Al
geri moderno (Roma: Tipografia delle Belle Arti, 1842), 6.
138. Ghisotti, Notizie sulla schiavitù nell’Algeria e sull’Algeri moderno, 8.
139. Ghisotti, Notizie sulla schiavitù nell’Algeria e sull’Algeri moderno, 19.
140. Agenore de Gasparin, Schiavitù e tratta (Parigi: Joubert, 1838) in
Annali Universali di Statistica, economia pubblica, storia, viaggi e com
mercio, vol. 58, Ott–Nov–Dic (Milano: Società degli Editori degli
Annali Universali delle Scienze e dell’Industria, 1838), 126–127.
141. Agenore de Gasparin, Schiavitù e tratta, 128.
142. Andrea Zambelli, Sulla schiavitù de’negri, memoria, Milano, Per
Ferdinando Baret, Stampatore-Libraio, 1815, p. 6.
143. Zambelli, Sulla schiavitù de’negri, 14.
147. Giovanni Ferri, Lo spettatore italiano: preceduto da un saggio critico sopra
i filosofi morali e i dipintori de’ costumi e de’ caratteri (1755–1830), vol.
3 (Milano: Società tip. dei Classici italiani, 1822).
148. Ferri, Lo spettatore italiano, 113.
150. L’ape italiana, anno IV, 1825, Milano, 1825, vol. 2, 48.
152. Gazzetta di Milano, Saturday 14 September 1816, no. 258. On gazettes
see L’Evoluzione dei giornali, in Carlo Capra, Valerio Castronovo, and
94 G. BONAZZA
Giuseppe Ricuperati, La stampa italiana dal’500 all’800 (Bari: Laterza,

1986), 229–266.
153. Gazzetta di Milano, Saturday 14 September 1816, no. 258.
154. Nuovo Giornale dei Letterati, Pisa, Dalla Tipografia della Società letter-
aria, 1803, vol. 5, Article IV, 52.
155. Nuovo Giornale dei Letterati, 63.
158. Antologia, (aprile, maggio, giugno, 1821), tomo 2, Firenze Al Gabinetto
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159. Antologia, (aprile, maggio, giugno, 1821), tomo 4, Firenze Al Gabinetto
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160. Antologia, (aprile, maggio, giugno, 1821), tomo 4, 427.
165. Antologia, (luglio, agosto, settembre 1827), tomo 27, Firenze Al
Gabinetto scientifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, articolo I; Antologia,
(aprile, maggio, giugno, 1828), tomo 13, Firenze Al Gabinetto scien-
tifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, articolo II; Antologia, (gennaio,
febbraio, marzo, 1830), tomo 37, Firenze Al Gabinetto scientifico e let-
terario di G. P. Vieusseux, articolo III.
166. Antologia, (luglio, agosto, settembre 1827), tomo 27, Firenze Al Gabinetto
scientifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, article I, 91.
167. Antologia, (luglio, agosto, settembre 1827), tomo 27, Firenze Al
Gabinetto scientifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, article I, 92.
168. Antologia, (aprile, maggio, giugno 1828), tomo 13, Firenze Al
Gabinetto scientifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, article II, 24.
169. Antologia, (gennaio, febbraio, marzo 1830), tomo 37, Firenze Al Gabinetto
scientifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, article III, 76.
170. Lodovico Menin, Sulle cause che resero finora infruttuose le misure prese
per abolire la tratta dei Negri, e come tale scopo si potrebbe raggiungere.
Riflessioni del m. e cav.ab. Lodovico Menin, in “Memorie del Reale
Veneto Istituto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti,” vol. 8 (Venezia: Segreteria
dell’I.R. Istituto, Palazzo Ducale, 1859), 87–100, 87–88.
171. Menin, Sulle cause che resero finora infruttuose le misure prese per abolire
la tratta dei Negri, 91.
172. Menin, Sulle cause che resero finora infruttuose le misure prese per abolire
la tratta dei Negri, 94.
173. Civiltà Cattolica, anno decimosettimo, Serie VI, vol. VII, quaderno
393, Roma 4 Agosto 1866; Civiltà Cattolica, anno decimosettimo,
Serie VI, vol. VII, quaderno 395, Roma 1 Settembre 1866; Civiltà
Cattolica, anno decimosettimo, Serie VI, vol. VII, quaderno 397, Roma
1866. I want to thank Alessandro Capone for his kind help in finding
the numbers of the review.
174. Civiltà Cattolica, anno decimosettimo, Serie VI, vol. VII, quaderno 393,
Roma 4 Agosto 1866, 308.
Roma 4 Agosto 1866, 310.
Roma 1866, 34.
177. Civiltà Cattolica, anno decimosettimo, Serie VI, vol. VII, quaderno
397, Roma 1866, 327.
179. Francesca Sofia, “Sismondi, l’Europa e gli altri,” in Atti dell’Accademia
dei Georgofili, vol. 11, tomo 2 (2014), 443; Berchtold, “Sismondi et le
groupe de Coppet face a l’esclavage et au colonialisme,” 169.
181. On the establishment of the Société des Amis des Noirs on the model
of the British Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade see Hodgson,
Politique abolitionniste et identités nationales dans l’Europe du XIXe siè
cle, 2; Marcel Dorigny, “Sonthonax et Brissot: Le cheminement d’une
filiation politique assumée,” in Léger-Félicité Sonthonax. La première
abolition de l’esclavage. La Révolution française et la Révolution de
Saint-Domingue, ed. Marcel Dorigny Paris (Société française d’his-
toire d’outre-mer/Association française pour l’étude de la colonisation
européenne, 1997), 29–45, 29–31.
182. After Madame de Staël died prematurely in 1817, her battle was con-
tinued by the other members of the Coppet group, and it influenced
French abolitionism in the years 1820–1848. Nelly Schmidt called this
period “Le second souffle” of abolitionism. Berchtold, “Sismondi et
le groupe de Coppet face a l’esclavage et au colonialisme,” 174–175;
N. Schmidt, Abolitionnistes de l’esclavage et réformateurs des colonies, 55.
183. Berchtold, “Sismondi et le groupe de Coppet face a l’esclavage et au
colonialisme,” 178.
184. Sofia, “Sismondi, l’Europa e gli altri,” 438–446, 443–444.
185. Berchtold, “Sismondi et le groupe de Coppet face a l’esclavage et au
colonialisme,” 184–188.
186. Antologia, (aprile, maggio, giugno, 1826), tomo 22, Firenze Al
Gabinetto scientifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux.
96 G. BONAZZA
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CHAPTER 3
Forms of Slavery in the Italian States
Even as abolitionist debate raged in the Italian states and internationally,

cases of slavery persisted in many of Italy’s Mediterranean cities between
1750 and 1850. The aim of this chapter is to present concrete evidence
of cases of slavery and, where available, quantitative data which reveal
distinctions or parallels within or between different geographical areas.
The cities of Naples, Caserta, Rome, Palermo, Livorno and Genoa will
be considered. The cases selected make it possible to understand trajec-
tories and living patterns; contemporary sources allow us to observe how
slaves were viewed at the time. From a quantitative point of view, slavery
in the early nineteenth century can be described as a “residual phenome-
non”, but in court and church records we still find evidence of practices
that loudly echo those of previous centuries. Captivity, the role of priva-
teering, the link between slavery and serfdom, and finally, baptism as the
way to liberty are all relevant aspects of this complex process.
The first section of the chapter consists of an introductory historio-
graphical overview of ransom procedures in the Mediterranean. The rest
of the chapter examines slavery in clearly defined geographical areas,
looking in turn at Naples, Caserta, Rome, Palermo, Livorno and Genoa.
Archival records on slavery survive for each of these cities. Each section
examines one of these cities in relation to a particular theme: Naples and
the connection between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic; Caserta and
the grey area between slavery and serfdom; Rome and the connection
between the baptism of slaves and the achievement of freedom; Palermo
and different types of slaves; Livorno and the persistence of slavery after

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3_3
104 G. BONAZZA
the closure of the bagno (slave prison); and finally, Genoa and galley
slaves. These selections are partly dictated by the fact that limited sources
mean it is not possible to fully recreate the slavery situation in the Italian
states or any particular city: the Catholic Church holds rich source mate-
rial on Naples and Rome, as does the Italian state, albeit to a lesser
extent. For Palermo, Caserta, Livorno and Genoa, there is only state
material available, and the type of information available is not consistent
between cities. Circumstances in the cities provide a compelling picture
of the slavery situation generally, revealing much about the number of
slaves, their living conditions, the religious problems they encountered
and the connection between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. These
cities have been chosen because they were situated on the west coast of
the Italian Peninsula and—with the exception of Caserta—they were
port cities, with a close connection to the Atlantic and North Africa.
In the last section of the chapter, I expand the perspective of the case
studies from the local to the Italian context. This wider outlook allows
me to connect specific cases to the internal and external political dynam-
ics of the Italian states, in particular their relationships with the other
European powers, particularly Great Britain and France, and with the
Barbary States. While the history of slavery presented in the present vol-
ume focuses on the Mediterranean space, it goes beyond a concern with
the interplay between the Muslim and Christian worlds, to encompass a
vision in which the Mediterranean world is connected to the Ottoman,
African and Atlantic worlds.
3.1 The Redemption of Slaves

In addition to private intermediaries in Naples, Caserta, Rome, Palermo,
Livorno and Genoa, confraternities and other institutions in these cities
dealt with the redemption of slaves and contributed to the sums offered
by captives’ families for the redemption of their loved ones.1 Two reli-
gious orders had been involved in the business of redemption since the
twelfth century: the Trinitari and the Mercedari.2 The Holy Trinity
Order was established in 1198 by two Frenchmen, Jean de Matha and
Saint Félix de Valois, while the Saint Mary of Mercede order was estab-
lished by Saint Pietro Nolasco, from Languedoc.3 Institutions and con-
fraternities aiming to liberate compatriots started to appear in the Italian
Peninsula from the sixteenth century, among them the Redenzione dei
Cattivi in Palermo, the Santa Casa della Redenzione dei Cattivi in
3 FORMS OF SLAVERY IN THE ITALIAN STATES 105
Naples, the Arciconfraternita del Gonfalone in Rome and the Magistrato

per il Riscatto in Genoa.4 There was a Grand Duchy Treasury for
redemption in Tuscany, and in 1665, the Trinitarian Order was allowed
to settle in Livorno. Christian and Jewish merchants also played an
important role in parallel to these institutions.5
In Palermo, from as early as the mid-fifteenth century, the order of
Saint Mary of Mercede took on the task of finding assets with which to
redeem Sicilian slaves in the Barbary States. Many other charitable insti-
tutions then emerged in Palermo to imitate the model of the Mercedari:
the Monte di Pietà (Pawn Shop), the Congregazione dell’Oratorio, the
Casa di Santa Maria la Catena, the Compagnia della Mercè and the
Rifugio delle Sette Opere della Misericordia.6 Rivalries and the squander-
ing of donations meant that these institutions were unsuccessful, how-
ever. In 1585, when the Sicilian Parliament asked Fillip II to intervene,
the king agreed to establish a Redenzione in Palermo. It was modelled on
the Redenzioni dei Cattivi of Naples and Venice, and the Viceroy con-
firmed its four constituent chapters in 1595, enumerating the names of
the deans. The new religious institution aimed to coordinate activities
pertinent to the redemption of Sicilian slaves. The Redenzione enjoyed
many privileges, such as the exclusive right to collect donations and spe-
cial powers in the case of redemption being blocked.7 The Redenzione
redeemed Christian slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms and acted as a
mediator in the exchange of Muslim, Jewish and Christian slaves; it also
assisted families that wanted to redeem their beloved by paying a ran-
som.8 The institution in Palermo redeemed slaves from 1595 to 1830,
and it was only in 1860 that it faded away.9 While the Mercedari were
formally deprived of the authority to collect donations, they persisted in
doing so, provoking a controversy that extended into the first half of the
eighteenth century.10
Turning our attention to Naples, the Santa Casa della Redenzione
dei Cattivi (Holy House for the Redemption of Captives)—the first lay
institution to deal with redemption—was established in 1548 in order
to redeem Christians enslaved by Muslims. This institution—the inspi-
ration for the establishment of its counterpart in Palermo—coordinated
the charitable institutions in Naples that redeemed Neapolitan people
captured by the Barbary States.11 The method for the redemption of
slaves was only fixed in 1648, when the Holy House started to use alba
rani. An albarano was a sort of binding agreement for the refund of the
price of a slave to anyone who de facto paid the ransom in advance.12
106 G. BONAZZA
Redemption transactions mainly took place in Constantinople, in the

Ottoman Empire. The agents of the Redenzione were not the only eco-
nomic arbiters of these deals. Alternative financial operators worked in
Venice and in other strategic cities.13 Another important institution was
the Pio Monte della Misericordia, which was established in 1602. The
Monte gathered together six charitable institutions, among them the
Opera della Redenzione dei Cattivi, which was established in the same
year as the Monte.14 When the Holy House for the Redemption of
Captives was founded, the Pio Monte supplied it with many donations.
However, the Opera della Redenzione functioned autonomously. The Pio
Monte also used the albarano as a redemption instrument.15
In Rome, the Arciconfraternita del Gonfalone was established under
the papal seal Christianae nobiscum, which was issued by Gregorio XIII in
1581. In respect of its institutional procedures, the Arciconfraternita styled
itself on the Neapolitan Opera della Redenzione.16 The Arciconfraternita
was one of the oldest of these institutions and it was located in the church
of Saint Lucy. Its aim was to collect the sums needed for redemption
activity.17
In Genoa, in response to the continuous raids on men and women on
the Ligurian coast, the Magistrato per il Riscatto degli Schiavi was estab-
lished in 1597. This was a lay institution aiming to provide the means
needed to redeem as many slaves as possible.18 It was not the first such
body in Genoa. The Magistrato di misericordia had been at work on the
same project since 1403. The Compagnia dell’Ufficio di Pietà and the
Consortia Charitatis Jesus Mariae had come together as the Opera del
riscatto di schiavi. Around the end of the fifteenth century, the Opera was
absorbed into the Magistrato di Misericordia.19 Finally, in an attempt to
make progress in solving the slavery problem, the Minor Consiglio and the
Gran Consiglio of Genoa approved the establishment of the Magistrato
per il Riscatto degli Schiavi, which was the first lay institution in the Italian
area that was allowed to address juridical issues concerning slavery.20
Livorno was a natural site for the French religious order, Trinitari,
because of France’s geopolitical interest in the Mediterranean Sea. The
neutrality of Tuscany, after the assignment of its navy to France some
years prior to the establishment of the order in the city, meant that the
Trinitari reaped great economic benefits from the redemption of slaves
from the area.
From the point of view of redemption activities, the presence of a
Jewish community and the cosmopolitan spirit of Livorno also aided the
purchase of slaves and the commerce in captives.21 In addition to the

Trinitari, there were other religious institutions operating in Livorno
with the support of the Grand Duchy, including the Compagnia della
Natività di Maria Vergine e della Santissima Trinità del riscatto. In order
to regulate the competition between the various institutions, a Grand
Duchy Treasury for the redemption of slaves was established in Tuscany.
In Livorno, the Confraternita della Natività e del riscatto had to report
to the new Grand Duchy Treasury. Rival institutions which continued
in the field, especially the Trinitari, retained control over donations
received since the Treasury did not demand otherwise.22 Finally, one
of the groups working in Livorno was concerned exclusively with the
redemption of Jewish slaves.23 The development of redemption institu-
tions—both lay and religious—is indicative of the scale of the economic
interests reliant on the trade in people between the European and the
African continents. Slaves in the Italian area did not only originate from
these “reciprocal” Mediterranean exchanges and they were not only cap-
tives. Among the assorted categories of non-free persons identifiable
in the sources, the majority originated in North Africa or the Ottoman
Empire, but there were also some from sub-Saharan Africa and the col-
onies of the wider Atlantic world. Many never returned to the place of
their birth or early years. Others, including slaves born on ships, might
not have identified with any particular place or homeland.
3.2 Slaves Baptised in Naples: From the Atlantic

to the Mediterranean
Between the eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries, the Bourbon

Kingdom underwent many political changes, from the proclamation
of the Neapolitan Republic in 1799 and the first Bourbon Restoration
(1799–1805) to the French decade (1806–1815) and the restoration of
the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies by Ferdinand IV on 8 December 1816.
The coastal city of Naples and the inland city of Caserta were part of the
Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. In Naples, there were approximately 30
slaves. The Palace of Caserta was a distinct case and its slaves must be
treated separately from those in the rest of Naples.
Slavery persisted in Naples until at least 1845 and probably until
1856. Despite changes in the law, it appears that unfreemen continued
to work for noble families. This assumption depends on the fact that,
108 G. BONAZZA
from a practical point of view, the boundaries between slavery and

domestic servitude were not always well defined.24
Specifically, consultation of a register of conversions (catechumens)
and a register of baptisms of slaves in the diocesan archives in Naples
reveals cases of slavery in the first half of the nineteenth century.25
More precisely, there are 21 cases of slavery after 1783 (see Fig. 3.1)
detailed in the Libro degli infedeli adulti battezzati in questa cattedrale
ed in altre chiese di Napoli (from 18 April 1742 to 9 March 1861)26;
27.63% of the total number of baptisms in the book relate to baptised
slaves. Among these cases, 19 are Muslims—one of whom was defined
as “moro idolatra” (idolatrous black). The two remaining cases were
those of Pasquale, son of an African slave, and Carlo Tomasi, a “savage”
from Patagonia.
Given the nature of the source (a register of baptisms), we can extract
information on the origin of the slave, his/her parents, the original name
and the new Christian name obtained after the baptism. The slaves were
not all Muslims and there were some Jews. The source lists the names
of the families baptising slaves, and these were presumably the own-
ers. Pasquale, for instance, was a slave born to an African slave on a
Portuguese vessel:
1
2
18 Non-baptized slaves
Slaves baptized “muslim”
Slaves baptized “moor idolatrus”
Slaves baptized religion

55 undefined
Fig. 3.1 Categories of baptisms made by Don Biase Gambaro in Naples

between 1783 and 1845 (Source: Book of Baptisms of Slaves christened by
Rev Parish Priest Biase D. Gambaro, Archivio Storico Diocesano di Napoli,
Cattedrale, 44)
19 August 1825
A slave of about twenty years, named Pasquale after His Master and igno-
rant of his old name, was born at sea on a Portuguese vessel, his mother
being an African Slave from Guinea, as witnessed by a sailor on the Vessel
of his Master Marino Cafiero on sail to Sorrento. The slave was catechized
by the Reverend Father Francesco Savarone, Professor of Theology at the
Royal Public University, by order of SE Rma our Cardinal Archbishop and
was Baptized by the Reverend Vicar Curate of the Cathedral Don Raffaele
Sarena, in the Cathedral itself, and was given the name Salvadore Maria,
Raffaele, Francesco Marino Cafiero: owned by Marino Cafiero Vessel
Master.27
From this description, we see that the twenty-year-old slave’s new name
is Salvadore Maria. The geographical origin of Pasquale—a name that
he received from his owner, the owner of the ship, Marino Caffiero28—
is notable as he was born on a ship that had probably crossed both the
Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. This demonstrates that the
trafficking of men was actually global, and so the problem of slavery can-
not be easily demarcated by any particular geographical frontier because
of trading route overlaps.29
The Mediterranean is a particular maritime space. We think of it as an
internal sea, enclosed between the three continents of the Old World,
but actually there is also another Mediterranean Sea. Fernand Braudel
called it the “Plus Grande Méditerranée”.30 The phenomenon of slavery
helps us to extend the borders of this “big Mediterranean Sea” and to
discover that, on the one hand, its history is intimately linked to that
of Africa and the Saharan traffic in “blacks” but, on the other hand, the
Mediterranean is only one step away from the Atlantic Ocean—just think
of the Iberian Peninsula.31
The problem of the extension of the Mediterranean’s borders and the
necessity of thinking of a double Mediterranean area (a Mediterranean
region and a Mediterranean Sea) have been considered by many schol-
ars in recent years.32 Peregrine Horden and Nicholas Purcell refer to a
“greater Mediterranean”, an abstract place the borders of which are fluid
and in which the relationships between various cultures and commercial
contacts become crucial.33
Regarding this topic, and particularly the problem of slavery, it is
interesting to recall a question concerning the trade in “blacks” in
the Atlantic world and in Spain posed by Michel Fontenay during a
110 G. BONAZZA
conference held in 2002. Should Spain, where mainly black slaves were
traded and employed, be included in the debate on Mediterranean slav-
ery?34 The same question is valid for the Neapolitan case: even though
we have only identified two cases of “Atlantic” slaves, should they be
included in the Mediterranean slavery context? It seems natural to won-
der if these methodological distinctions are still valid. The phenomenon
of Mediterranean slavery is not entirely comparable to the Atlantic one,
given their glaringly different proportions and different typologies of
slaves. However, it is important to underline that within the same geo-
graphical area there was not a single slavery system and that the various
systems were related, as were different geographical areas.
The slave Carlo Tomasi (this was the name he received from the
owner of the ship he sailed on) is described in the source as a “savage”
whose name was unknown. Carlo was born in Patagonia in the Americas
and he was around 28 years old when he was baptised in 1826. He
worked on a schooner owned by Giovanni Battista Abbagnara and was
catechised by a Jesuit priest named Englestain.35 Another interesting case
is that of Cassanth, a young African “black idolater” who was around
16 years old in 1826. Neither his slave status nor origin is specified, but
Cassanth reached Brazil and then Lisbon on a Portuguese frigate com-
manded by Captain de Bosa. Finally, he reached the Kingdom of Naples
on a frigate from Sorrento, commanded by Captain D. Carlo Cilenti.
He received the name Salvadore Mario Gregorio.36 The case of this bap-
tised slave again demonstrates that the circulation of slaves had global
dimensions. In this instance, it involved Africa, the Americas and Europe.
Moreover, the slave changed owners many times, given that many cap-
tains transported him.37
Giovanni Batta Maria Michele Mormile, a Turk from Sfax, was orig-
inally called Alambruc. His father’s name was Alì. He was 18 years
old when baptised on 28 May 1797. His godfather was the Duke of
Marzanello, Michele Mormile. The fact that the surname was passed on
suggests that the former slave was now granted the status of family serv-
ant.38 In 1797, the Duke of Andria, Carlo Carafa, baptised a Turk called
Sale, who received the name Giuseppe Carafa from Smirne. Another
similar case is that of a black slave from Cairo who received the name
Giovanni Francesco Bologna from Levant. Prior to his captivity, he had
been named Alì, son of Sulman. His godfather was the knight, Don
Michele Bologna, Marquis of Sambuca. Thus, it seems that the most
important families in Naples and in the Kingdom of Naples were highly
interested in the baptism of these men, probably because the former
slaves then became servants for the families themselves.39 In a case that
is probably comparable, the memoires of the Iodice seu Giudice family
indicate that in 1768 two Turkish slaves were purchased in Malta for the
price of 270 scudi and then brought to Naples.40
On 8 February 1783, a female slave named Ahauha was baptised. She
was a black Turk, around 40 years old,41 and her name became Maria
Carmela Rosa Vinaccio.42
In 1803, Maria Luigia Bernardina, an 18-year-old woman from
Alexandria in Egypt, was baptised and became known as Maria di
Giuseppe in her community. Also in 1803, a 16-year-old Egyptian
slave named Abdaleker Bijun (male) was led to the baptismal font by
Michelino Dentice. Alì, son of Alì Mustafà, a “maomettano” (Muslim)
from Tunis, was 20 when he was baptised in 1803 and received the name
Giuseppe D’Amora.43 Sometimes, we are not sure whether we are deal-
ing with cases of slavery, such as in the case of Maria Anna, who was
born in the Ottoman Empire. She was 26 when she was baptised in
1810 as the wife of Gio. Burchard, a Catholic soldier.44 A case in 1841
involved a young Abyssinian, aged 12, whose parents were unknown.
He received the name Sebastiano Maria Gabriele Faraia. According to
the convert, his godparents were Sebastiano Infante, Prince of Spain,
and Sebastiano’s wife, Princess Maria Amalia.45 The last cases of slavery
recorded in the register date to 1845.
Still in Naples, analysis of the Libri delle Conclusioni (stored in the
Archives of the Pio Monte della Misericordia), covering the period 1789–
1848, reveals not the presence of slaves in Naples, but the presence of
cases of redemption of Christian slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms. It is
also interesting to note that the regulations of Pio Monte for 1856 took
into account “the changed conditions of the times”. Assets previously
allocated to the redemption of captives would now be dedicated to reha-
bilitating young women who had succumbed to what were regarded as
questionable moral practices.46
3.3 Working Slaves in the Palace of Caserta:

Between Slavery and Serfdom
Remaining in the Kingdom of Naples, there are many cases of slav-
ery evident in the archive of the Palace of Caserta, although they are
mainly dated to the eighteenth century. The sources record baptisms
of slaves, marriages between slaves, escapes by slaves and the arrival of
slaves from Tripoli. The information is preserved in Volume VI delle
112 G. BONAZZA
Cantiche del Canto del Tesoriere di Caserta per l’anno ad Ag.[osto] 1800
a Incartamento delle Raz.ni di pane, e fave, che giornalmente si danno
à Schiavi battezzati; che sono in questo Real Sito, come anche di tre lam
pade, una cioè per il Padre Spirituale, un’altra pel Capo, e la terza per
essi medesimi; alla raz.one di once 4 d’olio il giorno per ciascuna lampada
(register of the portions of bread, and beans that are delivered daily
to baptised slaves that are on this royal site). This register contains the
records of what was assigned to slaves for their sustenance, and therefore,
it records how many baptised slaves there were on the site, confirming
the continuation of cases of slavery into the beginning of the nineteenth
century.47
The sum total of the historiography on the issue of slavery in the
Palace of Caserta amounts to an article by Ugo Della Monica, an article
on Muslim slaves by Maurizio Crispino and a book by Riccardo del Prete
and Nathalie Jaulain that was financed by the European Commission for
the European Voluntary Service (Schiavi a Caserta. La vita, i lavori, il
contributo delle schiere di lavoratori musulmani).48 This valuable book
has the merit of offering an exhaustive overview of the life of slaves in
the Palace of Caserta, dating their arrival to 1752 and attempting to pro-
vide quantitative data on how many slaves were employed on the con-
struction site for the Palace in the service of Luigi Vanvitelli.49 Del Prete
and Jaulain assert that the construction project was the only reason for
the presence of slaves at Caserta; their analysis covers the period up to
1799. However, the four volumes of the Dispacci e Relazioni archival
collection, which del Prete and Jaulain did not consult, contain evidence
which disproves their claim. I can demonstrate the presence of slaves in
the Palace of Caserta until 1800.50 This new chronology deepens our
understanding of the phenomenon of slavery in this locale.
There was a dedicated quarter for slaves in the Palace, namely the
Ercole district, and the slaves had their own chapel too. Moreover,
Casanova hospital was used by slaves, prisoners and other workers on
the royal construction site. Sources provide the names of baptised slaves,
detailed descriptions about their earnings—the fact that slaves in Caserta
were paid is unique (and the reason for this remains uncertain) although
in Rome baptised slaves did receive a form of payment—and the work
on which they were employed. For example, in Volume Decimo 2º Delle
Cautele del Sig. D Mattiangelo Forgione Tesoriere del Real Stato di Caserta
per l’anno da Settembre 1780 a tutto Agosto 1781, there is a “Nota de
Schiavi che hano travagliato in questo Real Boschetto in aver assistito alla
Gran Peschiera Nuovo Canale, e Castello del dì 27 Agosto a tutti lì 2

novembre 1780 Caserta” (register of the slaves who worked in the Real
Boschetto, helping in the Gran Peschiera Nuovo Canale and Castle, from
27 August to 2 November 1780, Caserta).51 It was not only slaves that
worked on the building of the Palace; slaves actually constituted quite
a low percentage of the total number of inhabitants of the Palace. Of
3000 or so inhabitants, only 306 were enslaved.52 Between 1753 and
1763, the respective figures for slaves and total inhabitants were 405 and
2905 (14%); between 1764 and 1768, 360 out of 1805 inhabitants were
enslaved (20%); and between 1769 and 1777, the figure was 360 out of
3005 (12%). Finally, the proportion of slaves rose significantly between
1774 and 1779, to 360 out of 892 persons (40%) (see Fig. 3.2).
Total inhabitants Number of slaves

4000
3500
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
1753-1763 1764-1768 1769-1777 1774-1779
Fig. 3.2 Relationship between the number of slaves working on the construc-

tion of the Palace of Caserta and total inhabitants (Source R. Del Prete and
N. Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta. Le vite, i lavori, il contributo della schiera di lavora
tori musulmani [Roma: Lunaria, 1999], 17–18)
114 G. BONAZZA
This relatively small proportion of slaves in the workforce may be

explained by a number of factors. At the end of the eighteenth century,
it might have been less advantageous to use slave labour than was the
case previously. It is true that slaves did not earn a full salary but they
did receive certain forms of payment, and they had to be maintained.
Moreover, the testimony of De La Lande demonstrates that it was also
expensive to oversee slaves, because 250 men were needed to perform
this function in Caserta. Therefore, the retention of slaves is best under-
stood in this instance as a symbol of prestige, as was habitual in Spain.
Even though the sale of slaves was in fact no longer legal within the
borders of the Kingdom, there were still contracts issued for the sale
of slaves. These probably concerned slaves imported through Sicily.53
The slaves who were in Caserta had been stolen during an operation
by Captain Pepe and the Bourbon navy. The quota of Turkish slaves,
of which almost half were subsequently baptised, remained stable in the
second half of the eighteenth century. The number of salaried workers
changed, however. Some prisoners and slaves, it should be noted, were
paid for the work they performed. De La Lande testifies that in 1760,
2000 men were employed in the Caserta works: these included 200
bricklayers or stonecutters, 75 prisoners, 165 Turks and 160 baptised
slaves.
Baptised slaves earned four grane more than the non-baptised and
they lived in the Ercole district.54 Post-1779 expenses lists for clothes
and food are supplemented by descriptions of the slave district and its
chapel. In September 1799, there were 14 slaves lived in the Ercole dis-
trict. When one escaped, temporarily reducing the number to 13, he
was quickly replaced. From January to July 1800, the figure was down
again to 13 following a death.55 In September 1799, every slave received
a total of one bean, one piece of bread and four ounce of oil a day.56
Moreover, among other costs attributed to the Ercole district, there
were those for clothes, brooms, lamps and a candelabra for the rosary.57
Petitions from slaves also offer an insight into life in Caserta. For exam-
ple, at the end of the 1799, Ignazio Piano, chief of the baptised slaves,
asked for clothes for the following six months as he was in credit for
clothes from the previous December.58
Most slaves were baptised. Baptism was useful to slaves as it offered
hope of better living conditions. Joseph Dolat was the catechist
father who prepared catechumens in the Ercole district.59 Slaves who
were not baptised did not live in the Ercole district, but in a district
where the living conditions were worse. There is proof of the hiring of
32 “maomettani” (Muslim) baptised slaves in the Ercole district in 1770.
They had to wear special clothes for the ritual of baptism.60 Marriage
could also be a recipe for emancipation. However, a slave could not
marry a free woman without a royal licence and marriage itself did not
mean freedom (as in Roman law), but it did mean that his descendants
would be free.61 Slavery followed a matriarchal line in Roman law, and
so did freedom: the union of a slave and a free woman produced a free
child. On 1 April 1769, the baptised slave Nicola Laqual, an employee
at the royal construction site, asked for a royal licence to marry Anna
Perrotta. Sometimes, marriage could be an instrument of escape, so it
was not only motivated by the conception of free children.62 There were
complaints about the—non-Christian—practice among non-baptised
slaves of exhuming cadavers and about the absence of a specific ceme-
tery in the district. A letter explains that remains of cadavers were used
to fertilise land. A comparison with the Jews on the royal building site
was made and it affirmed that they had a specific fenced area for their
burial rituals.63 Many cases of escape are documented in the archival
sources, but slaves never successfully escaped en masse. For example, the
Neapolitan Revolution in 1799 did not inspire an anti-Bourbon rising
and there were not many attempts to escape. In that year, the 14 slaves
living on the royal building site escaped simultaneously, but 13 of them
were recaptured.64 The master builder at the time, Nicola Gabrielli,
forced them to prepare weapons for use against the invaders. This meant
they faced the threat of execution upon the arrival of the French. Fear
prompted the escape bid. Only one slave initially headed for Rome, but
he turned to Foggia so as to avoid meeting French troops and being
forced to enlist in their ranks. In Foggia, he worked in the fields for a
spell before being readmitted to Caserta. However, he was readmitted
on the condition that he lived with Muslim slaves and not the baptised
ones.65
Moving back in time, there were two escapes in 1756: Maomet
di Bosra and Mustafà di Smirne escaped and settled first in Lucera in
Foggia and then in the Vicaria neighbourhood of Naples. The two runa-
ways tried to change their names to Francesco and Giovanni di Martino
di Tlischì, but they were discovered and brought back to Caserta.66
Mainly, Muslim and non-baptised slaves escaped. Countermeasures
included increased surveillance. An official, two sergeants, three cor-
porals and 40 more soldiers were enrolled and patrols became more
116 G. BONAZZA
frequent.67 The master builder decided how slaves should be employed.

