asiento de negros
(Spanish: "Negroes' contract")
[Index] , between the early 16th
and the mid-18th century, an agreement between the Spanish crown
and a private person or another sovereign power by which the
latter was granted a monopoly in supplying African slaves for
the Spanish colonies in the Americas. The contractor (asentista)
agreed to pay a certain amount of money to the crown for the
monopoly and to deliver a stipulated number of male and female
slaves for sale in the American markets. The first such contractor
was a Genoese company that in 1517 agreed to supply 1,000 slaves
over an eight-year period. In 1528 an agreement was reached
with a German firm to supply 4,000 slaves. For its monopoly
the firm paid 20,000 ducats annually to the crown. Each slave
was sold at a price not exceeding 45 ducats.
Until the 18th century individual Spaniards, as well as Portugal,
France, and Great Britain, entered into such contracts. In spite
of heavy taxation, government interference, and unsettled trade
conditions, all of which greatly curtailed the profitability
of asientos, foreigners, nevertheless, sought them because
they provided the chance to share in the lucrative Spanish-American
trade and, especially, to acquire some of the gold and silver
bullion produced by the slave trade.
The last and most notable asiento was that granted to
the
British South Sea Company, in 1713, by a provision
in the Treaty of
Utrecht. This contract
entitled the company to send 4,800 slaves to Spanish America
annually for 30 years and to send one ship (navío
de permiso) each year to engage in general trade. The company
found the enterprise unprofitable because war and other adverse
conditions usually prevented importation to the American markets,
while an annual tax to the Spanish crown of 
34,000 for the first 4,000 slaves had to be paid whether or
not they were imported. Also, the legal trade was accompanied
by illicit traffic that continually exacerbated Spanish-British
relations, leading to the War of
Jenkins' Ear in 1739.
This disrupted the profitable British trade with peninsular
Spain. Spain renewed the asiento at the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle
in 1748, but two years later the British relinquished their
rights in exchange for a payment of
100,000 from Spain. Between 1600 and 1750 an estimated 450,000
Africans were dispatched to Spanish America under the asiento
system.
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Development and importance of the slave trade