Increase Mather XXI commented on High Irish Nov-24-2020 11:07 AM UTC
Did not the Vikings sell Irish lasses to the pashaliks of Morocco for a time?
To begin with, the term slave is Arabic for Slavic property, much of which they acquired through trade with Vikings who sold fair-haired wenches from the Caspian Sea, Black Sea, the Don and Volga river basins, as far west as Iceland and as far south as Spain. Eventually Normans would traffic fair lasses to Muslims through Sicily. The numbers were tiny compared to what the Kazars, Turks and Barbary pirates abducted directly. However, Christendom had a thirst for gold above all other things. When Cortez described he and his men as suffering from a sickness of the heart that could only be cured by gold, he was pointedly correct in his odd moment of honesty.
In one specific year of the 1300s I found a billing record of 300 castrated Englishmen being sold by Venetian cardinals to the Turks, to be sodomized. These men were sourced by Christian or non-Christian means within England. Since I also found records of English boys being sold by English lords to Irish lords, and also of English merchants [do not ask me to expand on this, please] trafficking in English children, and also the fact that Venice was one of the only European nations to fight the Barbary pirates who were their competitors in the slave trade, and that neither party would likely sell to the other for sale to the Turks and lose the profits they enjoyed through direct business with the largest slave market in the world in Istanbul, it is a safe bet that those Englishmen were trafficked either by English, French or Norman slavers, the latter being the latter day Vikings.
Fair-haired and light-eyed sex slaves were highly sought in North Africa due to that being the region's ancient beauty standard, including the blonde and red-headed aborigines of the Atlas Mountains and Canary Islands. The latter population was devastated by the slave trade into Italy and Iberia from the 1300s through 1500s where the Christian and Non-Christian elites had a very Mediterranean thirst for boys.
In the 1600s the Barbary pirates actually raided Ireland and Iceland for the descendants of Vikings to take as slaves, and did so under a Dutch captain. Keep in mind that Christian monarchs all demonstrated a very high tolerance for slave raiding against their coastal serfs and peasants, which begs the question, were the kings of Christendom all weaklings, or were some of them in on the trade?
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Very interesting, surprised to see my comment be post-worthy. As far as the kings being weaklings, I'd say largely 'yes' (my opinion). Euros of the past have been given far too much credit for omnipotence, but they were not as powerful as the 'anti-imperialists' claim, I'd say their reach was quite limited. Also, the 'antis' underrate the power of the various caliphates, which were quite powerful at the time.
Ottomans took tons of slaves, largely Balkan, but really from everywhere. Boy sex-slaves (yusufakia) were well-known. interesting about the Englishmen.
Thank you for the prompt and the yusufakia info—will search it.
So much slavery, so little time.
Happy Thanksgiving good sir.
In that case the beatings will continue.
At least we are not turkeys.
Happy Thanksgiving to you too!