Sengoku Komachi Kurou Tan, European slavery

[Mr Zoat]

I've been reading Sengoku Komachi Kurou Tan! (The Hardships of a Warring States Era Beauty), and while I don't know enough about Japanese history to critique that part of it, I was extremely surprised that the main character was able to buy ethnically European slaves from a European merchant in 1573. I could see her being able to do it is the merchant was an Arab, but I was fairly sure that we didn't really have slavery in Europe at that time. Have I missed something important about European history?

 

[Rin]

Debt bondage and debt-slavery existed up until the 18th century in europe, as did the slavery of non-christians, pagans and heretics, many of whorm were ethnically european. That's my understanding at any rate.

This isn't taking into account all the various grey-area workarounds either, let alone the *actual* black market.

Official, mass-market slavery of non-criminal christians was technically illegal, but that's about as far as protections went.

I'm not surprised that Shizuko was able to buy a few european slaves. That the merchant is also european only makes sense. He'd have the connections and the routes and access to the 'merchandise'.

 

[Mr Zoat]

The slave trader in the comic says that of the two men, one was convicted of preaching heliocentrism and the other of iconclasm. Given that the Pope was familiar with Copernicus's work and Copernicus never got arrested, and Galileo mostly got imprisoned for being an unlikeable argumentative arsehole, the first one seems unlikely. I am not aware of restrictions on religious art during that period, though I suppose he might have gotten in trouble if it was something insulting. Of the two women, one got enslaved for criticising the church and the other for being a bastard. Given that this was during the start of the Reformation I could see a Catholic ruler signing off on a Protestant being enslaved -and vice versa- but I don't think being a bastard ever got you enslaved.

Also, the slave trader says that they were all originally sentenced to be burned at the stake, which seems even more unlikely.

 

[Rin]

The slave trader in the comic says that of the two men, one was convicted of preaching heliocentrism and the other of iconclasm. Given that the Pope was familiar with Copernicus's work and Copernicus never got arrested, and Galileo mostly got imprisoned for being an unlikeable argumentative arsehole, the first one seems unlikely. I am not aware of restrictions on religious art during that period, though I suppose he might have gotten in trouble if it was something insulting. Of the two women, one got enslaved for criticising the church and the other for being a bastard. Given that this was during the start of the Reformation I could see a Catholic ruler signing off on a Protestant being enslaved -and vice versa- but I don't think being a bastard ever got you enslaved.

Also, the slave trader says that they were all originally sentenced to be burned at the stake, which seems even more unlikely.

Click to shrink...

Selling off your bastards would be an easy way to get them out of sight and out of mind. I can't imagine it didn't happen. I can't comment on the stake burning, only that slavery was alive and well in europe in the 16th century.

 

[Megaolix]

Also, keep on mind this can also be a case of the author being wrong here. Wouldn't be the first japanese author getting things wrong.

 

[Mr Zoat]

That's what I was assuming, but I wanted to check.

And of course none of them can be English. The Cartwright Case was in 1569.