Captives and Corsairs France and Slavery in the Early Modern Mediterranean [Paperback]

Captives and Corsairsuncovers a forgotten story in the history of relations between the West and Islam: three centuries of Muslim corsair raids on French ships and shores and the resulting captivity of tens of thousands of French subjects and citizens in North Africa. Through an analysis of archival materials, writings, and images produced by contemporaries, the book fundamentally revises our picture of France's emergence as a nation and a colonial power, presenting the Mediterranean as an essential vantage point for studying the rise of France. It reveals how efforts to liberate slaves from North Africa shaped France's perceptions of the Muslim world and of their own Frenchness . From around 1550 to 1830, freeing these captives evolved from an expression of Christian charity to a method of state building and, eventually, to a rationale for imperial expansion.Captives and Corsairsthus advances new arguments about the fluid nature of slavery and firmly links captive redemption to state formationand in turn to the still vital ideology of liberatory conquest.

Captives and Corsairsis a well-researched and engagingly written book. Weiss's work complicates and enriches our understanding of the modern history of slavery and brings a valuablelongue dur?eperspective to our understanding of early modern relations between France and North Arica. In a remarkably erudite and lucid narrative, Gillian Weiss tells the unjustly neglected story of Mediterranean slavery, highlighting the interchange between French captives in North Africa and Islamic captives in France.Captives and Corsairsis a fascinating chronicle of changing cultural perceptions that will be warmly welcomed by all historians of modern Europe, all scholars of slavery, and all thinking individuals concerned with West/East and Christian/Islamic relations. Captives and Corsairsis undoubtedly a major contribution to both the growing literature on early modern slavery,l¾