Slave Coffle: Yoked and Chained Through Africa

Heartbreaking historical illustration depicting enslaved Africans bound in a coffle with wooden neck yokes and chains, being marched through the African landscape by armed slavers. The detailed engraving shows men, women, and children connected by heavy wooden yokes around their necks, with some carrying bundles on their heads while being driven forward by captors with weapons. Palm trees and tropical vegetation frame this scene of horror, while vultures circle overhead—a grim detail suggesting the death and suffering along these forced marches. This illustration documents the brutal reality of the African slave trade, where people were kidnapped from their villages, yoked together like animals, and marched sometimes hundreds of miles to coastal slave ports. The neck yokes prevented escape and caused immense suffering during the long journey. Those who survived these death marches faced the Middle Passage and a lifetime of bondage in the Americas. A devastating document of slavery's African origins, available in three sizes with your choice of black or silver aluminum frame.