They were used for the cleaning of ditches, as carpenters and mainly in
the work on the Gran Peschiera—which was close to the slave district.
In the immediate surroundings, there was also a tavern that Turkish
slaves could frequent together with forced labourers, and this situation
led to continuous brawls between slaves and prisoners.68 Adjacent to
the Ercole district was the slave chapel, a collaborative design by Luigi
Vanvitelli and Francesco Collecini. The chapel probably lost its religious
role when construction ceased in the early years of the nineteenth cen-
tury. Thereafter, there were few slaves in Caserta. After the French inva-
sion of 1800, numbers were as low as 13 or 14.69 The king transferred
his court to Palermo to avoid the French, taking his slaves with him or
selling them. The slaves who worked on the construction of the Palace
did not have different living conditions to those of the forced labourers
or the other inhabitants of the building site. Even though they had a spe-
cific district and a chapel for catechisation, which equated to segregation,
they could go to the tavern and they were supplied with a certain, albeit
fairly miserable, level of food and clothing. There conditions may have
been better than those of prisoners, but they suffered the same lack of
freedom.
3.4 Baptism of Slaves and the Achievement

of Freedom in Rome
The issue of slavery in Rome and Civitavecchia, as in the Papal States,

is intimately linked to the religious problem of the conversion of slaves
through baptism.70 Historical research on the topic usually takes as its
starting point the study by Salvatore Bono of slavery in Rome during
the Early Modern period. However, the phase between the end of the
eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century has
not been considered until now, the only exception being the work of
Wipertus Rudt de Collenberg.71 De Collenberg discovered twenty cases
of salves being baptised in Rome between 1801 and 1815 by consult-
ing the archives of the Casa dei Catecumeni di Roma (House of the
Catechumens of Rome). He also discovered a baptism register from the
eighteenth century detailing 306 ceremonies, 284 of them concern-
ing men and only 22 relating to women; 25 free people were baptised,
meaning that a total of 281 slaves were baptised in Rome during the
eighteenth century.72 For this reason, the particular nature of slavery in

Rome (but not only in Rome, as we have also seen the importance of
the baptism of slaves in the case of Naples) was partly defined by a reli-
gious problem surrounding conversion. Conversion was a double instru-
ment: on the one hand, the majority religion attempted an operation
of integration; on the other hand, it tried to coerce the slave. Persisting
with the otherness of the slave or, on the contrary, changing his iden-
tity by converting him, results in suppression of the slave’s origin, even
if the concept of identity is “ephemeral”, to quote Bernard Vincent
and Jocelyne Dakhlia.73 In fact, “Les conversions, plus ou moins libres,
offrent un point de vue trasversal idéal pour étudier les phénomènes
de mobilité, de flux continus et d’installation plus ou moins définitive,
dans leurs aspects matériels et, peut etre avant tout, immatériels”.74 The
importance of baptism lies in changing the slave’s original name and him
having to accept a new name. Thus, one of the traits that most charac-
terised identity had to change in order to create a new subject. In the
cases described in Naples, the new name—and especially the surname—
coincided with that of the godfather, who was frequently a member of a
noble family, probably the former owner of the slave or somebody who
wanted to hire the newly baptised slave as a domestic servant. Thanks to
consultation of the precious documents of the Pia Casa dei Catecumeni,
we know that it was mainly bishops and cardinals who transmitted their
surnames to baptised slaves in Rome. The Casa dei Catecuemeni e dei
neofiti (House of Catechumens) was established in Rome in 1543, at the
height of the Counter-Reformation. It was supervised by high-ranking
officials a Rector Cardinal overseeing its work and reporting directly to
the Vicar Cardinal, the bishop of Rome. Its aim was to conquer souls
and to proceed to baptisms. The Casa dei Catecuemeni e dei neofiti was
tasked not only with conversions but also with spiritual and disciplinary
decision-making. It was charged with converting both Muslims and
Jews. There were 1958 baptisms of Jews between 1614 and 1797, and
1086 baptisms of Muslims in the same period.75 Many of the Muslims
baptised were slaves.
Pope Pius V tackled the juridical question of the emancipation of
slaves in Rome when he promulgated the motuproprio in 1556. He
ruled that Christians—by birth or by conversion—who presented them-
selves to the conservatory in the Campidoglio would obtain manu-
mission and Roman citizenship.76 This was a completely innovative
118 G. BONAZZA
juridical approach, as conversion and emancipation had been totally

distinct before then.77 Converted slaves could also be seen as a menace
because of the risk of proselytism. Both in Christian and in Muslim areas,
enslaved men and women represented a significant workforce as well as
a prized merchandise for exchange. For this reason, slaves on galleys did
not suffer the same pressure to convert as domestic slaves. There were
limitations on the conversion of slaves on galleys. Masters of galley slaves
were tempted to contest applications to convert because a decree issued
by Paul III in 1548 differentiated between “private propriety” and “pub-
lic propriety”. This legislation seemed to hold out the promise of formal
citizenship. However, I have not unearthed evidence of the application
of this law.
In Rome, slavery was thought of as a public utility. The desire of
slaves to convert was accepted, but it had to be approved by the Catholic
Church.78 Slaves preparing for conversion were educated about the
Christian religion at the Casa dei Catecumeni. After baptism, but with-
out an act of manumission, the slave was integrated among the citizens.
With conversion and the transformation of his personal identity, the
slave could begin the pursuit of freedom. Converted and newly chris-
tened slaves could immediately earn more money and take on positions
of increased responsibility. This enhanced liberty was a precursor to a full
measure of juridical freedom.79
After the one-year education of the slave in the Catholic religion
at the Pia Casa dei Catecumeni, baptised slaves moved to the Castel
Sant’Angelo. They sometimes became soldiers or were employed in tem-
porary jobs while they waited for their eventual freedom. None of the
cases from 1784 resulted in an immediate realisation of freedom.80 At
the end of the eighteenth century, there were a large number of slaves
at the Castel Sant’Angelo. The conversion of a Turkish slave, Machmet
d’Abdulla e Fatima, nicknamed Mamelucco, was an interesting case:
And as your humble servant replied on the 27th November and on the
4th December, the date on which according to his information the same
Father Franceschi previously mentioned expressly confirmed in reply
that E.V. would order that the said Slave be taken to the Pia Casa dei
Catecumeni in Rome if he had been educated here in the rudiments of the
Christian Doctrine, and if this was confirmed to E.V. Concerning this, the
slave and moreover his legion were duly informed […] the said Slave was
occasionally questioned; he already arrived with weak memories and was
needy […] in Civitavecchia.
Mechmet, who asked to be admitted to baptism […] Therefore tell Father

Icario that we have tried to instruct the slave, but that his memory is so
weak that in the end he made up his replies: […] he needs somebody with
him to stop him doing this; this is not possible in Civitavecchia, where he
is continually distracted by his work; something that wouldn’t happen at
the Casa dei Catecumeni. […] I add that there is another slave, named
Amor Bisertino, who is well educated, who responds well, and who really
longs to embrace the Christian belief.81
Amor was a slave in Civitavecchia in August 1784. In September of the

same year, six slaves were brought to the Castel Sant’Angelo fortress
in Rome. Theoretically, they should have passed through the Casa dei
Catecumeni in order to receive baptism.82
Regarding the number of cases of slavery in Civitavecchia and Rome
in the period 1745–1807, consulting the Soldatesche e Galere (soldiers
and galleys) archives I have found 103 slaves. In 1795: 88 had been cap-
tured, 11 were old slaves and 4 came from Maccarese beach.83
As prisoners in the galleys often offended slaves, it was ordered that
the cabins should be closed and the stern locker should be opened for
slaves during the night. Therefore, an attempt was made to keep Turkish
slaves and Christian prisoners separate. Beside sexual crimes, betting and
forging documents were everyday practices in the galleys. The jailors
were often accused of forging false coins and printing coupons stamped
with all kinds of seals: of bishops, priests and notaries. Capuchin priests
who celebrated Mass and who cared for the spiritual condition of the
prisoners complained about poor sanitary conditions.84 There were also
episodes of thefts of the goods owned by slaves. For example, on 21
October 1795, several individuals were arrested in Torre di Maccarese
because they had stolen goods from four Turks. Unsurprisingly, slaves
were concerned about their own living conditions. In 1795, slaves in
Civitavecchia asked to “not wear cuffs on their feet”. The request was
motivated by the fact that Christian slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms did
not wear ankle cuffs.85 Among Turkish slaves, there was a case of an elev-
en-year-old son of a Spanish renegade who was to be received in the Pia
Casa dei Catecumeni (House of Catechumens). The child wanted to
convert to the Christian religion, and so he was first moved to the pris-
oners’ hospital in order to remove him from the galley. If the conversion
was confirmed, he would be loaded on a battispiaggia (a small boat) and
moved to Rome; if not, he would be brought back to Civitavecchia.
120 G. BONAZZA
Non-baptised slaves were thus moved to the Pia Casa dei Catecumeni,
while baptised ones were moved to the Castel Sant’Angelo.86 The stay
in the Castel Sant’Angelo was not always a first step towards freedom.
Documents reveal how they petitioned for legal freedom. Giuseppe
Bastoncelli, a renegade slave in the fortress, wrote a petition asking for
his freedom as he had received baptism five years previously. He explicitly
asked for a position as a soldier and he asked for grace. This case demon-
strates that in the Castel Sant’Angelo fortress the slaves were not already
free but that they could become free after a certain period.87
Among the group of baptised Turkish slaves in the Castel Sant’Angelo
between 1783 and 1784, the case of Giuseppe Antonio Joannini stands
out. Joannini, a Tunisian, also asked for a job at the cove or as a sol-
dier. From his biographical profile, we know that he had been a slave for
ten years, eight of them working at the filarello in the old city. His peti-
tion was addressed to Cardinal Guglielmo Pallotta, who was the General
Treasurer and Prefect of the Castel Sant’Angelo.88
A memo from Bali Pupi, commander of the Papal galleys and then
keeper of Castel Sant’Angelo, tells us that the slaves he brought to the
fortress were treated in the same way as the other prisoners, except that
they remained quartered in the main building of the castle and that they
could be employed at various tasks such as transporting goods between
the cupboards and kitchens. Moreover, they could pay to achieve
their freedom; if they successfully bought their liberty, they were then
employed as grooms and porters and allowed to go outside. The most
deserving individuals could be given the task of converting people or of
spreading the faith in the castle. Before being freed, however, they were
sent to churches in Rome to worship, but only on non-working days
and in the company of a strong soldier. The soldier had to report on the
behaviour of the baptised slaves. Other slaves were immediately brought
to the catechumens as soon as they reached the castle.89
Also in 1783–1784, a Barbary pink (Pinco) with 720 men on board
was plundered by a knight named de Polastron. Among the crew were
two young slaves, a Turk and a Jew, who were brought directly to the
Castel Sant’Angelo. In 1796, the slave known as Bellacamicia stated
his intention of becoming a Christian and he was taken directly to the
dean of the Pia Casa dei Catecumeni. Alì, Abdilcard and Alson, all
from Tunis, were three more slaves who wished to convert. A register
called Riscatto de Schiavi, Conversione de Schiavi Turchi alla Religione
Cattolica (1804–1807) also documents conversions of Turkish slaves to
the Catholic religion. It details the case of a son of a Spanish renegade

detained in the prisoners’ hospital. This place was considered dangerous
because prisoners could have a negative effect on slaves. For this reason,
the boy had to be brought to Rome for his conversion. If the conversion
was not authentic, he would be brought back to Civitavecchia.
Among the slaves, the son of a Spanish renegade. God has brought him to
the land of Christians, and particularly to that of the Holy Church and he
wants to embrace the law rejected by his father, and he insisted so much
that I separated him from the others, and I could not keep him with me
so I put him in the Prisoners Hospital, but in this place there are not good
Christians so he could not have a good example to nurture his vocation if
it is a true one. As a ship is ready to leave for Rome I am taking the liberty
of sending (…) the said slave and the young boy, who I hope will be able
to stay in Rome. Otherwise, the ship can bring them back to Civitavecchia.
I beg you to forgive the liberty I am taking and to attribute it to my zeal
to give good service.90
The Riscatto de Schiavi register also tells us that the Trinità clergy had
to negotiate the exchange of five Turks for two soldiers, Matteo Garbini
and Luigi Giorgi, who were slaves in Tunis. The five Turks had been
plundered from Grottaccia beach in 1802, and they were still in the
Anzio dock on 5 June 1805. The first of the five Turks was Assan, son
of Mustafà, a 35-year-old bachelor from Cania, who was a sailor and
helmsman of an armed xebec in the service of the King of Tunis (the
rais of the xebec was Assis Levantino). The second slave was Maometto
Cassangi, son of Maometto, a 30-year-old widower from Biserta, a city
near Tunis. Both spoke Italian. The third Turk was Amur Tinzinover,
a recently married 25-year-old sailor from Tunis. Next was Machmet,
son of Machmet, a bachelor from Chems, a land controlled by Tunis.
Machmet was blind in his left eye. He was 32 years old and he was a
butcher before becoming a sailor. The last slave was Alì, son of Acmet,
a bachelor from Smirne. He was a 40-year-old sailor. Alì was separated
from the other slaves because he wanted to become a Christian. He was
seriously ill with a life-threatening disease, and so he was in the Hospital
of the Darsena dock. For this reason, the President of Darsena, Father
Alessandro da Furano, ordered his transfer to the Casa dei Catecumeni.91
On 17 November 1802, the Turkish slave Sansone was sent to the Pia
Casa dei Catecumeni, and in 1803, the head of the Trinità clergy wanted
to take the 19 enslaved Turks away in order to redeem the Garbini
122 G. BONAZZA
family.92 On 5 February 1803, there were 22 slaves of different ages and

geographical origins held in the port of Civitavecchia. Beside slaves from
Tunis and the Levant, there was one from Dulcigno, one from Candia
and one from Constantinople (see Table 3.1).93
Moreover, on 23 September 1806, there were 43 slaves from Tunis
in Civitavecchia waiting to be exchanged. Their Spanish owner, Caff.
Antonio Nadal, was appointed to take them back to their homeland.94 In
a source dated 8 September 1806, there is a chart with precise numbers:
of the 50 slaves originally present (4 had died and 3 had converted to
Christianity). Of the 50, forty-eight were identified as Tunisians. The 2
exceptions were listed as “Levantines”, from Tunis also.
Descriptions of three Turkish slaves who lived at the Pia Casa dei
Catecumeni for several months provide an idea of what living conditions
there were like. Dervisce, Cosme and Alì needed additional clothing
Table 3.1 Slaves registered in the Chivitavecchia dock on 5 February 1803
Name Native land Age Native profession Profession on the ship
Orsim Candiotto 35 Helmsman

Amor Tunis 20 Sailor
Sichir Tunis 33 Sailor
Salì Dulcignotto 70 Helmsman
Orsin Levant 30 Sailor
Mustafà Tunis 27 Helmsman
Macmet Tunis 60 Helmsman
Rpetlà Levant 20 Soldier
Gummà Tunis 40 Sailor
Amur Tunis 50 Helmsman
Belis Levant 30 Sailor
Solemà Constantinople 30 Soldier
Abittilà Tunis 30 Sailor
Alis Tunis 20 Soldier
Asaan Tunis 30 Helmsman
Alis Tunis 30 Soldier
Maumetto Tunis 30 Helmsman
Ibraim Levant 36 Soldier
Mustafà Levant 30 Soldier
Smael Levant 35 Soldier
Amur Tunis 20 Soldier
Asan Levant 28 Soldier
Source ASR, Soldatesche e galere, b. 748

because in the days when a north wind was blowing (Tramontana) they
could not tolerate the cold. Their house offered them food, but they
could not work. The money for clothing the three slaves came from the
pawnshop (Monte di pietà) in Rome and the Salvatore Machelli parish
gave 90 scudi.95
The “profitability” of the exchange of baptism for possible freedom
constitutes an interesting aspect of the slavery relationship, but there
were contradictions inherent in the process. If baptised slaves did not
obtain freedom, they could not be employed at Castel Sant’Angelo, so
it suited the Catholic Church when freedom was achieved. In some rare
instances, slaves already worked there before baptism, but promotion to
more senior positions was only ever available to the baptised.
The Casa dei Catecumeni provided benefit in kind to the slaves and
limited cash. For living expenses, the Casa gave them three pieces of
bread, clothes and 13 lire. Cardinal Polletta suggested making two
particular slaves work in the wadding factory at Civitavecchia or mov-
ing them to Ferrara, also in the Pontifical State.96 These two slaves were
not freed after their baptism, so the Casa dei Catecumeni maintained
them. Their transfer to Ferrara was a step towards making them useful
as soldiers in the fortress at Forturbano. It appears that in cases of con-
flict of jurisdiction within the Papal States, the cardinals helped slaves
to move between states according to the needs of the labour market. It
was important to the authorities that such movements did not look like
escapes.
Another interesting case concerns the testimony of a slave involved in
a mutiny on the St. Peter galley in 1792. Alì, from Tripoli, who had been
enslaved 13 years previously, was a witness in a judicial trial against the
prisoners. Here is the introduction to his speech:
I have been a Turkish slave for 13 years, I have always lived in this city, and
I was destined to stay on the S. Pietro galley. The reason why […] by your
order I am in this residence, I imagine, at least, must be the escape of the
convicts of this galley, who took possession of the galley in the evening of
last Tuesday and on Wednesday morning at sea. And as at this time I was
engaged on … the S. Pietro galley, […] in truth, I am ready to tell you as
much as I know about the event, if you want. […]
You must know that on the morning of 6th August, that is to say on
Tuesday, the 3 pontifical galleys, namely Capitana, the command ship, the
Padrona and S. Pietro, sailed from the dock accompanied by 5 lanzoni.
124 G. BONAZZA
I was on the S. Pietro galley and…around 11 p.m. I went to sleep, but at

5 a.m. I was woken by a riot of cries and I saw, thanks to the light, many
convicts with unsheathed sabres and muskets around the galley, of whom
I could only distinguish Giacomo Porta, called ‘Cimino’ and another who
was called ‘il Sagrestano.’ Together with others that I was not able to rec-
ognize, they went around the galley distributing arms to the other con-
victs, who fought hand to hand and forced the sailors to work […]97
This testimony was quite important as the slave reported the names
and surnames of the organisers of the mutiny. It seems that the event
happened in the waters of Maccarese.
In January 1793, an accident was reported that involved a slave, Alì,
who worked in the Saint Peter galley. After a fight with daggers on the
dock, a porter, Camillo Bragaglia, wounded the slave with a needle he
used for his work. The slave was taken to the hospital at the dock while
the porter escaped. The motivation for the event seems to have been
playful, and there was probably no malice intended.98
The rich historical archives of the Vicariato of Rome conserve
l’Archivio dei Luoghi Pii dei Catecumeni e Neofiti. Consultation of some
of the sources in the Liber Battizzatorum, 1759–1806, proves the pres-
ence of other slaves in Rome. It has been possible to reconstruct some
of their lives.99 In addition, sources regarding doubts about the validity
of slave baptisms are of great interest because they reveal the number of
geographical movements and religious conversions which a slave could
be involved in.100 For example, a source from April 1758 relates the case
of Macmet, who was born in Mytilene, was 24 years old and had been a
slave for two years in pontifical galleys and for several months at the Casa
dei Catecumeni in Rome. Macmet was a Christian schismatic, and when
he was eight years old, he was forced to move to Constantinople. There,
he renounced his native Christian faith and he was educated in the
Muslim religion. After 14 years, he came back to his native island, but
was captured and enslaved on Papal galleys as he was about to leave for
Algiers on a merchant ship. Macmet had already received baptism and his
godfather was a Greek merchant. His baptismal name was Demetrio and
his family in Mytilene practised the Christian religion. Macmet’s case was
complicated, since he was born a Christian, converted to Islam and was
now reverting to Christianity. The dean of the house, Filippo Colonna,
did not know whether to approve the baptism or not.101 A “black
Muslim” woman coming from the Casa dei Catecumeni in Livorno was
also received, but it was not known if she was baptised or not. Her name
was Elena and her Turkish name was Obra. She related that in Livorno
she had been in the service of a master of Zante, whose religion was
Greek Orthodox (“schismatic”). However, Elena decided to become a
Catholic. She said she had been baptised in Zante by a secular official,
but she did not hear any words when she was baptised. She said that the
celebrant immersed her in a tub of water and washed her. Theologians
ruled the baptism in Zante invalid.102
Another interesting case, dated 1784, refers to the baptism of a
Muslim Tatar woman. She was named Esta and was the daughter of
Solimano, born in Colombië.103 She claimed she had been born in 1756
and was around 28 years and six months old. In 1778, she left Colombië
and got married, so she was freed. Her husband was Mustafà, a 74-year-
old general of the Tatar Konische regiment. He was the brother of her
father, Solimano. She had a child with this husband, but he lived for only
three years. She left her husband Prince Girolamo Radzivil brought her
to Poland and then to Versailles, in France. The Prince was Catholic. At
the French court, they encouraged her to be baptised. After France, her
journey continued to Hamburg in Germany, and then, she returned with
the same Prince Radzivil to Poland. She then fled Poland in an attempt
to reach Constantinople and the Grand Vizier. Her route encompassed
Fiume, a city under Austrian control, and Trieste, where she stayed two
days. She passed through Treviso and Verona, and in 1779, she traversed
the Venetian state dressed as a Turk with a turban. She was received by
the Conservatorio della Santissima Trinità (Conservatory of the Holy
Trinity), where she remained for three months, and as she was consid-
ered a Christian by birth, she could live devoutly and serenely in the
Conservatorio. The housemother did not know that she was a converted
Muslim. However, Count Alessio Malfatti told the housemother the
truth and Esta had to leave the Conservatorio. Countess Chiara Giraud,
wife of Count Alessio, took Esta to Verona with her.104 In 1782, Count
Alessio went to Rome with all his family and testified to the Pia Casa
that Esta had always maintained a Christian comportment, so he kept
her as a neophyte. She claimed she had been baptised in Versailles in the
Royal Palace. She lived in Rome with the Countess and the Count until
1783, until about a month after Count Alessio’s death. Then, she left
the Count’s house and she reached the Casa dei Pellegrini (House of
Pilgrims), where she stayed for eight days.105
126 G. BONAZZA
A document from the Propaganda, dated 8 May 1820 and signed by

Filippo Colonna, dean of the Catecumeni, tells the story of four young
Circassian Turks, two boys and two girls, redeemed from slavery in
Constantinople. A Catholic Armenian trader from Constantinople had
bought them from a Turkish merchant for a price of 4000 scudi. They
moved first to Trieste and then on to Rome. The older girl was 12 years
old. Her Turkish name was Havà and her Christian name was Anna. The
older boy was named Stefano and his baptism was brought into question.
The younger boy was called Antonio and the younger girl Santina. It was
certain that they did not receive baptism in Constantinople and that their
Christian names had been imposed by the Catholic Armenian family.
Anna was taken to Trieste together with the other three by a Mechitarist
monk from Venice, but fell sick with “putrido maligno” (putrid disease).
In order to nurse this serious disease, the Armenian spent all the money
that he had received for taking them to Rome and he even incurred a
debt of 300 lire. The Propaganda offered a charitable gift of 124 lire,
and the Prefect also provided assistance.106
The Mechitarist who accompanied them believed that he should bap-
tise them, so he wrote to the Casa dei Catecumeni. When the girl even-
tually recovered, they continued the journey to Rome and Don Stefano,
a missionary from the Propaganda, instructed them. Havà doubted that
she had received baptism when she was young, even though a Catholic
merchant bought her and an Armenian Catholic woman educated her.
Moreover, she stated that she had received a Catholic education with-
out her consent and that she never understood the meaning of the bap-
tism. The monk told her that he would send her to Rome to work.107 In
Trieste, she had actually received baptism when she was near death. In
fact, she was unconscious. For this reason, the dean of the Catecumeni
raised a doubt:
Now leaving aside what is necessary to receive baptism, which is not our
purpose, it is certain that for it to be valid there must be will, that is, vol-
untary consent, either real, virtual or habitual, in other words voluntary
intention once had in the past and never repudiated. The said girl there-
fore does not seem to have had any intention to receive the baptism that
she was given, neither real, virtual or habitual, as is clear from her own
confession, and consequently there are grounds to rightly doubt the valid-
ity of the baptism conferred on her.108
In conclusion, the baptism she received from the Mechitarist monk

was not validated. This story is interesting because it tells us the
sequence of events involving the four young Turks in some detail: who
redeemed them, their geographical itinerary, their arrival in Rome and
finally the discrediting of two baptisms. The redemption seems to have
been another commercial operation, even though the children’s living
situation with the protector monk does not seem like slavery. However,
some of the details of the statement by the elder girl, Havà, indicate that
some of the things she experienced, such as being baptised, were not
done voluntarily. She thought she was going to Rome from Trieste to
look for work, not to be baptised. If the four young Turks had not been
bought by the Catholic Armenian merchant, they would have remained
in Constantinople.
Another remarkable aspect of the sources in the Liber Battizzatorum
is their descriptions of slaves. For example, on 6 March 1763 Francesca
Cotur was baptised. Previously, she had been seen as a Muslim and
a Turk (“qui antea erat Maumet Turca”). She was born in Borno in
present-day Nigeria, an area defined as Regione Nigrorum. There were
four cases in 1762 and four more in 1763, all concerning Turks.109
As in the Kingdom of Naples, baptism meant a change of the original
name in these cases too. Thus, in 1766, Tafil Turco became Giuseppe
Giovanni Castelli. This surname was the same as that of the dean of
the House, Monsignor Castelli. Another slave was named Salvatore
Antonio Giovanni Castelli, and he was Giuseppe’s brother.110 In 1767,
22-year-old Antonio Maria Sfarzeschi was baptised. His previous name
was Mustafà Chiel.111 In December 1782, Assan Abdella, an Eastern
Turk, became Maria de Paulis. Twelve months later, it was the turn of
Antonio Tommaso Maria Melchiori, a black Turk.112 The adjective black
(nigra) once more appears regarding a baptism on 22 September 1802:
“M. Matilde Geltrude Vallemanni Turca Nigra annorum 28 que antea
erat Lulla filia Coniugum Turcarum Nigrorum ex Egypto Roma traslata
[…]”.113 The case of Alì, discussed above, a slave with a particular yearn-
ing to convert to Catholicism, is also attested in the baptismal register.
Alì, a Turk from Tunis, was enslaved by a Papal galley in 1805 and then
instructed by the President of the galleys and Saint Barbara Church par-
ish. As he became seriously ill at Civitavecchia dock, he was baptised on
6 August 1806 and was named Fortunato. A Capuchin priest wrote a
letter about him.114
128 G. BONAZZA
In 1822, there were two more cases of baptism, involving a Greek

slave and a slave from the island of Giglio. There are slaves listed in the
Liber Battizatorum until 1825, and the cases concerning black women
slaves always use the adjective nigra. Maria Anna Catharina Salvi “Nigra
de Secta Mahumetica”, was from Egypt; Maria Carola Anna Patti,
“nigra” and Muslim, was a 28-year-old woman from Alexandria in
Egypt; and Maria Anna Fortunata de Santis, described only as “Muslim”,
was from Tripolizza in the Peloponnesus.115 Anna Maria Vicentina Elena
Zanti, a Muslim, was also baptised in 1825.116 There were 720 cases of
baptisms recorded between 1759 and 1825, although the title of the
inventory states that it only covers the period 1759–1806.
The cases reported in the register of the Pia Casa dei Catecumeni
relate to slaves but also to Jews, Muslims and other people who wanted
to be baptised. It is very likely that the black Muslim women who
received noble surnames had been brought to work in the service of
these families. We can therefore affirm that there were around 26 bap-
tisms. If in addition to the Liber Battizzatorum we consider the other
source consulted in the archive of the Curacy of Rome, the total number
is 29. Moreover, taking into consideration the Soldatesche e Galere in the
State Archives of Rome—and that one case can be found in both archives
(Soldatesche e Galere and archive of the Vicariato of Rome), as well as the
fact that slaves could be sold after a short time on galleys—the sources
indicate the presence of 208 slaves between 1750 and 1808 in Rome.117
It is clear, then, that slavery in the Papal State was not a residual phe-
nomenon at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nine-
teenth century. The religious and economic implications of conversion
and the master–slave bond were not static. To a certain extent, they were
matters of convenience, and they changed in accordance with circum-
stances. In the context of pontifical galleys especially, the master–slave
relationship with respect to Catholic intermediaries seemed to fluctuate
due to the conceptual connection between slaves as “public property”
or “private property”. Furthermore, the connection between religion
and slavery in the Mediterranean was fundamental: the Muslim slave in
Rome was both a worker and also a living demonstration of the mixing
of cultures, like Christian slaves in Tunis. For this reason, conversion was
a way to show the superiority of one religion over another. It was not
just a matter of simple economic exploitation. The presence of Jewish
prisoners, “schismatic” Armenians and others meant that the religious
landscape was not binary but variegated. The practices that arose around
slavery and redemption therefore also represented encounters between

various cultural and religious realities. On the Papal galleys, there were
various juridical statuses, not only simple definitions such as servile
dependence after baptism. Baptism was at times imposed but sometimes
was a free choice made by a slave who hoped to improve his status. In
this sense, the decision to be baptised could be considered a form of
slave agency.
3.5 Different Types of Slaves in Palermo

The sources confirm the presence of slaves in the Kingdom of Sicily, and
especially in Palermo, into the first half of the nineteenth century. The
archives of the Redenzione dei Cattivi are a fundamental source of doc-
uments on slavery. Given its function, it has been possible to find lists
of Muslim slaves (and others) covering the period 1802–1812. There
were also cases of Jewish slaves in Palermo, and it is possible to pinpoint
some of the specific geographical areas where slaves resided and to iden-
tify the tasks they carried out. So far, the documents produced by the
Redenzione have been used to analyse the phenomenon of the redemp-
tion of Sicilian slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms or in specific cities like
Algiers. The aim of previous studies has been, among other things, to
estimate the numbers of Sicilian captives in the Barbary Kingdoms.118
But there are no in-depth studies of slaves in Palermo and Sicily in the
first half of the nineteenth century. Here and there, some traces appear,
in somewhat dated volumes or in summary papers.119 The Lettere
appartenenti alla Redenzione delli Schiavi dall’anno 1802 a tutto l’anno
1805 (letters of the Redenzione degli Schiavi from 1802 to 1805) con-
firm the presence of slaves in Palermo. There is proof of the purchase of
30 Turkish slaves in 1804, 13 of them from Levantine Tunis, who were
bought for 1000 ounces of gold. The exchange rates were fixed at five
slaves from Levantine Tunis for two Christians and seven Dervishes for
two Christians.120
The Redenzione dei cattivi of Palermo also acted together with other
institutions for the redemption of slaves. A letter written by the dean
of the Redenzione, Monsignor Castelli, confirmed an enquiry from the
Neapolitan Redenzione degli schiavi about the availability of Algerian
slaves in order to facilitate the redemption of 15 slaves from Messina
who were in Algiers.121 The owners of the slaves were inhabitants
of the Kingdom of Sicily. A loved one of theirs had been captured, so
130 G. BONAZZA
they purchased slaves in order to use them for his redemption. On 15

