Antão Gonçalves is sent by Henry the…
1442 CE
Antão Gonçalves is sent by Henry the Navigator in 1441 to explore the West African coast in an expedition under the command of Nuno Tristão.
As Gonçalves is considerably younger than Tristão, his duty is less exploration than it is hunting the Mediterranean monk seals that inhabit West Africa.
After he has filled his small vessel with seal skins, Gonçalves, on his own initiative, decides to buy some Africans to return to Portugal.
With nine of his crewmen, Gonçalves buys an Azenegue Berber and a black tribesman who has worked as a slave for the Berbers.
By this time, Tristão has arrived at the same place, and the two crews join together for another purchasing trip, on which they buy ten slaves, one of them an Azenegue chief.
After this, Tristão continues exploration southwards while Gonçalves returns to Portugal.
Gonçalves embarks on another expedition in 1442, taking the Azenegue chief he had bought the year before.
Hoping to barter the chief for a number of the Azenegues' black slaves, Gonçalves receives ten slaves, some gold dust and, curiously, a large number of ostrich eggs.
However, this expedition contributes nothing to the cause of exploration; Gonçalves, who is granted a new Coat of Arms for his name, has not even sailed past the Río de Oro.
He is, however, the first European to buy enslaved Africans from black slave traders.
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