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Spanish fort in Veracruz (2008)

Spanish fort in Carthagena (Colombia)

The island Cádiz by Blaeu in 1662

The asiento (Spanish: asiento) was a contract between Spain and Great Britain created in 1713 that dealt with the supply of African slaves for the Spanish territories in the Americas. The general meaning of asiento (from the Spanish verb sentar, to sit, and this from Latin sedere) in Spanish is "seat" or "settlement, establishment"; in a commercial context it means "contract, trading agreement." In the words of Georges Scelle, it is "a term in Spanish public law which designates every contract made for the purpose of public utility…between the Spanish government and private individuals."^[1] In Habsburg Spain, assientoes were a basic method of financing state expenditures: "Borrowing took two forms – long-term debt in the form of perpetual bonds (juros), and short-term loan contracts provided by bankers (asientos). Many assientoes were eventually converted or refinanced through juros."^[2]

In the history of slavery, asiento refers to the permission given by the Spanish government to other countries to sell slaves to the Spanish colonies, between the years 1543 and 1834.

Through an asiento, a trade relationship was established whereby a set of traders was given a monopoly over that route and/or product. In this case, it refers specifically to a monopoly over the trade of slaves between Africa and the Americas. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, this asiento existed between the early 16th and mid 18th century.

Initially, Portugal dominated the slave trade. Before the onset of the official asiento in 1595, the Spanish fiscal authorities gave individual asientoes to merchants, primarily from Portugal, to bring slaves to the Americas. For the 1560s most of these slaves were obtained in the Upper Guinea regions, especially in the Sierra Leone region where there were many wars associated with the Mane invasions. However, following the establishment of the Portuguese colony of Angola in 1575, and the gradual replacement of Sao Tome by Brazil as the primary producers of sugar, Angolan interests came to dominate the trade, and it was Portuguese financiers and merchants who obtained the larger scale, comprehensive asiento that was established in 1595. Angolan dominance of the trade was pronounced after 1615 when the governors of Angola, starting with Bento Banha Cardoso, made alliance with Imbangala mercenaries to wreak havoc on the local African powers. Many of these governors also held the contract of Angola as well as the assiento, thus insuring their interests. Shipping registers from Vera Cruz and Cartagena show that as many as 85% of the slaves arriving in Spanish ports were from Angola, brought by Portuguese ships. The earlier asiento period came to an end in 1640 when Portugal revolted against Spain, though even then the Portuguese continued to supply Spanish colonies. In the 1650s Spain sought to enter the slave trade directly, sending ships to Angola to purchase slaves and toying with the idea of a military alliance with Kongo, the powerful African kingdom north of Angola. But these ideas were abandoned and the Spanish returned to Portuguese and then Dutch interests to supply slaves. Later in history, Britain and Holland dominated the slave trade. The slaves were sent mostly to the New World colonies.

At the conclusion of the War of the Spanish Succession, the Treaty of Utrecht gave to Great Britain a thirty-year asiento, or contract, to furnish (supply) an unlimited number of slaves to the Spanish colonies, and 500 tons of goods per year. This provided British traders and smugglers potential inroads into the traditionally closed Spanish markets in America. Disputes connected with it led to the War of Jenkins' Ear (1739).

The reason for such patents is that trade routes were not what we take for granted today. At the time, the development of ports on either side and facilities for the trade was very expensive to develop and more so to manage. The European governments found it easier and more lucrative to assign a monopoly (ostensibly protected by the armada) to a group of traders who would pay the government for the privilege and invest in the infrastructure to enable the trade. One must remember that these were pre-bureaucratic and fractured governments. Organization and leadership of distant activities was often placed in the hands of traders who would pay a flat fee. For the government, the sole purpose of these endeavours was money. The spread of Christianity should not be forgotten as a motivator, but this was always secondary to resources (gold, spices, etc.). There are many examples of Isabella referring to the Christianizing of the "heathens" but even she wouldn't have the resources for this if there weren't gold to pay for it. This is why Florida never gained significant development until much later. However it is a more modern concept that land had value above and beyond the resource extraction that could be gained by controlling it. So really, it is dangerous to look at the assiento or patent system as different from how we currently look at patents on drugs or technology. The government, in order to facilitate the development of such things, literally sells the right to them to gain rent from the exclusion of others.

Similar patents in the English system were the Virginia Company, the Levant Company, and the Merchant Adventurers' patent of trade with the United Provinces (pretty much concurrent with modern day Netherlands). A detailed and well written overview of the English system is given by Robert Brenner in "Merchants and Revolution".