October 1804, Nicola Calandro of Trapani owned five Turks. Also in
Trapani, in 1805 a Moor named Alì Abdella Biniamur Ferraro was sto-
len from a boat loaded with coal. He was purchased by a Mrs Alloisio
to exchange for her husband, Giovanni Alloisio, in exchange. Her son,
Antonio Alloisio, bought two Turks, one of them called Alì Bell’Aura di
Biserta Ferraro, in order to redeem his father in the Barbary Kingdom.
In addition, the wife of Emanuele Torrente obtained a concession from
the King to give the Redenzione 84 Turks in order to exchange them for
24 Sicilian slaves.122
A letter written on 29 April 1806 by the deans of the Palermitan
deputation states that 68 Muslims from Tunis were held in custody in
the Real Piazza of Capua (near Caserta) from 29 December 1804 to 4
May 1805. Eight of them were used for an exchange for the brothers
Saverio and Paolo Basile from Palermo and Sebastiano di Paola from
Trapani, who were all enslaved in the Regency of Tunis. Sixty Tunisians
were involved in the same exchange operation. The Redenzione dei
Cattivi delegated the Batavian Consul Nyssen to exchange 60 Tunisians
for 24 slaves from Sicily and eight Tunisians for the Basile brothers.
However, Nyssen did not succeed in concluding the affair because he
did not obtain the 68 Tunisians that had previously been granted by
the Redezione. The slaves were on trial in Capua and they could not be
moved.123
In the same chronological period, there were 58 more captives: 33
were held in the Castello di Augusta (Augusta Castle) and 25 in the for-
tress of Messina.124 Five more Turks were captured on the Licata Beach
so they could be exchanged for two Sicilian slaves. After that, an Algerian
xebec was stolen by the frigate Venus, which arrived in the Arsenal of
Palermo on 14 July 1808 carrying 54 men who we can define as captives
(see Table 3.2).
According to a royal note of 16 July 1808, the Algerians captured
were to be exchanged for Christian slaves.125 Only four of the 54 slaves
were black. It seems reasonable to assume that these men were already
slaves on the ship that was plundered because the document does not
specify a maritime position or another occupation. All 54 slaves were
held in the prisoners’ district in Palermo.126 Slaves in the prisoners’ dis-
trict received the same financial support as convicts (the so-called servi di
pena).127
Table 3.2 Captives who arrived in Palermo in 1808
Name Father Mother Provenance Description
Mamet Mustafà Fatma Constantinople Head soldier

Mustafà Alì Fatma Smyrna Sergeant
Ibraim Maometto Ajxa Constantinople Corporal
Imbraim Alì Fatma Constantinople Soldier
Ibraim Mustafà Ajxa Constantinople Soldier
Calil Alì Emne Constantinople Soldier
Mamet Musa Ajxa Constantinople Soldier
Mamet Mamet Fatma Constantinople Soldier
Ibraim Mamet Fatma Constantinople Soldier
Naseen Osseman Vintisben Constantinople Soldier
Ajsa Ali Fatma Algiers Sailor (assistant
to the Rais)
Gaddur Maometto Caybua Algiers Sailor
Mamet Maometto Bintbacana Algiers Sailor
Mustafà Smain Vintcuosi Algiers Sailor
Saaman Mamet Resa Algiers Sailor
Dei Mametto Abduluat Vintstrach Algiers Sailor
Musa Mametto Vintrieire Algiers Sailor
Amida Mametto Maricana Algiers Sailor
Ali Costimo Vintguccur Algiers Sailor
Mametto Muluca Ajxa Algiers Sailor
Cosimo Mametto Annja Algiers Sailor
Alì Nayen Alima Algiers Sailor
Mametto Amur Sebovia Algiers Sailor
Daaman Mamet Arafa Algiers Sailor
Mamet Mamet Vincofeg Algiers Sailor
Mametto Mametto Ajxa Algiers Sailor
Said Mametto Augua Algiers Sailor
Hambadan Alil Ajala Algiers Sailor
Hamet Narbi Maxuda Algiers Sailor (ill)
Mamet Ali Sfecta Algiers Sailor
Ali Macmet Vintbinovta Algiers Sailor
Namet Nabri Ajxa Algiers Sailor
Mamet Alì Libarca Algiers Sailor
Miya Soliman Luata Algiers Sailor
Mamet Namet Fidaenich Algiers Sailor
Nasen Mamet Aysa Algiers Sailor
Alì Mamet Aracna Algiers Sailor
Mamet Nasen Gala Algiers Sailor
Hamet Mamet Venticues Algiers Sailor
Naysen Nysen Nuara Algiers Artilleryman
Daaman Mamet Vincalejan Algiers Artilleryman
(continued)
132 G. BONAZZA
Table 3.2 (continued)
Name Father Mother Provenance Description

Hamet Mamet Locara Algiers Ill
Mamet Mamet Ajxa Algiers Artilleryman
Alì Mamet Zuna Algiers Moor
Amida Mamet Vintbinar Algiers Moor
Maometto Essa Sofia Algiers Moor
Alì Amur Ajata Algiers Moor
Paddur Ali Alime Algiers Caulker
Saltich Paddur Dervisce Algiers Cabin boy
Total: 52 + 1 Rais
and 1 Deputy Rais
Source ASP, Redenzione dei Cattivi, vol. 315, fol. 509
In October 1808, there were 62 Algerian slaves but six died. Four of
the dead slaves were among the seven deputy rais who tried to escape
from the castelletto (castle), while the other two were ordinary slaves who
died in the hospital. This left 56 slaves.
Father Paolo and Monsignor Castelli, who were in charge of the ran-
som operations, had to exchange the Turkish slaves for 28 Christian
slaves. We can therefore assume that the exchange rate was around two
Turkish slaves for one Christian slave. The rate for black slaves was less
than for Turkish Levantine ones: two Christian slaves for five black
slaves.128
In the first half of the nineteenth century, the privateering war became
more intense and peace treaties between the Barbary Kingdoms and the
Kingdom of Sicily were often disregarded. Privateers were largely suc-
cessful in evading the authorities and they never respected treaties.129
The Bey of Tunis did not accept an exchange for 18 Tunisian slaves
because they were Moorish rather than Levantine. The problem was that
Moorish Tunisians were not accepted as Levantine Tunisian slaves. This
was probably due to the fact that the relationship between the Barbary
States and the other countries around the Mediterranean Sea worsened
in the first half of the nineteenth century. English raids against North
African states (at the time Great Britain was an ally of the Kingdom of
the Two Sicilies) played a significant part in exacerbating the tension.
The fact that the value of a black slave was less than that of a non-black
or Levantine proves that skin colour was an important element of
discrimination in Mediterranean exchanges and that from a commercial

point of view a black slave was merchandise with a lower value.130
The failed exchange for 18 Tunisian slaves was meant to bring Cecilia
Forte and her unmarried daughters back to Sicily.131 For the redemp-
tion of the daughters, the Jewish slave Davide Fano was to be used, but
he had never been consigned to the Deputazione in Palermo. Matteo
Gaudioso also refers to the sequence of events involving Davide Fano:
the slave was captured by a privateer from Palermo, but given that he
came from Livorno he was considered a prisoner of war and so he came
under state jurisdiction rather than the rules of privateers. In spite of this,
the Tribunale delle prede (court of plunder) authorised the exchange
and the government ordered the privateer who captured him to trans-
fer Fano. Gaudioso states that the owner of the four unmarried girls
intended to only yield them for money.132
Fano, however, circulated freely around the city of Palermo and it
was feared that he would escape. This example thus shows the difficulty
in understanding how many slaves were actually present, because some
of them obtained their freedom after a trial or managed to escape. It is
also interesting because it demonstrates the presence of Jewish slaves
alongside Muslims. Moreover, it demonstrates the difficulties that were
involved in defining jurisdiction over slaves between privateers, the state
and potential buyers.133
In July 1808, 70 Algerians were captured from the Real Fregata
and eight Tunisians from the Brigantino Vulcano and they were then
consigned to the arsenal in the port of Palermo on the 17th of the
month.134 The year after, 20 more Tunisians were captured. The English
consul, Oglander, proposed seventeen of them for an exchange to
the Bey of Tunis, but he again refused because they were black rather
than Levantine slaves. Instead, they were employed on work in the
fortress of Trapani.135 Testimony dated December 1812 on a mara-
bout—a Muslim holy man—from Tripoli named Amur Scerif who lived
in a house near Hag Ashmet Hassan’s bakery in Palermo demonstrates
how such clerics were advantageous in exchanges because more than
one Sicilian slave could be obtained for a marabout. Scerif wrote a letter
proving his miserable condition.136 Matteo Gaudioso covers a case of a
black slave being sold to the Prince of Petrulla for 70 onze in 1808. In
the sale agreement, it was established that if the black slave was freed by
the government or by magistrates, then the vendor should refund the 70
onze. Gaudioso also details a case of a slave in 1812.137
134 G. BONAZZA
It was not only the Redenzione dei Cattivi that adjudicated on the
legitimacy of raids by Sicilian, royal or privateer ships, and ships sailing
under enemy or neutral flags, but also the Tribunale delle Prede. This tri-
bunal operated between 1808 and 1813, a period partly coinciding with
the so-called English decade, during which there was great geopolit-
ical change in the Mediterranean. These fluctuations reflected the con-
test between France and England for maritime superiority. In exchange
operations, cooperation between the Kingdom of Sicily and the English
navy was fundamental. The English cooperated in the exchange of slaves
from various countries. For example, in 1812 the English freed 600
Portuguese slaves detained in Tunis.138 The Tribunale was established in
a specific political situation. In 1807, Ferdinand IV joined the continental
blockade and declared all the ports in the Kingdom of Sicily blockaded.
Therefore, every merchant ship—from whatever nation, even neutral
ones—that contravened the blockade could be considered ripe for legit-
imate plunder. The blockade and the increase in privateering—under
any flag—led to the creation of the Tribunale delle Prede the following
year.139 Documents produced by this institution are helpful in explaining
the process of seizure and in identifying the names of captains and buy-
ers.140 Thanks to the Tribunale delle Prede, we know that private citizens
could purchase slaves.141 For example, the previously mentioned Nicola
Calandro owned five slaves, which he purchased in order to redeem some
of his family. Given that five slaves were not enough for this purpose, he
purchased five more on the coast of Licata for 324 onze.142 There are lists
of some Turkish captives that came back to their homeland between 1807
and 1815 after specific orders from the King of Sicily, probably because
they had been redeemed. In one of these lists, there are 25 names.143
We can estimate that around 410 slaves passed through Palermo,
Capua and Trapani between 1802 and 1812. Some of them had never
been sold or exchanged and they probably stayed in Sicily until they
died. Others—as we saw in the exchange operations—did not stay in
captivity very long. The cases demonstrate that at the beginning of the
century of Atlantic abolitionism, captivity was still a relatively common
phenomenon, and slaves still existed in Palermo and in other areas of
Sicily. The living situations of the slaves varied to quite a degree: some
of them, such as the marabutto Scerif, lived freely in the city of Palermo;
others were prisoners in fortresses. Finally, we have seen that black slaves
were discriminated against compared with other slaves: their monetary
value was lower, or they were exchanged for fewer men.
3.6 Slaves in Livorno: Persistence After the Closure

of the Bagno (Slave Prison)
Livorno, in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and governed by the

Hapsburg-Lorenas since 1769, was a fairly important commercial mar-
itime hub in the Mediterranean Sea. It was a free port, so it was par-
ticularly suitable for operations of exchange, commerce and seizure of
men. Through this port, Ferdinand I, Grand Duke of Tuscany, allowed
the transit and refuge of merchants from all sides of the Mediterranean
Sea: Turks, Persians, Jews, Corsicans, Armenians, French, English and
Dutch.144 The Bagno (bath) of Livorno was a building that hosted pris-
oners coming from every Italian state. These prisoners worked side by
side in the galleys with slaves who had been plundered or purchased.
On the orders of Ferdinand I, the Bagno was built between 1598 and
1604 in imitation of the slave prisons in Algiers and Constantinople.145
There was also a hospital, initially located outside the Bagno but then
situated over its storehouses and divided into two specific areas accord-
ing to the religion of the patients.146 Salvatore Bono also confirms the
construction by Cosimo III of a new hospital for Turks and the exist-
ence of four mosques in Livorno in 1680.147 According to reports by the
Capuchin monk, Filippo Bernardi, there were dormitories for the crews
of the galleys on the ground floor. At the end of the seventeenth century,
these dormitories were named the Bagno of Sant’Antonio, the Bagno of
Concezione, the Bagno of San Francesco and the Bagno of San Giuseppe.
There was also a bakery for ship biscuits, a place where food was pro-
duced not only for the Bagno but also for sale in the city of Livorno.148
The prisoners’ Bagno ceased to exist on 13 February 1750, and thereaf-
ter, most of the slaves held there were freed.149 The date is reported in
the register of prisoners in the State Archives of Livorno. Some prisoners
were exiled and some were sent to the Bagno of Pisa to be employed on
the construction of vessels—which by that time had substituted galleys.
The spaces of the old Bagno were assigned as military quarters.150
Salvatore Bono and Renzo Toaff have investigated the question of
slavery among the Jewish population. Moreover, Lucia Frattarelli Fischer
and, most recently, Cesare Santus have analysed the seventeenth-century
dimensions of this topic. Santus uses documents produced by the Holy
Office.151 In quantitative terms, Vittorio Salvadorini counts 10,115
slaves captured between 1568 and 1668 and 6175 slaves between
136 G. BONAZZA
1600 and 1620. Franco Angiolini tallies 15,000 prisoners between the
mid-sixteenth century and the mid-seventeenth century.152 According to
Santus, who bases his calculations on the quantitative data available in
the existing body of historiography, around 20% of the inhabitants of
Livorno were “Turks” in 1601, 10% in 1622 and 8% at the beginning of
the 1740s. This population was therefore continually decreasing.153
Research in the State Archives of Livorno and consultation of the
archival records of the Governatore revealed the presence of slaves in the
city until 1816 and the continued presence of the Bagno, even though it
had been stripped of its former function (see Figs. 3.3 and 3.4).154 We
can thus contribute to the study of slavery in Livorno by demonstrat-
ing the presence of slaves between 1790 and 1816. In spite of the clos-
ing of the Bagno, there were still slaves, even though the phenomenon
was residual compared to the levels it reached during the seventeenth
century.
A manuscript compiled in Florence in 1790 documents an inten-
tion to exchange 11 Turkish slaves plundered in the Caldane bay for
the redemption of Tuscan slaves held by the Bey of Tunis.155 A let-
ter sent to the Father Minister of the Redenzione in July 1791 con-
cerns the redemption of Francesco Corridi and his son, both slaves in
Algiers. The sum of 1700 zecchini was proposed and the mediator in
the exchange was Bacrì, a Jew. In October 1790, however, there were
Fig. 3.3 Map of the Old Bagno, 1798, A (Source ASL, Governo Civile e
Militare di Livorno (1764–1860), no. 895)
Fig. 3.4 Map of the Old Bagno, 1798, B (Source ASL, Governo Civile e
Militare di Livorno (1764–1860), no. 895)
18 Turkish slaves present. It looks as if Bacrì must have exchanged the

18 Turkish slaves for six Tuscan slaves and must have asked the Bey of
Tunis for their liberation.156 Among the 18 slaves, two were Levantine,
two Algerians and two from the Morea: 22-year-old Cadur Ben Bellacagi
Abdelcaden was Algerian; so was 20-year-old Ibrahim Ben Iacù Bipimon;
Ismail Ben Mahamet, a 25-year-old gunner soldier, was from the Morea;
so was 27-year-old soldier Mahamet Ben Assemon; Mahamet Ben Lacagi
Amor was a 27-year-old Levantine and Achafsen Ben Ibrahim was a
20-year-old Levantine soldier.157 In 1790, 19 plundered Turks arrived at
the Bagno from the island of Giglio. Twelve of them had previously been
in the Bagno, while six came from Algiers. A letter was sent to the Dutch
Consul, Nyssen, asking for help with the redemption of the Tuscan
slaves. Table 3.3 reports the identities of the 12 Tunisian slaves in the
Bagno of Livorno.
In July 1792, 12 mori (black slaves) arrived in the Bagno of
Livorno. They should have been exchanged for the members of the
Corridi family, but the swap twice fell through because of their skin
colour. A copy of the letter sent by the Father Administrator of the
Hospital of Algiers to the prior of the Redenzione of Livorno contex-
tualises such failures:
138 G. BONAZZA
Table 3.3 List of the

Tunisian slaves Age
12 slaves in the Bagno of
Livorno in 1790 Mohamed Ben Mustafà 20
Mohamed Ben Mahamet 20
Amon Ben Laeusin 18
Mualy Achamed Ben Mahamet 54
Ottomen Ben Mohamed 34
Elecaufsin Ben Sola 35
Jusuf Ben Salem 25
Luenes Ben Cafsimo 20
Mahamet Ben Amor 20
Mahamet Ben Alì 27
Rehafson Ben Mahsmet 16
Mahamet Ben Lacagi Soliman 27
Source ASL, Governo Civile e Militare di Livorno, n. 896, cc.

349–350
The arrival of a French Tartana (ship) brought me a letter from you with
the instruction to negotiate the exchange of some Tuscan slaves described
in the list for the Turks who are in this Bagno. I would be happy to do
that, but it is unnecessary to negotiate with the Algerians, who are not
interested in exchanging their slaves for Christian ones […] but they are
not interested in black slaves. On the contrary, they despise them and they
usually say that the Algerian Kingdom is full of such scoundrels. However,
I tried to execute the orders and I conversed with the Algerian minister,
but he answered me that he does not want to talk about this and that the
Bey would only release the Christian slaves in exchange for money in cash.
Among the Tuscan slaves described in the letter, only the father and son
Carridi are slaves of the Kingdom, so if we want to redeem them, I think
that they will cost less than 1500 zecchini.158
This excerpt clearly shows that black slaves were not exchangeable and
that the transaction had to be done for money. In fact, the Tuscan gov-
ernment was also only interested in exchanging certain types of slaves,
and they can be divided into three groups: first, subjects—both native
and resident—enslaved on a Tuscan ship; second, people enslaved while
sailing on foreign ships; and finally, people who served on Tuscan ships
as foreigners but who were included in the crew. Redemptions were
prioritised according to these classifications. For example, in 1786 a
passport was sent to a shipowner because he was classified in the first
group.159 The problem involving Francesco Corridi and his son and their
ransoms was still not solved. The leaders of the Trinità intervened and
they commissioned the intervention of the Father Administrator of the
Hospital of Algiers. The condition was that the cost should not exceed
1500 Algerian zecchini. Carridi accrued debts in gathering the ransom
and he had to beg the Ransom House in Algiers to lend him money.
Bacrì also had to be rewarded.160
In April 1792, there were 12 Tunisians slaves in Livorno. The Tuscan
government assigned them to a Captain Pietro Bratich. They were sent
to Tunis in exchange for two Tuscan prisoners and one Austrian.161
Moreover, on November 25 of the same year there was a shipwreck,
which meant the arrival in Livorno of new slaves. In the account of the
event, there are also some cases of conversions:
25 November 1792
Royal Highness
And accompanied with great respect and submission, prostrated at the
foot of the royal throne, the poor unhappy Turkish slaves present them-
selves with tears in their eyes. They are humble servants of your Royal
Highness, still living in the Bagno of the city of Livorno. Finding them-
selves sailing near the Roman shore, they briefly represent a group of
as many as 59 slaves, and maybe a tornado and a terrible wind before
long transported them close to Giglio Isle, and there realizing that their
ship was beginning to sink they tried to save themselves as fast as they
could. Some fell into the sea, some reached Corsica, and 19 landed on
Giglio Isle, where they were enslaved under the full jurisdiction of Your
Highness. Subsequently they were taken to the abovementioned city
of Livorno and set under the authority of Your Majesty. Two of them
decided to embrace the Holy Christian law, and the others, 17 in number,
at your feet humbly supplicate your goodness and pious bright clemency
to commiserate with the deplorable state they find themselves in and to
grant them the much desired grace of their freedom to be able to go back
home to their motherland and live with their brethren, who will not omit
to pray to God for a long and prosperous life for your highness and for
your august Royal Consort.162
In 1816, there were still 48 Turkish slaves in the Livorno dock.

Consideration of the exchange of five Turks for one Christian opened
negotiations. The second-born son of the Bey owned young Simone
Sardi but did not want to free him, even if all 48 Turks were consigned
to him. Minister Soliman Kaya said that the exchange that he had to
140 G. BONAZZA
administer at a price of three Turks for one Christian was in the name
of the Queen of Sardinia. In fact, the Bey Hassan wanted to pay out-
right for his subjects and not to exchange them for Christian slaves. In
the end, Genoese slaves were requested in place of slaves from Livorno.
The Tunisian slaves complained of harsh treatment in Livorno; they had
previously been slaves in Genoa and in Sardinia, where—according to
them—living conditions were better. In spite of these difficulties, Consul
Nyssen managed to accomplish the exchange and to bring back the 48
Tunisian slaves to the Kingdom of Sardinia.163
3.7 Slaves in Galleys in Genoa

Genoa was a great port for commercial exchanges, and given its strate-
gic position in the Mediterranean Sea, it indisputably dominated trade
between Italy and Spain. This was a double-edged sword: on the one
hand, the city had to protect itself from privateering raids, while on
the other hand it could count on fleets owned by private citizens—first
among them the Doria family—which fought autonomous privateer-
ing wars in other seas. In 1559, Genoa established the Magistrato delle
Galee (Office for the Galleys), which was charged with constructing
a fleet to protect the city from privateers.164 The institution that han-
dled the redemption of Genoese slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms was
the Magistrato per il riscatto degli schiavi (Office for the Redemption
of Slaves), established in Genoa in 1597. It operated until 1823.165
Historiography on slavery in Genoa in the Early Modern period includes
a book by Luigi Tria, another by Giulio Giacchero and an article by
Salvatore Bono, which gives the most interesting figures on the num-
bers of slaves in galleys from the sixteenth century to 1780.166 At the
end of Bono’s article, he refers to the capture of 46 slaves from an
Algerian xebec by the Genoese galley Capitana. In 1788, the number of
slaves grew, and it seems that there were 58 new prisoners. According
to Bono’s figures, there were only 68 remaining Algerian and Tunisian
slaves in Genoa and they were freed on the advent of the Democratic
Republic.167 Gillian Weiss also affirms that the black slaves in Genoa
were freed with the arrival of Napoleon.168
From consultation of the archival source Magistrato delle galee in
the State Archives of Genoa, it appears that until 1793 there were still
around 160 slaves present.169 Andrea Zappia has recently demonstrated
that there were 217 slaves in the galleys in 1783, of whom 181 were
able-bodied, 29 had impairments and seven died.170
Bono’s research focuses on Genoese galleys named Capitana,
Padrona, S. Giovanni, S. Giorgio, S. Bernardo and Diana. According to
his results, among the total number of 933 prisoners and slaves in service
on the Genoese galleys in 1635, there were 302 Muslim names—i.e. a
third. Moreover, of the 185 men in the crew of the galley San Bernardo,
58 were slaves.171 The figure for the galley Capitana in 1780 is 46 slave
oarsmen, who received payment, as did the prisoners. Finally, accord-
ing to Bono, slavery ended in Genoa in 1797, at which point there were
fewer than a hundred slaves.172
In the second half of the seventeenth century, Genoa reduced its fleet,
and my research in the archival source Magistrato delle galee for the years
1791–1793 demonstrates the presence of only four galleys: S. Maria,
Raggia, S. Giorgio and Capitana.173 The number of slaves on each galley
changed, sometimes from day to day, as it becomes clear from the tables
of food consumed on each galley (Table 3.4).
Compared to Salvatore Bono’s figures for the year 1651, on the galley
San Bernardo (58 slaves among 185 men),174 the absolute number of
slaves in the years 1791–1793 had decreased only slightly. It is important
to underline that on the various galleys, there were no substantial varia-
tions during the three years considered. There was the case of a decree
issued on 21 August 1747 to free a Turkish slave—a papasso, a reference
point for the slaves because he was a chief and a spiritual guide—who
worked in the galleys like the other slaves. The price for the redemption
was 1750 lire, which was to be paid to the Magistrato delle Galee.175
Regarding the living conditions on the galleys, it seems that forced oars-
men and slaves wore iron rings on their feet and the descriptions are
quite similar to those found for other cities, such as Civitavecchia.176
Many iconic works from the Genoese painter Alessandro Magnasco con-
firm this (see Fig. 3.5).
After 1797, with the end of the Republic of Genoa, the slaves were
freed. This was not a deliberate decree or state policy so much as the
spontaneous action of Napoleonic troops enacting Jacobin thinking.177
Table 3.4 Number of slaves on Galleys Santa Maria, Raggia, Capitana and San Giorgio
Galley S. Maria Maggio Agosto Ottobre Maggio Agosto Ottobre Maggio Agosto Ottobre
1791 1791 1791 1792 1792 1792 1793 1793 1793
Slaves 42 45 29 33 27–30 32 18 35 35
Prisoners 106 76 68 61
142 G. BONAZZA
Buonavogliaa 90 62 62 53
Total number of 245 241 167 170 150 162 132 228
crew members
Galley Raggia Gennaio Maggio Luglio Agosto Ottobre Dicembre Maggio Agosto Ottobre
1791 1791 1791 1792 1792 1792 1793 1793 1793
Slaves 44 47 25–48 34 41 41 44 28 26
Prisoners
Buonavoglia
Total number of 203 233 180 241 230 270 147 150
crew members
(continued)
Table 3.4 (continued)
Galley Capitana Maggio Agosto Novembre Agosto Ottobre Novembre Maggio Giugno Agosto
1791 1791 1791 1792 1792 1792 1793 1793 1793
Slaves 32 62 41 37 29–31 22–35 30 32 40

Prisoners 125 107 131
Buonavoglia 102 81 62
Total number of 93 289 229 230 194 185 157 149 261
crew members
Galley S. Giorgio Gennaio 1791 Maggio 1791 Agosto 1791 Maggio 1792 Ottobre 1792 Dicembre 1792
Slaves 50 50 26 42 40 35–39
Prisoners 61 90
Buonavoglia 60 80
Total number of 209 147 212 181
crew members
Source ASG, Magistrato delle galee, n. 159

aThe prisoners in the galley were condemned oarsmen, while the buonavoglia or bonavoglia were free oarsmen; see Luca Lo Basso, Uomini da remo. Galee e
Galeotti del Mediterraneo in età moderna (Milano: Selene Edizioni, 2003), 30

3 FORMS OF SLAVERY IN THE ITALIAN STATES
143
144 G. BONAZZA
Fig. 3.5 “L’imbarco dei galeotti nel porto di Genova” di Alessandro Magnasco

(1740) circa (Source Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux)
3.8 The History of Slaves and the History

of Slavery in the Italian Area
In conclusion, the data presented in this chapter demonstrate that the

panorama of slavery in these Italian cities was quite varied and had
wide-ranging political implications. Of particular interest are the rela-
tionships with enemy states, the simple employment of slaves by noble
families and the phenomenon of catechisation of slaves. The last of these
practices offered slaves the possibility to somehow affect their own des-
tiny by choosing to be baptised, which in turn created hope for freedom
in a foreign land or even opportunities to escape. Finally, slaves employed
in “traditional” positions in galleys, alongside prisoners, endured the
hardest of all living conditions.
The history of slaves could be read within the history of
Mediterranean slavery, but this study goes beyond the Christian
world/Muslim world dynamics and instead offers a vision in which the

