Part 9/20:
The transatlantic slave trade was not merely a European endeavor; the majority of enslaved Africans were captured and enslaved by other Africans and sold to Europeans. African internal slave trades, fueled by warfare, political instability, and the desire for firearms, vastly predated and outstripped the Atlantic trade in scale. This reality complicates narratives that overly simplify the origins of African-American ancestry and identity.