The spread of Bogomilism
The battle of Wadi al-Khazandar, 1299. depicting Mongol archers and Mamluk cavalry. During that time many mamluk soldiers originated from the Balkan slave trade and the Black Sea slave trade.

The Balkan slave trade, was the trade in slaves from the Balkans via Venetian slave traders across the Adriatic Sea and the Aegean Sea to Italy, Spain and the Islamic Middle East, between the 7th-century during the early Middle Ages until the mid 15th-century.

History

The slave trade was founded upon the fact that the Balkans was a religious border zone between first Pagan and Christian lands, and then between Catholic and Orthodox Christianity. Since the custom at the time did not approve of enslaving people of the same religion, in combination with the fact that the Balkans was for a long time politically decentralized and instable, made it a fertile target for slave trade, when war captives were sold by their enemies to Venetian slave traders at the coasts.

The most targeted category of the slave trade were the Bosnians, since the Bosnians were adherents of Bogomilism, a faith which was not acknowledged as Christianity and therefore made them legitimate targets of slavery in Catholic as well as Orthodox Europe.[1]

The Balkan slave trade was, alongside the Black Sea slave trade, also one the two main slave supply sources of future Mamluk soldiers to the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt.[2]

The end

The Venetian slave trade from the Balkans gradually during the 15th-century ended in parallell with the conquest of the Balkans by the Ottoman Empire. The slave trade from the Balkans was ended as a separate slave trade and was overtook by the Ottomans and incorporated in to the Ottoman slave trade,[3] which on the Balkans was connected to the Crimean slave trade. The Venetian slave traders were not able to compeet with Ottoman-Crimean competition. After this, the Venetian slave traders acquired a smaller amount of slaves from Ottoman slave traders via the Trans-Saharan slave trade.

See also

References

  1. Omerovic, Asmin, BETWEEN ISLAM, CHRISTIANITY, AND BOGOMIL HERESY: THE SLAVE TRADE IN THE BOSNIAN SLAVING ZONE, 1280-1464
  2. The Cambridge World History of Slavery: Volume 2, AD 500–AD 1420. (2021). (n.p.): Cambridge University Press. 117-120
  3. The Cambridge World History of Slavery: Volume 2, AD 500–AD 1420. (2021). (n.p.): Cambridge University Press. 117-120
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