India and the Indo-Chinese Peninsula, taken together, afford 13 positive and 11 negative cases, the former being found in the Northern parts of both groups.
In Central Asia and Siberia slavery seems to be unknown, except among the Kamchadales (in Central Asia 4 neg. cases, in Siberia 1 pos. case and 7 neg. cases).
The Caucasus yields 3 positive cases, 1 negative case, and several doubtful cases. Our literature on this group is rather scanty.
The Arabian Aeneze Bedouins, as well as the Arabian Larbas who live in North Africa, keep slaves (2 positive and no negative cases).
As for Africa, the Northern part of this continent, being inhabited by semi-civilized peoples, is excluded from our survey. Among the savage Africans slavery very frequently occurs. There are only two districts, in which scarcely any clear positive cases are found, viz. South Africa to the South of the Zambesi, and the country about the Upper Nile, to the South-West of Abyssinia. Large agglomerations of slave-keeping tribes are found on the Coast of Guinea, and in the district formed by Lower Guinea and the territories bordering the Congo. A few negative cases, however, are interspersed among the members of both groups, especially of the latter. There are altogether 90 pos. and 31 neg. cases in Africa.
All over the globe, there are, among the savage tribes on which we are sufficiently informed, 210 with slaves and 181 without slaves. [[167]]
[1] Dr. Tönnies, in his review of the first edition of this work, expresses a doubt as to whether slavery in the proper sense exists in every case in which, relying on the often superficial accounts of travellers, we conclude that slavery is present.
The foregoing passage and the whole of the present chapter are, we think, sufficient evidence that we have set ourselves the task of subjecting the accounts of travellers and other writers on savage tribes, on which our conclusions are to be based, to a critical examination. There may be particular instances in which we have failed in this respect; but we believe our conclusions on the whole rest upon a solid basis and Dr. Tönnies’s objection, in corroboration of which he does not adduce a single fact, does not seem to us well founded. [↑]
[2] Sometimes, however, children are sold to adoptive parents within the tribe. Such is the case in Greenland; see Crantz I, p. 178. But these are exceptional cases, so, when no particulars are given, we may suppose that the purchased persons become slaves and not adopted children. [↑]