Mediterranean world lies between the Ottoman, the African and the
Atlantic worlds. In addition to undertaking gruelling physical journeys
between often far-flung destinations, the individuals that concern us
transitioned between faiths and sometimes even personae. Name changes
were often imposed on our subjects, although sometimes they adopted
a new moniker by choice—even though slavery is never a free choice.
Among the fundamental questions emerging, the issue of baptism and
conversion appears across all the areas considered, with the exception of
the cities where we did not consult religious sources, specifically Genoa,
Livorno, Caserta and Palermo. Another important element is the taxon-
omy of categories used to define slaves in the sources; they were not sim-
ply defined as slaves or Turks. Finally, in exchange operations the colour
of the slave’s skin was important and “black” slaves sometimes had less
value compared to the others or they were not considered for exchanges.
Regarding religious problems, baptism was not a guarantee of legal
freedom but a step towards freedom. Therefore, after baptism, there
was a period of “limbo” between being a slave and being a free per-
son. Freedom, as we interpret it in the traditional juridical way, was
not necessarily the immediate post-slavery condition. The question of
self-sufficiency also took on new dimensions after baptism. In Rome, it
seems that slaves usually started to earn money after baptism. This makes
it likely that they could redeem themselves with their own money. This
mechanism is similar to that involving slaves in the colonial world of
the British abolitionists, which assumed a period of transition between
non-freedom and freedom, the apprenticeship. Even if Mediterranean
slavery was reciprocal slavery, it is more likely that there were more slaves
converted to Christianity and integrated—or, more precisely, assimi-
lated—than slaves who were able to return to their homelands.178
Only in Naples were there examples of the transatlantic movement of
slaves, and only then in 3 cases out of 21 detailed in the baptism regis-
ter. At the same time, however, in Rome, Livorno and Palermo, there were
black slaves from sub-Saharan Africa and others who had come directly
from the Ottoman Empire. The number of such cases was about 70, which
allows for wider applicability from the point of view of quantitative analysis.
There were a host of classifications applied to slaves, encapsulated by
phrases including “Muslim black”, Circassian Turks, turca nigra, regione
nigrorum and schismatic Armenian. This demonstrates how diverse the
slavery scene was and that the categories were often not religious but eth-
nic. The annotation nigra frequently appears to distinguish black slaves
146 G. BONAZZA
from other ethnic groups. It is not necessarily the case that there were
racial connotations involved. Black skin was specifically recognised and
described in the sources. Certain ethnic groups were defined by non-phys-
ical terms, such as “Muslim Turks”. Emphasising ethnicity was impor-
tant because a “black” remained a black person after baptism and after
the achievement of freedom. Therefore, as with baptism, definitions and
categorisations of slaves also demonstrate that it is necessary to move
beyond the freedom/non-freedom dichotomy and to add another layer
of complexity.179 A further dynamic was the lower value of black slaves
in exchange operations. In the case of Livorno, black slaves were not
even considered for exchange. Moreover, a “black” was not necessarily
a Muslim. He could also be from sub-Saharan Africa. We have reported
some cases of the seizure of enemy crews on ships that already carried
slaves who were not Europeans—slaves that we might previously only have
expected to be on ships in the Atlantic. When they reached Italian ports,
these detained men were all subject to some form of captivity: slaves were
still slaves, but the rais and sailors were also held against their will.
There was little differentiation between men and women. Jocelyne
Dakhlia found cases in which baptised Muslims received a patronymic
such as Amet Maroque (from Morocco) along with a new name, which
was often a bastardised version of the original, a mangling of the origi-
nal name. In the Italian states, however, only the new name remained.
A patronymic based on the original name was initially applied during bap-
tism but immediately disappeared. Given that these baptisms involved slaves,
the emphasis was on rebirth and moving on from the past. Free Muslims
who wanted to be baptised maintained their patronymic as an inheritance
from their place of origin, even if it indicated a vast geographical region.180
The continued presence of slaves in the Italian area during the era of
abolitionism demonstrates that internal jurisdictions were not particu-
larly interested in them. Sometimes, slaves existed away from the public
eye and outside of the public mind. The public debate centred around
the problem of Christian slaves in North Africa and the Atlantic trade,
especially so after the Congress of Vienna. Public opinion and govern-
ments were influenced by the great powers, above all Great Britain, the
foremost proponent of international abolitionism. Obviously, the twenty-
year French period also deeply affected the juridical debate in the
Italian states, and as we have seen, Napoleon freed slaves in cities such
as Genoa and Livorno. The Italian Peninsula had many political exiles
outside its borders, and external abolitionists exerted significant juridical
influences, aided by their links with cultural élites.181 The idea of the
superiority of European civilisation that lay at the basis of slavery was
also a dynamic in abolitionism, albeit in a different form. Italian patri-
ots, and European patriots more broadly, viewed themselves as part
of a liberal internationalism which intended to build a new, better and
stronger Europe after the Congress of Vienna. The Creole patriotic
movements in Latin America also felt an attachment to this movement.
According to the patriots, Latin America should aim to achieve a level
of civilisation comparable to Europe’s. Therefore, from the point of
view of these intellectuals, there was an ideal of international coopera-
tion which should bring happiness to Africans, Asiatics and all humanity.
Revolutions in Spain, Latin America and Greece supported the devel-
opment of political internationalism. Here too, England was the pro-
ponent. In terms of juridical frameworks, navigation and international
trade, Great Britain generated benefits for all humanity. Therefore, lib-
eral milieus looked positively on these projects, without realising that
abolition and the notion of international justice actually concealed other
forms of mistreatment.182
At the end of the eighteenth century, France and Great Britain were
competing for dominion in the Barbary States. After the conquest of
Malta in 1798, Napoleon was positively accepted by many states, but
this changed after the Egyptian expedition. As suggested by Volney in
his Considérations sur la guerre actuelle des Turcs (1788), the French
hypothesised the possession of Egypt. Expansion into Egypt promised
a privileged route to India, restoring the old passage through Suez and
trade in the Red Sea; more than this, Cairo was a prime marketplace for
the sorting and purchase of slaves.183
Egypt was also the battlefield where France and Great Britain disputed
access to the East Indies.184 At the time of Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt,
England and the Ottoman Empire pressured Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli
to declare war against France. However, the Barbary Kingdoms wanted
to maintain good relationships with France, and in 1801, the Bey of
Tunis and the Dey of Alger stipulated peace.185 Barbary privateers were
reinvigorated after a decline in the middle of the eighteenth century and
the mercantile fleet of the USA fell victim to their war. When the Italian
area was included in the Napoleonic Empire, Napoleon tried to force the
Barbary States to free Italian Christian slaves and to protect Italian ships
from privateers. During the Congress of Vienna, the question of aboli-
tion was reopened by the British Admiral Sidney Smith, who said:
148 G. BONAZZA
While we are discussing ways to abolish the black slave trade on the coast
of west Africa … it is astonishing that we give no attention to the northern
coast of this same continent, which is inhabited by Turkish pirates, who
not only oppress their natural neighbours but also capture them and buy
them as slaves to use on privateers, with the aim of tearing honest farm-
ers and peaceful inhabitants of the coasts of Europe from their homes …
This shameful brigandage not only moves humanity to indignation but
also gravely hinders commerce, because nowadays a sailor cannot sail in the
Mediterranean or even in the Atlantic on a merchant ship without being
oppressed by fear of falling prey to pirates and of being taken to Africa as a
slave.186
The Admiral proposed the abolition of slavery in Europe and the uni-
fication of naval squads against the Barbary forces. In Vienna, however,
the diplomats were more interested in problems linked to the Atlantic
trade. In 1816, only England sent a naval squad—commanded by Lord
Exmouth—to free Christian slaves in the Kingdoms of Naples and
Sardinia. France continued to sign treaties with the Barbary States to
peacefully negotiate the end of the privateering war. In the years before
the French occupation of Algiers in 1830, there were a series of wars—in
1824 between England and Algiers, and in 1825 between Tripoli and
the King of Sardinia, Carlo Felice, which ended with a peace favourable
to the Savoy State, thanks to the mediation of the English consul. France
also acted against Tripoli in its capacity as defender of the citizens of the
Papal States, who enjoyed the same rights as French citizens.
Moreover, a Neapolitan naval squad commanded by Alfonso Sozi
Carafa acted against Tripoli in 1828. Thanks once again to the media-
tion of the French consul, the Barbary city and the Kingdom of the Two
Sicilies stipulated a peace.187 Then, in the years between the Congress of
Vienna and the French invasion of Algeria, the Italian states that inter-
vened against the Barbary Kingdoms always had either France or Great
Britain as a “supervisor”. Here too, interference in the foreign policy of
the pre-unification Italian states by the great European powers is evident.
Together with philosophical abolitionism and the insertion of new abo-
litionist juridical rules in the international arena of the Mediterranean
Sea, the foreign policy of the Italian states had to be guided by European
powers, and so it was not autonomous. The privateering war did not
finish in 1830 but only in 1856 with the end of the Crimean War.
Mediterranean slavery, like Atlantic slavery, persisted for a long time.
After the French conquest of Algiers, even though it was unrivalled at sea
and a key proponent of the abolition of slavery, Great Britain could not
oppose the French project to dominate North Africa and benefitted from
the French destruction of pirate nests.188
In conclusion, we have ascertained the persistence of cases of slavery
into the first half of the nineteenth century despite abolitionist legisla-
tion. This legislation was the result of external influences rather than the
consequence of juridical reflection or reform within the Italian states.
Moreover, in the public perception of the phenomenon, the persistence
of forms of slavery in Italian cities did not seem as important or prob-
lematic as the colonial trade in Africans. In important European legis-
lation, such as that of the Congress of Vienna, dated 8 February 1815,
slaves were only the black slaves from Western Africa. There were slaves
from a variety of ethnic groups in the Italian cities, and in the first half of
the nineteenth century, when the phenomenon was diminishing, many
of them were probably becoming servants or they were achieving a dif-
ferent status which was more difficult to define. The Italian states and
European powers were less interested in the phenomenon of slavery
within the continent and more concerned with its external implications.
The slave trade was only denounced as inhuman when it was no longer
convenient for the great powers. Imperialism would involve new forms
of exploitation, and in spite of juridical abolitionism, varieties of forms of
slavery continued.
Notes
1. For more on this topic, with specific reference to Malta, see Anne
Brogini, “Intérmediaires de rachat laïcs et religieux à Malte,” in Les
musulmans dans l’histoire de l’Europe. I. Une intégration invisible, ed.
Jecelyne Dakhlia and Bernard Vincent (Paris: Albin Michel, 2011), 47.
2. Andrea Pelizza, “Schiavi e riscatti: alcuni cenni al caso veneziano nel
contesto europeo d’età moderna,” in Luoghi d’Europa: spazio, genere,
memoria, ed. Maria Pia Casalena (Bologna: Archetipolibri, 2011), 22.
3. Salvatore Bono, “Istituzioni per il riscatto di schiavi nel mondo mediter-
raneo. Annotazioni storiografiche,” I Trinitari, 800 anni di liberazione.
Schiavi e schiavitù a Livorno e nel Mediterraneo, Nuovi Studi Livornesi,
no. 8 (2000): 30.
4. Aurora Romano, “Schiavi siciliani e traffici monetari nel Mediterraneo del
XVII secolo,” in Rapporti diplomatici e scambi commerciali nel Mediterraneo
Moderno, ed. Mirella Mafrici (Salerno: Rubettino, 2004), 276.
150 G. BONAZZA
5. Lucia Frattarelli Fischer, “Il bagno delle galere in ‘terra cristiana’. Schiavi
a Livorno fra Cinque e Seicento,” I Trinitari, 800 anni di liberazione.
Schiavi e schiavitù a Livorno e nel Mediterraneo, Nuovi Studi Livornesi,
no. 8 (2000): 78.
6. Giuseppe Bonaffini, La Sicilia e i barbareschi, incursioni corsare e riscatto
degli schiavi (1570–1606) (Palermo: Ila Palma, 1983), 24.
7. Bonaffini, La Sicilia e i barbareschi, 25.
8. Fabrizio D’Avenia, “Schiavi siciliani in Barberia: ultimo atto (1800–
1830),” Clio 1 (2002): 136.
9. Among studies using the sources produced by the Redenzione dei
Cattivi are the following: Romano, “Schiavi Siciliani e traffici monetari
nel Mediterraneo del XVII secolo,” 276; Giovanna Fiume, “Lettres de
Barbarie: esclavage et rachat des captifs siciliens (XVIe–XVIIe siècle),”
Cahiers de la Méditerranée 87 (2013), http://cdlm.revues.org/7255
(consulted on 31 July 2015); Bonaffini, Missioni siciliane ad Algeri, 11.
10. Bonaffini, Missioni siciliane ad Algeri, 33.
11. Giovanna Boccadamo, “I ‘Redentori’ napoletani. Mercanti, religiosi,
rinnegati,” in Le Commerce des captifs. Les intermédiaires dans l’échange
et le rachat des prisonniers en Méditerranée, XV e–XVIIIe siècle, ed.
Wolfgang Kaiser (Rome: École française de Rome, 2008), 220.
12. Boccadamo, “I ‘Redentori’ napoletani. Mercanti, religiosi, rinnegati,” 219.
13. Boccadamo, “I ‘Redentori’ napoletani. Mercanti, religiosi, rinnegati,” 221.
14. Gian Paolo Leonetti di Santo Janni, “Il Pio Monte della Misericordia tra
passato e futuro,” in Il Pio Monte della Misericordia di Napoli nel quarto
centenario, ed. Mario Pisani Massamormile (Napoli: Electa Napoli,
2003), 17.
15. Rosita D’Amora, “Il Pio Monte della Misericordia di Napoli e l’Opera
della Redenzione dei Cattivi nella prima metà del XVII secolo,” in Le
Commerce des captifs. Les intermédiaires dans l’échange et le rachat des
prisonniers en Méditerranée, XV e–XVIIIe siècle, ed. Wolfgang Kaiser
(Rome: École française de Rome, 2008), 233–234.
16. Salavtore Bono, I corsari barbareschi (Torino: Eri, 1964), 286.
17. Bono, I corsari barbareschi, 287.
18. Anita Ginella Capini, Enrica Lucchini Aronica, and Maria Giuliana
Buscaglia, Immagini di vita tra terra e mare, la Foce in età moderna e
contemporanea (1500–1900) (Mostra storico-documentaria, 1984), 75;
Bono, I corsari barbareschi, 308.
19. Enrica Lucchini, “L’istituzione del Magistrato per il Riscatto degli
Schiavi nella Repubblica di Genova,” Critica Storica, no. 3 (1986): 376.
I thank Andrea Zappia for indicating this article to me.
20. Lucchini, “L’istituzione del Magistrato per il Riscatto degli Schiavi nella
Repubblica di Genova,” 379.
21. Giacomo Panessa, “L’insediamento dei Trinitari e l’interculturalità di

Livorno, in I Trinitari, 800 anni di liberazione. Schiavi e schiavitù a
Livorno e nel Mediterraneo,” Nuovi Studi Livornesi, no. 8 (2000): 136.
22. Paolo Castignoli, “La Cassa granducale del riscatto a Livorno
nel Settecento. Prime note, in I Trinitari, 800 anni di liberazione.
Schiavi e schiavitù a Livorno e nel Mediterraneo,” Nuovi Studi
Livornesi, no. 8 (2000): 148–149.
23. Bono, “Istituzioni per il riscatto di schiavi nel mondo mediterraneo.
Annotazioni storiografiche,” 39.
24. Further examination of this topic can be conducted by looking at rele-
vant notarial acts. Individual testimonies should help to reconstruct the
biographies of some of those involved.
25. Diocesan Historical Archives of Naples (hereafter, ASDN), Registro degli
Infedeli ed Eretici convertiti dall’anno 1833 all’anno 1898.
26. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, Libro degli infedeli adulti battezzati in questa
cattedrale ed in altre chiese di Napoli. It contains the Libro de Battesimi
de Schiavi battezzati per mano del Rev Paroco D. Biase Gambaro.
Così dentro questa Catedrale di Napoli come fuori di essa cominci
ato dall’Anno 1680, nel quale il sudetto Parroco pigli possesso di questa
Arcivescoval Parocchiale. This book of slaves was found in the Parish
Archives of the Cathedral of Naples. It was not known by this name
because a nameplate on the cover of the parchment has the inscription
“Battesimi adulti I 18 aprile 1742–9 marzo 1861”. It is cited in the arti-
cle by Gennaro Nardi, “Due Opere per la Conversione degli Schiavi a
Napoli,” Asprenas 13, no. 2 (1966): 190. Giovanna Boccadamo, “Tra
Croce e Mezzaluna. Storie di schiavi,” in Integrazione ed emarginazi
one. Circuiti e modelli: Italia e Spagna nei secoli XV–XVIII, ed. Laura
Barletta (Napoli: Cuen, 2002), 351.
27. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, f. 29.1; See Boccadamo, Tra Croce e Mezzaluna.
Storie di schiavi, 355.
28. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, f. 29.1.
29. Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch and Éric Mesnard, Être esclave. Afrique-
Amériques, XVe–XIXe siècle (Paris: La Découverte, 2013), 57–58.
30. Fernand Braudel, La Méditerranée et le monde méditerranéen à l’époque
de Philippe II, 2 vol. (Paris: Armand Colin, 1966, t. 1), 155.
31. Michel Fontenay, “Pour une géographie de l’esclavage méditerranéen
aux temps modernes,” Cahiers de la Méditerranée 65 (2002), http://
cdlm.revues.org/42 (consulted on 2 July 2013).
32. David Abulafia, “Mediterraneans,” in Rethinking the Mediterranean, ed.
William Vernon Harris (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 65.
33. Peregrine Horden and Nicholas Purcell, “The Mediterranean and ‘the
New Thalassology’,” American Historical Review 111, no. 3 (June
2006): 725.
152 G. BONAZZA
34. Michel Fontenay, “Pour une géographie de l’esclavage méditerranéen

aux temps modernes,” 11.
35. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, f. 30.
36. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, the page number is not reported.
40. Avvocato Vincenzo Yodice, Memorie storiche della famiglia Iodice seu
Giudice (Del) (Napoli: Tipografia di Francesco Mormile, Largo S.
Gaetano, 314, 1900), 81. I thank Dr. Daminano of the State Archives
of Naples for the bibliographical reference.
41. A Turk could be a slave or non-slave Muslim; in this case, she was proba-
bly a Muslim coming from the Maghreb.
42. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, f. 23.1.
45. ASDN, Cattedrale, 44, the page number is not recorded.
46. Archives of the Pio Monte della Misericordia (hereafter, APMM), name
of the files: Monte della Misericordia. Fondazione Costruzione dell’Edifi
cio. Natura del Documento. Data 7 Ottobre 1856. Oggetto: Statuto e reg
olamento del Monte approvati dal Re Ferdinando II (Fasc: 2). Termina
la copertina. Regolamento del Pio Monte della Misericordia disposto ed
approvato da. S.M. il re Nostro Signore, Napoli, Stamperia e Cartiere del
Fibreno, 1857.
47. Archives of the Palace of Caserta (hereafter, ARC), Dispacci e Relazioni,
vol. 1456, f. 58.
48. Ugo Della Monica, “La fatica degli schiavi musulmani nella sontuosità
della reggia,” in Alle origini di Minerva trionfante. Caserta e l’utopia
di S. Leucio. La costruzione dei Siti Reali borbonici, ed. Imma Ascione,
Giuseppe Cirillo, and Gian Maria Piccinelli (Roma: Pubblicazione
degli Archivi di Stato, 2012), 333–346; Maurizio Crispino, “Schiavi
musulmani alla Reggia di Caserta. Documenti d’Archivio,” in Presenza
araba e islamica in Campania, ed. Agostino Cilardo (Napoli: Istituto
Universitario Orientale, 1992), 223–236; Riccardo Del Prete and
Nathalie Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta. Le vite, i lavori, il contributo della
schiera di lavoratori musulmani (Roma: Lunaria, 1999).
49. Del Prete and Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta, 17.
50. The volumes not consulted by Del Prete and Jaulain are 1456,
1768, 1587 and 1574. In particular, volume 1456 covers the years
1799–1800.
51. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1042, Peschiera, fos. from 1 to 51.
52. The data are reported by Maria Raffaella Caroselli in Del Prete and
Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta, 17–18.
53. R. Del Prete and N. Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta, 11–21.

54. Jerome de La Lande, Voyage d’un français en Italie, fait dans les années
1765 & 1766, Tome septieme, Venise, et je trouve à Paris, chez Desaint,
Libraire, rue du Fain, M.DCC LXIX, 225.
55. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1456.
56. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1456, f. 86.
57. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1456, fos. 91–92.
61. Corpus Iuris Civilis, I, Institutiones, titulus IV De ingenuis, ed. Paul
Krueger (Dublin/Zurich: Weidmann, 1970), 2; Yan Thomas, “La divi-
sione dei sessi nel diritto romano,” in Storia delle donne. Antichità, ed.
Georges Duby and Michelle Perrot (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1990), 141–
149. See Del Prete and Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta, 32.
62. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1567, fos. 119/2-63/2.
63. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1567, f. 63/2.
65. ARC, Dispacci e Relazioni, vol. 1456, f. 60. See Del Prete and Jaulain,
Schiavi a Caserta, 39.
69. According to Ugo Della Monica, the last documented case of slavery in
the Palace of Caserta dates to 1858. See Della Monica, “La fatica degli
schiavi musulmani nella sontuosità della reggia,” 334, while Riccardo
del Prete and Nathalie Jaulain date their last cases in 1799 (see Del
Prete and Jaulain, Schiavi a Caserta, 19).
70. Salvatore Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna. Galeotti,
vu’cumprà, domestici (ESI: Napoli, 1999); G. Fiume, ed., “La schiavitù
nel Mediterraneo,” Quaderni Storici 107/a, no. 2 (August 2001).
71. See Serena Di Nepi, ed., “Schiavi nelle terre del papa. Norme, rappre-
sentazioni, problemi a Roma e nello Stato della Chiesa in età moderna,”
Dimensioni e problemi della ricerca storica 2 (2013). Wipertus Hugo
Rudt de Collenberg, “Le baptême des musulmanes esclaves à Rome aux
XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles. Le XVIIe siècle,” Mélanges de l’Ecole française
de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée 101, no. 1 (1989): 9–181.
72. Rudt de Collenberg, “Le baptême des musulmanes esclaves à Rome aux
XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles,” 23–24.
73. Dakhlia and Vincent, Les musulmans dans l’histoire de l’Europe, 25.
74. Marina Caffiero, “Juifs et musulmans à Rome à l’époque moderne, entre
résistance, assimilation et mutations identitaires. Essai de comparaison,” in
Les musulmans dans l’histoire de l’Europe, ed. Dakhila and Vincent, 594.
154 G. BONAZZA
75. Marina Caffiero, Battesimi forzati. Storie di ebrei, cristiani e convertiti

nella Roma dei papi (Roma: Viella, 2004), 22.
76. Serena Di Nepi, “Le Restitutiones ad libertatem di schiavi a Roma
in età moderna: prime note su un fenomeno trascurato (1516–
1645),” in Dimensioni e problemi della ricerca storica (Roma: Carocci,
no. 2/2013), 25.
XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles,” 12.
XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles,” 13.
79. Fiume, Premessa, in “La schiavitù nel Mediterraneo,” Quaderni Storici
107, no. 2 (2001): 334.
80. State Archives of Rome (hereafter ASR), Soldatesche e galere, b. 684,
f. 274: destino degli schiavi turchi poi battezzati e detenuti a Castel
S. Angelo (1783–1784).
81. ASR, Soldatesche e galere, b. 724.
82. ASR, Soldatesche e galere, b. 684, f. 274.
83. Maccarese is a small town close to Rome’s beach, ASR, Soldatesche e
galere, b. 724.
84. The order that Capuchin fathers had to celebrate Mass for prisoners
came from Innocenzo XI in 1684. This practice continued until 1752.
Ibid.
94. ASR, Soldatesche e galere, b. 684. The presence of 43 slaves is also proven
by another document in the Archivio Storico di Propaganda Fide (APF),
Barbaria, n. 10, Scritti riferiti nei Congressi Barbaria dal 1800 al 1815,
f. 442.
95. APF, Barbaria, n. 10, Scritti riferiti nei Congressi Barbaria dal 1800 al
1815, f. 442.
97. ASRg, offices in Galla Placidia, Governo di Civitavecchia, b. 671 bis,
f. 86. The transcription is partially incomplete because of the corrupted
state of the manuscript.
98. ASRg, Sede di Galla Placidia, Governo di Civitavecchia, Atti Criminali,
b. 671.
99. Archivio Storico del Vicariato di Roma (henceforth ASVR), Fondo Pia

Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, no. 181. Besides the previously cited book
by Wipertus Rudt de Collenberg, the archival source has recently been
analysed by the archivist Domenico Rocciolo, “Fra promozione e dif-
esa della fede: le vicende dei catecumeni e neofiti romani in età mod-
erna,” in Ad Ultimas Usque Terrarum Terminas in Fide Propaganda.
Roma fra promozione e difesa della fede in età moderna, ed. Massimiliano
Ghilardi, Gaetano Sabatini, Matteo Sanfilippo, and Donatella Strangio
(Roma: Edizioni Sette Città, 2014), 147–156. Domenico Rocciolo,
“Catecumeni e neofiti a Roma tra ‘500 e ‘800: provenienza, condizioni
sociali e ‘padrini’ illustri,” in Popolazione e Società a Roma dal Medioevo
all’età contemporanea, ed. Eugenio Sonnino (Roma: il Calamo, 1998).
Unfortunately, some of the baptismal registers are not available for
consultation.
100. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 28, position no. 4.
Archivio dei Luoghi Pii dei Catecumeni e Neofiti XIII. Dubbi, decreti e
risoluzioni del S. Uffizio. Oggetto: casi dubbi circa la validità del battes-
imo e loro soluzione.
101. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 28, posizione n. 4, f. 20.
102. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 28, posizione n. 4, fos.
30–31.
103. I was not able to identify the geographic location of Colombië. I assume
that it is a place in the Ottoman Empire. However, I wish to thank the
members of the NavLab of the University of Genoa for an exchange of
views, especially Emiliano Beri.
51–53.
106. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 28, posizione n. 4,
fos. 68–69. The case of the four Circassian Turks bought by a Catholic
Armenian trader is also covered in ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecu
meni e neofiti, n. 181, fos. 200–201.
74–75.
109. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 181, fos. 18–23.
110. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 181, f. 32.
114. ASVR, Fondo Pia Casa dei catecumeni e neofiti, n. 181, fos. 133–134.
156 G. BONAZZA
117. In all probability, there were many more cases, and from a merely quan-
titative point of view, this research should be extended.
118. Bonaffini affirms that between 1807 and 1811 there were still 241
Sicilian slaves in the Kingdom of Algiers. Bonaffini, Missioni siciliane ad
Algeri nel primo ottocento, 11. Fabrizio D’Avenia asserts that there were
a thousand or so Sicilian slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms around 1809,
60–70 in Tripoli, 240–250 in Algiers and 700 in Tunis. D’Avenia,
“Schiavi siciliani in Barberia: ultimo atto (1800–1830),” 141. Matteo
Gaudioso, recalling an estimation by E. Pelaez, comes close to Fabrizio
D’Avenia’s figure, suggesting the presence of 800 Sicilian slaves. Matteo
Gaudioso, La schiavitù in Sicilia dopo i normanni. Legislazione, dottrina,
formule (Catania: Musumeci, 1979), 23.
119. Among the studies on slavery in Sicily, Matteo Gaudioso’s contribu-
tion is fundamental thanks to its juridical approach and because he is
the first historian to refer to cases of slavery in nineteenth-century Sicily.
M. Gaudioso, La schiavitù in Sicilia dopo i normanni. Legislazione,
dottrina, formule (Catania: Musumeci, 1979). Giovanna Fiume has
recently studied a case of slavery in the seventeenth century, G. Fiume,
“L’impossibile riscatto di Aly del Marnegro, ‘Turco vero’,” Quaderni
Storici 140, no. 2 (2012): 385–424.
120. State Archives of Palermo (hereafter ASP), Redenzione dei Cattivi, vol.
311. Levantine slaves came from Anatolia or from the Aegean Isles in
the Ottoman Empire.
121. Among the other institutions that acted for the redemption of slaves
in the Italian area were the Santa Casa della Redenzione dei cattivi in
Naples, the Arciconfraternita del Gonfalone in Rome and the Magistrato
per il Riscatto in Genoa. ASP, Redenzione dei Cattivi, vol. 311.
122. In the sources, a Turk could be a slave or non-slave Muslim.
123. ASP, Redenzione de Cattivi, vol. 315, f. 385.
125. ASP, Redenzione dei Cattivi, vol. 298, f. 463.
126. Regarding the terminology for the types of slaves in the Mediterranean
area—types that are not classifiable in the complex phenomenon of
slavery—we can divide the black slaves in the sources into Maghrebis,
Moriscos and blacks. In fact, in the sources consulted for this work, they
are probably Muslim slaves from North Africa and potentially “black”
but not moriscos, given the late chronology. ASP, Redenzione dei
Cattivi, vol. 315, f. 509. On the problem of misunderstanding between
the concepts of morisco and moro (black) in the Italian area, see Bruno
Pomara Saverino, “La diaspora morisca in Italia: storie di mediatori,
schiavitù e battesimi,” Storia Economica XVII, no. 1 (2014): 167.
129. D’Avenia, “Schiavi siciliani in Barberia: ultimo atto (1800–1830),” 138.

130. On discrimination based on skin colour, see Florence Gauthier,
L’aristocratie de l’épiderme. Le combat de la Société des Citoyens de
Couleur 1789–1791 (Paris: CNRS, 2007).
131. ASP, Redenzione dei Cattivi, vol. 315, f. 509. See Giuseppe Bonaffini,
Un mare di paura (Caltanissetta: Sciascia, 1997), 89–102.
132. Gaudioso, La schiavitù in Sicilia dopo i normanni. Legislazione, dottrina,
formule, 22.
135. ASP, Redenzione de Cattivi, vol. 315, fol. 576.
136. ASP, Redenzione de Cattivi, vol. 315. Unfortunately, the page number is
not present on the document.
formule, 23.
formule, 23.
139. Ida Fazio and Rita Loredana Foti, “‘Scansar Le Frodi’. Prede Corsare
nella Sicilia del decennio inglese (1808–1813),” Quaderni Storici
143/a. XLVIII, no. 2 (August 2013): 497–539, 497–498, 502–503.
140. Fazio and Foti, “‘Scansar Le Frodi’. Prede Corsare nella Sicilia del
decennio inglese (1808–1813),” 497–498.
142. ASP, Redenzione de Cattivi, vol. 311, Lettere Appartenenti alla
Redenzione delli Schiavi Dall’anno 1802 a tutto l’anno 1805, vol. 2.
144. Steven F. Ostrow, “Pietro Tacca and His Quattro Mori: The Beauty and
Identity of the Slaves,” Artibus et Historiae 71, XXXVI (2015): 152. I
wish to thank Professor Salvatore Bono, who kindly recommended this
article to me.
145. On the Bagno of Livorno, see Frattarelli Fischer, “Il bagno delle galere
in terra ‘cristiana’,” 70.
146. Cesare Santus, “Il ‘Turco’ e l’inquisitore. Schiavi musulmani e processi
per magia nel bagno di Livorno (XVII secolo),” Società e Storia 133
(2011): 453.
147. S. Bono, Schiavi musulmani in Italia in età moderna (Ankara: Haziran,
1988), 835.
148. Santus, “Il ‘Turco’ e l’inquisitore,” 455.
150. ASL, Inventario dei forzati.; Curiosità Livornesi inedite o rare, https://
archive.org/stream/curiositlivorn00perauoft#page/312/mode/2up
(consulted on 25 March 2016), 6; Calogero Piazza, Schiavitù e guerra
dei barbareschi: orientamenti toscani di politica transmarina, 1747–1768
(Milano: Giuffrè, 1983), 92–93.
158 G. BONAZZA
151. Renzo Toaff, “Schiavitù e schiavi nella Nazione Ebrea di Livorno nel

