Barbados did not simply grow sugar; in 1661, it composed a code that turned individuals into property and influenced servant law across the British Atlantic. That is the world Washington Black is born into. This brand-new short explainer introduces the Barbados Slave Code and why historians call Barbados Britain’s first slave society. The post links the legal structure to day-to-day truth in mills, boiling homes, and markets, and touches the Halifax trade routes that linked islands to northern ports. It is a brisk guide for readers who desire the history behind the fiction without wading through a book.

See the history behind the fiction in under a minute.