Toby Green Explained

Toby Green is a British historian of inequality. He is also a Professor of Precolonial and Lusophone African History and Culture at King's College London. He obtained his Doctor of Philosophy in African studies, at the University of Birmingham. He is Chair of the Fontes Historiae Africanae (Sources of African History) Committee of the British Academy,^[1] and has written extensively about African early modern history and colonial African slavery, mainly focused on slavery in the Portuguese colonies.

He has also written on the Spanish Inquisition.^[2] Green disagrees with the notion of a Black Legend of the Spanish Inquisition and often quotes sixteenth-century sources, regarding the institution's abuse of power in Latin America, and is often cited regarding this subject. He has other publications regarding the issues of religious prosecution and oppression in Africa and other European colonies.His interests are slavery in the Atlantic and cultural and economic links between America and Africa.^[3]

His book, A Fistful of Shells won the 2019 Nayef Al-Rodhan Prize for Global Cultural Understanding.^[4] It was a finalist for the 2019 LA Times Book prize,^[5] and was shortlisted for the 2019 Cundill History Prize^[6] and 2020 Wolfson History Prize.^[7]

Green was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2024.^[8]

Work on the Covid-19 pandemic

Green worked widely on the Covid-19 pandemic, addressing the impacts through the lens of inequality. He wrote two editions of a book, 'The Covid Consensus,'^[9] as well as various newspaper articles. He also broadcast a series of podcast interviews with academics from Africa and Latin America for Collateral Global.^[10] Green's main concern was the impact of Covid-19 lockdowns on impoverished people around the world. His work was widely discussed in the Guardian,^[11] Al-Ahram,^[12] El Pais,^[13] and Le Monde.^[14]

Views on the Spanish Inquisition

Green addresses the Spanish Inquisition mainly through Hispano-American sources. He notes that the great unchecked power given to inquisitors meant that they were "widely seen as above the law", and sometimes had motives for imprisoning, while sometimes executing alleged offenders other than for the purpose of punishing religious nonconformity, mainly in Ibero-America.^{[15] [16] [17]}

Publications

Articles

• Baculamento or Encomienda?: Legal Pluralisms and the Contestation of Power in Pan-Atlantic World of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries

Green, T. 28 Sep 2017 In : Journal of Global Slavery. 2, p. 310-336

• “Africa and the Price Revolution: Currency Imports and Socioeconomic Change in West And West-Central Africa During the 17th Century”, Journal of African History, 57/1 (2016), 1-24.
• “Beyond an Imperial Atlantic: Trajectories of Africans From Upper Guinea and West-Central Africa in the Early Atlantic World", Past and Present 230 (Feb 2016), 91-122
• “Beyond an Imperial Atlantic: Trajectories of Africans From Upper Guinea and West-Central Africa in the Early Atlantic World", Past and Present 230 (Feb 2016), 91-122
• Brokers of Change: Atlantic Commerce and Cultures in Pre-Colonial Western Africa (Oxford University Press, for the British Academy: 2012)
• “Building Slavery in the Atlantic World: Atlantic Connections and the Changing Institution of Slavery in Cabo Verde, 15th-16th Centuries”, Slavery and Abolition 32/2, 2011, 227-45:

Major books (selected only)

• Saddled with Darwin: A Journey through South America on Horseback (1999)
• Meeting the Invisible Man: Secrets and Magic in West Africa (2001)
• Thomas More's Magician: A Novel Account of Utopia in Mexico (2004)
• The Inquisition: The Reign of Fear (2007)
• The Rise of the Transatlantic Slave Trade in Western Africa (2012)
• A Fistful of Shells: West Africa from the Rise of the Slave Trade to the Age of Revolution (2019)
• The Covid Consensus: The New Politics of Global Inequality (2021)

Further reading

A Fistful of Shells by Toby Green review – the west African slave trade - The Guardian

What heart of darkness? Busting myths about West African history - The Telegraph

Interview with Toby Green in QG Media - QG Media

Interview with Toby Green in La Presse du Soir - La Presse du Soir

Interview with Toby Green - Times Higher Education

Three Years on there is a New Generation of Lockdown Sceptics - The Guardian

We Must Change the Way we Understand our History - Big Issue North

Notes and References

1. https://www.fonteshistoriaeafricanae.co.uk/ Fontes Historiae Africanae
2. News: Pindar, Ian. 25 August 2007. The Guardian. Review of The Inquisition: The Reign of Fear by Toby Green.
3. Web site: King's College London - Dr Toby Green. www.kcl.ac.uk. 1 May 2018.
4. Web site: 'A Fistful of Shells' wins 2019 Nayef Al-Rodhan Prize. 2019-10-31. Books+Publishing. en-AU. 2019-11-08.
5. Web site: Ronan Farrow, Emily Bazelon and Colson Whitehead among L.A. Times Book Prize finalists . . 19 February 2020 .
6. Web site: Jurors hail works that "seek to illuminate… . January 2024 .
7. Web site: Shortlist announced for £40k Wolfson History Prize. 2020-04-30. Books+Publishing. en-AU. 2020-05-05.
8. Web site: 2024-07-18 . The British Academy welcomes 86 new Fellows in 2024 . 2024-07-26 . The British Academy.
9. Web site: The Covid Consensus | Hurst Publishers .
10. Web site: Toby Green and Elsa Ofélia Sequeira Rodrigues . .
11. News: The price Britain paid for lockdown was colossal. Was there an alternative? . The Guardian . 12 February 2023 . Elliott . Larry .
12. Web site: https://french.ahram.org.eg/NewsContentP/4/36243/Opinion/La-d;cennie-du-virus.aspx.
13. Web site: Consensos cuestionables . 16 August 2021 .
14. News: " le Covid-19 n'est pas, sur le plan sanitaire, le principal problème de l'Afrique " . Le Monde.fr . 10 June 2021 .
15. Book: Green. Toby. Inquisition : the Reign of Fear. 2007. Thomas Dunne Books. New York. 978-0-312-53724-1. 4–5. registration.
16. Archivo General de las Indias, Seville, Santa Fe 228, Expediente 63
17. Archivo General de las Indias, Seville, Santa Fe 228, Expediente 81A, n.33