Sei e Settecento,” Rassegna Mensile di Israel 51, no. 1 (January–April
1985): 82–95; Santus, “Il ‘Turco’ e l’inquisitore,” 449–484; On slaves
in Livorno, see Bono, Schiavi musulmani nell’Italia moderna, 226–232;
in particular on Capuchin monks in Livorno, 243; slaves who passed
through Livorno are also mentioned on other pages of the book. Also
see the entry “La schiavitù” in Marco Lenci, Corsari. Guerra, schiavi,
rinnegati nel Mediterraneo (Roma: Carocci, 2007), 122–134.
152. Franco Angiolini, “Slaves and Slavery in the Early Modern Tuscany
(1500–1700),” Italian History and Culture 3 (1997): 67–82, 69–74.
Vittorio Salvadorini, Traffici con i paesi islamici e schiavi a Livorno nel
XVII secolo: problemi e suggestioni, in Livorno e il Mediterraneo nell’età
medicea (Livorno: Bastogi, 1978), 206–255, 218–221.
154. State Archives of Livorno (hereafter ASL), Governo Civile e Militare di
Livorno, n. 896, file 15, March 1818, f. 3.
155. ASL, Governo Civile e Militare di Livorno, n. 896, file 15, March 1818,
f. 342.
f. 344.
f. 345.
f. 363r.
f. 351.
f. 388.
161. The source has been used in an exhibition at the Archivio di Stato di
Livorno. ASL, Governo Civile e Militare di Livorno, n. 45, f. 378r.
162. ASL, Governo Civile e Militare di Livorno, no. 45, f. 232.
163. ASL, Governo Civile e Militare di Livorno, no. 896, folder dated 15
March 1818, f. 6 and other folders without numbers or dates.
164. Paolo Giacomone Piana, Ordinamenti navali della Repubblica di Genova
nel Settecento, www.Assostoria.it/Armisovrano/Piana.pdf.
165. State Archives of Genoa (henceforth ASG), Archivio di Stato di Genova,
Magistrato del riscatto schiavi (1598–1823), from no. 2 to 128.
166. Luigi Tria, Le schiavitù in Liguria, ricerche e documenti (Genova: Società
Ligure di Storia Patria, 1947); Giulio Giacchero, Pirati barbareschi,
schiavi e galeotti nella storia e nella leggenda ligure (Genova: SAGEP,
1970); Salvaotre Bono, “Schiavi musulmani a Genova (secoli XVI–
XVIII),” in Rapporti Genova-Mediterraneo-Atlantico nell’età moderna,
ed. Raffaele Belvederi (Genova: Tip. Gotica Padova, 1990), 85–102.
167. Bono, Schiavi musulmani a Genova, 96. The thesis by Andrea Zappia

reports the presence of 217 slaves, of whom 181 were able in 1783;
Andrea Zappia, “Rapporti diplomatici e commerciali tra la Repubblica
di Genova ed il Nord Africa sul finire del XVIII secolo” (master the-
sis, Università di Genova, 2010–2011). Our data on the Genoese gal-
leys also demonstrate that in 1793 there were around 30–40 slaves on
each of the Genoese galleys: S. Maria, S. Giorgio, Raggia, Capitana.
Therefore, there were still around 160 enslaved men, ASG, Magistrato
galee, no. 159 (the documents are without numbers).
168. Gillian Weiss, Captives and Corsairs: France and Slavery in the Early
Modern Mediterranean (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011),
235.
169. ASG, Magistrato galee, no. 159.
170. Zappia, Rapporti diplomatici e commerciali tra la Repubblica di Genova
ed il Nord Africa sul finire del XVIII secolo, Università di Genova, 2010–
2011. ASG, Archivio Segreto Marittimarum, n. 1729.
171. Bono, Schiavi musulmani a Genova, 89.
172. Bono, Schiavi musulmani a Genova, 87, 96.
173. ASG, Magistrato delle galee, no. 159.
174. Bono, Schiavi musulmani a Genova, 89.
175. ASG, Riscatto schiavi, no. 103, f. 6.
176. ASG, Riscatto schiavi, no. 102. On an attempt to improve the living con-
ditions of prisoners and forced men, see Luigi Levati, I dogi di Genova
dal 1746 al 1771 e vita genovese negli stessi anni (Genova: Tipografia
della Gioventù, 1914), 4.
177. Indeed, we found a Napoleonic decree on the freeing of the Genoese
slaves in the Barbary Kingdoms. See Leggi, Decreti ed altre stampe pub
blicate a Genova dal 1797 al 1800, tomo I e II. (V.2.12–V.2.13), Altra
lettera pastorale dello stesso per la liberazione de Schiavi Genovesi per
mezzo dell’Imperatore Napoleone Bonaparte 1805, 3 ottobre (Tomo
II) V.2.13.
178. Salvatore Bono, Schiavi. Una storia mediterranea (XVI–XIX secolo)
179. Marina Caffiero, “Schiavitù, conversioni e apostasie di musulmani tra
Inquisizione e Casa dei Catecumeni,” Dimensioni e problemi della
ricerca storica 2 (2013): 90.
180. Jocelyne Dakhlia, “Musulmans en France et en Grande-Bretagne à l’épo-
que moderne: exemplaires et invisibles,” in Les musulmans dans l’histoire
de l’Europe.I.Une intégration invisible (Paris: Albin Michel, 2011), 263.
181. Maurizio Isabella, Risorgimento in esilio. L’internazionale liberale e l’età
delle rivoluzioni (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2011), 40.
182. Isabella, Risorgimento in esilio, 126.
160 G. BONAZZA
183. Pierre Pluchon, Histoire de la colonisation française. Le premier empire

colonial. Des origines à la Restauration, vol. I (Paris: Fayard, 1991), 479.
184. Pluchon, Histoire de la colonisation française, 716.
186. F. Charles-Roux, France et Afrique du Nord avant 1830. Les précurseurs
de la conquête, Paris, 1932, in Bono, I corsari barbareschi, 69.
188. Pluchon, Histoire de la colonisation française. Le premier empire colonial.
Des origines à la Restauration, vol. II (Paris: Fayard, 1991), 25.
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costruzione dei Siti Reali borbonici, edited by Imma Ascione, Giuseppe Cirillo,
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Stato, 2012.
Di Nepi, Serena. “Le Restitutiones ad libertatem di schiavi a Roma in età mod-
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problemi della ricerca storica, no. 2 (2013): 25–52.
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no. 2 (August 2013): 497–539.
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Università di Genova, 2010–2011.
CHAPTER 4
The Memory of Slavery
Since the 1980s, the memory of slavery has been an increasingly topical
issue in the USA, in Europe and in Africa. This has manifested in not just
academic publications, but in a burgeoning public interest. This public
interest has frequently been fed by personalities who are not necessar-
ily only seeking justice tout court, but who may also be pursuing public
prestige and economic profit from the “business” of the memory of slav-
ery. This applies especially to memory tourism in Africa.1 Europe too is
home to museums dedicated to the slave trade and Atlantic slavery in
particular. The purpose of these museums is both pedagogic and repara-
tory. The history of the West and of slavery are inseparable. Therefore,
the memory of slavery, for so long repressed and hidden, is itself insepa-
rable from the so-called modernisation of Europe. Slavery and the mem-
ory of slavery are global issues, directly linked to the evolution of the
concept of “race” and the process of “racialization”. Myriam Cottias,
Elisabeth Cunin and Antonio De Almeida Mendes write in their intro-
duction to Les traites et les esclavages that “The analysis of slavery and
post-slavery societies produces new knowledge, both on the colonised
societies and on the European metropoles”, “L’analyse des sociétés
esclavagistes et post-esclavagistes est porteuse de savoirs renouvelés,
tant sur les sociétés colonisées elles-mêmes, que sur les métropoles
européennes”.2 So, while slavery was mainly conducted in the Atlantic
world and around the Indian Ocean, we must also consider the memory
of Euro-Mediterranean slavery. Slavery started earlier in this region than
elsewhere—it can be traced back to antiquity—and continued alongside

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3_4
168 G. BONAZZA
Atlantic and Indian Ocean slavery until its decline at the end of the
nineteenth century.3
There was no uniformity to slavery in the Mediterranean world. As
Salvatore Bono recently demonstrated, while slavery was a phenom-
enon in some Mediterranean societies, a system was not formalised
in any Mediterranean society. This differentiated Mediterranean slav-
ery from Atlantic slavery, which was highly structured. The history of
Mediterranean slavery has long been neglected, however.4 It is instruc-
tive, then, to consider how and when the memory of Mediterranean
slavery, and specifically slavery in the Italian regions, was marginalised
and elided. Examining traces of memory that managed to avoid being
erased and still survive may also reveal much about the process. First, it
is important to establish that the cases under review amounted to real
forms of slavery and to understand why slavery endured. Next, this chap-
ter will frame the relationship between memory and history in the con-
text of research on slavery. Finally, the chapter will analyse some sites
associated with the memory of slavery in the Italian regions, particu-
larly those with notable architectural or artistic features. And while the
Mediterranean trade has not been widely framed in terms of the patrimo-
nialization of slavery (certainly not in the way that the Atlantic trade has
been), historians have started to make some moves in that direction.
4.1 Defining Slavery in the Italian States

The sources consulted record cases of real slavery, as distinct from other
forms of servile dependence, although the living conditions of slaves
were not necessarily any worse than those of convicts or of the buona
voglia in the galleys. When joining a new community, a former slave or
a baptised slave could sometimes live a life similar to that of a servant.
There are examples of slaves from a wide array of backgrounds. Some
were Ottoman Arabs, others were black Africans and there were also
also Jews and Greeks. The “racial” dimension of slavery emerged later—
in the fifteenth century—and developed in tandem with the Atlantic
trade (whence the binomial “black” and “slave” emerged). This char-
acteristic of Atlantic slavery cannot be automatically transplanted to the
Mediterranean in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.5 I am not
suggesting that there was no racism directed against the “sauvage”,
who was considered as inferior to the European. Rather, I am pointing
out that in the Mediterranean context, the only proof we have of how
black slaves were viewed in comparison with other slaves derives from
4 THE MEMORY OF SLAVERY 169
commercial values. Some sources show that a black slave was worth
less than a Muslim slave from the North of Africa. But it is difficult to
pinpoint the chronological origin of this racist attitude to black people
in Europe. Although its scale declined, slavery persisted well into the
nineteenth century in the Italian states (up to 1845 according to my
research).6 And while the abolitionist movement was strong in France
during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and slavery was abolished
juridically, it persisted there until the Napoleonic era.7
From a juridical point of view, it is vital to be able to contrast the rel-
ative standing of a slave vis-á-vis a freeman in order to understand the
juridical status of a person. The slave and the freeman did not auto-
matically form a dichotomous pair and there were a variety of forms
of unfree labour that did not qualify as slavery in a traditional juridical
sense.8 The dividing line between slavery and freedom was often a fine
one, and not just in ancient societies where various types of slavery and
serfdom coexisted, but across historical periods.9 This work defines slaves
according to juridical rules, because of the social and economic condi-
tions in which they lived and, primarily, because the sources being uti-
lised treated them as slaves. An agreement between one freeman who
was without means of subsistence and another freeman who possessed
goods and needed a service was considered as a contract to rent goods:
the goods could be a home, a parcel of land or a slave. The distinction
between enslavement due to war and voluntary submission, whether
temporary or permanent, to the will of another due to an inability to
subsist, is the fundamental device in identifying the salaried worker as a
temporary servant: “this juridical category is not a neutral one; it rep-
resented the employment contract of the salaried worked as typical of
some of the characteristics of slavery”.10 However much that truth that
definition contained, it was not the case that there was a clear route of
progression from slave to servant to salaried worker. The coexistence of
various restrictions on freedom—slavery, serfdom and even salary—has
always been present, from Greco-Roman antiquity to the Middle Ages
and beyond.11 The nineteenth-century liberation of the slave—aboli-
tion occurred in various jurisdictions in both the Mediterranean world
and the Atlantic colonies—only led to real freedom if the former slave
could procure his sustenance. Juridical liberation aside, economic
independence was the real marker of freedom.12 That is why the model
of the slave as either voluntary servant or salaried worker remains so
crucial. As a juridcally freeman, the work of the former slave could not
170 G. BONAZZA
be considered exploitation because it was legalised; he was not a slave

anymore. In practice, however, according to Maria Luisa Pesante, this
scenario tended to heavily favour the employer. The reality for the free
salaried worker was that he was severely limited in his options. Until the
first half of the eighteenth century, a marked contrast was visible among
the authors of jurisprudence in respect of attitude to temporary serfdom
as an expression of power relations and the total precariousness of alter-
native methods of control. The salaried worker, even if he was an active
subject, inherited this condition of vulnerability from the perpetual vol-
untary servant.13
Nineteenth-century abolitionist arguments, in wishing to trace the
path of the slave to freedom, sometimes employed a formula of “free
labour” which was actually coerced labour in disguise and which was
intended to maintain levels of production unchanged. On the connec-
tion between freedom and abolitionist proposals, the juridical status of
the slave in the French colonies echoed the binomial contrast present
in the Code Noir (1685) that referred to “slave-person” and “not-slave
person”.14 Therefore, gradual abolition initially made the slave free in
primis so that he could make purchases and become an owner of goods.
In the second step could no longer be considered as property, before the
proprium was extended to him that made him a freeman from a jurid-
ical point of view. Therefore, the gradual abolition would have made
in primis the esclave free, as owner of goods, and only in a second step
the proprium would have transformed him in a freeman from a juridical
point of view.
The Declaration of Human Rights (1789) specified the fundamental
right to freedom. Freedom, from the perspective proposed by Kant, is a
universal right: “There is only one innate right. Freedom […] is the only
original right that is due to every man because of his human being”.15
The right to freedom, if it is considered as an innate right, is in direct
conflict with the juridical existence of the slave. Grozio’s interpretation,
however, linked the right to freedom to ownership of property and to
the proprium: “freedom in respect of action, is conditional on the own-
ership of the goods”.16 According to this thinking, the slave—being him-
self a good and not a good owner—cannot be free. Thomas Raynal too,
in his Histoire des deux Indes (1776), had presented a similar hypothesis.
In book XI, chapter XXIV (“Origin and progress of slavery. Arguments
to justify it. Answers to these arguments”), he contended that that the
restitution of freedom to the slave, after giving him a homeland and the
means by which to support himself, was a positive development for any

colony because it increased the productivity of the workforce.17
British abolitionism, in advocating a gradual approach, adhered to
these principles. The best method would initially involve giving the slave
the right to own goods before making him a freeman from a juridical
point of view. And while Mediterranean slavery did not involve exploita-
tion on anything like the scale or ferocity of the Atlantic trade, the slave
was responsible for his own maintenance. In the Italian regions, as we
saw, slaves frequently partially maintained themselves. This increased
the likelihood that they would successfully integrate into a new com-
munity after liberation. For example, in the context of the Palace of
Caserta, slaves were paid for their pre-liberation work, even if the sums
involved were derisory. They were also fed and clothed, but there was
at least some responsibility on them to maintain themselves, although
this might just have involved frequenting the tavern.18 In the other geo-
graphical areas referred to above, such as Rome, baptised slaves were
sometimes employed as soldiers or placed in paid roles with increased
responsibilities. The accounts of foreign visitors to seventeenth-century
Genoa provide evidence of the employment of Muslims in artisanal works
and the presence of Turkish slaves in workshops. An anonymous German
account from the late eighteenth century describes Genoese shopkeepers’
slaves who earned enough to pay their own ransoms.19 In Civitavecchia
too, according to an essay by Guglielmotti, many slaves were able to ame-
liorate their situation by selling baskets and Moorish-style caps. A 1773
essay, referring to slaves who worked outside Livorno’s Bagno, described
how they rented small shops and shacks at the dock were they worked
as barbers, porters, haberdashers and the like. After the motu proprio
taken by the Grand Duke of Tuscany in 1616, slaves had been p rohibited
from opening shops on the dock in Livorno and it was some time before
they could exercise their commercial interests on an equal footing.20
The commercial activities of slaves were tolerated or even encouraged
because the citizens and the soldiers of the various cities which allowed
them to trade also stood to benefit. For example, in Civitavecchia in
1724, some citizens used slaves to enter galleys to purchase smuggled
wine and tobacco from oarsmen.21 Salvatore Bono quoted from an 1822
pamphlet by Emile Humbert, I Barbareschi e i Cristiani, on the man-
agement of taverns. A typical incident involved a scuffle between a black
sailor, a renegade Christian and a Turkish soldier. Scuffles between slaves
and convicts were also a regular occurrence in the tavern of the Palace
172 G. BONAZZA
of Caserta. Intercultural encounters did not just result in fistfights, how-

ever, but also led to the diffusion of new habits, especially in the dietary
context. The circulation of coffee around Livorno is a clear example: in
the eighteenth century, a ransomed Turk, Mustafa Topal, ran a coffee
shop in Saint John Street.22
This complexity makes it necessary to look beyond the dualist per-
spective freeman-slave. A more sophisticated and flexible case-by-case
approach is required to distinguish between forms of slavery and to
understand the relationship between slavery and similar types of servile
dependency.23 A full analysis of this relationship involves dissecting a
Eurocentric view of history that dates back, as we have seen in Chapter 2,
to Roman law and to Natural law, and their attempts to crystallise the
division between freeman and slave.
4.2 Taxonomy and the Problem of Race

We are dealing with a heterogeneous, multifaceted collection of trades
and locations as well as the mutable question of the status of the indi-
vidual. The varied taxonomy applied to Mediterranean slavery points to
a highly diverse landscape and the fact that the slave was usually a for-
eigner. Originally, the word sclavus was used in the territories of the
Byzantine Empire and in the German territories, before coming into
use in the Italian commercial cities. From the tenth century, the use of
sclavus extended well-beyond its geographical origin and entered the
common lexicon. It represented the juridical status of the slave. On
Italian and French galleys in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,
the word “Turk” was synonymous with slave. Moreover, with the estab-
lishment of the Atlantic trade in the sixteenth century, the word “black”
became interchangeable with slave. Slavery was not initially linked to
“race”, but this concept of slavery gradually crept into popular think-
ing.24 The taxonomy of the sources, in particular the Catholic sources,
includes the terms Turk, black and Muslim. Skin colour is often speci-
fied so that a subject is “black and Muslim” rather than simply “Muslim”
or “Turkish and Muslim”. It is difficult to state definitely whether or
not this focus on skin colour relates to a direct interest in race because
there was a particular category reserved for black slaves, and even a
sub-category within the list of baptised slaves. There is no evidence to
suggest that the living conditions for black slaves in the House of the
Catechumens were any worse than those for other slaves or captives.
From the eighteenth century, however, it is indisputable that racism

played a fundamental role in the institution of slavery (and not just in
the Western world). It had an essential totalising dimension that justi-
fied an inequitable system of economic relationships and denied the right
of those considered naturally to own property. Racism was a precondi-
tion for slavery, but it did not melt away with abolition. In fact, post-
abolition, a free black man was still a black man, theoretically equal to
other citizens in the eyes of the law, but barred from accessing his full
rights in practice.25
European racism had a philosophical matrix, as well as a scientific or
pseudoscientific rationale, which was linked to certain aspects of liber-
alism and cosmopolitism before the nineteenth century. This matrix
“from above” emerged before the diffusion of “scientific” racism in
European societies. Kant’s racial theories are pertinent here. The con-
cept of race portrayed in Kantian philosophy is very important for the
conjectural reconstruction of the history of natural law, but it seems to
be less important in terms of what he defined as the history of freedom,
that is human and political history. In his political writings, he did not
attribute political relevance to the division of humanity into races or to
the description of a strictly physical natural inequality. The concept of
race emerged in response to the need to systematise a sector of physical
geography that was confused and incoherent and to criticise polygenism.
Kant, writing about races, did not want to justify forms of oppres-
sion or slavery, even if parts of his work could lead one to think oth-
erwise.26 According to Kant, blacks and whites are not different species
of humans, because they belong to the same lineage, but they are two
different races, because each one perpetuated itself in different regions
of the earth. According to the philosopher Könisberg, humanity was
divided into four races: the white race, the black race, the Hun race and
the Hindu race. The criterion for the division was skin colour. External
elements, such as climate and nutrition, were understood to determine
diversity. Therefore, Kant’s monogenetic theory distinguishes a unique
original lineage and resorts to the alleged influence of the climate to
explain the formation of different races. The content of his lessons on
the races is included in his conception of history as a teleological uni-
versal history, constantly progressing towards perfection. The notion of
the intertwining of physical forces that led to the creation of the races,
and the Kantian understanding of nature, helps to explain common prej-
udices of his epoch. What he referred to as the black race and the red
174 G. BONAZZA
race came in for the most criticism. The coloured man was suited to
his climate: he was strong, muscular and agile but because of the abun-
dance of natural products in his native land, he was lazy, weak and apa-
thetic. The Caribbean man too, considered a cross between the African
and American races, was disregarded because he “lives hand to mouth”,
without forward planning.27 Kant counterpoised the European man,
who always tended to improve himself and bored easily, with the carefree
Caribbean man who is free from this concern. He did not suffer for the
absence of stimulation. Indeed, Kant regarded Americans as semi-listless
because of cold climates. Therefore, inferiority was not inherent but the
result of external environmental elements. In this way, the Caribbean
man was comparable to the white reader with refined tastes, who was
frivolous and similarly unburdened by worries.28 The Caribbean man and
the white man were considered to be at a similar level and share the same
flaws irrespective of race. Kant incarnates the contradictions of a century
when slavery established itself simultaneously to the theoretical and his-
torical demand for individual human rights. In some excerpts, he stresses
the inferiority of black people, so the anti-egalitarian threads of his think-
ing should not be underestimated. Kantian universalism does not provide
a solution to this problem. Even if the universalistic perspective is pres-
ent in Kantian essays, the prejudice based on nature or socio-economic
factors is not negated by his theory of the rights.29 Hume’s thoughts
on race and human differences are presented in his essay “Of National
Characters” (1748 and 1753):
I am apt to suspect the negroes, and in general all the other species of men
(for there are four or five different kinds) to be naturally inferior to the
whites. There never was a civilized nation of any other complexion than
white, nor even any individual eminent either in action or speculation.30
This passage is the subject of fierce controversy among defenders

and critics of the Scot. Contextualisation is vital. According to Hume,
human nature was composed of uniform principles, and differences
were accidental results of historical moral and pragmatic human con-
ventions. Hume identified stereotypes regarding sex, age and profession
as well nationality. For Hume, these differences were not exposed in a
deterministic way according to climate, as long argued by the school of
Montesquieu and Buffon, but in terms of moral causes.31 According to
Hume, prosperity and poverty were moral matters, so the poverty of the
inhabitants of the Northern part of the world equated to the indolence

of the inhabitants of the Southern part. The indolence of the inhabit-
ants of tropical countries was explained by natural causes, such as the
abundance of products. Moreover, if a characteristic did not persist
beyond a number of generations, it could not be defined as racial. Hume
expressed the same ideas in relation to the North and South of Great
Britain, and not just Africa. Finally, Hume seemed sometimes to refer to
class distinctions as opposed to racial distinctions. Regardless, “black”
slaves, even if circumstances changed, were not eligible for emancipa-
tion, so the alleged differences between whites and the other “human
species” definitely had a racial character.32 According to Robert Palter,
the evolution of Hume’s thinking should protect him against posterity’s
charges of racism. Part of a 1776 essay, published after his death, read
as follows: There scarcely ever was a civilized nation of that complexion
(black). Previously, it has read There scarcely never was a civilized nation
of that complexion. Therefore, according to Palter, Hume acknowledged
that coloured people too built civilisations, even if they were inferior to
white civilisations. Palter also observes that Hume was once defined
as “intolerant”, whereas he is now considered as racist, especially by
American philosophers.33
Montesquieu too reflected on the differences between freemen and
black slaves, but primarily in relation to climatic influence. In book XV,
How the rules of civil slavery are related to the nature of the climate, the
lawyer of La Brède seems to justify the practice of slavery on the basis
of a wholly artificial theory that says that freedom and slavery depend
on the climate.34 Nonetheless, the climatic determinism of Montesquieu
cannot be defined as racism.35 Among the more important thinkers of
the eighteenth century, including those who laid the foundations for the
Enlightenment, there lurked the discriminative germs of a phenomenon
that was certainly similar to racism but cannot be strictly defined as such.
This discriminative force was the product of changes in the European
mentality that developed between the fifteenth and the eighteenth
centuries.
Racist thinking came to the forefront during the eighteenth and the
nineteenth centuries, when supporters of monogenism, such as Linné,
Blumenbach and Lamarck, appealed to an argument that was in synch
with Enlightenment anthropology: it is the diversity of the climatic and
natural conditions that explains the diversity of the races. Men, who
were originally equal, differentiated themselves according to the various
176 G. BONAZZA
environments in which they lived. From this point, not only physical
and anatomic specificities but also moral and intellectual characteristics
started to be attributed to each race. So, whites were disciplined, pro-
bative and inventive, but blacks were not. The cultists of the natural
sciences drafted a comparative picture of the abilities and of the char-
acters of the various races.36 Beside the assumption of a fixed aesthetic
criteria that, as we will see in the following paragraph, almost automati-
cally translated into a fixed artistic portrayal of black people as beautiful,
the most serious dimension was the scientific one. The black man was
considered as inferior, and the “good savage” was no more. According
to Charles White (and the nineteenth century philosophy of progress),
the black was the joining link between man and monkey. This was also
the analytical position of anthropology and linguistics. Only Europe,
according to these thinkers, demonstrated the highest development of
civilisation and the creation of citizenship at a political level was proof of
this. The civil man did not include everyone, only the white European.
According to Pietro Costa:
the racial argument not only pauses the subject, but it suggests a new phi-
losophy of history that, if on one hand underlines the dramatic nature of
the fight, on the other hand distracts attention from the conflict on which
until now the discourses on citizenship specifically lingered – the social
conflict, the fight for rights or “around” rights – and it concentrates on
the international scene, waiting for the State to do its part in the fight for
supremacy.37
The late nineteenth-century European state revolved around more than

the concept of citizenship; this internal conflict had been settled and it
now fell on Europe to express its legitimate superiority over races out-
side its borders. Beyond theoretical debates and the “scientific” roots
of racism, the establishment of racism within social groups and across
European societies was a complex process. During the Ancien Régime,
conceptions of race were fluid and uncertain, and applied in different
contexts. The concept of race was akin to an imaginary category that
involved only an élite who applied it in order to regulate power relation-
ships.38 The debate on the origin of the concept of race and on racism,
from the perspectives of legal and social history, varied sharply between
the colonial and European worlds. This was partly a function of black
slaves in Europe being afforded a different status to colonial slaves before
the eighteenth century. This does not mean that racism was absent from
Europe but that it was framed differently in relation to servants and
slaves there than in the colonies.39 For example, prior to a royal decla-
ration in 1777—that prohibited mixed marriages and regulated the
entrance of slaves to France—it was forbidden to keep slaves in French
territory; slaves brought into France frequently managed to obtain the
protection of the king against his master and to secure freedom.40 As a
consequence, there was a jurisdictional clash between public tribunals
and slave owners. Before the creation of the French colonial empire,
and particularly until the seventeenth century, when France created
the slavery system in the Antilles, black visitors to France were consid-
ered as exotic and uncivilised individuals. The prejudice was more cul-
tural than racist and was often linked to religious causes. When in 1685
the Code Noir legalised colonial slavery, it led to a change in attitudes
towards the Africans in France. In order to legitimate colonial slavery,
an attempt was made to differentiate Africans, to make them “others”.
In the first half of the eighteenth century, “negrès” were considered
a real problem for public order, especially in Paris and the coastal cit-
ies involved in the slave trade. The government argued that: “Most of
the negroes picked up habits, and an independent spirit that could have
unpleasant consequences. […] we find often that they are useless and
also dangereous”. La plupart des Negres y contractent des habitudes, & un
esprit d’indépendance qui purroient avoir des suites facheuses. […] il s’en
trouve le plus souvent d’inutiles & meme de dangereux.41 This thesis took
hold more swiftly in urban centres while mixed marriages remained a fea-
ture of rural life, often in contravention of legislation. The king’s 1777
decree prohibited masters from wither selling or freeing slaves in France.
Liberation was permitted only when it involved official transfer of status
from slave to servant, and the servant would still be subject to some of
the conditions of slavery. In this manner, the law became gradually more
discriminatory and truly racist. Still, mixed marriages persisted in small
communities. The law could still be circumvented with the cooperation
of intendants or local authorities.42
In Portugal too, on 9 September 1761, a royal decree ended the
introduction of new slaves into the state, but it maintained the status
quo for the slaves who were already there. On January 1773, all the
“blacks and mulattos”, as long as their ancestors had not been slaves
for four generations or more, were declared free. On 25 May 1773, the
principle of ventre esclave was abrogated.43 The Pombal laws were part
178 G. BONAZZA
of a modernisation project designed to showcase Portugal’s high level

of civilisation, a level appropriate for a European power. In conjunction
with these laws, the economy of the state and of its colonies relied com-
pletely on the slave trade and on servile labour. The abolition of slav-
ery within the state, therefore, should not in any way be considered as
morally motivated. Internal abolition, however, and the associated emer-
gence of a group of newly free black men, led to the proliferation of anti-
black prejudice. Even though former slaves could become Portuguese
citizens, their skin colour and former status meant they were excluded
from full participation in cultural and political life. Africans who disem-
barked in colonial metropolises were granted the same rights as freed
slave and forro (liberated) status. The abolition of the slave trade in the
Portuguese empire in Africa began in 1836 and in 1869.44
In the Italian regions, as we saw, not every state had legislation reg-
ulating slavery. In the Papal States, for example, there was never an act
of abolition, and in states where there was legislation, it was influenced
by the jurisprudence of other European countries. Given that the Italian
states did not possess colonies, they did not face the problem of having
to regulate the inward flow of slaves.45 In the nineteenth century, the
international diplomatic debate regarded black people as “savage” and
unable to adapt to life in Europe, so the successful integration experi-
enced in some parts of the continent during the eighteenth century was
undone. An article by Vieusseux in the Antologia portrayed black people
as “savages”, completely detached from European ways of life. The entry
entitled “Statistics-Civilization-Savages” tells the story of a slave named
Botocude who was taken from Brazil to Vienna in 1822. He could not
assimilate and, after the death of his wife and son, his protectors had to
banish him to the wild. He had failed to learn German beyond the most
basic level. His love for his homeland was interpreted as confirmation
of his supposed inferiority. The thrust of the article was that slaves from
sub-Saharan Africa had no place in nineteenth-century Europe.46 It is
also interesting to observe that at the beginning of the twelfth century,
the essay Conseguenze della schiavitù sui caratteri antropologici degli ital
iani aimed to track down in the Sicilian population specific physical-bi-
ological characters in order to demonstrate that Sicilians were in some
ways closely related to blacks and, therefore, were probably descendants
of slaves.47
With the commencement of the Atlantic trade in the sixteenth
century, another important phenomenon arose: the beginning of the

downplaying of the Mediterranean trade. It was as if the opening of the

Atlantic channel had extinguished slavery in Europe. Focus switched to
the Atlantic trade, and there was little reflection on the persistence of
European slavery until the nineteenth century. Simultaneously, the mem-
ory of slavery grew more hazy.48 At the end of the nineteenth century,
when European historiography started to analyse the problem of slavery
in European countries, it tended to look to ancient and medieval cases
and to overlook the Early Modern period. Slavery was presented as a
minority phenomenon, practiced only in royal courts and among nobles.
Salvatore Bono’s latest book ascribes this silence to the fact that histo-
rians, sociologists and anthropologists who study slavery are interested
in analysing systems, and because Mediterranean slavery could not be
explained according to a single system, scholars neglected it.49
The interconnection of the Mediterranean and Atlantic trades began
with the transport of the ladinos to the American colonies. These were
the first slaves to cross the Atlantic from the Iberian Peninsula rather
than directly from Africa. The ladinos were Africans who has been
exposed to European culture and civilisation and were therefore consid-
ered more suitable as labour for the new territories of the Americas.50
In the opening years of the Atlantic trade, in the first half of the six-
teenth century, slaves were transported from Africa to the western
Mediterranean. The ports of Lisbon and Seville flourished on the back
of the Atlantic trade and acted as distribution points for the rest of the
western Mediterranean before the slave ships sailed out into the Atlantic.
At the Casa de Escravos in Lisbon, there was incessant trading of slaves
for export to Spain and Italy.51 While slaves never formed a majority of
the labour force in local economies, they accounted for 15% of the pop-
ulation in the coastal cities of southern Portugal. In other Portuguese
cities and in Castile, the proportion of slaves in the population was less
than 10%. In communities where slavery was already present, slaves
newly arrived from Central-Western Africa joined the workforce, which
usually included many Moors. Slaves worked in the countryside as well as
in the cities, but mostly in a domestic capacity rather than as agricultural
labourers. In 1630, there were about 15,000 slaves in Lisbon and a com-
munity of 2000 free black people.52 After the ladinos, the bozales arrived
in the Americas. They were Africans who never passed through Europe,
being shipped directly from the western coast of Africa.53 According
to Salvatore Bono’s estimates, between European, Muslim and black
Africans slaves, around seven million people, but probably more, were
180 G. BONAZZA
involved in the Mediterranean trade during the three centuries of the

Early Modern period (1500–1800).54 My research indicates that around
410 slaves passed through Palermo, Trapani and Capua between 1802
and 1812. I have confirmed only thirty cases in Naples in the late eight-
eenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century but it likely
that there were many more. There were around 360 cases in Caserta in
the second half of the eighteenth century. Sources reveal the presence of
208 slaves in Rome and Civitavecchia between 1750 and 1808. Forty-
eight slaves remained on the dock of Livorno in 1848. Finally, there were
around 160 slaves in Genoa in 1793. In conclusion, real slavery persisted
in the first half of the nineteenth century.55
4.3 The Memory of Slavery in the Italian Space

