Three centuries of the slave trade had taught Europeans that Africans were inferior, and that helped to justify imperialism in the minds of many Europeans. Even slave abolitionists contributed to this by arguing that Africans had to be "protected" from slavers; i.e. they couldn't take care of themselves. The limited information brought back to Europe by explorers like Mungo Park and Henry Morton Stanley made Africans appear warlike and/or childlike, and they wrote books and gave lectures that popularized the notion of Africa as "the dark continent." For example, this relatively favorable quotation from a first-time visitor to Africa illustrates the prevailing beliefs among Europeans:"As we steamed into the estuary of Sierra Leone on November 18th [1889], we found Africa exactly as books of travel had led us to anticipate--a land of excessive heat, lofty palm-trees, gigantic baobabs, and naked savages. At five o'clock we dropped anchor at Free Town, called, on account of its deadly fevers, the `white man's grave.' Immediately, our vessel was surrounded by boats filled with men and women, shouting, jabbering, laughing, quarrelling, and even fighting. ... Without exception it was the most confusedly excited and noisy lot of humanity I have ever seen."Source: William Harvey Brown, On the South African Frontier: The Adventures and Observations of an American in Mashonaland and Matabeleland (New York: Negro Universities Press, 1970; London: Sampson Low, Marstan & Co., 1899), 3.Victorian philosophers even had an explanation for African backwardness. According to late 19th century science, human development took place in three stages: savagery, marked by hunting and gathering; barbarism accompanied by the beginning of settled agriculture; and civilization, which required the development of commerce. European scientists believed that Africa were stuck in the stage of barbarism because they lived in a place with such good soil and climate that it provided "tropical abundance." The ease of life in Africa made Africans fat and lazy. For proof, Europeans relied on data about the work habits of African-American slaves (who had their own r
