A hundred years ago, there were rare images of the "human zoo" in the United States, and the indigenous people had no dignity at all!

"This place belongs to you, you just need to live according to your original way of life, and I will provide you with food." In the 15th century, an Italian named Hipólito spoke to some indigenous people in a zoo with a whip.

He bought these natives from the European fleet, and the purpose of buying them was to "raise" them and show them to those who were willing to spend money on tickets.

And this, Hippolito's behavior, became the beginning of the "human zoo" in European history.

So, where did these natives come from? And why should they listen to them?

Where did the natives come from?

In November 1492, the European voyage was bored after months at sea, and although the voyage allowed them to see many new things, their actual discoveries were far worse than they had planned.

Just a few days after November, the sailing fleet discovered an island. One of the crew members shouted into the cockpit: "There are people on the island, do you want to take a look!" ”

Columbus, an explorer in the cockpit, became interested and immediately sailed the boat to the shore, intending to communicate with those people and see if there were any new discoveries.

However, when he saw the Indians on the island, Columbus found that these people were very strange in dress and language, and he was very alarmed when he saw the arrival of the crew members.

At that time, Columbus realized that he could not communicate with the Indians, so he set his sights on the Indians. He thought to himself that the king must have never seen these strange Indians, so he made a bold decision.

"Go to the boat and get the ropes, tie them up and take them away!" Columbus said.

A dozen Indians were kidnapped and taken to the ship before they knew what they were doing, and Columbus was completely unaware of how immoral his behavior was.

The Indians stayed on the ship and followed Columbus through the rest of the voyage before returning to Europe.

Columbus not only showed the nobles of the country the novelties of the voyage, but also brought these Indians out to show them. Due to the language barrier and the different society in which they lived, these nobles looked at the Indians as if they were animals.

At that time, because Columbus brought back other animals that had not been seen in Europe, the nobles directly opened a zoo and put these animals on display in the zoo. A place was also built to display the Indians.

Later, in order to see these animals and Indians, people were very willing to pay for tickets to watch.

Seeing that this method was very profitable, Hippolito also found some indigenous people and founded a "human zoo".

For a time, this "zoo" exploded, and Hippolito made a lot of money in this way. And every once in a while, he opens a new exhibition hall, which is closed to a new race of humans.

The "human zoo" is intensifying

Although the "Human Zoo" was opened earlier, it was only popular in a small area at that time, and it was only later that people spread the word of mouth to spread the human zoo.

It wasn't until the early 19th century that human zoos began to spread across Europe. Conversely, many of the island's indigenous people will also be persecuted.

Many merchants bought the natives through various channels, even at great expense, and then put them in zoos.

In order to give them a look at their previous lives, the merchants also built an environment similar to their original life on the island.

During the day, the merchants did not allow these natives to rest, they had to move to attract the attention of the audience, and if they did not obey, they would not get food.

After dark at night, the natives thought they would be able to rest, but they were secretly sent to the rich people to show them, and these rich people played tricks on people in many ways, and the merchants allowed the rich people to do whatever they wanted to do with the natives in order to make money.

During the day, the aborigines do not have a long rest, and their bodies are in a state of exhaustion for a long time.

Then the merchant had the more cruel idea of eliminating the food of these natives and selling it to the audience, who fed them food. If the natives want to eat, they have to ask the audience for it.

It can be seen that from Columbus to these merchants, these natives have not been treated as human beings at all. And these natives are also tortured without dignity.

Among those indigenous people at that time, there was also a South African woman named Sarah, due to the characteristics of her body, the buttocks were very large, especially some nobles in Europe at that time, this kind of girl with large buttocks was very fond of.

So, Sara was a popular star at a "human zoo" in London at the time, and the businessmen who controlled Sara were even more cruel, using Sara almost to the extreme in order to make money.

More expensive tickets are also sold to visitors to the "zoo", which allow you to touch Sarah. Sara also felt humiliated, but she knew that she could not escape at all, and that she had to work harder to survive.

Slowly, the novelty of seeing Sara became more and more, the zoo saw fewer visitors, and Sara was bought into a circus.

Due to the need to train and perform with the circus, Sarah's body could not bear it and she was sick for a while. The boss didn't want to treat Sara, so he sold Sara at the lowest price.

Eventually, Sara was seriously ill and could not be treated, and died in 1816.

I thought that after Sara's death, she would finally be able to settle in the ground, but her body was targeted by a scientific research institution, which bought Sarah's body back and not only dissected her, but also put the dismantled body parts on display in the museum.

The "Human Zoo" was closed

From the 19th century to the mid-20th century, when human zoos were popular in Europe, Paris, France, built a village in order to expand the human zoo and put these indigenous people in it.

The United States is also following suit, and businessmen have built several large-scale "human zoos" one after another in order to seize this business opportunity.

At that time, the tourists who went to see these indigenous people did not think of them as human beings at all, but as a kind of creature between humans and animals.

In addition to the blacks and some indigenous people of primitive tribes who were arrested to watch, there were also yellow people who were also arrested.

Due to the change of times, it was not until 1958 that this kind of human zoo was completely abolished.

Source: Hundreds of Years of Black History in Europe and the United States: Human Zoos - Global Network