A dialectical relationship based on exclusion from or inclusion in the
public mind exists between memory and identity. An attempt to analyse
memory as a political act means analysing not only the public uses and
manipulation of memory, but also the sidelining of certain elements of
the past and the silences that pertain around controversial issues. All of
these dynamics are relevant to how slavery is remembered. There is no
public historical memory of the Atlantic slave trade in Italy, even though
Italian states were home to slave ship owners and Italian cities were logis-
tical bases for the trade. Granted, the Italian role was less than that of the
great powers, but it was still significant. Recently, scholars have started
to highlight this role, using examples such as the transfer of the sugar
market from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic with the colonisation of
Madeira and the Canaries. Italian, Florentine and Genoese names appear
in Madeira from the mid-fifteenth century. Battista Lomellini appeared
first and was followed later in the century by Bartolomeo Marchionni,
Geronimo Sernigi and Luigi Doria. They were involved in the com-
merce of sugar, and they also became landowners. In the sixteenth cen-
tury, the Italian community grew and prospered thanks to the sugar
market. Florentine merchants-bankers played an important part in con-
necting Madeira and the European ports: among their ranks were the
Giraldis, Marchionni and Luca, and Benedetto Morelli. Madeira’s net-
work of Italians had its strategic base in Lisbon.56 They controlled no
less than 78% of the island’s sugar commerce in the sixteenth century.57
According to Antonio De Almeida Mendes, while the participation of
Italians in the discovery and exploration of the Azores, Cape Verde, the
Canaries and Madeira and the western coasts of the African continent
generally is sufficiently acknowledged, their financial and technical role
in the Atlantic slave trade is forgotten58 The fourteenth- and fifteenth-
century Mediterranean merchants’ réseaux demonstrates the impor-
tance of familiar and community networks made up of members with
diverse origins and religious backgrounds. Communities of Spanish and
Moroccan Jews, in league with Italian merchants, monopolised the tradi-
tional Mediterranean trade circuits (oil, cereals, sugar and slaves). These
continuous circuits blended with and facilitated the first phase of Atlantic
expansion.59 Not only memory of the Italian role in the trade was absent
for a prolonged spell, however, but memory of the very trade itself.
Specifically, there was no memory of the presence of slaves, particularly
black slaves.60
A jump forward to the late nineteenth century is appropriate at this
juncture because the problems of selection of memory of the Early
Modern period are connected to the problem of selection of memory
of the Italian colonial period. From the 1880s to the 1940s, the Italian
empire included Eritrea (1882), Somalia (1889), Libya (1911) and
Ethiopia (1935). Compared to the empires of other European powers,
the Italian version was chronologically and spatially limited. Post-World
War II politics censored Italy’s imperial past and directed the public gaze
away from the stark realities of the colonial project. Reflection on this
part of Italy’s history was discouraged.61 The substantial problem was the
conflation of Italian imperialism and Italian Fascism, even though colo-
nial conquest commenced in liberal Italy; post-Fascist Italy undertook a
project defined by Nicola Labanca as the decolonization of minds.62 Thus,
Italy’s colonial past was deliberately forgotten by the institutions of the
state. Another peculiar aspect of Italian historiography, however, is that
the colonial project, during both the colonial period itself and then dur-
ing the post-colonial period, received little academic attention.63 In the
first thirty years of the Italian Republic (1946–1976) only three scholars
published historical surveys of Italian colonial expansion. Two of these
books were written by colonial historians, while the other was produced
by a French historian. The brilliant journalist Angelo Del Boca offered his
first analysis of Italian colonialism in 1975. He followed his monograph
with documentary essays from 1976. According to Labanca, Del Boca’s
account of Italian involvement in Africa was a Histoire événementielle that
challenged the official historiography of the colonial period.64 It por-
trayed Italian imperialism as demographically motivated and intended
182 G. BONAZZA
to provide an outlet for exportation of the labour force. The primary

motivations were actually diplomatic and concerned the pursuit of inter-
national prestige: colonies were not intended simply as a relief valve for
the pressure exerted by intended emigrants.65 Academic history began
to engage more fully with the topic from the 1980s, but only Labanca’s
Oltremare has looked beyond the national dimension and viewed Italian
imperialism in the wider context of European imperialism.66
According to Alice Bellagamba, it is important to connect analysts of
forms of contemporary subjugation to analysts of historical slavery. The
most productive part of such a connection is the post-abolition age,
looking in particular at the growth of public discussion on human traf-
ficking and the indiscriminate exploitation of labour.67 This approach
can enhance our understanding of repressive measures but also of his-
toriographical trends. There are no museums dedicated to the subject of
Mediterranean slavery, for example, although some museums dedicate
specific sections to the topic, especially maritime museums. For exam-
ple, there are reproductions of galleys in the Sea Museum of Genoa that
include representations of slaves.68 Historians have been able to recover
traces of memory in archival sources but also in art and in cityscapes,
especially in street names.
4.4 Memory and History
Before addressing the commercialisation of the memory of slavery,
I would like to offer some historiographical reflections on the many
meanings of the word “memory” in relation to history. Tzvetan Todorov
defined memory as the human capacity to retain some elements of the
past. In this reading, our entire relationship with the past was based on
memory. From the 1960s, the word “memory” was given a more restric-
tive meaning in order to differentiate it from “history” and to set the two
concepts in opposition to each other. Memory came to denote an emo-
tional attachment to the past, while history was an impersonal, cold and
abrupt discourse that ignored the personal dimension of the past.69 There
is no absolute conflict between history and memory, of course, and his-
torians acknowledge that it might not be possible to establish “facts”
pertaining to abstract issues of conscience and sensibility, but that they
remain just as important as verifiable external events. Thus, historians seek
to understand mentalities. So, in this sense, history can be as subjective as
memory, but the difference is that history should seek to avoid subjectiv-
ity. Quoting Todorov: la mémoire est partielle, l’histoire globale.70
Pierre Nora, in a series of lectures at the Ecole des hautes études en

sciences sociales in Paris from 1978–1981, spoke about the relationship
between the death of national history and the end of historical memory.
He argued that breaking with the past lacerated the memory. A sense
of continuity with the past depended on memory. According to the
French historian, lieux de mémoire were substituting milieux de mémoire,
precisely because memory was no longer able to incarnate in historical
subjects. Memory establishes roots in the physical environment, in space,
in gestures and in images, while history clings to temporal continu-
ities, to evolutions and to the relationships between these phenomena.
Moreover, history has a problematic relationship with the reconstruc-
tion of the past. Memory is an absolute; it is always actual, while history
is partial.71 With the crisis of the nation state, history became a social
science and memory a private phenomenon. The memory of a nation
can be considered the last example of the history of memory. Sites of
memory exist in the following contexts or forms: on the one hand, as
an historiographical movement that poses questions about and reflects
on the sense of history itself; on the other hand, as a properly historic
movement which involves the end of a tradition of memory. Therefore,
sites of memory serve to de-ritualise the world, and to create the mean-
ing of memory; this process is dependent on the will of a community.
Sites of memory can be physical or mental places, such as museums,
archives, monuments, anniversaries, myths or personalities. They arise in
response to the lack of a spontaneous memory, so it is necessary to create
archives and organise celebrations. So, as Pierre Nora concludes, celebra-
tion of the nation has been replaced by analysis of the celebrations.72
The duty of memory is then intrinsically linked to the production, and
that is why we talk about archival memory, duty memory and distance
memory. We talk also about the emergence of world memory, given that
in the 1960s a new relationship developed between history and social,
ethnic and family groups worldwide. This involves a renewed interest in
history, with the positive addition of new stakeholders, but this evolu-
tion is not risk free. This new correlation between actors, memory and
history involved a challenge to official versions of history, the demand by
some subaltern social groups to recover traces of a confiscated or abol-
ished past, and the emergence of what might be called the cult of origins
and the associated surge in genealogical research services. The commem-
oration industry thrived internationally and museums proliferated. The
overall result has been to breathe new life into what the English call her-
itage and the French patrimoine.73
184 G. BONAZZA
The reinvigoration of memory led to a democratisation of history,

especially in respect of the memory of minorities, who look to their past
for an affirmation of their identity. The concept of identity, together with
that of memory, has been increasingly prominent. Identity morphed
from an individual concept into a collective one, and from a subjective
form into something more prescribed and approaching official. Identity,
like memory, is now a form of duty, but it can pigeonhole stakeholders in
an artificial, undemocratic fashion. I am expected to investigate my his-
tory and then to conform to a rigidly defined identity: black, Corsican,
Jew, Algerian.74 Pierre Nora finds that minorities were affected by three
kinds of decolonisation: global decolonisation occurs in the wake of
colonial oppression; interior decolonisation relates to internal or individ-
ual sexual, religious and social matters; and ideological decolonisation is
linked to the legacy of Europe’s twentieth-century totalitarian regimes.
At the end of the twentieth century, historical literature introduced the
concept of trauma, part of which involved the destruction of memory.75
Feminist literature and Holocaust studies, as well as de-constructivism,
argued that the process of the cancellation of memory was well under-
way. It was not just a possibility, or even imminent. Rather, it was an
established part of the political and mental order. So, memory is seen as
impossible to recall. History, on the contrary, can support the onerous
task of recovering memory, acting much like a form of psychoanalysis.76
According to Paolo Sorcinelli, history is a context discipline, while
memory is the past in the present. Memory is an ever-evolving phenom-
enon, open to the dialectic of the remembrance. History is an attempt
to reconstruct as accurately as possible a past that no longer exists.77
Mario Isnenghi studied Italian sites of memory. In his three books on
I luoghi della memoria, he addressed the topics of celebrities and the
anniversaries of the unification of Italy, looking in particular at sym-
bols and myths, structures and events. The second of Isneghi’s volumes
includes an important essay by Nicola Labanca on Italian Africa. In order
to legitimate the African campaigns undertaken by liberal Italy, a popular
memory of “wild” Africa was mythologised as the basis of the scramble
for Africa.78 In reality, Italian cities had long-standing relationships with
the cities of Mediterranean Africa, although Italy had no real connec-
tion with sub-Saharan Africa. However, prejudicial notions of the “wild
black” dated back to the era of Mediterranean and Atlantic slavery (from
the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries). Italy’s African empire became
a reality with the conquest of Eritrea in 1885, so it can be defined as
a lieu de mémoire. Anthroponymy demonstrates the creation of new

names with colonial origins at this time, such as Eritrean and Asmaro
or Asmarino to denote a native or inhabitant of Asmara. Thus, colonial
propaganda was well internalised and returning conquerors idealised the
African continent; demonstrations and commemorations were organised
and the first monuments were built.79
Paul Ricoeur ponders collective memory in his essay La mémoire,
l’histoire, l’oubli, asking “Who does memory belong to?” The unsolved
problem is how to bridge the gap between the sociology of collective
memory and the phenomenology of individual memory. The French phi-
losopher considers memory to be censored, manipulated and imposed,
proposing in place of the concept of devoir de mémoire, the idea of
travail de mémoire.80 The duty of remembering is itself an abuse; it is
wrong that we are expected to justify the past through history. The pur-
pose of history should be to acknowledge and increase awareness and
understanding of what happened in the past, not to foster reconcilia-
tion or healing. Here we find another important problem: the question
of post-colonial reparations.81 The issue of material reparations due to
former colonies from former imperial powers has several dimensions: in
primis, who really participated in the colonisation process? Responsibility
can be limited to the nation state. According to Appiah, not all whites
favoured resorting to servile labour. Also, it was not unknown in the
colonial world for former slaves to become slave owners themselves.
While some developed societies, such as France, would not have devel-
oped in the same way without the labour of colonial slaves, many his-
torians do not consider financial reparations a good method of making
amends: “All the research on collective responsibility is at risk of being
lost in a global rereading of all human history from at least the fifteenth
century” “Toute recherche de responsabilité collective risque de se perdre
dans une relecture globale de l’histoire humaine tout entière depuis au
moins le XVe siècle”.82 Moreover, the past frequently resides in the realm
of national memory rather than in the discipline of history. As has hap-
pened in Italy and France, the memory of the colonial period is white-
washed or elided. The situation in France is further complicated by
the right of certain Algerians and Haitians to citizenship, meaning that
France is paying reparations to some of its own citizens. Achille Mbembe
made the point that experiences of peace and reconciliation between
western and African countries often conceal other situations of war or
internal conflict in the African continent.83 In terms of memory and
186 G. BONAZZA
reconciliation with the past, colonial museums tend towards simplifi-

cation, and there is doubt as to whether aesthetics and art are able to
encompass this memory. For example, the aesthetic universalism of the
Quai Branly museum in Paris attempts to recompose the entirety of colo-
nial heritage, charging aesthetic universalism with the protection of all
human cultural diversity. The result is the stripping of context from the
cultural heritage of the collections of the former colonies.84
On the global reinterpretation of the history of colonialism, it is true
that responsibility cannot be properly attributed to the nation only, that
not all members of a nation were complicit and that the parties involved
cannot be classified in line with fixed identities (European coloniser ver-
sus extra-European colonised). European is not absolved of its respon-
sibilities but it should be recognised that a variety of stakeholders and
lobbyists of different origins shared in the profits of the slave trade. The
problem often resides in how the question is framed. For example, until
the nineteenth century, the states which constituted Italy in 1861 were
frequently occupied territories. This may explain why the involvement
of these states in the Atlantic trade since the fifteenth century has rarely
been considered; instead, national memory concentrates on a colonial
empire which only came into being late in the nineteenth century.
4.5 Patrimony and the Memory of Slavery

The memory of Mediterranean slavery was lost until its recovery in the
1980s. The increasing attention it has received in recent years is at least
partly a reaction to dramatic current events involving millions of people
and mass Mediterranean migration. At a global level, the slave trade is
no longer a taboo subject; on the contrary, it is now wrapped up with
heritage, patrimony and even tourism.85 Lampedusa hosts a migration
museum and former colonial powers such as France, Great Britain and
Holland dedicate museums to the Atlantic slave trade. British abolition-
ism and the memory of British slavery feature in Bristol Museum and
Art Gallery for instance. But they seem to be confined there. Inside the
walls of the museum, slavery seems to come to a happy ending with the
abolition of the trade in 1807. The Anglo-Saxon abolitionist move-
ment occupies centre stage in the museum’s exposition and is rendered
a very sympathetic and positive analysis. British moral supremacy, illus-
trated by imagery rooted in the imperial experience, is safeguarded and
visitors are treated as the direct heirs of an élite who progressed from
slave ownership to abolitionism.86 Analysing the performance of com-

mercial entities that form part of the historical memory chain is complex.
A resident of Bristol does not necessarily feel like an heir to slave owners
or abolitionists; he or she might perceive the issue as distant, when it is
not. A museum must strive to tell two stories of the slave trade and slav-
ery: the official version and the subaltern version.87 The Mediterranean
trade does not feature heavily in any telling: the online catalogue of
Liverpool’s International Slavery Museum, for example, does not include
Italy in its list of “European traders”. However, in the entry “Black
People in Europe”, we find that Portuguese traders brought slaves in
the Italian regions from 1450. It is correctly stated that the legal status
of slaves Europe was uncertain prior to the nineteenth century, and that
this was not resolved in England after abolition in 1833.88 In France, the
museum Mémorial de l’abolition de l’esclavage in Nantes focuses exclu-
sively on the horror of the Atlantic trade and stresses the importance of
human rights and human solidarity. The Mediterranean trade is conspic-
uous by its absence.89
A field in which the Mediterranean trades is well represented is that
of Italian artistic heritage. Livorno, for example, symbolises the pres-
ence of slaves in the city during the Early Modern period with the
Monumento a Ferdinando I dè Medici, who was known as “of the Four
Moors”, in the middle of Micheli Square (see Fig. 4.1). This public
monument is of great sociopolitical relevance to this topic: Great Duke
Ferdinando I dè Medici stands at its centre; to the side is a monumental
bronze statue representing four Ottoman slaves, one of whom is a black
African.90 Commissioned by the Duke himself and designed by Giovanni
Bondini, a sculpture depicting captives in this way was without prece-
dent in European history. The representation of black slaves or Turks
in European was an attempt to portray the reality of the Mediterranean
trade in the seventeenth century, specifically the involvement of the
Italian regions. What is more, according to Steven F. Ostrow, is that it
was the first time that slaves were represented in chains: Medici propa-
ganda aimed to represent them as “the other”, non-European and non-
white. Ferdinando was represented as the symbol of the Knights of Saint
Stefan—he was the Great Master of the Order. Therefore, the statue
represented the power of the Medici and the leading role played by the
Knights in defending the coasts of Tuscany against Barbary pirates and
liberating Christian slaves. The statue was initially transported to Livorno
in 1601 and deposited in the Dock Square, but it was not erected.
188 G. BONAZZA
Fig. 4.1 Monumento a Ferdinando I de Medici named of the “Four Moors”

(Source Gastone Razzaguta, Livorno Nostra. Nascita, Progesso e Grandezza di
Livorno, cui fa seguito il racconto della sua distruzione e la nostalgia di questa
città ed il suo destino, Tirrenia-Belforte, 1948. Photo courtesy of Andrea Dani
Photography)
It remained unfinished until 1617, when Pietro Tacca added the Moors
at the foot of the statue. The four Moors probably signified the father
and three sons Ferdinando apparently encountered among the Turkish
captives after his victory over an Ottoman fleet in 1602. He was happy
to place himself among them in the statue. Another historiographical
interpretation is that the inclusion of the Moors was the idea of Cosimo
II, Ferdinando’s son. According to this interpretation, Tacca visited the
Livorno Bagno, when he was working on a monument to Henry IV of
France, as a member of the group led by Giambologna. The statue of
the French king was completed in 1618 and installed on the Pont-Neuf
in Paris. At its base in bronze were tied slaves. While the monument was
largely destroyed during the French revolution, the base survived and is
housed in the Louvre.91 Ostrow finds similarities between the Livorno
statue, which was probably constructed first, and the Paris monument.
Ostrow dated the commissioning of Tacca to 1607–1608, when he vis-

ited the Bagno in order to study the slaves. He finished his work in 1626
when he added the base to the tribute to Ferdinando I. It is important
to note that in 1622 the slave population in Livorno was around the 10%
of the total population of the city. Galley slaves were Ottoman Turks
or Barbarians. Most slaves were owned by the state and served as oars-
men in the galleys. Two of the four Moors in the statue were named
Morgiano and Alì. Morgiano was a Turkish Moor from Alger, Alì was
a Turk from Salé.92 The sharp facial expressions and body shapes of
the slave figures are very realistic. Morgiano was considered a beautiful
man at the time. The “black” man was not considered as demoniac, and
there was no racial stereotype according to which the black had to pos-
sess big lips and irregular features, in contrast to the supposed perfection
of the features of the white. There was no clear concept of race in the
sixteenth century, or if it was present, it was not strictly categorised. In
the paintings of the time, it was usually the black woman rather than the
black man who was the beautiful one. Parmigianino’s The Turkish Slave
(1532), representing Isabella d’Este, depicted a young black servant who
was considered beautiful except for her mouth.93
The monument to Ferdinando provides some interesting lessons on
memory and the eighteenth century. Joseph Jérôme de Lalande in his
Voyage en Italie, describing Livorno, is much more impressed by the rep-
resentation of the four slaves than he is by the depiction of the Duke.
De Lalande rates their composition as excellent, especially the faces of
the two older slaves.94 Reactions to Tacca’s work were generally posi-
tive until the nineteenth century. Napoleonic troops entering the city in
1799 described the monument as tyrannical and an insult to humanity.
The French actually liberated the slaves in Livorno in 1799 (although
Napoleon himself restored slavery in the French colonies in 1802). The
statue was politicised by both opponents and supporters of slavery in
the centuries after it appeared. It was subject to increasing criticism as
abolitionism spread through the nineteenth century because it symbol-
ised a stain on European civilisation. It was removed from its original
sixteenth-century context.95 In the Borgo dei Cappuccini in present-day
Livorno, it is easy to find traces of the Turkish community, whether in
the names of hardware stores or “The four Moors” cinema theatre. So,
even though slaves are forgotten in the historiography, physical symbols
of their former presence remain in place.
190 G. BONAZZA
Art history is a very rich source of information on the role that

Muslims played in the Italian regions, and it reveals much about the
extent to which they were integrated; for example, certain sources allow
us to understand how domestic servants and black slaves were perceived.
In a recent article, Maria Vittoria Spissu analyses Maestro di Ardara’s
Natività della Vergine painting, which represents a black female domestic
servant.96 This is a unique scene in Sardinian painting from the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries. According to Spissu, the Moor could have an
exotic connotation, but she could also symbolise a certain multicultural
atmosphere that marked Sardinian society and which we observed in
other areas two centuries later. The author presents other cases in sup-
port of her theory, such as the presence of Jews and a Muslim in the
Predica della Porziuncola, or the case of the Jew Giuda, who was painted
by Maestro di Orzieri. Spissu uses these sources to illustrate the evolu-
tion of the perception of the other in the Catholic world. There is evi-
dence of an attempt to convert and to absorb the diversity.97 Francesco
d’Austria- Este visited Sardinia in 1812 and saw between 80 and 100
slaves working in the streets of Cagliari amid poor conditions.98
The religious cult of black Saints that developed in Sicily and in the
Iberian and Portuguese world was closely linked to slavery. Antonio di
Noto and Benito, two saints from sixteenth-century Palermo, were ini-
tially slaves; it is not clear whether Benito’s parents were free when he
was born, but his family continued to live under the protection of their
former master. Antonio, for his part, was born into a Muslim family in
Cyrenaica and after his capture was sold to an inhabitant of Noto who
employed him as a shepherd. Antonio then joined the Franciscan order
and frequented a community of hermits and while serving the poor in
Noto’s hospital. He is remembered for the miracles he performed dur-
ing his life and because his body was allegedly found intact in 1549, fifty
years after his death.99 Benito’s life story is somewhat similar. In 1589,
just after his death, his hagiography was composed in Palermo, and he
was declared a saint in 1626: Saint Benedetto the Moor.100 That two
black men were declared saints during the sixteenth century is remark-
able. Their fame soon spread to the Iberian Peninsula, where Benito (or
Benedetto) in particular was revered. His body remained in the convent
of Saint Mary of Jesus in Palermo, however. He was quickly adopted as
the saint of all Sicilian blacks, and in the Iberian Peninsula he was the
preferred saint of confraternities in cities with large black populations.
Statues of Saint Benito proliferated in Andalusia, for example, where
there was a significant slave population. In Cadiz, he was celebrated with

a theatrical play representing one of his miracles. The Ordinaria inqui
sition (1594), which considered matters of health, referred to miracles
including the healing of the notary Francesco Musanti from oedema
after touching Benito’s coffin.101
The black confraternity of Granada erected a statue in his hon-
our. Moreover, his fame (and his statues) spread from Palermo in
the Mediterranean world across the Atlantic to as far as Vera Cruz in
Mexico.102 The appeal of the confraternity in Bajío novohispano had an
appeal stretching beyond standard socio-racial limitations; women were
active rather than passive contributors and played a fundamental role as
collectors of donations to the confraternity.103 A confraternity of Saint
Benito was established in Mexico city in 1599, in the Church of Saint
Mary of the Redemption, later the convent of Saint Francesco. The
Confraternity consisted of black African slaves and freemen of mixed
race but they did not mingle happily and there was an attempt to expel
some slaves. Nonetheless, the membership of the Bozales was symbol-
ically important, and their active involvement in religious associations
was a vehicle for social advancement. Though distant from Rome,
the role of these confraternities was not far removed from that of the
House of Catechumens; they aimed to convert slaves and offered them
a chance of freedom.104 The Catholic Spanish monarchy was pleased by
Benito’s popularity in the colonial world. There was a greater urgency
to the spiritual conquest of the new world after the Council of Trent.
Franciscan missionaries displayed roses for slaves during their transpor-
tation as proof of the divine.105 A crown of roses was actually offered
to slaves during the oceanic crossing or on landing in an effort to make
them renounce to their original religions.106 Benito’s popularity was
closely linked to the spread of the rosary in the Americas. In the colo-
nial world, the rosary was considered a gift from heaven, while in Europe
Pope Pio V, a Dominican, characterised it a bastion of Christianity after
it had been adopted as the symbol of the defence of Lepanto in 1571.
In South America, the cult of Benito gained traction in the Brazilian
colonies such as Minas Gerais and Bahia during the eighteenth century.
In Argentina, he attracted followers in Buenos Aires. Benito was beati-
fied in in 1743 and canonised by Pio VII in 1807. In the second half of
the eighteenth century, some holy cards circulated in Lisbon portrayed
him as white. A range of causes claimed the Moorish saint as their own:
Europe’s black population was decreasing, especially in Sicily and Iberia,
192 G. BONAZZA
so the fact that Benito was black seemed to matter less. But his colour
remained vital to the religious syncretism that was so prevalent in the
colonies. Saint Antonio of Noto was relatively anonymous in compari-
son, fading in the Benito’s shadow.107 Equally, religious sites and cere-
monies testified to the Mediterranean’s changing political fortunes and
the associated movements of people. This was certainly the case with
the Sanctuary of Notre-Dame-de-Sante-Cruz in Nîmes in France. The
sanctuary was originally in Orano in Algeria. The city became a presidio
after the Spanish landed there in 1509 and remained so until 1790. The
Spanish were the first foreign minority in Algeria. Orano was then occu-
pied by French in 1831, and after Algeria became part of French ter-
ritory in 1848, the sanctuary ritual spread in France thanks to Spanish
Algerians. The heritage of the Sanctuary in Nîmes is nowadays part of
collective memory, and its Spanish dimension is prominent, even though
the practice originated in Algeria and then made its way to France.108
Rome’s art history and heritage also testifies to the influence of the
Moors. The Moor fountain in Navona Square was created by Giacomo
della Porta in 1575. Pope Innocenzo X Pamphilj commissioned Gian
Lorenzo Bernini to sculpt a mighty Moor figure which appeared at the
centre of the fountain in 1655 and featured a terracotta Moor head
sculpted by Bernini in 1653.109 Representations of black men were also
a feature of the Christian painting tradition in the nineteenth century.
For example, the Roman painter Pietro Gagliardi produced an impor-
tant model in Adorazione dei magi (1847), adorning the Church of
Saint Girolamo degli Schiavoni (see Fig. 4.2). Without any doubt, the
black king represented Africa and the other characters Europe and Asia.
Essentially, the black magus was inserted into the painting in order to
highlight the most relevant Christian celebration. Gagliardi’s wall
painting was one of the decorative works ordered by Pio XI in order
to restore the Papal prestige of the age of Baroque Rome (although
Baroque painting had never ceased). Gagliardi placed himself within
both the popular tradition and the nativity scene style. His black magus
keeps a modest posture. Pope Gregorio XVI belatedly condemned the
slave trade in 1839, but the attitude of the Church towards the aboli-
tionist movement remained ambiguous. In early abolitionism, the Pope
was suspicious and fearful of Protestant influence in early abolitionism
but soon realised that he had to support the movement.110
In acknowledgement of the problem of slavery and the slave trade,
French iconography featured black figures from the second half of the
Fig. 4.2 Pietro Gagliardi, Adorazione dei magi (1847) (Source Chiesa di San
Girolamo dei Croati. Photo courtesy of Bruno Brunelli)
seventeenth century. The first prints with slaves date back to the Histoire
naturelle des Iles Antilles de l’Amérique by Charles de Rochefort (1658)
and to Histoire générale des Antilles habitées par les Français by Father
Du Tertre (1667–1671). Images frequently depicted the works that
slaves had to perform on houses and included a European supervisor
with a hat and a cane. Although the rest of Europe was abandoning the
agrarian theme, eighteenth-century French iconography tended to focus
on agricultural works rather than on slave labour.111
From the nineteenth century, Italian artists paid greater attention
to black people, and the ornamental black man came back into vogue.
This had been a popular motif in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century
France. The images Europeans created of the black slave in the colonies
were sometimes completely imaginary, so a working slave might be pic-
tured in very elegant silk clothes. This betrayed the European notion
194 G. BONAZZA
of the black as both servile and frivolous at the same time. The Nègre
domestique aux isles de l’Amérique coupant des cannes à sucre is a typical
example.112 The image of the black as a commercial good only became
widespread in the second half of the eighteenth century, as the récits
de voyage (travel books) genre blossomed thanks to productions such
as the fifteen volumes of the Histoire générale des Voyages by the Abbé
Prévost (1746–1759). In this painting genre too, the slave or the cap-
tive appears as placid, there is no violence or harsh travelling conditions.
In short, the true role of Europeans in the slave trade is hidden. Only
abolitionist-era art accurately represented the brutality of the trade. This
involved the resurgence of a certain orientalist vogue, but the level of
exoticism and hedonism was more restrained than in eighteenth century,
and consequently more realistic. A classic example and a reminder of the
persistence of the slave trade in the abolitionst era is the Nègres à fond
de cale that the German Johann Moritz Rugendas painted for his Voyage
pittoresque dans le Brésil (1827–1835).113 In the nineteenth century,
abolitionist imagery made its appearance in paintings such as Am I not a
Man and a Brother? or Voyage à l’Isle de France (1773).114
Paintings featuring black servants—perhaps free, perhaps not—were
offered by artists in the Italian regions in the late eighteenth century
and the first half of the nineteenth century. But the abolitionist move-
ment did not find an artistic outlet. French painting was influential in the
Italian states although it took a full century for the focus on the servant
to be replicated. Examples include Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Lechi con
attendente by Giambattista Gigola, dated around 1801 (see Fig. 4.3).115
The Count was born in Brescia in 1766. He was an anti-Venetian revolu-
tionary. In Milan, in July, he enrolled in the Cisalpine Republic (1797).
Rising to the rank of general, he led campaigns in Romagna, Umbria and
Marche, before being appointed as commander by Napoleon in 1799.
Teulié was his adjutant. In the following years, he distanced himself
more and more from Napoleon, moving closer to Gioacchino Murat.
Like many Italian patriots who had tried to expel the invaders, he was
captured. After Murat’s defeat, he had attempted to flee to France, but
he was placed under house arrest in a villa in Monterone, surveilled by
Austrians. In his portrait, this batman is a black man. This batman was
probably free given that invading Napoleonic troops had abolished slav-
ery (temporarily). In the painting, the whiteness of the Count’s visage
is in stark contrast to the darkness of the black man’s face, although the
black man is smiling, as if happy with his position.
Fig. 4.3 Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Lechi con attendente by Giambattista

Gigola (around 1801) (Source Private collection, photograph © Fotostudio
Rapuzzi Brescia)
196 G. BONAZZA
Il Piccio (1842), a portrait by Giovanni Carnovali, represents Count

Giuseppe Manara with his servant. The servant is a young, elegantly
dressed black boy; he is free but in a servile condition (see Fig. 4.4).
A portrait including a black servant is typical of the exotic taste
eighteenth-century visual culture. The black servant only started to
appear in Italian portraiture in the nineteenth century, however. The
Enlightenment deeply influenced the history of art and the non-exotic
subjects that were mainstays of the period included the produc-
tion of luxury goods, the political use of arts in relation to the French
Revolution, scientific and technological advances, and the stories and
theories of travellers, intellectuals and philosophers. Exoticism was the
central characteristic of most European art, however, whether Catholic,
Protestant or Orthodox in origin. The aesthetic taste of the day, driven
by public curiousity, demanded images of black people. But the overrid-
ing urge of public curiousity should not conceal the fact that there were
also ethical elements to this fashion.116 For example, in 1787 in Great
Britain, Josiah Wedgwood, a famous producer of pottery, represented in
relief a chained black man with the caption: “Am I Not a Man and a
Brother?”117 So, abolitionist sensibility also influenced art. In this case,
Wedgwood was a member of William Wilberforce’s Society of London.
Abolitionist painting was transnational. The paintings discussed above
demonstrated this abolitionist link and followed the French lead: Count
Giuseppe Manara’s black servant, for instance, was redolent of the black
servant portrayed by Maurice Quentin De La Tour in the Giovane negro
che si abbottona la camicia (1741).118 The servant is dressed elegantly
but his posture is meditative and he exudes modesty, suggesting that
the painter holds the character in high esteem. The attention devoted
to the black “other” seems to be explorative rather than derisory,
whether the servant is a slave or a freeman. Paintings produced in the
Italian regions at this time also illustrate the presence of black servants
among noble families. Again, they may have been slaves or freemen.
The Neapolitan painter Vincenzo Marinelli’s mid-nineteenth century
La Danse de l’abeille represents a naked black woman dancing sensually
during an exhibition. She is in the centre of the painting and surrounded
by a large group of spectators, some of whom are playing musical instru-
ments while others work on textiles (see Fig. 4.5). Marinelli lived as a
political exile in Egypt after the 1848 Revolution. He produced this
piece in 1862, after his return to Naples. Marinelli encountered a new
world in Egypt, far from the classics, and the oriental subjects before him
Fig. 4.4 Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Manara con servitore by Giovanni

