middle passage

or Middle Passage

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noun History/Historical.

the part of the Atlantic Ocean between the west coast of Africa and the West Indies: the longest part of the journey formerly made by slave ships.

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Origin of middle passage

First recorded in 1780–90

Words nearby middle passage

middlemost, middle name, middle-of-the-road, Middle Palaeolithic, Middle Palisade, middle passage, Middle Path, Middle Persian, Middle River, Middlesborough, Middlesbrough

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use middle passage in a sentence

What about North American, Caribbean, and European blacks who trace their ancestry to the Middle Passage?
What Makes a Great Olympian? Sometimes It’s Genetics|Jon Entine|August 11, 2012|DAILY BEAST
Nevertheless the abominable cruelties to which the slaves were subjected during the middle passage were clearly proved.
The Political History of England - Vol. X.|William Hunt
In each story were two rooms, separated by an entry, or middle passage, with which they communicated by opposite doors.
Wieland; or The Transformation|Charles Brockden Brown
La Salle followed that of the west, and Dautray that of the east; while Tonty took the middle passage.
La Salle and the Discovery of the Great West|Francis Parkman

And the mortality of the middle passage, computed by some at five, is now admitted not to have exceeded nine per cent.
Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments|Various
He walked up and down the middle passage like a suffering animal, his gall rising.
Pelle the Conqueror, Complete|Martin Anderson Nexo

British Dictionary definitions for middle passage

middle passage

noun

the middle passage history the journey across the Atlantic Ocean from the W coast of Africa to the Caribbean: the longest part of the journey of the slave ships sailing to the Caribbean or the Americas

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012