So... I'm about to write something messed up, that I learned today and I'm freaking out. If you're from balkan and you knew this please message me and explain how.
I was on wikipedia, reading the page 'Human' because I was curious what it said, and honestly that article is unhinged and sounds copied from an alien textbook. It goes over the history of human development and at one point starts going over slavery and I accidentally clicked on 'atlantic slave trade'. Since the page was open, I thought, why not learn more about this, always good to know about history of slavery since it set the world up into what it is today.
So I am reading, and it explains how big empires relied on slaves to produce sugar, cotton, and other commodities, and at first trafficked and sold people from Africa for this, but then also incorporated religion as a judgment of who can be a slave. So they weren't supposed to enslave people of their own religion, but could enslave someone they believed to be a heretic. Catholics were enslaving orthodox christians and muslims could enslave shia muslims.
I am reading this and thinking how religion is even more evil than I originally thought and this is disgusting and then I read the words 'balkan slave trade' and I'm just ????. Like what do you mean. I know I havent paid attention in history but come on. That I would surely remember?
So I click it, and find out. In 14th century, balkans were pagans, and there was also 'Bogomilism' religion which meant 'dear to god' and it was anti church, gnostic practice that went against christian hierarchy. Since balkan was on the religious borders of christianity and islam, they were allowed to be taken slaves and were trafficked via port in Dubrovnik. The pagan religion of balkan was the confirmation of their slave status, and Bosnians were most aggressively targeted. Women were trafficked to be house help in Italy, while males were turned Egyptian soldiers. The practice stopped when Ottoman empire claimed balkan in 15th century at which point the slave trade was absorbed into the ottoman slave trade.
I've never even heard of any of that before. I'be been mad about destructiom of pagan religion for years but they actually enslaved and trafficked pagans? I didn't know.
Then I wondered why I didn't know, and asked wikipedia to show me the same article in croatian language. It didn't exist. In fact, the article only existed in english language. I then googled 'balkan slave trade' in croatian. Zero results. Nothing. It wasn't that I didn't pay attention, there are no sources about this written in my language!
We just DON'T TALK ABOUT THIS??!!
Was the only way for me to find out a miniscule chance I stumble on it accidentally on wikipedia? I need more info. Who knew about this and why is it hidden. I need to know everything. I want to understand why things are the way they are.