Carnovali detto il Piccio (1842) (Source C. Caversazzi, Giovanni Carnovali detto
il Piccio, Bergamo, Istituto italiano d’arti grafiche, 1933, tav. XXX)
198 G. BONAZZA
Fig. 4.5 Il ballo dell’ape nell’harem by Vincenzo Marinelli (1862) (Source

Napoli, Ministero per i beni e le attività culturali—Museo e Real Bosco di
Capodimonte, photograph © archivio dell’arte | pedicini fotografi)
seemed to provide an escape from to the conventions of mythological

scenes. The dancing black woman is an example of exoticism but with
a sense of naturalness rather than the inferiority of the “other”.119 The
painting could represent a choreographic intermission during an art
exhibition, as musicians and singers are relegated to the background.
Marinelli uses the pretext of the bee dance as a means to gather many
exotic figures around the black woman.120
The instances of slavery unearthed by this research involved full,
unmitigated cases of slavery. Evidence of their former presence is extant
not only in archival sources but in street names and in our artistic her-
itage. Present-day perspectives on slavery are probably the result of the
interplay between history and memory that has been hotly debated in
the historiography of the last thirty years. The process involves restoring
a voice to people whose stories were not told and describing lives that
went unrecorded.
We have considered how intellectuals, public opinion and jurists

viewed slaves in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and we traced
the last slaves held in the Italian states, looking at their names, their liv-
ing conditions and how they were represented artistically, all in order to
obtain a more comprehensive understanding of their lived experience.
Like abolitionism, the painting and architectural landscapes were also
transnational. Outside of the debate on the commercial aspects of slavery
and the slave trade, paintings and architectural remains have been some-
what overlooked by historians working on the Italian regions. The inter-
vention of memory, however, in the form of street names and through
institutional sites of memory, including archives, has allowed us to recon-
struct a more detailed mosaic of the lives of slaves in the Italian states.
Notes
1. Ana Lucia Araujo, “Welcome the Diaspora: Slave Trade Heritage
Tourism and the Public Memory of Slavery,” Ethnologies 32, no. 2
(2010): 145–178.
2. Myriam Cottias, Elisabeth Cunin, and Antonio De Almeida Mendes,
ed., Les traites et les esclavages. Perspectives historiques et contemporaines
(Paris: Éditions Karthala, 2010).
3. Cottias, Cunin, and Antonio De Almeida Mendes, Les traites et les esclav
ages, 3.
4. Salvatore Bono, Schiavi. Una storia mediterranea (XVI–XIX secolo)
(Bologna: Mulino, 2016), 9.
5. Myriam Cottias, Antonio Stella, and Bernard Vincent, ed., Esclavages et
dépendances serviles. Histoire comparée (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2006), 13.
6. Raffaella Sarti refers also to the purchase of a slave in Bologna in 1858.
Raffaella Sarti, “Tramonto di schiavitù sulle tracce degli ultimi schiavi
presenti in Italia (secolo XIX),” in Alle radici dell’Europa. Mori giudei
e zingari nei paesi del Mediterraneo occidentale, vol. 2, sec. XVII–XIX,
ed. Felice Gambin (Firenze: SEID, 2010), 291.
7. Bono, Schiavi, 25.
8. Joel Quirk, “La schiavitù e le forme ‘minori’ d’asservimento in prospet-
tiva giuridico-storica,” Mondo Contemporaneo 2 (2015: 113).
9. Gabriele Turi, Schiavi in un mondo libero. Storia dell’emancipazione
dall’età moderna a oggi (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2012), 15.
10. Maria Luisa Pesante, Come servi. Figure del lavoro salariato dal diritto
naturale all’economia politica (Milano: Franco Angeli, 2013), 9.
11. Cottias, Stella, and Vincent, Esclavages et dépendances serviles. Histoire
comparée, 15.
200 G. BONAZZA
12. Pesante, Come servi. Figure del lavoro salariato dal diritto naturale
all’economia politica, 11.
13. Pesante, Come servi. Figure del lavoro salariato dal diritto naturale
all’economia politica, 13.
14. The Code Noir was a juridical document—consisting of around sixty
articles and composed in 1685, during the reign of Louis XIV—that
regulated the jurisdiction on slaves. See Louis Sala-Molins, Le Code
Noir, ou le calvaire de Canaan (Paris: Puf, 1987/2007), 7.
15. Immanuel Kant, Die Metaphysik der Sitten, 345; trans. Italian and
quoted in Gustavo Gozzi, Diritti e civiltà. Storia e filosofia del diritto
internazionale (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2010), 104.
16. Ugo Grozio, Mare Liberum, ed. Francesca Izzo (Napoli: Liguori
Editore, 2007), 16.
17. Thomas Raynal, Histoire philosophique et politique des etablissements
et du commerce des Europeens dans le des deux Indes, trans. Alessandro
Pandolfi, Storia delle due Indie (Milano: Rizzoli, 2010), 481.
18. See Chapter 3, paragraph 3.3.
comparée, 11.
comparée, 13.
25. Turi, Schiavi in un mondo libero, 17. On the problem of the transition
from slavery to coerced labour, see Célyne Flory, De l’esclavage à la
liberté forcée. Histoire des travailleurs africains engagés dans la Caraïbe
française au XIXe siècle (Paris: Karthala, 2015), 31.
26. Marina Lalatta Costerbosa, “Kant e la teoria delle razze,” Filosofia
Politica XVII, no. 3 (December 2003): 387.
27. Lalatta Costerbosa, “Kant e la teoria delle razze,” 390–391.
28. Lalatta Costerbosa, “Kant e la teoria delle razze,” 392.
29. Lalatta Costerbosa, “Kant e la teoria delle razze,” 394.
30. Aaron Garrett and Silvia Sebastiani, “David Hume on Race,” in The
Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Race, ed. Naomi Zack (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2017), 31.
31. Garret and Sebastiani, “David Hume on Race,” 37.
32. Garret and Sebastiani, “David Hume on Race,” 42.
33. Robert Palter, “Hume and Prejudice,” Hume Studies XXI, no. 1 (April
1995): 4.
34. Charles-Louis de Secondat de Montesquieu, Lo spirito delle leggi, vol. I,

Lib. XV, cap. III, trans. Beatrice Boffito Serra (Milano: Rizzoli [1989],
6th ed., 2004), 293.
35. Jean-Frédéric Schaub and Silvia Sebastiani, “Between Genealogy and
Physicality: A Historiographical Perspective on Race in the Ancien
Régime,” Graduate Faculty Philosphy Journal 35, no. 1–2 (2014): 26.
36. Piero Costa, Civitas. Storia della Cittadinanza in Europa. La civiltà lib
erale, vol. 3. (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2001), 407.
37. Costa, Civitas, 459.
38. Schaub and Sebastiani, “Between Genealogy and Physicality,” 24.
39. Pierre-Henri Boulle, Race et esclavage dans la France de l’Ancien Régime
(Paris: Perrin, 2007), 19.
40. Boulle, Race et esclavage, 86.
41. Déclaration du roi du 15 décembre 1738, in Boulle, Race et esclavage, 89.
42. Boulle, Race et esclavage, 93.
43. Antonio De Almeida Mendes, “Esclavage et race au Portugal: une expéri-
ence de longue durée,” in Myriam Cottias and Hebe Mattos, Esclavage
et subjectivité dans l’Atlantique luso-brésilien et français (XVIIe–XXe
siècles) (Brésil and France: Open Edition Press, 2016), 67.
44. De Almeida Mendes, “Esclavage et race au Portugal: une expérience de
longue durée,” 68.
45. See Chapter 2, paragraph 2.3.
46. Antologia, (April, May, June, 1824), tomo 14, Firenze Al Gabinetto sci-
entifico e letterario di G. P. Vieusseux, 144.
50. Herbert S. Klein, The Atlantic Slave Trade (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2010), 11.
55. See Supra Chapter 3.
56. Alberto Vieira, “Sugar Islands: The Sugar Economy of Madeira and the
Canaries, 1450–1650,” in Tropical Babylons: Sugar and the Making
of the Atlantic World, 1450–1650, ed. Stuart B. Schwartz (Chapel
Hill and London: The University of North Carolina Press, 2004),
64–65; Antonio De Almeida Mendes, Le premier atlantique portugais
entre deux Méditerranées (XVe–XVIe siècles). Comment les Africains
ont développé le Vieux Monde, in Les esclavages en Méditerranée.
202 G. BONAZZA
Espaces et dynamoques économiques, ed. Fabienne P. Guillén and Salah

Trabelsi (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez), 167.
57. Antonio De Almeida Mendes, “Les réseaux de la triate ibérique dans
l’Atlantique nord (1440–1640),” Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales 64,
no. 4 (2008): 753.
58. De Almeida Mendes, “Les réseaux de la triate ibérique dans l’Atlantique
nord (1440–1640),” 748.
59. De Almeida Mendes, “Les réseaux de la triate ibérique dans l’Atlantique
nord (1440–1640),” 745.
60. Olivier Leservoisier and Salah Trabelsi, ed., Résistances et mémoires des
esclavages. Espaces arabo-musulmans et transatlantiques (Paris: Karthala-
Ciresc, 2014), 15.
61. Paolo Jedlowski, “Memoria pubblica e colonialismo italiano,”
Storicamente 7 (2011): 1.
62. Nicola Labanca, “Post-colonial Italy: The Case of a Small and Belated
Empire: From Strong Emotions to Post-colonial Italy,” in Memories of
Post-imperial Nations: The Aftermath of Decolonization, 1945–2013, ed.
Dietmar Rothermund (Delhi: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 120.
63. Nicola Labanca, Oltremare. Storia dell’espansione coloniale italiana
64. Interview by Gianluca Gabrielli to Nicola Labanca, “Il passato coloniale:
una storia complessa,” Educazione Interculturale 11, no. 3 (2013): 344.
On the histoire événementielle see Paul Ricoeur, “Le retour de l’Événe-
ment,” Mélanges de l’Ecole française de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée,
tome 104, no. 1 (1992), 29.
65. Gabrielli and Labanca, “Il passato coloniale: una storia complessa,” 348.
On the historiography of Italian colonialism see Labanca, Oltremare.
Storia dell’espansione coloniale italiana (Bologna: Mulino, 2002);
Angelo Del Boca, Gli Italiani in Africa Orientale, 4 vols. (Roma-Bari:
Laterza, 1976–1984); Teobaldo Filesi, L’Africa in La storiografia ital
iana degli ultimi vent’anni, vol. III, Età contemporanea, ed. Luigi De
Rosa (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1989); Riccardo Bottoni, ed., L’Impero
fascista. Italia ed Etiopia (1935–1941) (Bologna: il Mulino, 2008),
287–321.
66. Labanca, Oltremare, 13.
67. Alice Bellagamba, “Introduzione. Dopo la schiavitù,” Mondo
Contemporaneo 2 (2015): 7.
68. I wish to thank Dr. Franca Acerenza di Galata of the Sea Museum of
Genoa for advising on this issue.
69. Tzvetan Todorov, “La mémoire devant l’histoire,” Terrain, no. 25 (1995):
101, http://terrain.revues.org/2854 (consulted on 2 May 2016).
70. Todorov, “La mémoire devant l’histoire,” 101.
71. Pierre Nora, “Entre Mémoire et Histoire. La problématique des lieux,”

in Les lieux de mémoire. I. La République, ed. Pierre Nora (Paris:
Gallimard, 1984), XIX.
72. Nora, “Entre Mémoire et Histoire. La problématique des lieux,” XXIV.
73. Pierre Nora, L’avènement mondial de la mémoire, « Eurozine » (April 2002),
https://www.eurozine.com/lavenement-mondial-de-la-memoire/.
74. Yvan Combeau, “Entre l’Histoire et la Mémoire,” in Du vrai au juste: la
mémoire, l’histoire et l’oubli, ed. Michèle Baussant (Laval: Les Presses de
l’Université Laval, 2006), 27.
75. Pierre Nora, L’avènement mondial de la mémoire, in “Eurozine” (April
2002), https://www.eurozine.com/lavenement-mondial-de-la-memoire/.
76. Antonis Liakos, “Il passato come utopia e il desiderio di storia,” in
Nostalgia. Memoria e passaggi tra le sponde dell’Adriatico, ed. Rolf Petri
(Roma-Venezia: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, Centro Tedesco di
Studi Veneziani, 2010), 67.
77. Paolo Sorcinelli, “Suggestioni della memoria e riflessioni storiografiche,”
Storia e Futuro, no. 23 (June 2010): 3.
78. Nicola Labanca, “L’Africa italiana,” in I luoghi di memoria. Simboli e
miti dell’Italia unita, ed. Mario Isnenghi (Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1996),
259.
79. Labanca, “L’Africa italiana,” 264.
80. Paul Ricoeur, La memoria, la storia, l’oblio, trans., Daniella Iannotta
(Milano: Raffaello Cortina Editore, 2003), 99.
81. Michèle Baussant, “La mémoire, l’histoire et l’oubli de P. Ricoeur ou la
notion de ‘juste mémoire’,” in Du vrai au juste: la mémoire, l’histoire et
l’oubli, ed. Michèle Baussant (Laval: Les Presses de l’Université Laval,
2006), 20.
82. Bogumil Jewsiewicki, “Héritages et réparations en quête d’une justice
pour le passé ou le présent,” Cahiers d’études africaines, nos. 173–174
(2004): 9.
83. Jewsiewicki, “Héritages et réparations en quête d’une justice pour le
passé ou le présent,” 13.
84. Bogumil Jewsiewicki, “La mémoire est-elle soluble dans l’esthètique?,”
Le Débat, no. 147 (2007): 175.
85. Gianluca Gatta and Giusy Muzzopappa, “Middle Passages, musealizzazi-
one e soggettività a Bristol e Lampedusa,” Estetica, studi e ricerche, no. 1
(2012): 168, Luciano Editore.
86. Gatta and Muzzopappa, “Middle Passages,” 174.
87. Gatta and Muzzopappa, “Middle Passages,” 176.
88. h ttp://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/ism/slavery/europe/black_
people.aspx (consulted on 5 March 2016).
204 G. BONAZZA
89. h ttp://memorial.nantes.fr/le-memorial/decouvrir-le-memorial/
(consulted on 5 March 2016).
90. Steven F. Ostrow, “Pietro Tacca and His Quattro Mori: The Beauty and
Identity of the Slaves,” in Artibus et Historiae 71, no. XXXVI (2015):
145. On the Monumento a Ferdinando I, known as “of the Four
Moors” see Lucia Frattarelli Fischer, “La città medicea,” in Storia illus
trata di Livorno, ed. Olimpia Vaccari, Lucia Frattarelli Fischer, Carlo
Mangio, GianGiacomo Panessa, and Maurizio Bettini (Pisa: Pacini
Editore 2006/2010), 68.
91. Ostrow, “Pietro Tacca and His Quattro Mori: The Beauty and Identity
of the Slaves,” 148.
94. Joseph Jérôme de Lalande, Voyage en Italie, vol. 2 (Ginevra, 1790), 418.
96. Maria Vittoira Spissu, “Il nemico oltremarino come alterità integrata?
Casi di ebrei e musulmani nei retabli di Sardegna (1492–1556),” in
Identidades cuestionadas. Corxistencia y conflictos interreligiosos en el
Mediterràneo (ss. XIV–XVIII), ed. Borja Franco Llopis, Bruno Pomara
Saverino, Manuel Lomas Cortés, and Barbara Ruiz Bejarano (València:
Universitat de València, 2016), 337 and 355. On the visual representa-
tion of the moriscos see Franco Llopis, “Identidades ‘reales’, identidades
creadas, identidades superpuestas. Alguna reflexions artisticas sobre los
moriscos, su representaciòn visual y la concepciòn que los cristianos vie-
jos tuveron de ella, in Identidades cuestionadas. Corxistencia y conflic-
tos interreligiosos en el Mediterràneo (ss. XIV–XVIII),” in Identidades
cuestionadas. Corxistencia y conflictos interreligiosos en el Mediterràneo
(ss. XIV–XVIII), ed. Borja Franco Llopis, Bruno Pomara Saverino,
Manuel Lomas Cortés, and Barbara Ruiz Bejarano (València: Universitat
de València, 2016), 286.
97. Spissu, “Il nemico oltremarino come alterità integrata?,” 355.
99. Bernard Vincent, “Le culte des saints noirs dans le monde ibérique,”
in Ritos y ceremonies en el mundo hispàno durante la Edad Moderna,
ed. David Gonzalez Cruz (Huelva: Universidad de Huelva, 2002),
122–123.
100. Riccardo Rosolino, “Le reti sociali della santità: notai, giudici e testimoni
al processo di canonizzazione de Benedetto il Moro (1625–1626),”
in Il santo patrono e la città. San Benedetto il Moro: culti, devozioni,
strategie di età moderna, ed. Giovanna Fiume (Venezia: Marsilio,

2000), 253.
101. Rosolino, “Le reti sociali della santità: notai, giudici e testimoni al pro-
cesso di canonizzazione de Benedetto il Moro (1625–1626),” 255.
102. Vincent, “Le culte des saints noirs dans le monde ibérique,” 125.
103. Rafael Castañeda García, “Piedad y participación femenina en la con-
fradìa de negros y mulatos de San Benito de Palermo en el Bajío
novohispano, siglo XVIII,” Nuevo Mundo Mundos Nuevos, https://nue-
vomundo.revues.org/64478 (consulted on 23 April 2016).
104. Cristina Veronica Masferrer León, “Por las ànimas de negro bozales.
Las cofradías de personas de origen africano en la ciudad de México
(siglo XVII),” Cuicuilco 18, no. 51 (May–August 2011), México,
http://www.scielo.org.mx/scielo.php?script=sci_ar ttext&pi
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105. Alessandro Dell’Aira, “Il Santo nero e il rosario: devozione e rappre-
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106. Dell’Aira, “Il Santo nero e il rosario: devozione e rappresentazione,” 172.
107. Vincent, “Le culte des saints noirs dans le monde ibérique,” 126.
108. Michèle Baussant, “Des objets à histoire pour un espace sans « mémoire » .
Des pèlerins entre Oran et Nîmes,” Mélanges de la Casa de Velàzquez 40,
no. 1 (2010): 79.
109. http://www.sovraintendenzaroma.it/mecenati_per_roma/fontana_del_
moro_a_piazza_navona (consulted on 14 March 2016); http://www.
museopalazzovenezia.beniculturali.it/index.php?it/129/ricerca-nel-cat-
alogo/139/testa-di-moro (consulted on 14 March 2016).
110. Hugh Honour, L’image du noir dans l’art occidental, vol. IV-2, De la
révolution américaine à la première guerre mondiale (Paris: Gallimard,
1989), 183–184.
111. Danielle Bégot, “L’image du Noir dans l’iconographie française de la
traite et de l’esclavage, de la seconde moitié du XVIIe siècle au milieu
du XIXe siècle. Enjeux et discours,” in Les traites et les esclavages.
Perspectives historiques et contemporaines, ed. Myriam Cottias, Elisabeth
Cunin, and Antonio De Almeida Mendes (Paris: Éditions Karthala,
2010), 310.
112. Nègre domestique aux isles de l’Amérique coupant des cannes à sucre,
Dessin aquarellé, XVIIIe siècle (38 × 24.5 cm), BNF, Estampes, Of-4d-
Fol, see http://expositions.bnf.fr/lumieres/grand/229.htm (consulted
on 14 March 2016).
113. Nègres à fond de cale, in Voyage pittoresque dans le Brésil, Johann Moritz
Rugendas, auteur, Paris, Ed. Egelman, 1835. BNF, département
206 G. BONAZZA
Philosophie, histoire, sciences de l’homme, GR FOL-PX-186, http://

expositions.bnf.fr/montesquieu/grand/ess_215.htm (consulted on 14
March 2016).
114. Bégot, “L’image du Noir dans l’iconographie française de la traite et de
l’esclavage, de la seconde moitié du XVIIe siècle au milieu du XIXe siè-
cle. Enjeux et discours,” 318.
115. Adriano Cera, ed., La pittura neoclassica italiana (Milano: Longanesi,
1987), tav. 424. I wish to thank the Library of Art History of Genoa for
recovering the sources, especially Doctor Paolo Arduino for his courtesy.
116. Orietta Rossi Pinelli, Il secolo della ragione e delle rivoluzioni. La cultura
visiva nel settecento europeo, Torino, UTET, 2000, 149.
117. Rossi Pinelli, Il secolo della ragione e delle rivoluzioni, 155.
118. Rossi Pinelli, Il secolo della ragione e delle rivoluzioni, 156.
119. Honour, L’image du noir dans l’art occidental, vol. IV-2, 164–165.
120. Honour, L’image du noir dans l’art occidental, vol. IV-2, 165.
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CHAPTER 5
Conclusion: Abolitionism
and the Continuity of Slavery
Despite the affirmation of the great principles of abolitionism in Italian

states, forms of slavery survived there for an extended period. The juridi-
cal abolitions of slavery in these states were usually imposed and influenced
by external powers, namely Great Britain and France. Rather than being
the result of internal reflection, these changes were closely connected with
evolving international juridical norms regarding the abolitions of the vari-
ous slave trades. The relationship between transnational abolitionism and
philosophical and public debate on the subject in the Italian states had
something of a reciprocal dimension to it and was not entirely unilateral.
The transnational movement certainly had a fundamental impact on Italian
intellectuals, but they in turn contributed to the transnational debate.
The Italian pre-unitarian codes, with some exception, did not
expressly punish the exercise of slavery but concentrated instead on the
rape of women and minors. Only in the Napoleonic period did specific
articles of law prohibiting kidnapping and slavery emerge. Slaves were
sometimes freed by acclamation by Napoleon or by his troops with-
out an abolitionist law necessarily being in place, such as happened in
the Ligurian Republic. Napoleon, even though he re-established slav-
ery in the French colonies in 1802, adopted the policy of liberation in
the pre-unitarian Italian states. After the Napoleonic era, slavery was
re-established in some cases, but the French influence remained strong in
the juridical codes of the majority of Italian states during the Restoration
period. Nonetheless, slavery sometimes endured even where the legal
code expressly forbade it. Theoretically, changes to the law had put an

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3_5
212 G. BONAZZA
end to slavery in the Italian states. In practice, slavery persisted in some

instances until the mid-nineteenth century, as was the case in Naples.
In the case of the Papal States, Rome’s House of the Catechumens
(the archives of which indicate the continuing presence of slaves
there in the nineteenth century) was closed after the creation of the
Roman Republic (1798–1799). Pio VII reopened the House of the
Catechumens in 1800, and it maintained its activities after the inclu-
sion of Rome in the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy. Later, during the
Restoration period, the House continued its work and the last verifia-
ble cases of slaves being baptised there date to 1825. Napoleonic influ-
ence was minimal in the Bourbon Kingdom of Sicily, and it was not until
1819 that a French-like code abolished slavery there; in fact, feudalism
had only been abolished by the 1812 constitution.
In the Kingdom of Naples, the penal laws issued by Giuseppe
Bonaparte in 1808 were explicit in respect of slavery. This is a prime
example of how the influence of foreign codes helped to impose more
specific laws regulating the forms of slavery which still existed in the
Italian states. After the Napoleonic intervention, Naples subscribed to
the international treaties on the abolition of slavery in 1839. The first
Italian state penal code that was an internal innovation rather than
an external imposition by invading forces was the Grand Duchy of
Tuscany’s (1853). In 1827, in the context of privateering, Carlo Felice of
Savoia issued a penal code for the Mercantile Navy, including two articles
on pillaging. International laws banned privateering in 1856, coinciding
with the end of the Crimean War.
In the first half of the nineteenth century, and particularly so from
the time of the Congress of Vienna, the Papal States proclaimed sup-
port for international abolitionist policy and maintained an anti-slavery
position, repeatedly condemning the black trade. However, from the
juridical point of view, the position of the Church remained ambigu-
ous, and it seems that slavery was not prohibited within the Papal States
until the nineteenth century, although some regulatory measures had
been adopted even under the ancien régime. So, there were still slaves in
Rome only seven years before the Congress of Vienna and they remained
in the Papal States even after Vienna. There was a stark contradiction
between the Papal States’ support for universal rights in the international
arena and their own domestic practices.
Another interesting aspect concerns the place of slavery in the wider
Italian political climate of the first half of the nineteenth century.
5 CONCLUSION: ABOLITIONISM AND THE CONTINUITY OF SLAVERY 213
For instance, in the Sub-Alpine Parliament, Deputies Domenico Farini

and Paolo Farina debated the need for an anti-slavery law in the
Kingdom of Sardinia (1853). The disagreement between Farina and
Farini shows that there was no unanimous definition or interpretation
of slavery in the mid-nineteenth century. They could not even agree on
whether or not slavery existed in Piedmont. The regulation of coercion
in the 1889 Code, the Zanardelli Code of the Kingdom of Italy, nat-
urally drew from the pre-unitarian codes but it was heavily influenced
by the proceedings of the Congress of Berlin in 1884 when Italy sub-
scribed to newly accepted international norms on the abolition of slav-
ery. Anti-slavery legislation was still evolving during the government of
Prime Minister Francesco Crispi. This was the point at which Italy signed
important agreements with England on the definitive abolition of the
trade. The process by which the Italian states and then the unified Italy
involved themselves in the international treaties of the nineteenth cen-
tury can be traced step-by-step through diplomatic documents. On 22
November 1816, for example, Sardinia subscribed to rights of inspection
that had been agreed as the final item at the Congress of Vienna on 9
June 1815; 1889 was key, however, and the Italian-British anti-slavery
agreement of that year was extensive in scope and provided perhaps the
most interesting reflection on the definition of slavery offered at the
time. In ambiguous fashion, article 5 stated that “the crime of trade will
be considered as committed if a slave is treated as such on the ship”.1
The implication is that slavery was characterised as a condition with var-
ying levels. So, still at the end of the nineteenth century, the formal abo-
litions of slavery in Italian area, whether internally inspired or externally
agreed, clashed with the reality of persistent slavery. Transnational ele-
ment of the abolitionist debate was made its presence felt in the Italian
states through operettas, university lessons and the press, as well as
through Vieusseux’s Antologia. The focus of the debate was the Atlantic
trade and occasionally the question of Christian slaves in Barbary States
as opposed to slavery in Italian states or Europe more generally.
The purpose of this research on cases of slavery was not specifi-
cally to generate quantitative data, but the statistics it has produced
are particularly useful. Between 1802 and 1812, 410 slaves transited
through Palermo, Trapani and Capua. Some of these slaves were never
exchanged, while others spent extended spells in captivity. Their living
conditions could vary to a certain degree, but not dramatically: some of
them, such as the marabout Scerif, lived freely in the city of Palermo;
214 G. BONAZZA
others were prisoners in fortresses. Black slaves did not suffer discrimi-
nation in terms of worse treatment than others but their monetary value
was comparatively low, as was their exchange rate for other slaves.
In Naples, slavery persisted until at least 1845. More precisely, a bap-
tism register evidences 21 cases of slavery after 1783. The interesting
cases Pasquale, a slave who was born to an African slave on a Portuguese
vessel, and Carlo Tomasi, a “savage” from Patagonia, demonstrate that
the Atlantic and Mediterranean trades were intertwined. In the con-
text of baptism and conversion, it has emerged that the most impor-
tant Neapolitan families bestowed their family name to converted slaves.
A new name could lead to a new identity, illustrating the free and unfree
interactions between master, state and captives or slaves.2
There were still 13 slaves in Caserta in 1800, although this num-
ber had decreased substantially since 1760, when 160 baptised slaves
were present. The majority of slaves were baptised. Baptism was useful to
slaves as it offered hope of better living conditions. Joseph Dolat was the
catechist priest who prepared catechumens in the Ercole district, which
was the slave quarter and where slaves had their own dedicated chapel.3
Slaves who were not baptised were not allowed to live in the Ercole
district and had to live in worse conditions elsewhere. The slaves
who worked on the construction of the Palace of Caserta experienced
the same living conditions as forced labourers and other participants on
the building site. They could go to the tavern, and they were supplied
with a certain, albeit fairly miserable, level of food and clothing. Their
living standards may have been better than those of prisoners, but they
suffered the same lack of freedom.
The Liber Battizzatorum records 26 cases of baptism in Rome. When
we consider the other source consulted in the archive of the Curacy of
Rome, the total number is 29. Moreover, taking into consideration the
Soldatesche e Galere in the State Archives of Rome—and that one case
can be found in both archives (Soldatesche e Galere and archive of the
Vicariato of Rome), as well as the fact that slaves could be sold after a
short time on galleys—we can estimate that a total of 208 slaves were in
Rome between 1750 and 1808.4 To conclude, I can state that slavery in
the Papal States was not just a residual phenomenon at the end of the
eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century.
The religious and economic implications of conversion and the
master–slave bond were not static. To a certain extent, they were matters
of convenience, and they changed in accordance with circumstances.
In the context of pontifical galleys especially, the master–slave relation-

ship with respect to Catholic intermediaries seemed to fluctuate due to
the conceptual connection between slaves as “public property” or “pri-
vate property”. Furthermore, the connection between religion and slav-
ery in the Mediterranean was fundamental: the Muslim slave in Rome
was both a worker and a living demonstration of the mixing of cultures,
like Christian slaves in Tunis. For this reason, conversion was a way to
show the superiority of one religion over another. It was not just a mat-
ter of simple economic exploitation. Baptism was at times imposed but
was also sometimes a free choice made by a slave who hoped to improve
his status. In this sense, the decision to be baptised could be considered a
form of slave agency.
The Governatore collection in the State Archives of Livorno demon-
strates the presence of 48 slaves there until 1816. The Bagno had ceased
to function as a prison in 1750 but it was still referred to by the same
title many decades later.5 The Magistrato delle galee collection in the
State Archives of Genoa shows that until 1793 there were still around
160 slaves in the city. From 1791 to 1793, there were four galleys: Sain
Mary, Raggia, Saint George and Capitana.6 The number of slaves in each
galley could change daily, as statistics on the food consumed on each gal-
ley testify. Salvatore Bono generated data on the San Bernardo galley for
1651 (there were 58 slaves among 185 men on the galley),7 which shows
that the absolute number of slaves in Genoa between 1791 and 1793
was fairly consistent, with numbers falling only slightly. In August 1793,
there were 35 slaves among the 228 men on the Saint Mary galley. None
of the four galleys varied greatly in terms of crew numbers over the three
years in question.
The picture that emerges from the cases of slavery referenced here
is quite composite. At first glance, these cases might be categorised as
part of the history of Mediterranean slavery exclusively but closer anal-
ysis reveals that they go beyond the bi-univocal relationship between
the Muslim and Christian worlds that was conducted across the
Mediterranean. In fact, they show how the Mediterranean world, rather
than being isolated from the Ottoman, African and Atlantic worlds, was
closely connected to them. Among other fundamental problems, bap-
tism and conversion were common practices in our locations of interest
(with the exception of Genoa and Palermo) although it should also be
noted that slaves arrived at the House of the Catechumens in Rome from
a range of territories outside the Papal States. Another indication of the
216 G. BONAZZA
complexity of the situation is the taxonomy or the categories that were

