A Hydra of Business and Men: The Habsburg Asiento de Negros in Structuring the European Transatlantic Slave Trade

This book offers a historical and historiographical analysis of the Spanish asiento de negros, a contract between the Spanish Monarchy and private parties to introduce specific number of enslaved Africans to Spanish America. As the Spanish American market was the largest single market for enslaved people prior to 1720, studying this colonial contract is essential for understanding the development of the most significant colonial contract of the long 17th century. The asiento framed the European transatlantic slave trade for nearly two centuries and shaped much of the political economy of the Spanish Atlantic empire.

This book is unique in providing the first comprehensive study of the asiento since George Scelle’s 1906 work (La traite négrière aux Indes de Castille. Contracts et traités d’assiento, 2 vols.). Unlike Scelle, who focused on legal frameworks and presented the monarchy’s perspective, this book examines the asientistas themselves, offering insights into their business decisions and organizations. It concentrates on the period that gave rise to the idea of an asiento and the Habsburg-era asientos (1595–1713), preceding the so-called Bourbon reforms.