People database
People from the Italian peninsula involved in the Atlantic slave trade and slavery, 15th–19th centuries. Search by name or filter by role, place, network and period.
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Poleo Bartolomé
1790–1815Vecino of Lima, born in Savona, in the Republic of Genoa («vecino de Lima, natural de Savona, en la República de Génova»). Between 1790 and 1815 he is documented in 33 transactions involving enslaved people.
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Porcio Noce Nicolas
1679–1687Born in Crema, in the Venetian Terraferma, after his father's death he moved to Cádiz with his mother and his brother Pompeo. In Cádiz he married Teresa María Barroso del Pozo de la Oliva, daughter of Juan Barroso del Pozo. In January 1679 Porcio, on behalf of Juan Barroso, undertook to introduce 6,000 of the 10,000 enslaved people granted to the Consulado of Merchants of Seville, which then held the asiento: the two thus obtained 60% of the contract, which expired at the end of 1681. Through their agents in Amsterdam they negotiated with the Dutch West India Company (WIC) the delivery to Curaçao of 9,800 enslaved Africans by the end of 1681, on average 4,900 a year. In 1682 Porcio and Barroso obtained a new contract that made them sole holders of the asiento: for five years they were to introduce into Spanish America up to 10,000 toneladas (the fiscal unit of the asiento, corresponding to the 'pieza de Indias'), with the possibility of obtaining supplies directly in Jamaica and Curaçao, like Grillo and Lomellini, in exchange for silver or colonial products. Conflicts with the Dutch, and above all with the Coymans brothers, put an end to the asiento before 1687.
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Porrata Giovanni Battista
1661–1670A Genoese merchant active in Cádiz, between 1661 and 1670 he was a trading partner of the asiento and took part in the expeditions of its ships to the Caribbean. He belonged to the same Cádiz group as Giovanni Rolato, the brothers Giovanni Battista and Pantaleo Grasso, Pietro Del Forno, Giovanni Battista Priaruggia and Alberto Bieluto.
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Priaruggia Giovanni Battista
1660–1679 (decade)A Genoese merchant active in Cádiz, in the 1660s and 1670s he took part as a partner in the expeditions of the asiento ships to the Caribbean, together with Giovanni Battista Porrata, Giovanni Rolato, the Grasso brothers, Pietro Del Forno and Alberto Bieluto.
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Ratto Manuel
1685–1689A Genoese merchant, partner of Balthasar Coymans in Cádiz in the firm «Coymans en Ratto», recorded in the archive index as «Conio e Ratto». Between 1685 and 1689 he directly managed the financial operations, remittances and shipping freights on behalf of the asiento company, holder of the monopoly of the slave trade in the Spanish colonies.
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Recagno Domenico
1601–1700 (century)A Genoese merchant settled in Cádiz, he took part with Francesco Ferrari of Amsterdam, Bartolomeo Grillo and Ambrogio Lomellini in a company for the transport of enslaved people to American ports. He is a different person from Bernardo Recagno, active in the same Cádiz merchant colony.
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Rezzonico Aurelio
1666A merchant originally from Como and partner in Venice of Pietro Cernezzi, in 1666 he contributed to the loan of 9,180 ducats sent to Amsterdam to pay for a cargo of enslaved people for the asiento. The operation passed through the house of Giovanni Battista Benzi and Giovanni Gabriele Voet and combined Venetian capital with payments to the suppliers of the Dutch market.
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Ricasoli Luigi
1526In December 1526 Luigi Ricasoli and Giovanni Orsucci form Lucca, after declaring that they had resided in Spain for more than fifteen years, obtained from the sovereign the right to send goods accompanied by enslaved people to the West Indies.
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Riparola Franceso
1492–1515Known as Francisco de Riberol, he financed he Spanish conquest of La Palma and Tenerife, led by Alonso Fernández de Lugo, alongside other Genoese merchants, including Matteo Vigna and Francesco Palmario. He settled in La Palma, where he traded enslaved Guanche people and owned plantations on which they worked.
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Riparola Giacomo
1462–1507Besides trading in enslaved people, he held the monopoly of the trade in orchil (orchilla), a dye, and took part in the wine trade with the West Indies.
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Rizo Bartolo
1804–1819By 1819, his assets included two ranchos worth 8,097 pesos, four enslaved individuals, two pairs of oxen, five draught horses, a cart, and 1,000 pesos in cash. He provided credit to other Ligurians who wanted to buy land.
