Excerpt of letter from Nzinga Mbemba to Portuguese King João III, 1526 CE, King Nzinga (Afonso) (KONGO)

In 1526, the king of the Kongo, Nzinga Mbemba (who by this time had adopted the Christian name of Afonso I) began writing a series of twenty-four letters to the Portuguese King Joao III appealing for an end to the slave trade. While a trading relationship had been in place between Portugal and Kongo since the 1480s, Afonso was increasingly unhappy that the relationship between both countries had degenerated into one in which the slave trade had become increasingly important

As Portuguese trading activities increased in Africa, many African kingdoms experienced the negative effects of the Atlantic Slave Trade. In the excerpt, Nzinga Mbemba (Afonso I), the king of the Kongo, writes to the Portuguese king to express his concern over the damaging effects of the slave trade.