The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

Full versions of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

The 2019 version of the transatlantic slave trade database contains 36,108 voyages compared to 34,940 in 2008 (and 27,233 in the 1999 version of the database that appeared on CD-ROM). Since 2008, several thousand corrections have been made and additional information added. Thus 284 of the 2008 voyages have been deleted either because we found they had been entered twice, or because we discovered that a voyage was not involved in the transatlantic slave trade. For example voyage id 16772, the Pye, Captain Adam, turned out to have carried slaves from Jamaica to the Chesapeake, but obtained its captives in Jamaica, not Africa. Offsetting the deletions are 1,345 voyages added on the basis of new information. Further, many voyages that are common to both 2008 and 2019 versions of the database now contain information that was not available in 2008 (see table 1 of “Understanding the Database” for the current summary). The 2019 version has 274 variables, compared with 98 in the Voyages Database available online. Users interested in working with this larger data set can download it in a file formatted for use with SPSS software. Because some users may find it useful to view data as it existed in earlier versions, the database as it was in 1999, 2008 and 2010 can also be selected for download. A codebook describing all variable names, variable labels, and values of the expanded dataset is available as a pdf document. With only a few exceptions, it retains variable names in the original 1999 CD-ROM version 

Questions about downloading or using these datasets? Please contact svopcom@googlegroups.com.

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

The December 2019 version of the transatlantic slave trade database contains 36,108 voyages compared to 34,940 in 2008 (and 27,233 in the 1999 version of the database that appeared on CD-ROM). It has 274 variables, compared with 98 in the current online version. Users interested in working with this larger data set can download it in a csv file or a file formatted for use with SPSS software. Because some users may find it useful to view data as it existed in earlier versions, the database as it was in 1999, 2010 and 2016 can also be downloaded here along with a codebook describing all variable names, variable labels, and values of the expanded dataset. With only a few exceptions, later files retain the variable names in the original CD-ROM.

Questions about downloading or using these datasets? Please contact svopcom@googlegroups.com.

Estimates Datasets and Supplementary Documents

The Estimates section uses data from the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database dataset, aggregated by regions of embarkation and disembarkation, but also incorporates published series of embarkations and disembarkations for particular regions when these data provide more accurate estimates than the database itself. Users interested in exploring the complex methodology involved in generating the estimates, or in testing the extent to which alternative assumptions lower or augment estimates of the full volume of the slave trade (in its entirety or for a national carrier or period of time), can download below an Excel-formatted copy of the spreadsheet estimating the full volume of the slave trade by national carrier and year of arrival, the SPSS file applying estimates of volume in the spreadsheet to data on exports and imports aggregated by national carrier, year of arrival, and the route of the voyage from region of embarkation to region of disembarkation, and a PDF version of the essay detailing the methodology used. New estimates of the pre-1640 traffic to Spanish America can be found in Alex Borucki, David Eltis and David Wheat. “Atlantic History and the Slave Trade to Spanish America,” American Historical Review, 120 (2015): 433-461, supplementary notes and an additional spreadsheet for which appear below. For further discussion of the validity of our overall estimates see David Eltis and Paul Lachance, “Comments on Patrick Manning, Yun Zhang, and Bowen Yi, ‘Volume and Direction of the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1650-1870,’” Journal of World Historical Information, 2 (2014-15): 150-53, an appendix to which is the final document in this panel.

Questions about downloading or using these datasets? Please contact svopcom@googlegroups.com.