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Rodriguez Juan
1520–1529A ship's captain of Genoese origin living in Seville, he was one of the most important agents of Grimaldi and Centurione in Santo Domingo. Although above all a seaman, he enjoyed their full confidence, and he also began to trade on his own account and to make profits. He made loans and went so far as to purchase vessels such as the Santa Maria and the Trinidad. He probably died in 1529.
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Rolato Giovanni
1661–1663A Genoese merchant and partner of the asiento in Cádiz between 1661 and 1662, he was investigated for smuggling in the Indies. He belonged to the same trading network as Giovanni Battista Porrata and the other Cádiz partners who took part in the slave-trading expeditions in the Caribbean, including the Grasso brothers, Pietro Del Forno, Giovanni Battista Priaruggia and Alberto Bieluto.
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Rondinelli Piero
1485–1520A Florentine merchant, he was called by Donato Nicolini to direct in Seville the trading company that had belonged to Giannotto Berardi and that, on the latter's death, had passed to Amerigo Vespucci. He traded in enslaved people on behalf of Marchionni and Cesare Barzi. Besides the slave trade, he dealt in Canary sugar, English woollen cloth, Italian silk fabrics and many other products.
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Rossi Juan Bautista
1784A trustee and business agent, in Madrid he collected the income from the Real Compañía de La Habana, deeply involved in the Cuban slave economy, due to the Infante Fernando, Duke of Parma: 3 and one-third shares, which came from the estate of Elisabeth Farnese. The dividend, 83 and one-third pesos, equal to 1,268 reales de vellón, was collected on 30 July 1784.
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Rovellasca Giovanni Battista
1583–1599From 1583 to 1589 he held the contract for the trade in enslaved people from the island of São Tomé to the Antilles. Between 1595 and 1599 he purchased a licence to import 230 enslaved people into Cartagena de Indias.
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Sacio Antonio
1798–1825He was a Genoese merchant in Lima who married Gertrudis Poleo, the daughter of another Genoese man named Bartolomé Poleo. She brought a dowry of around 13,000 pesos to the marriage, but in 1822 he claimed that her contribution was actually worth around 24,000 pesos — 11,000 pesos more than the dowry. His properties included four cajones (shops) on the Ribera, bodegas on Calle Aldabas, Mantas and Portal de Botoneros, as well as properties rented on Calle Pescadería and Calle Santo Toribio. In his early years of business, he traded brandy from the Ica Valley. He also owned two pulperías (grocery shops). In 1825 he married, as his third wife, Toribia Poleo, who brought him a dowry of about 16,000 pesos, including three enslaved people worth 780 pesos.
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Saluzzi Giacomo
1632–1636Through his representative, Antonio Balbi, he claimed the dividends of a shipment of enslaved Africans undertaken together with Antonio del Campo and Benavidez. He also claimed 84,500 ducats for the cargoes shipped to the Indies in 1632. He appears also to have benefited from the licences granted by the court of Philip IV in the 1630s, which links him directly to those granted to Nicola Salvago.
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Salvago Ambrogio (o Ambrosio)
1603–1609At the beginning of the seventeenth century he invested, together with Francesco Serra, in the asiento of the Portuguese Gonzalo Baez Coutinho.
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Salvago Benedetto
1401–1500 (century)A fifteenth-century member of the Salvago merchant family, he owned an enslaved person engaged in domestic service. He appears with his relative Brunetto Salvago in the notarial records because he provided for the manumission of that person and assigned that person a share of the inheritance.
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Salvago Brunetto
1401–1500 (century)A fifteenth-century member of the Salvago merchant family, he owned an enslaved person employed in domestic service. He appears with his relative Benedetto Salvago in the notarial records because he provided for the manumission of that person and assigned that person a share of the inheritance.
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Salvago Carlo
1639–1659On the death of his brother Nicola, in 1639, he inherited all his property and sought to obtain further licences to bring enslaved people to Buenos Aires. With his brother Enrico he used the Regia Camera of Milan to exchange the silver he brought from the Americas, and he entered the wool trade between Spain and Genoa.
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Salvago Cristobal
1490–1500He traded in enslaved people with the Canary Islands.
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Salvago Enrico
1633–1635A Genoese merchant, between 1633 and 1635 he fitted out and dispatched a ship from Genoa to Brazil via Lisbon, perhaps making use of the licences and the slave asiento of his relative Nicola Salvago; it is not certain that he held an authorisation of his own.
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Salvago Luca
1490–1500Owner of a sugar plantation in Madeira.