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43 - The “Hidden Transcripts” and Legal Rights of Slaves in the Muslim World

A Legal Case from Nineteenth-Century Mauritania

from Part Eight - Documents from Muslim Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 April 2013

By
Ghislaine Lydon
Edited by
Alice Bellagamba ,
Sandra E. Greene  and
Martin A. Klein
Alice Bellagamba
Affiliation:
University of Milan-Bicocca
Sandra E. Greene
Affiliation:
Cornell University, New York
Martin A. Klein
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
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Summary

Until the second half of the twentieth century, slavery and the trade in slaves were part of everyday life among many societies of western Africa. This chapter examines a legal debate surrounding the ownership and treatment of an enslaved caravan worker. The details of this unusual case, which sheds light on the local determinants of slavery, were recorded in a legal document found in a private family archive in the oasis town of Tishit, located in the heart of the Saharan country known today as the Islamic Republic of Mauritania. This document sheds light on four subjects: the trans-Saharan slave-trading world and the use of slaves as caravan workers; Islamic law and the rights of slaves; the public space accorded to the enslaved in various cultural settings; and the voices of the enslaved or hidden transcripts that can be gleaned from legal documents.

Keywords

missionary recordsslaveryhuman sacrificeEuropean religious workersChristianitylate-nineteenth-century Africa
Type
Chapter
Information
African Voices on Slavery and the Slave Trade , pp. 503 - 510
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

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