Converging on Cannibals
Africa in World History
SERIES EDITORS: DAVID ROBINSON, JOSEPH C. MILLER, AND TODD CLEVELAND
James C. McCann
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John M. Mugane
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Making Money: Life, Death, and Early Modern Trade on Africa’s Guinea Coast
Jared Staller
Converging on Cannibals: Terrors of Slaving in Atlantic Africa, 1509–1670
Converging on Cannibals
Terrors of Slaving in Atlantic Africa, 1509–1670
Jared Staller
OHIO UNIVERSITY PRESS
ATHENS
Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio 45701
© 2019 by Ohio University Press
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Staller, Jared, 1982- author.
Title: Converging on cannibals : terrors of slaving in Atlantic Africa, 1509-1670 / Jared Staller.
Other titles: Africa in world history.
Description: Athens, Ohio : Ohio University Press, 2019. | Series: Africa in world history | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018045764| ISBN 9780821423523 (hc : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780821423530 (pb : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780821446607 (pdf)
Subjects: LCSH: Cannibalism--Atlantic Coast (Africa)--History. | Slavery--Atlantic Coast (Africa)--History.
Classification: LCC GN409 .S73 2019 | DDC 394/.90967--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018045764
For Iggy
CONTENTS
ONE: An Introduction to Cannibal Talk
TWO: Angels of Deliverance, 1483–ca. 1543
THREE: Phantoms of the Kongo, 1568–1591
FOUR: Destroyers of Angola, 1600–1625
FIVE: Queen of Cruelty, 1629–1655
SIX: Preachers and Publicists, 1500–ca. 1670
SEVEN: The Afterlife of the Jaga
APPENDIX B: Suggested Further Readings by Chapter and Topic
APPENDIX C: Primary Source Excerpts
Plates follow
ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure
6.1. The “Jaga” text as printed in Purchas His Pilgrimage in 1613 and 1617
Maps
2.1. The Kongo composite in 1500
4.1. West-central Africa with possible Imbangala migrations, ca. 1560–1620
5.1. Njinga’s joint kingdom of Matamba and Ndongo at the height of her power, early 1640s
Table
5.1. Known and estimated slave exports from Luanda and west-central Africa, 1580–1670
Plates
1. Afonso I of Kongo’s coat of arms
2. Detail of broken idols in Afonso I of Kongo’s coat of arms
3. Afonso I orders the idols in Kongo to be burned
4. Sebastian Münster’s colorful woodcut map of Africa
5. Engraving showing Anzichi warfare and anthropophagy
6. Engraving showing “Jaga” (Imbangala) warfare
7. Cavazzi’s diagram of Imbangala man-eating and blood-drinking
8. Cavazzi’s depiction of infanticide
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book has been simmering for more than a decade in my mind and in conversations with friends, family, and colleagues. My appetite for Luso-African history was piqued as an undergraduate by Professor Bob Hannah at Indiana University Purdue University–Fort Wayne (now Purdue–Northeast). While I’ve always been drawn to stories from the era of contacts in the 1400s and 1500s, when the world must have seemed very exciting and confusing, my passion for the history of the region near the Congo River was kindled as a graduate student at the University of Virginia during 2006–2013.
I’ve also been blessed by insightful commentary and support about ideas