Empires of Slavery: Rights and Power in the Early Modern Iberian World

Enslavement was central to the early modern Iberian empires. No one at the time seriously questioned its legality, yet widespread reports of violent practices of captivity and human trafficking contrasted sharply with the Christian ideal of charity. This volume explores how Spanish and Portuguese theologians, jurists, and missionaries grappled with this moral dilemma. These thinkers developed ideological tools to protect the souls of those who appeared to be in a state of mortal damnation. Slavery prompted Iberian intellectuals to rethink the boundaries between property and person, law and religion, and household and commonwealth. By reconstructing these debates, this volume offers a new narrative about the relationship between individual rights and political power in the early modern Iberian world.