Holders of the Assiento

Joseph Coymans, with coat of arms, three oxheads, by Frans Hals in (1644). He and his brother, & two cousins named Balthasar and Joan were financing slave trade. Wadsworth Atheneum Hartford (Connecticut)

• 1595-1615 - Pedro Gómez Reynel.^[3]
• 1602-1610 - Juan Rodríguez Coutiño, succeeded by Gonzalo Báez Coutiño.
• November 5, 1611 - Juan Alfonso de Molina Cano for Antonio Fernández de Elvas.
• January 24, 1615 - Melchor Maldonado.
• 1615-1621 - Antonio Fernández de Elvas.
• February 2, 1622 - Gaspar de Monteser for Antonio Fernández de Elvas.
• 1623-1625 - Miguel Rodríguez Lamego.
• 1631-1640? - Melchor Gómez Angel and Cristobal Méndez de Sousa.
• July 5, 1662-1669 Domingo Grillo and Ambrosio Lomelín will ship 24,000 slaves in seven years, assisted by the Dutch West India Company from Curaçao and the Royal African Company from Jamaica.^[4]
  • The assiento is ended because of mistrust.^{[5] [6]}
  • King Charles II of England tries to lay hands on the assiento.
• 1670-1675 Antonio García, a Portuguese (and Sebastian de Síliceo his guarantee).^[7][8]

The Dutch merchant in Cadiz Joshua van Belle, involved with his brother Pedro in slave trade, by Murillo in 1670, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin

• 1676-1679 Manuel Hierro de Castro, and Manuel José Cortizos, members of the Consulado de Sevilla. It is not longer accepted by the Spanish to buy slaves on Curaçao!
  • [Señor. El Maestro Fray Juan de Castro, Religioso de la Orden de Santo Domingo, dize : Que por el año de 1678 hollandose en la Ciudad de Cádiz, le solicitaron D. Baltasar Coymans, y Pedro Bambelle de Nacion Olandeses, para la disposicion de un Assiento, que se auia de hazer para comerciar à Indias, haziendole grandes ofertas…y auian de ser Españoles los que le auian de hazer ; y reconociendo…que se trataua de adulterarel comercio…]"
• 1680 Juan Barroso del Pozo, a former assistent Coymans (?) ^[9] and Nicolas Porcio, his Venetian son-in-law, became asentistas.
• 1682-1688 Juan Barroso del Pozo (-1683) and Nicolás Porcio succeeded in getting the assiento for 6.5 years.
• February 1685-1688 Balthasar Coymans (1652-1686).^{[7] [10]}
  • Royal Order, signed 'El Rey', commanding Don Balthasar Coymans, Don Juan Barrosa & Don Nicolas Porzio to assemble ten Capuchin monks (Franciscan friars) from either Cadiz or Amsterdam for the purpose of sailing to the coast of Africa to buy slaves, to convert them to Christianity and sell them in the West Indies, 25th March 1685 Balthasar & Johan Coymans.^[11]
  • Carta de Rodrigo Gómez a [Manuel Diego López de Zúñiga Mendoza Sotomayor, X] Duque de Béjar informando de la concesión de un asiento de negros en el Río de la Plata a favor de Baltasar Coymans y pide recomendaciones personales para que su hijo Pedro sea empleado en ese negocio. Menciona también a Gaspar de Rebolledo, Juan Pimentel como Gobernador de Buenos Aires y a [Carlos José Gutiérrez de los Ríos Roha, VI] Conde de Fernán-Núñez. Antwerp, 1685-04-17.^[12]
  • July 1686. King Charles II of Spain starts an investigation in to the legitimacy of the Assiento.^[13] The assiento with B. Coymans is annulled.
  • October 1686 The Dutch refuse to accept the "Junta de Asiento de Negros".
  • There is a risk of war between France and Spain; Jamaica is becoming more important than Curaçao.^[14]

Jean Baptiste du Casse, 1700

A Danish ship near Accra in 1767. In the rear the fortification Christiensborg.

• 1687-1688 Jan Carçau, or Juan Carcán a former assistent of B. Coymans, takes over the assiento.
  • March 1688 Jan Carçao is put in prison in Cádiz, accused of fraud.
• 1688-October 1691 Nicolás Porcio.
• 1692-1695 Bernardo Francisco Marín de Guzmán
• 1695-1701 Manuel Ferreira de Carvallo representing the Real Compañía de Cacheu or Real Compañía de Guinea del Reino de Portugal
  • 1698 The Royal African Company looses her monopoly.^[15]
• 1701-1713 Jean du Casse in name of the Compagnie de Guinée et de l’Assiente des Royaume de la France.^[16]
• 1713-1750 South Sea Company. ^[17]
• 1750-1764 ???
• 1765-1772 Miguel de Uriarte in name of Aguirre, Aristegui y Compañía, or Compañía Gaditana.
• 1773-1779 Aguirre, Aristegui y Compañía, or Compañía Gaditana.

Sources

• Goslinga, C.Ch. (1985) The Dutch in the Caribbean and in the Guianas 1680-1791.
• David Marley (ed.), Reales asientos y licencias para la introduccion de esclavos negros a la America Espagnola (1676-1789), ISBN 0-88653-009-1 (Windsor, Canada. 1985).
• Postma, J.M. (2008) The Dutch in the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600-1815 Cambridge University Press

References

(See also: Chartered companies)