On this day in 1884, the "Berlin Conference" began when delegations from nearly every Western European country and the U.S. met in Germany to develop a set of protocols for the seizure and control of African resources.
The conference, which had no African representatives, was the first international conference ever on the subject of Africa, and dealt almost soley with the matter of its exploitation.
At the time, approximately 80% of African land and resources were under domestic control; the influence of Europeans was most strongly exerted on the coast. Following it, colonial powers began seizing resources further inland.
As a result of the conference, which continued into 1885, a "General Act" was signed and ratified by all but one of the 14 nations at the table, the U.S. being the sole exception. The Act's main features were the establishment of a regime of free trade stretching across the middle of Africa, the development of which became the rationale for the recognition of the short-lived "Congo Free State", the abolition of the overland slave trade, and the principle of "effective occupation".
The Conference's rapacious intentions for Africa were noted by outsiders: socialist journalist Daniel De Leon described the conference as "an event unique in the history of political science...Diplomatic in form, it was economic in fact."
Before the Conference ended, the Lagos Observer declared that "the world had, perhaps, never witnessed a robbery on so large a scale." Theodore Holly, the first black Protestant Episcopal Bishop in the U.S., condemned the delegates as having "come together to enact into law, national rapine, robbery and murder".
Berlin 1884: Remembering the conference that divided Africa
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Ome of those parts of medieval history that get sort of overlooked is the sheer criminality of the feudal system. Even outside of robber barons, actual barons who would actually rob you, most of the feudal regime was just legitimised protection rackets, robbery and theft.
Don't forget the warrior elite (knights) who could just ride through and do whatever they wanted. The church even had to establish days of the week (god's truce I think it was called) on which pillaging was illegal
The terms of the truce of god was iirc not to fight on feast days and sunday between nobility and not to go after women, men while they were working the field or the church and its properties at any time. The doctrine fell to the two pronged attack of Thomas Aquinas and the Crusades.
I first read about it in a book about the conditions before the battle of Hastings
Wikipedia does have this though: "This prohibition was later extended to certain days of the week, namely Thursday, commemorating the Ascension, Friday, the day of the Passion, and Saturday, the day of the Resurrection (Council 1041). In the middle of the twelfth century, the number of days prescribed was extended until there were about eighty days left for fighting."
Love it as a way to demonstrate how desperately the church was striving to find some way to reconcile the daily brutality of the peasant's lives with their teachings