Where Did All the “MONEY” Go If Africa Earned So Much During the Slave Trade?

Added: 2026-04-28

[00:00:00]What happened to all of the money that African rulers and African slave traders got during the transatlantic slave trade? What happened to it? This is a common question and I even didn't know the answer to it until I went and researched it. Okay. I had always assumed that along with the trade of merchandise they got actual money like actual money but they didn't.

[00:00:21]It wasn't even like that. Okay. So here's the breakdown. So Africa had its own form of currency and money. Okay.

[00:00:29]the cowie shells and stuff like that.

[00:00:31]Um, also merchandise. They saw value in in things, not actual money like we see today. They saw value in um maybe gold.

[00:00:42]Um, but it had to be like an actual thing that you could make use of, okay?

[00:00:48]Like cows and and um cloth um stuff like that. They saw that and their actual currency currency was cowery. Okay. The cowry shells and like and like um I don't know what they're called, but they're um like the the the the bracelets, the copper things made of um metals like that.

[00:01:13]Yeah. They the bracelets and stuff that's what they that's what they considered um more like currency. Um but other than that, people were their um what they had value that held value. So they could trade people um cows, rum, anything that they could use that was valuable. That was how the monetary system worked in Africa. Okay? And this is why the trade I'm going to tell you about here's Europe's part. Europe saw money in a different way. Okay?

[00:01:50]They looked at money as far as um gold, all the precious metals and um mercantalism.

[00:01:59]They wanted a lot of precious metals and things of that nature, but they also use coins. Now the lower the lower class, I read they they had a bunch of the coins.

[00:02:07]So the lower class Europeans used coins where the upper class used paper and they also had like this form of um this form of credit like they do like they do now like this form of credit. So, it's invisible, but yet um you can still get stuff, right? Because later on you'll pay with the gold and the stuff like that. Okay? So, that's that's how they viewed it. Okay? They didn't want to import a whole bunch of stuff, okay? Cuz they felt like that that wasn't what it was. They they didn't want that. They wanted to export a lot of stuff, right?

[00:02:37]Okay? So, if you understand that part, so when Europe actually ended up conquering Africa in the late 19th century, right?

[00:02:48]All that went away.

[00:02:51]The they all of that whole the calorie shells paying for stuff and all that stuff that went away. That stuff was garbage. Okay? Because the Europeans um instituted their currency system. So where you had like let's say an African ruler had like loads of family cuz family was also wealth. So the more children, the more the more wives, the more everything that was that was wealth to the African ruler um because they were able to tend to the land and tend to whatever needed to be tended to.

[00:03:26]Okay. Um but when Europeans came through and they had a bunch of cowry shells, calorie shells were the equivalent of wealth the more you had, right? Um back then, but when the Europeans came through, that was over with. So you you were left with a bunch of calorie shells that you weren't wealthy anymore because the European basically devalued everything.

[00:03:50]So basically the world was running off of the African definition of wealth back then.

[00:04:01]Yeah. The world was running based off the African definition of wealth back then. I say that because Europeans couldn't bring their coins to Africa to exchange anything because Africa didn't want Africa didn't even want their gold because they felt like their gold a their um European gold and stuff like that was worthless. It wasn't it wasn't like African gold, right? So, they didn't even want their gold. They wanted to be paid in what they considered valuable. Okay?

[00:04:39]And so that's where the stuff came in and all the products and stuff in the calorie shelves. Europeans had to purchase African money.

[00:04:51]Ain't that something? They had to purchase African money. So they had to go and they had to buy whatever needed to happen to get the cower shells and then bring the cow shells. They had to buy the products to bring to Yeah. So because Africa was not going to take African rulers I should say um and tra slave traders and stuff and traders period were not going to accept something that they didn't consider valuable.

[00:05:17]Okay.

[00:05:18]So what it was whatever Africa felt was valuable that's what they gave to Africa. Now you'll see on documents this blew me away. You'll see on documents where um they'll say we gave them 140,000 pounds, right, for this many um enslaved. That was a conversion for the amount of stuff that they brought. I'mma show it to you right here. Okay. So, you see all this stuff right here, right?

[00:05:48]Long long long long long. So that number at the bottom, what I originally thought was the money. No, that was the conversion because Europe needed a way to balance its book. So they would write how much they believe this was worth and that's how they would balance the book in Europe because this stuff wasn't wasn't quote unquote valuable to Europeans like that. Okay? it was valuable to Africa, African rulers.

[00:06:21]And so when they would write it down on paper, they had to write it down how Europe would accept it. So if it be like 140,000bs, then that's what it was.

[00:06:32]That's what the stuff was worth. And so that's how they would, you know, cuz they collected taxes and stuff in Europe and everything, right? So that's how that's how that would work. So, when you're looking at um a trade and they say we got this many dollars or we bought we bought we bought the enslaved for this many pounds, right? It wasn't actually the money. It was stuff.

[00:06:59]So, if you understand what I'm saying, right, that's what happened to the the the wealth of the African.

[00:07:11]It wasn't in the tinder that we use today.

[00:07:15]You can go into Africa today and see that there are still groups, ethnic groups that utilize the amount of cows to pay for something, right? Or the amount of cattle to pay for something, right? So that's that's what it was. But see, for for the European, that's that's not worth anything.

[00:07:38]And now we're in this global system where everything has to be exchanged with um money, right? Like just paper money and stuff like that, but it's backed up by gold and everything. This goes back to the European way of gold and all that stuff, right? So yeah, I was floored. I said, "Oh my gosh." So you're looking at a conversion.

[00:08:04]They got stuff.

[00:08:06]And so when they were conquered, everything that Africa actually had, they were left poor from the very jump.

[00:08:15]They were left poor because nothing they had was worth anything when it came down to the European system.

[00:08:23]So everybody just dropped. Everybody was like here at first dropped. Boom.

[00:08:28]A lot of people just boom, just drop. So this is basically why everybody wants their their currency to rule. Okay, right now it's basically it's the United States of America, but this is exactly why everybody wants their their their currency to rule because that's who is the wealthiest at that point.

[00:08:52]makes you look at the world a bit differently.