The Anglo-Egyptian Slave Trade Convention, also known as Anglo-Egyptian Convention for the Suppression of the Slave Trade or Anglo-Egyptian Convention for the Abolition of Slavery was a treaty between the

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the union of the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland into one sovereign state, established by the Acts of Union 1800, Acts of Union in 1801. It continued in this form until ...

and the

Khedivate of Egypt The Khedivate of Egypt ( or , ; ') was an autonomous tributary state of the Ottoman Empire, established and ruled by the Muhammad Ali Dynasty following the defeat and expulsion of Napoleon Bonaparte's forces which brought an end to the short- ...

from 1877. The first version of 1877 was followed by an addition in 1884 and a second addition in 1895. It formally banned the slave trade to Egypt. While slavery itself was not abolished, existing slaves were granted the right to apply for manumission, which managed to phase out slavery by the early 20th-century.

Background

The British had an ongoing policy of pressure against the Ottoman Empire to prohibit the slave trade. The Anglo-Egyptian Slave Trade Convention was preceded by the

Firman of 1857 The Firman of 1857, also referred to as the Prohibition of the Black Slave Trade, refers to the Imperial ''Firman'' or ''Ferman'' (Decree) issued by Sultan Abdülmecid I Abdülmecid I (, ; 25 April 182325 June 1861) was the 31st sultan of the O ...

, which prohibited the trade in African slaves in to the Ottoman Empire, which Ottoman Egypt formally belonged to. However the Firman of 1857 was nominal on paper only, and the British pressure therefore continued in the issue.

Convention

The treaty of 1877 officially banned the slave trade from Sudan, thus formally putting an end on the import of slaves from

Sudan Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Libya to the northwest, Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the east, Eritrea and Ethiopi ...

.Kenneth M. Cuno:
Modernizing Marriage: Family, Ideology, and Law in Nineteenth- and Early ...
' Sudan was at this time the main import of male slaves to Egypt. This ban was followed in 1884 by a ban on the import of white women; this law was directed against the import of white women (mainly from

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region spanning Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is situated between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, comprising parts of Southern Russia, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The Caucasus Mountains, i ...

and usually

Circassians The Circassians or Circassian people, also called Cherkess or Adyghe (Adyghe language, Adyghe and ), are a Northwest Caucasian languages, Northwest Caucasian ethnic group and nation who originated in Circassia, a region and former country in t ...

via the

Circassian slave trade The Black Sea slave trade trafficked people across the Black Sea from Eastern Europe and the Caucasus to slavery in the Mediterranean and the Middle East. The Black Sea slave trade was a center of the slave trade between Europe and the rest of t ...

), which were the preferred choice for harem concubines among the Egyptian upper class.Cuno, K. M. (2015). Modernizing Marriage: Family, Ideology, and Law in Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century Egypt. Egypten: Syracuse University Press. p. 25 The addition of 1895 prohibited any interference of the "full liberty of action of an enfranchised slave", thereby assuring them the right to marry and inherit, which had often been deprived them by their former owners; slave trading was now to be addressed by the domestic criminal courts instead of the courts-martials, which made it more efficient, increased penalties and authorized vigilance preventing the slave traffic from the

Red Sea slave trade The Red Sea slave trade, sometimes known as the Islamic slave trade, Arab slave trade, or Oriental slave trade, was a slave trade across the Red Sea trafficking Africans from Sub-Saharan Africa in the African continent to slavery in the A ...

in to Egypt.Indian Ocean Slavery in the Age of Abolition. (2013). USA: Yale University Press.

Aftermath

The import of male slaves from Sudan as soldiers, civil service and eunuchs, as well as the import of female slaves from Caucasus as

harem A harem is a domestic space that is reserved for the women of the house in a Muslim family. A harem may house a man's wife or wives, their pre-pubescent male children, unmarried daughters, female domestic Domestic worker, servants, and other un ...

women were the two main sources of slave import to Egypt, thus these laws were, at least on paper, major blows on Slavery in Egypt. Slavery itself was not banned, only the import of slaves. However a ban on the sale on existing slaves was introduced alongside a law giving existing slaves the legal right to apply for

manumission Manumission, or enfranchisement, is the act of freeing slaves by their owners. Different approaches to manumission were developed, each specific to the time and place of a particular society. Historian Verene Shepherd states that the most wi ...

at the British Consulate or at four Bureaus of Manumission established in different parts of the country, and thousands of slaves used the opportunity to apply a certificate of liberation. British abolitionists in Egypt opened a home for former female slaves to assist them and protect them from falling victim to prostitution, which was in operation from 1884 until 1908. In 1901 a French observer shared his impression that slavery in Egypt was over "in fact and in law"; the Egyptian census of 1907 no longer listed any slaves, and in 1911 Repression of Slave Trade Departments were closed and transformed to Sudan. While it was acknowledged that slavery itself was not banned and still existed by 1908, it was by then no longer visible enough to be a focus of Western criticism.

References

* Francesca Biancani: ''Sex Work in Colonial Egypt: Women, Modernity and the Global Economy'' * Seong Hyun Kim: ''A Comparative Study of Anti-Slavery in 19th Century Middle East and North Africa: The Cases of the Egyptian Khedivate and the Husaynid Beylik of Tunis '' * Diane Robinson-Dunn: ''The Harem, Slavery and British Imperial Culture: Anglo-Muslim Relations in'' {{Anti-slavery treaties 1877 in Africa Anti-slavery treaties Abolitionism in Africa Slavery in Egypt Slavery in Sudan 1877 in Egypt 1877 in the British Empire 1877 treaties 1884 in Egypt 1884 in the British Empire 1884 treaties 1895 in Egypt 1895 in the British Empire 1895 treaties Treaties of the Khedivate of Egypt Treaties of the United Kingdom (1801–1922) African slave trade Egypt–United Kingdom relations Slave trade legislation 19th century in slavery Trans-Saharan slave trade Abolitionism in the Ottoman Empire Abolitionism in the United Kingdom

Background

Convention

Aftermath

See also

References