Triangular trade
Triangular trade, or triangle trade, is a historical term indicating trade among three ports or regions. Triangular trade usually evolves when a region has export commodities that are not required in the region from which its major imports come. Triangular trade thus provides a method for rectifying trade imbalances between the above regions.
The particular routes were historically also shaped by the powerful influence of winds and currents during the age of sail. For example, from the main trading nations of Western Europe it was much easier to sail westwards after first going south of 30 N latitude and reaching the so-called "trade winds"; thus arriving in the Caribbean rather than going straight west to the North American mainland. Returning from North America, it is easiest to follow the Gulf Stream in a northeasterly direction using the westerlies. A similar triangle to this, called the volta do mar was already being used by the Portuguese, before Columbus' voyage, to sail to the Canary Islands and the Azores. Columbus simply expanded the triangle outwards, and his route became the main way for Europeans to reach, and return from, the Americas.
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American History USA Articles
- The Atlantic Slave Trade to the United States
By any measure, the Atlantic slave trade was one of the great human crimes of the last thousand years. - Slave North -- "Slavery in Rhode Island"
Slavery was practiced in Rhode Island until the early 19th century, and that state's merchants also played a key role in the transatlantic slave trade.
Books/Sources
- Colonial Triangular Trade: An Economy Ba (Perspectives on History) - Phyllis Raybin Emert
- TRIANGULAR TRADE: An entry from Charles Scribner's Sons' Dictionary of American History - James P. Whittenburg