What did olaudah equiano do

Why was olaudah equiano important
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Interesting facts about olaudah equiano

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OLAUDAH EQUIANO - African, slave, author, abolitionist"

This sculpture of Olaudah Equiano was made by Christy Symington MRSS. Symington's practice has a focus on highlighting the contributions of frequently overlooked historical figures. Equiano, a key figure in the fight to end the slave trade within the British Empire, wrote the most important autobiography of an enslaved person's life in bondage and tells of his path to freedom. Despite his important historical position, there is only one plausible representation of him that was taken from life.

The artist has suggested that the broken chains and shackles reflect Equiano’s important role as an abolitionist and the shape that forms the back of the shoulders implies the continent of Africa. The Brookes slave ship diagram is directly represented on the back of the sculpture through a printmaking and bronze casting combination. This diagram represents how enslaved people were crowded into ships that crossed the Middle Passage and it became symbolic and the most widely used image by abolitionist campaigners. There

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Olaudah Equiano

Abolitionist and writer (c. 1745 – 1797)

For the exoplanet named in his honour, see HD 43197 b. For the Swedish king, see Gustav Vasa.

Olaudah Equiano (; c. 1745 – 31 March 1797), known for most of his life as Gustavus Vassa (), was a writer and abolitionist. According to his memoir, he was from the village of Essaka in present day southern Nigeria.^[1]^[2] Enslaved as a child in West Africa, he was shipped to the Caribbean and sold to a Royal Navy officer. He was sold twice more before purchasing his freedom in 1766.

As a freedman in London, Equiano supported the British abolitionist movement, in the 1780s becoming one of its leading figures. Equiano was part of the abolitionist group the Sons of Africa, whose members were Africans living in Britain. His 1789 autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, sold so well that nine editions were published during his life and helped secure passage of the British Slave Trade Act 1807, which abolished the slave trade.^[3]The Interesting Narrative gained

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Olaudah Equiano (c.1745 - 1797)

Olaudah Equiano, c.1789 ©Equiano was an African writer whose experiences as a slave prompted him to become involved in the British abolition movement.

In his autobiography, Olaudah Equiano writes that he was born in the Eboe province, in the area that is now southern Nigeria. He describes how he was kidnapped with his sister at around the age of 11, sold by local slave traders and shipped across the Atlantic to Barbados and then Virginia.

In the absence of written records it is not certain whether Equiano's description of his early life is accurate. Doubt also stems from the fact that, in later life, he twice listed a birthplace in the Americas.

Apart from the uncertainty about his early years, everything Equiano describes in his extraordinary autobiography can be verified. In Virginia he was sold to a Royal Navy officer, Lieutenant Michael Pascal, who renamed him 'Gustavus Vassa' after the 16th-century Swedish king. Equiano travelled the oceans with Pascal for eight years, during which time he was baptised and learned to read and write.