Ancient Chinese literati sometimes used words that lacked rigor, using "Kunlun Nu" to refer to all black slaves, but it made posterity confused. From historical records, it is possible that the Kunlun slaves of the Tang Dynasty came mainly from Southeast Asia, because Saigon in Vietnam at that time was the slave trading center, selling black Malays to China.
Saigon was called "Chai Stick" at that time, which may have been misread as Kunlun during the Tang Dynasty, so the black slaves from there were called Kunlun nu.
Malay blacks belonged to the dwarf black race, also known as negritos. They are distributed in many archipelagos in Southeast Asia, with dark skin and curly hair, which is very much in line with the characteristics of Kunlunnu. There is a saying that The Japanese have a large number of dwarf black genes, and they may be part of the ancestors of the Japanese. It is no wonder that the ancient Japanese were shorter than other East Asian peoples and were called Wokou.
The Northern Song Dynasty documents record that when some Kunlun slaves enter the water, their eyes do not blink, such a good water and Malay black people are worthy, after all, they live on the island, the water quality must be excellent.
The Dravidians of India were also part of the Kunlunnu, and as one of the earliest masters of the Indian subcontinent, the Dravidians were also a little miserable. After being conquered back and forth several times, he eventually fell into the position of a slave.
Although Kunlun Nu were all slaves, there were also special cases of turning over. During the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the crown prince Sima Yu, who was 42 years old and had no heir, obeyed the instructions of Xiang Shi, married Kunlun Nu Li Lingrong as a concubine, and gave birth to two sons and a daughter at once. Later, Li Lingrong also became the empress dowager, and his son also became emperor. Sima Yu used Kunlun Nu as a fertility machine, which was obviously very successful.
The black Africans brought by the Arabs should also be part of the Kunlunnu. After the rise of the Arabs, they occupied West Asia and North Africa, separated from Black Africa by only a Sahara Desert, and there were black people in the upper Nile. So it was perfectly normal for arabs to take some blacks as slaves.
China has a long history of using Kunlun nu, but it does not mean that China is a slave society. In fact, compared to other countries, Chinese was very friendly to Kunlun Nu. It is estimated that the Kunlun slaves who can travel thousands of miles to China are basically relatively honest, have great strength, and are hard-working. The Chinese nobles regarded Kunlun nu as a conspicuous capital, so naturally there was no reason to abuse them.
Although China treated Kunlun nu well, it could not change the attitude of other countries towards blacks. Black Africans, in particular, really began their tragic fate after the West entered the Age of Discovery.
First the Portuguese, then the Spaniards, the British, they used Africa as a hunting ground, for these Europeans, there was no essential difference between the negro and the beast, the beast had to be killed to make money, but the negro was the instrument of life.
Beginning in the 15th century, Europeans plundered black slaves in Africa on a large scale, they sent black slaves to work on plantations in the Americas, black people were born with strong adaptability to tropical climates, strong strength and hardship, was the perfect labor force, more importantly, they did not want anything except for food, they did not want a penny, everything belonged to their masters, just a tool for "work".
For 400 years, Europeans killed and plundered as many as "one hundred million" blacks in Africa. In 1980, the total population of Africa was 100 million. In Africa, backwardness is not about being beaten, but about extermination. Before europeans entered Africa, blacks were still in the primitive tribal stage, and the superior natural conditions made the production methods of blacks still stay in hunting and gathering, which lagged behind the world by thousands of years.
What is even more painful is that most of the blacks are not caught by Europeans themselves, and when the black people have defenses and desperately resist, the cost of catching black slaves is getting higher and higher, and there is a certain risk. So the Europeans found local black kings or tribal chiefs and bought captives from them. Then the main force for the capture of slaves became the Negro himself.
In exchange for some small favors from the Europeans, these blacks were not at all soft. After the abolition of the slave trade, some tribal leaders were still unhappy, believing that they were preventing them from getting rich.
The largest number of slaves trafficked was undoubtedly the British, the hegemon of the seas, and with the expansion of the British colonies, black slaves were also spread throughout North and South America. Washington, Jefferson, and other founding fathers of the United States were all slave owners.
On the contrary, at that time, England had abolished slavery, and many blacks preferred to follow their British employers back to Britain rather than mix in the American War of Independence. Unfortunately, the British still looked down on blacks, and if they had emancipated black slaves like Lincoln, the revolutionary war did not know what the outcome would be.
Compared with the Europeans who traded black slaves, the Chinese hundreds of years ago were really a more civilized people. However, some people think that Chinese is too merciful and misses the opportunity to introduce a large number of free labor.