Short Essay Two

As one would expect of a scholar of his position, the work of Professor Thornton is well researched, strongly supported by the available evidence, and thoroughly takes into account the differing viewpoints of his fellow scholars. Furthermore, since Thornton is familiar with the documents contained in the McKnight and Garofalo compilation, it is not surprising that there is a close alignment with the McKnight and Garofalo documents and Thornton’s own work.

One of Thornton’s main assertions is that there was a vibrant and well developed set of cultures in Africa that predated European contact (Thornton 20). Thornton also resists seeing Africa as a land that was wantonly exploited by European powers. Indeed, Thornton states as much when he says that “Europeans did not pillage Africa, either as raiders or indirectly as traders from a more advanced economy” (53). Both of these concepts stem from Thornton’s perception that Africa was something of a layered market for the Europeans, with multiple levels of African middlemen that did not allow for as favorable balance of trade as the Europeans might have wished for (Thornton 71).

It is this perception of Europeans acting mainly at the periphery of an African system that I find to be problematic when examining some of the McKnight and Garofalo documents. To be sure, Thornton’s arguments regarding the African role in the creation and maintenance of the slave trade are well supported, but I do find his insistence on the negligibility of European influence to be in contrast with some of the McKnight and Garofalo documents-specifically the records of the treason inquiry of Dom Pedro and the letters of Queen Njinga. These documents do not portray an impenetrable African economy, political sphere, or culture, but rather a set of peoples in flux, who were already living in a hybrid culture that was as much a blend of European and African cultures as anything that would emerge later in the New World.

Thornton’s view of the relationship between European and African powers is clearly illustrated by his reference to the Portuguese obtaining slaves through their status as “clients of the Kongo kings” (97). This presumed status of the Portuguese seems to be directly challenged by the documents from the treason trial of Dom Pedro. Several things are immediately apparent from these documents, the first being the adoption of Iberian nomenclature. The Kongo Kings refer to themselves (this was an internal Kongolese document) using Spanish names and titles in addition to their Kongolese names and titles (Mcknight and Garofalo 9). Additionally, the form of the legal proceeding is an inquest, which is European in nature, and the documents end with a reference to an ongoing request for a Papal Bull (Mcknight and Garofalo 29). None of these things would seem to indicate that the status of the Portuguese in Kongo was one of a “client”. On the contrary, these things seem to suggest that there was a strong European influence in the Kongo and that the Portuguese, in particular, exercised a great deal of influence over the politics, religion, and culture of the region. It simply does not seem reasonable that there was not an economic component to the Portuguese influence as well.

While Thornton makes careful note of the fact that the European presence in Africa was not responsible for the slave trade and even contends that the Atlantic slave trade may have been an outgrowth of the existing African model (Thornton74), he does not give much intellectual room to the notion that European interaction with Africa fundamentally altered Africa’s political balance of power, economic landscape, and cultural norms. However, the letters from Queen Njinga clearly indicate that the Portuguese military presence is exacerbating conflicts that might otherwise be settled “peacefully and without force” ( McKnight and Garofalo 43). This begs the question of whether or not there were African cultural customs in place to help avoid warfare between states and if there were, did the European presence alter these customs? Additionally, Queen Njinga spoke as though there was a significant impact on trade due to European machinations (McKnight and Garofalo 47). She adopts the verbiage of a supplicant and even goes so far as to petition for a betterment of trading conditions (McKnight and Garofalo 47). Although she was an African Queen and an enemy of the Portuguese for most of her life, she is clearly addressing individuals who she perceives to have power, and she is addressing them on their terms, not hers. This is difficult to reconcile with Thornton’s view of the Africans as being able to keep the Europeans at a safe economic and political distance.

Although, on the whole I find Thornton’s work extremely credible, I think that there are some nuances visible in the McKnight and Garofalo documents that Thornton does little to address. Given the high level of European cultural influence visible in the documents, Thornton seems to devote very little energy to the ways that the European presence in Africa was altering both African cultural norms and the African political landscape. Professor Thornton makes a compelling case that Africans were not simply passive victims of European imperialism, but I would like to see him address the emergence of the Afro-European cultural and economic model in an equally compelling manner.