Triangular Trade

The triangular trade was the three-leg Atlantic commerce that linked Europe, West Africa, and the Americas from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. Manufactured goods went from Europe to Africa, enslaved Africans were carried across the Middle Passage to the plantation colonies, and sugar, tobacco, cotton, and rum returned to Europe. The pattern enriched ports such as Bristol, Liverpool, and Nantes and was central to the Atlantic economy until abolition. The term simplifies a more complex web of routes but captures its core structure.