Triangular trade | Definition, Route, & System (2024)

triangular trade, three-legged economic model and trade route that was predicated on the transatlantic trade of enslaved people. It flourished from roughly the early 16th century to the mid-19th century during the era of Western colonialism. The three markets among which the trade was conducted were Europe, western Africa, and the New World.

The first leg of the triangular trade began in Europe, from which manufactured goods such as metals, brass dishes, knives, tools, textiles, firearms, ammunition, and alcoholic beverages were transported by ship to ports on the coast of western Africa. There these goods were exchanged for enslaved people, many of whom had been abducted in the so-called Slave Coast, a section of the coast of the Gulf of Guinea extending approximately from the Volta River in the west to Lagos, in modern Nigeria, or, alternatively, the Niger Delta in the east (in the present-day republics of Togo, Benin, and Nigeria). Many more enslaved people were taken from west-central Africa, centred on the Portuguese colony in what is now Angola. A smaller number came from Portuguese-controlled parts of southeastern Africa.

The second stage of this triangular trade was the shipment of enslaved people westward across the Atlantic Ocean, usually to Brazil or the West Indies. This journey, known as the Middle Passage, took roughly 21 to 90 days. The ships were grossly overcrowded, with the captives wedged belowdecks and chained to platforms stacked in tiers. Death rates on the Middle Passage ranged from about 10 to more than 20 percent.

The peak of the Atlantic trade of enslaved people seems to have been reached in the 1780s, when on average some 78,000 enslaved people were brought to the Americas each year. About half these captives were transported in the ships of British merchants. Their nearest competitors, French and Portuguese traders, each transported about one-fifth of the total number of enslaved people.

After arriving in Brazil or the Caribbean, the enslaved Africans were sold at auction and were taken throughout the New World. Many were put to work on plantations. The shipment to Europe of plantation crops and products made from them was the third leg of the triangular trade. Among the most valuable exports to Europe were sugar, rice, indigo, tobacco, cotton, molasses, and rum.

The third leg of the triangle also involved a distinct role for Britain’s North American colonies, which sent raw materials to Europe, where they supplied manufacturing industries. In return, Europe sent manufactured goods and luxury items to the colonies, which themselves exported items such as rum, gunpowder, iron, tools, and cloth to Africa. The colonies also sent fish, meat, flour, and lumber to the Caribbean islands in exchange for sugar and molasses.