An Estimated 400,000 Africans Enslaved in Americas by 1600

By 1600 scholars estimate that approximately 400,000 enslaved Africans had been transported to the Americas, with the majority going to Portuguese Brazil and Spanish Caribbean colonies. The annual volume of the trade was increasing rapidly. Brazil alone would eventually receive over 4.8 million enslaved Africans — the largest destination of any country in the Americas. The Slave Voyages database, the most comprehensive scholarly record, documents the systematic scale of this commerce in human beings.