used in order to describe slaves. They were not just referred to as slaves
or Turks in the sources.
On the religious front, baptism was not a guarantee of freedom but a
step towards it. Therefore, a state of uncertainty prevailed after baptism,
when the newly baptised slave found himself between the free and unfree
condition. Post-slavery, freedom as we perceive it in the traditional jurid-
ical sense did not necessarily materialise. The question of subsistence
post-baptism is another problem; sources seem to suggest that in Rome
slaves started to earn money after baptism and could probably therefore
eventually pay their own ransoms. This was a similar mechanism to that
which British abolitionists suggested for colonial slaves, i.e. a transition
period between the unfree and the free condition. There were probably
more slaves who were converted to Christianity and integrated (or, more
accurately, assimilated), than who managed to return to their homeland.
There was a rich variety of terms used to identify and describe
slaves: Maomettan black woman, Circassian Turks, turca nigra (black
turk), regione nigrorum (black region), schismatic Armenian; this is a
clear demonstration that slavery was very varied and categories tended
towards ethnic rather than religious characterisations. The word nigra
was frequently used in order to distinguish slaves of different skin tones.
Whether or not racial dynamics were at play, black slaves were clearly rec-
ognised and distinguished, whereas some ethnicities were defined more
generally, such as Maomettan Turks. The emphasis on the ethnic element
is particularly important because a “black” man remained as such after
baptism and after the achievement of freedom. Therefore, like baptism,
definitions and categorisations of slaves demonstrate that it is necessary
to extend our thinking beyond the binary concept of freedom-unfree-
dom. Moreover, a Moor was certainly a person of colour, but he was not
necessarily a Muslim; in fact, he could also be a “black” African.
In this sense, we can observe that there was no particular differen-
tiation between men and women. In onomastic terms, it seems that in
contrast with the cases of baptised Muslims found by Jocelyne Dakhlia in
France—where the neophyte’s geographical origin or history was alluded
to beside their new name (Amet Maroque: Amet from Morroco), and
where sometimes the new name/surname was simply an altered version
of the original name—in the Italian area only the new name was main-
tained. In the cases uncovered here, given the involvement of slaves, it
seems reasonable to suspect that more prominence was attached to the
new name and the idea of rebirth so as to hide the past of the slave-
man. Free converts from Islam, on the other hand, simply wished to be
baptised rather than to forget their origins. Sometimes, the geographi-
cal specification was wrong or extremely broad. In Naples, former slaves
acquired the surname of the godfather who was almost always the mem-
ber of a Neapolitan noble family or the owner of a ship. In the Roman
House of the Catechumens, where some of the slaves came from outside
the Papal States, the surname they acquired was often that of one of the
cardinals or bishops.
Individuals who remained enslaved in one of the Italian states even
after abolition were ignored by internal jurisdiction, and their existence
was sometimes either barely recorded or their real status was obscured.
After the Congress of Vienna, on the other hand, the public debate
on slavery focused on the Atlantic trade. The Mediterranean trade was
largely overlooked, while Italian slavery just did not feature. Public opin-
ion and governments in the Italian states were influenced by the great
powers, in primis by Great Britain, the main sponsor of international
abolitionism. Obviously, French rule deeply influenced the juridical
debate in the Italian states and, as we observed, Napoleon freed slaves in
some cities, such as in Genoa and Livorno.
The abolitionist movement campaigned in Europe for more than a
century, from the dawn of the Enlightenment to the second half of the
nineteenth century, reaching its apogee with the Brussels International
Conference of 1889, the last of the abolitionist conferences that took
place within our timeframe. In reality, slavery, in all its various forms,
has never been completely defeated, and as Alice Bellagamba argues, it is
necessary to ponder the real meaning of the term post-slavery.8
A final point on European slavery is that it repeatedly turned into
other systems of serfdom and forced labour. Even though abolition-
ist sentiment was widely expressed through abolitionist societies, in the
press and in philosophical debate, and even though European (includ-
ing Italian) legislation often reflected abolitionist will, the phenomenon
of slavery persisted. I would suggest that Mediterranean slavery stopped
before other trades because it was less significant in terms of geopolitics
and commerce than its colonial equivalent. Both Mediterranean slavery
and the Atlantic trade gave way to the imperialist assault on Africa and
Asia. The “politics of principle” and “affairs of state” were often incom-
patible. Constitutional charters produced in the wake of the French
218 G. BONAZZA
Revolution, but inspired by the liberal tradition of the seventeenth cen-

tury, proclaimed the equality of all men. But the concept of universal-
ity faced was at odds with the concept of particularity. The two could
not co-exist without cost, and slavery was accommodated in a regime of
exceptionality.
This book has investigated a variety of forms of slavery in the first half
of the nineteenth century while considering how the abolitionist debate
and juridical abolitions of slavery in Italian states demonstrate the contra-
dictions inherent in the Italian campaign against colonial slavery and the
simultaneous persistence of slavery in Italian territory. In adopting inno-
vative chronological and methodological approaches, it has strived to
develop a new understanding of slavery in the period 1750–1850, while
presenting the Mediterranean world as part of the Atlantic and Ottoman
worlds. It will hopefully add value to the historiographical debate by
reframing how slavery is viewed in the context of the Italian states as well
as in the wider international context.
Notes
1. Biblioteca del Ministero degli Affari Esteri—Farnesina, Atti Parlamentari
XVI Legislatura—Quarta sessione 1890. Camera dei Deputati, Documenti
diplomatici presentati al parlamento italiano dal presidente del consiglio
ministro ad interim degli Affari Esteri (Crispi), Tratta degli Schiavi,
Seduta del 17 dicembre 1889, Roma tipografia della Camera dei Deputati,
1890, 15.
4. In all probability, there were many more cases and from a merely quantita-
tive point of view this research should be extended.
5. ASL, Governo Civile e Militare di Livorno, n. 896, folder 15 March 1818,
f. 3.
6. ASG, Magistrato galee, n. 159.
7. Salvatore Bono, “Genova (secoli XVI–XVIII),” in Rapporti Genova-
Mediterraneo-Atlantico nell’età moderna, 85–102 (Genova: Tip. Gotica
Padova, 1990), 89.
8. Alice Bellagamba, “Introduzione. Dopo la schiavitù,” Mondo Contemporaneo
2 (2015): 7.
Index
A Algiers, 4, 20, 54, 73, 75–76, 124,

Abbagnara, Giovanni Battista, 110 129–130, 135, 137–139, 156
Abdaleker Bijun (slave), 111 Ali from Salé (slave), 189
Abdella, Assan (slave), 127. See also Alì from Tripoli (slave), 123
Maria de Paulis Alì from Tunis (slave), 22, 120, 127
Abdella Biniamur Ferraro, Alì (slave), Alì, son of Acmet (slave), 121
130 Alì, son of Alì Mustafà (slave), 111
Abdilcard (slave), 120 Alì, son of Sulman (slave), 110
Achafsen Ben Ibrahim (slave), 137 Alloisio, Antonio, 130
Africa (African Kingdoms), xii, xiii, xv, Alloisio, Giovanni, 130
2, 6, 10, 12, 18, 25n, 48–50, 53, Alson, 120
55–57, 64, 67, 77–80, 80–83, Aly from Marnegro (slave), 29n
104, 107–111, 132, 145–149, Americas, xiv
156n, 167, 169, 173–174, 176– Andalusia, 190
182, 184–186, 187, 191–192, Antilles, 47, 177, 193
214, 217–218 Antonio di Noto (Saint), 190–192
Ahauha (slave), 111 Anzio, 121
Aja, 70 Arabia, 1, 3, 5, 13, 18, 54, 74, 76,
Alambruc (slave), 110 168
Alessandro da Furano (father), 121 Arciconfraternita del Gonfalone, 105,
Algeria, 1, 4, 5, 20, 22, 129–133, 106, 156n
136–138, 140, 147–149, 184, Ariosto, Ludovico, 8
185, 192 Asia, 10, 49, 83, 147, 192, 217
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), 219

under exclusive license to Springer Nature
Switzerland AG, part of Springer Nature 2019
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01349-3
220 Index
Asmara, 185 Bologna, 8, 199n

Assan, son of Mustafà (slave), 121 Bologna, Don Michele (Marquis of
Assis Levantino (slave), 121 Sambuca), 110
Athens, 16 Bonaparte, Giuseppe, 58, 212
Atlantic (ocean-slavery-slave trade- Bonaparte, Napoleon, 46–47, 57, 87,
trade), vii, xii–xv, 1–3, 6, 10, 12, 140, 146–147, 189, 194, 211, 217
13, 18, 22, 24, 49–50, 59, 62, Bondini, Giovanni, 187
64, 73, 75, 79, 83, 103, 104, Bourbon Kingdom/Dinasty, 48, 58,
107, 109, 110, 134, 144–146, 107, 114, 115, 212
148, 167–171, 172, 178–181, Bragaglia, Camillo, 124
186, 191, 213, 215, 217 Bratich, Pietro, 139
Augusta, 130 Brazil, 3, 49, 64–66, 77, 110, 178, 191
August, Emperor, 70 Bridgetown, 76
Austria, 47, 51, 53, 58, 85n, 125, Bristol, 186
139, 190, 194 Brussels, 46, 53–54, 57, 69, 83, 217
Azores, 180 Buenos Aires, 191
Burchard, Gio., 111
B
Bacrì, 137, 139 C
Bagno (slave prison), 23, 104, 135– Cadiz, 5, 191
140, 157n, 171, 188, 215 Cadur Ben Bellacagi Abdelcaden, 137
Bahia, 191 Caffiero, Marino (shipowner), 109
Bali Pupi, 120 Cagliari, 190
Barbados, 76 Cairo, 110, 147
Barbary States/Barbary Kingdoms, Calandro, Nicola, 130, 134
3, 10, 13, 20, 50, 57–60, 73, Canaries, 180
75–76, 78–79, 83, 104–106, 111, Candia, 122
119–121, 128–130, 132–133, Cania, 121
140, 147–149, 156n, 187–189, Capua, 130, 134, 180, 213
213 Carafa, Carlo (Duke of Andria), 110
Bastoncelli, Giuseppe (slave), 120 Caribbean colonies, 5, 47, 174
Belgium, 51, 53–54 Carlo Felice (King of Sardinia and
Bellacamicia, 120 Duke of Savoy), 60, 148, 212
Bell’Aura di Biserta Ferraro, Alì Carnovali, Giovanni, 196
(slave), 130 Casa dei Catecumeni (House of the
Benedetto XIV (Pope), 64, 65 Catechumens), 8, 22, 34n, 58,
Benezet, Anthony, 63 116–128, 155n, 212, 215–217
Berlin, 51–52, 54–55, 61, 67, 213 Casa dei Pellegrini (House of
Bernardi, Filippo (Monk), 135 Pilgrims), 125
Bernini, Gian Lorenzo, 192 Casanova hospital, 112
Bey Hassan, 140 Caserta (and Palace of Caserta), xii,
Biserta, 121, 130 xiii, xv, 20–21, 103, 104, 107,
Index 221
111–116, 130, 152n, 171–172, de Bosa (Captain), 110

180, 214 De Chateaubriand, François-René,
Cassangi, Maometto, 121 52, 82
Cassanth, 110 De La Lande, Jérôme, 114, 189–190
Castelli, Salvatore Antonio Giovanni De La Tour, Maurice Quentin, 196
(slave), 127 de Matha, Jean, 104
Castel Sant’Angelo (Sant’Angelo De Medici, Cosimo II, 188
Castle), 118–121, 123 De Medici, Cosimo III, 135
Castlereagh, Robert Stewart, 47, 65 Denmark, 46, 51, 53
Catalani, Tommaso, 62 Dentice (slave), Michelino, 111
Caunes, Clemente, 76 De Polastron (Knight), 120
Charlemagne, 15 de Rochefort, Charles, 193
Chems, 121 Dervisce, 122, 132
Cilenti, D. Carlo (Captain), 110 de Santis, Maria Anna Fortunata
Civitavecchia, 9, 15, 22, 64, 116, (slave), 128
118–123, 127, 141, 171, 180 De Staël (Auguste, Albertine and
Clarkson, Thomas, 68, 78–79, 82 Madame de Staël), 82
Clemente I (Pope), 65 d’Holbac, Paul Henri, 81
Clemente VII (Pope), 63 Dolat, Joseph, 114, 214
Collecini, Francesco, 116 Don Stefano (Missioray), 126
Colombië, 125 Doria (family), 140
Colonna, Filippo, 124–126 Doria, Luigi, 180
Congo (State and river), 53–55 Dulcigno, 122
Consalvi, Ercole, xiv, 47, 65 Du Tertre (Father), 193
Conservatorio della Santissima Trinità
(Conservatory of the Holy
Trinity), 125 E
Constant, Benjamin, 70, 82, 91n Egypt, 16, 18, 79, 111, 128, 147, 196
Constantinople, 18, 106, 122, Elba Island, 48
124–127, 131, 135 England. See Great Britain/England
Coppet, 51, 82, 85n Englestain (Jesuit priest), 110
Corridi (family), 137 Ercole district (Caserta), 21, 112,
Corridi, Francesco, 137, 139 114–116, 214
Cosme, 122 Eritrea, 181, 184
Crimea, 60, 148, 212 Esta, 125–126
Crispi, Francesco, 61, 213 Ethiopia, 181
Cuba, 49, 51, 77
Cuffee, Paolo (Captain), 78
F
Falconer, Giovanni, 76
D Fano, Davide, 133
D’Amora, Giuseppe, 111 Faraia, Sebastiano Maria Gabriele,
Dawes, William, 78 111
222 Index
Farina, Paolo, 60, 213 Giambologna, 188

Farini, Domenico, 213 Giglio (island), 128, 137, 139
Father Paolo (Priest), 132 Gigola, Giambattista, 194
Ferdinand I (Grand Duke of Tuscany), Giorgi, Luigi, 121
135, 187–189 Giovanni di Martino di Tlischì (slave),
Ferdinand IV (King of Naples and 115
after Ferdiand I King of the Two Giovanni Francesco Bologna, 110
Sicilies), 107, 134 Giraud, Chiara (countess), 125
Ferdinand VII (of Spain), 47 Giuseppe Carafa from Smirne, 110
Ferrara, 8–9, 29n, 123 Giuseppe Giovanni Castelli, 127
Ferri, Giovanni, xiv, 75 Grand Duchy of Tuscany, 51, 52, 59,
Filangieri, Gaetano, 69, 91n 76, 105, 107, 135, 136–139,
Fiume, 125 171, 212
Foggia, 115 Gran Peschiera (Caserta), 21, 112,
Forte, Cecilia, 133 116
Forturbano, 123 Great Britain/England, 1, 3, 4, 25n,
France, 1, 3, 4, 11, 12, 13, 17, 46–48, 45–54, 56, 61–66, 67–69, 74–83,
51–53, 56–70, 74, 78–79, 81–83, 84n–86n, 89n, 104, 132–135,
84n, 104, 106, 125, 135, 147– 145–149, 175, 186, 187, 196,
149, 169, 176–177, 181–185, 211, 213, 217
186–187, 190, 191–196, 211, Greece, 7, 15–17, 51, 73, 124, 128,
217–218 147, 168
Francesco di Martino di Tlischì, 115 Gregory XVI (Pope), xiv
Freetown, 52 Grottaccia (beach), 121
Grozio, Ugo, 71–72, 170
Guadalupe, 47
G Guglielmo Pallotta (cardinal), 120
Gabrielli, Nicola, 115 Guiccioli, Alessandro, 66
Gagliardi, Pietro, 192
Galdi, Matteo, 70
Galiani, Ferdinando, 73 H
Gambini, Matteo, 121 Hag Ashmet Hassan (slave), 133
Garbini (family), 121 Haiti, 46, 68, 75, 185
Garbini (slave), 121–122 Hall, Robert, 76
Gasparin, Agenore de, 74 Hamburg, 125
Genoa, xii, xiii, xv, 7, 19, 22, 50, 57, Havà, Anna, 126–127. See also
103–106, 141, 144–146, 156n, Stefano, Antonio e Santina
158n, 171, 179–182, 202n, Havana, 52
206n, 215 Henry IV (King of France), 188
Genovesi, Antonio, 71–73, 83 Hierardus (slave), 8
Germany (German territories), 15, 51, Hobbes, Thomas, 71
53, 56, 125, 171–173, 194 Holland, 3, 74–75, 186
Ghisotti, Giovanni Giuseppe, 73 Holy See, xiv
Index 223
Hume, David, 174 Ligurian Republic, 57, 87n, 211

Hungary, 53 Lincoln, Abraham, 50, 81
Lisbon, 110, 179–181, 191
Liutprando (Lombardic King), 18
I Liverpool, 187
Ibrahim Ben Iacù Bipimon (slave), 137 Livorno, xiii, xv, 12, 13, 19, 23, 35,
Indian Ocean, 47, 167 58, 76, 103–104, 106, 124, 133,
Intieri, Bartolomeo, 73 135–140, 145–146, 149n, 171,
Isabella d’Este, 189 180, 187–190, 215, 217
Ismail Ben Mahamet (slave), 137 Locke, John, 71–72
Lombard States, 52
Lombard-Venetian region, 58
J Lombardy Kingdom, 76
Joannini, Giuseppe Antonio, 120 Lomellini, Battista, 180
London, 47, 51, 63, 65, 68, 77–78,
82, 196
K Lord Exmouth, 50, 76, 148
Kant, Immanuel, 170, 173–175 Lord Glenelg, 51
Kingdom of Italy, 45, 53, 58–61, 181– Low Countries, 47, 51. See also
182, 184–186, 208n, 212–214 Holland
Kingdom of Naples, 58–61, 69, 70, 73, Luanda, 52
83, 93n, 110–111, 127, 148, 212 Lucera, 115
Kingdom of Sicily, 20, 21, 51, 58, Lucerne, 54
129, 132, 134, 212
Kingston, 52
M
Maccarese, 119–120, 124, 154n
L Machelli, Salvatore, 123
Lamartine, Alphonse de, 68 Machmet d’Abdulla and Fatima named
Languedoc, 104 Mamelucco (slave), 118
Laqual, Nicola (slave), 115 Machmet (slave, bachelor from
Latin America, 49, 147 Chems), 121
Lavigerie, Charles (cardinal), 53–56, Macmet from Mytilene (slave), 124
69 Madame de Staël. See De Staël
Lechi, Giuseppe, 194, 195 (Auguste, Albertine and Madame
Leone XIII (Pope), 53, 55, 64–66, de Staël)
69, 80 Madeira, 180
Leopold II (King of Belgium), 54 Magistrato delle galee, 22, 140–141,
Levant, 13, 19, 79, 110, 121–123, 141, 215
129, 132–134, 137, 156n Magistrato per il Riscatto degli Schiavi,
Libya, 181 7, 105, 106, 140
Licata, 130, 134 Magnasco, Alessandro, 141, 144
224 Index
Mahamet Ben Assemon, 137 Musanti, Francesco, 191

Mahamet Ben Lacagi Amor, 137 Mustafà Chiel (slave), 127
Malfatti, Alessio (count), 125 Mustafà di Smirne, 115
Malta, 5, 7, 47, 111, 147, 149n Mustafa Topal (slave), 172
Manara, Giuseppe (count), 196
Mantua, 8
Maomet di Bosra, 115 N
Marchionni, Bartolomeo, 180 Nadal, Caff. Antonio, 122
Maria de Paulis, 127 Nantes, 82, 187
Maria Luigia Bernardina (Maria di Naples, xii, xv, 7, 15, 20–21, 57,
Giuseppe), 111 103–111, 145, 148, 115–116,
Marinelli, Vincenzo, 196, 198 151n, 180, 196, 212, 214, 217
Mauritius, 47 Neapolitan Republic, 107
Mediterranean (sea-slavery), xiii, xiv, Necker, Jacques, 82
xv, 2–7, 9, 10, 12–14, 18, 22, Netherlands. See Holland
24n, 27n, 45, 50, 59, 73, 74, Niccolò V (Pope), 63
79, 83, 103–104, 106–107, Nîmes, 192
109, 110, 128, 132–135, 140, Norway, 53
144–145, 148, 151n, 156, Nyssen (Dutch Consul), 130, 137,
167–171, 172, 178–182, 184, 140
187, 191–192, 214, 215, 217
Melchiori, Antonio Tommaso Maria,
127 O
Menin, Lodovico, 80 Obra (Elena), 125
Mercedari, 18, 104–106 Olaudah Equiano, 13
Messina, 20, 129–130 Orano, 192
Mexico, 191 Ottoman Empire, 4, 10, 21, 51, 79,
Milan, 56, 70 104–106, 111, 144–145, 147–
Minas Gerais, 191 149, 155, 156, 168, 187–189,
Modena, 52 215, 218
Moldova, 51 Ottone the Great, 15
Monsignor Castelli, 127, 129, 132
Montalembert, Charles de, 81
Montesquieu, Charles Louis, 70–71, P
74, 81, 174–175 Pacific Ocean, 49
Morelli, Benedetto, 180 Palace of Caserta. See Caserta (and
Morgiano (slave), 189 Palace of Caserta)
Mormile, Giovanni Batta Maria Palermo, xii, xiii, xv, 20, 69, 103–
Michele, 110 106, 116, 129–135, 145, 180,
Mormile, Michele (Duke of 190–191, 213, 215
Marzanello), 110 Paolo III (Pope), 65
Murat, Gioacchino, 194 Parma, 52
Index 225
Parmigianino, 189 Redenzione dei Cattivi, 7, 20, 104–

Pasquale (slave), 108–110, 214 106, 129–130, 134, 136–137,
Passy, Hippolyte, 69 150n, 156n
Patagonia, 108, 110, 214 Rémusat, Charles de, 69
Patti, Maria Carola Anna (slave), 128 Rodrigues, 47
Paul III (Pope), 118 Roman Republic, 58, 212. See also
Pepe (Captain), 114 Rome
Perrotta, Anna (slave), 115 Rome, xv, 8, 12–15, 19, 22, 28, 33n,
Persia (Persian Gulf), 53, 56, 135 52, 56–59, 64–66, 103–107,
Personè, Ermenegildo, 71, 73 115–121, 122–129, 145, 150n,
Piano, Ignazio, 114 171, 191–194, 202, 212,
Piedmont, 50, 52, 60, 213. See also 214–217
Sardinia (Kingdom of Sardinia) Rugendas, Johann Moritz, 194
Pio II (Pope), 65 Rush, Benjamin, 63
Pio V (Pope), 28, 64, 191 Russia, 10, 53, 60, 82
Pio VII (Pope), 58, 64, 191, 212
Pio XI (Pope), 192
Pio Monte della Misericordia, 7, 21, S
106, 111 Saint Benedetto the Moor, San
Pisa, 135 Benedetto il Moro, Benito,
Poland, 125 190–192
Pontifical States (Papal States), xi, xiii– Saint Domingo, 46, 52, 66, 68, 74, 82
xiv, 9, 22, 45, 47, 58, 62–67, 80, Saint Félix de Valois, 104
116, 123–125, 128–129, 148, Saint Lucy, 47, 74, 106
178, 212, 214–217 Saint Mary of Mercede, 104
Porta, Giacomo, 124, 192 Saint Petersburg, 51
Portugal, 3, 6, 47–50, 52–53, 64, 74, Saint Pietro Nolasco, 104
85n, 108, 110, 134, 177, 179, Salé, 189
201, 214 Salisbury, Robert Arthur Talbot
Prévost (Abbé), 194 Gascoyne Cecil (Marquis of), 62
Prince of Petrulla, 20, 133 Salvadore Maria, 109, 110
Princess Maria Amalia, 111 Salvadore Mario Gregorio (slave), 110
Provveditori sopra ospedali e luoghi pii, 7 Salvi, Maria Anna Catharina (slave),
Prussia, 47, 51, 84n 128
Pufendorf, Samuel, 72 Sansone (slave), 121
Sardinia (Kingdom of Sardinia),
50–52, 61, 140, 148, 190, 213.
R See also Piedmont
Radzivil, Girolamo (Prince), 125 Sardi, Simone, 139
Ragusa, 7 Scerif, Amur (slave), 133
Raynal, Guillaume-Thomas François, Scerif (marabout), 133, 134, 213
xiv, 77, 81, 170 Schoelcher, Victor, 46, 69
226 Index
Sebastiano Infante (Prince of Spain), Trieste, 125–126

111 Trinitari, 7, 18, 74, 76, 104, 106,
Sernigi, Geronimo, 180 107
Seville, 179 Tripoli, 50, 79, 111, 123, 133,
Seychelles, 47 147–148, 156n
Sfarzeschi, Antonio Maria, 127 Tripolizza, 128
Sharp, Granville, 68, 78 Tunis, 22, 50, 79, 111, 120–123,
Sicily. See Kingdom of the Two Sicilies 127–130, 132–134, 136–143,
Sierra Leone, 77–78 147, 156n, 215
Slavic territories, 15 Turkey, 53, 56, 77
Smirne, 110, 115, 121
Smith, Sidney, 147
Soliman Kaya, 140 U
Somalia, 181 United States, 5, 73, 74–75, 147,
Sorrento, 109, 110 167
South America, 49, 191. See also Latin Urbano VIII (Pope), 64
America
Sozi Carafa, Alfonso, 148
Spain/Iberian peninsula, xiv, 3, 5–7, V
12, 46–53, 56, 64, 68, 74, Vallemanni, Matilde Geltrude (slave),
79, 84n, 85n, 109, 111, 114, 127
120–121, 122, 140, 179–181, Vanvitelli, Luigi, 112, 116
190–192 Venezuela, 49
Stefano, Antonio e Santina, 126 Venice, 7, 30n, 33n, 52, 66, 76, 105,
Sweden, 47, 51, 53, 84n 106, 126
Switzerland, 51, 53, 82 Vera Cruz, 191
Verona, 51, 53, 56, 125
Versailles, 125–126
T Vicaria (Naples), 115
Tacca, Pietro, 188, 189 Vicentina Elena Zanti, Anna Maria
Tacito (Emperor), 70 (slave), 128
Tafil Turco, 127. See also Giuseppe Vienna, Congress of Vienna, xi, xiv,
Giovanni Castelli 47–48, 68, 80, 82, 89n, 146–
Talleyrand, Charles, 47, 84n 149, 178, 212–214, 217
Tinzinover, Amur (slave), 121 Vieusseux, Giampietro, 77, 78, 178,
Tobago, 47 213
Tocqueville, Alexis de, 68 Vieusseux, Giovan Pietro, xiv
Tomasi, Carlo, 108, 110, 214 Vinaccio, Maria Carmela Rosa (slave),
Torrente, Emanuele, 130 111
Trapani, 130, 133–135, 180, 213 Volney, Constantin-François, 147
Treviso, 125 Voltaire, François-Marie Arouet, 81
Index 227
W Z
Walachia, 51 Zambelli, Andrea, xiv, 74–75
Wellington (Duke of), 52, 84n Zanardelli, Giuseppe, 61, 213
Western Indies, 47, 76 Zante, 125
Wilberforce, William, 68, 69, 78, 82, Zanzibar, 53, 56, 77
196

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S T U D I E S

More information about this series at

Abolitionism and the

Italian and Italian American Studies

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018959732

Cover illustration: Testa di Moro di Giovanni David. Courtesy of Minerva Auctions

Giulia Bonazza’s Abolitionism and the Persistence of Slavery in Italian

Bonazza’s remarkable treatment of terminology (slaves, captives,

and of domination exercised in everyday life between women and men

Nantes, France Antonio De Almeida Mendes

This book explores the manifold contradictions involved in the persistence

of internal slavery in the pre-unitarian Italian states. Both types of aboli-

Chapter 3, Forms of Slavery in the Italian States, documents the exist-

Taken together, these chapters, particularly Chapter 5 on Abolitionism

Rome, Italy Giulia Bonazza

This book is the result of 4 years of Ph.D. research and of many

acknowledgement to Audrey Millet. Among the archivists and librarians

1 Introduction: Historiographical Perspectives 1

2 The Reverberations of the Abolitionist Debate

3 Forms of Slavery in the Italian States 103

4 The Memory of Slavery 167

5 Conclusion: Abolitionism and the Continuity of Slavery 211

ADF Archives Diplomatiques français

Fig. 3.1 Categories of baptisms made by Don Biase Gambaro in Naples

Fig. 4.3 Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Lechi con attendente by

Table 3.1 Slaves registered in the Chivitavecchia dock on 5 February

© The Author(s) 2019 1

remembered, and it produces, institutionalises and preserves what is to

1.2 Between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean

These relationship had emerged in “civil society”, as expression of

Blackburn’s interpretation of the role of states in the Atlantic trade is

appendix (Mediterranean Passes) provided partial information on these

Continental European academia’s growing interest in Mediterranean

employed as oarsmen in the galleys. The exclusively urban character of

guarantee of freedom, but a preparatory step. At an institutional level,

Marco Lenci’s Guerra, schiavi, rinnegati nel Mediterraneo presents

1.3 From the History of Slavery

As we observed previously, recent publications on slavery in the

On Subaltern Studies, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak makes the following

The language employed seems to constitute an effort to recognize that

In Europe in the late 1980s, Bertolomé and Lucile Benassar quoted

Recently, however, in a case study of Livorno, Guillaume Calafat and

1.4 A Problem of Definition: Slaves, Captives

colonial slavery, they are by no means identical. Nonetheless, the slav-

In the analysis of the cases of slavery I found, I prefer to use the

“barbarians”.102 According to the French historians Jean Andreau and

presence by having their children follow in their footsteps. Their agri-

1.5 Slavery in a Local Setting: The Case of the

in Italian states and international juridical rulings on the abolition of the

by captives themselves. However, she too focused mainly on Christian

August 27 to November 2, 1780, Caserta).136 This facilitates detailed

Finally, for Livorno, the last geographical area I analysed, relevant

3. Robin Blackburn, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery (1776–1848)

exchanges on the problem of Mediterranean slavery and for her advice

under the supervision of Professor Luca Lo Basso (Università di

79. Anna Lisa Tota, “Memoria, patrimonio culturale e discorso pubblico,” in

Claude Meillassoux, Anthropologie de l’esclavage: le ventre de fer et d’ar­

S. Sciascia, 1972); Giovanna Fiume, “Lettres de Barbarie: esclav-

di S. Leucio. La costruzione dei Siti Reali borbonici, ed. Imma Ascione,

Crispino, Maurizio. “Schiavi musulmani alla Reggia di Caserta. Documenti

Mafrici, Mirella. Mezzogiorno e pirateria nell’età moderna (secoli XVI–XVIII).

età moderna, edited by Massimiliano Ghilardi, Gaetano Sabatini, Matteo

Tarruell, Cecilia. Circulations et échanges en méditerranée occidentale: la monar­

ADF Archives Diplomatiques français

Fig. 3.1 Categories of baptisms made by Don Biase Gambaro in Naples

Fig. 4.3 Il ritratto del conte Giuseppe Lechi con attendente by

Table 3.1 Slaves registered in the Chivitavecchia dock on 5 February

1.2 Between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean

1.3 From the History of Slavery

1.4 A Problem of Definition: Slaves, Captives

1.5 Slavery in a Local Setting: The Case of the

3. Robin Blackburn, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery (1776–1848)

79. Anna Lisa Tota, “Memoria, patrimonio culturale e discorso pubblico,” in

Claude Meillassoux, Anthropologie de l’esclavage: le ventre de fer et d’ar

Tarruell, Cecilia. Circulations et échanges en méditerranée occidentale: la monar

The Reverberations of the Abolitionist

2.1 From the First Abolition of Slavery

2.2 Abolition in the Italian States:

2.4 The Abolitionist Network in the Italian

2.5 Between Universal Rights and Realpolitik

45. Schmidt, L’abolition de l’esclavage. Cinq siècles de combats XVIe–XXe siè

57. Enrico Dal Lago, Agrarian Elites: American Slaveholders and Southern

72. Biblioteca del Ministero degli Affari Esteri - Farnesina, Atti Parlamentari

100. The historiography of the differences and similarities between the British

128. John Locke, Il secondo trattato sul governo, 171.

diplomatici presentati al parlamento italiano dal presidente del consiglio min

Forms of Slavery in the Italian States

3.1 The Redemption of Slaves

3.2 Slaves Baptised in Naples: From the Atlantic