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However, racial-based slavery emerged as a new strand of slavery by the early Medieval period. Initially, Arab slave traders began to raid and establish slave colonies in Africa. The slaves, or called <i>zanj</i>, began to originate from Sub-Saharan Africa, which took advantage of other slave trade existing within Africa. Colonies soon developed, such as Zanzibar, that began as important ports for slave traders connecting the Arab Middle East and Africa. As many of these slaves were black, slavery over time began to be associated with racial aspects. No longer were slaves racially indistinguishable from others in society based on their skin color. Slavery and being black began to be associated together during the Medieval period.<ref>For more on the history of the early Arab slave trade, see: Curtis, V. S., Stewart, S., London Middle East Institute, & British Museum (Eds.). (2009). <i>The Rise of Islam</i>. London ; New York : New York: I. B. Tauris in association with The London Middle East Institute at SOAS and The British Museum : Distributed in the U.S. by Palgrave Macmillan, pg. 61.</ref> Slavery, nevertheless, did continue to be applied to people from a variety of ethnic backgrounds. White Europeans, for instance, were sometimes enslaved by Arab traders and others, such as Viking raiders.

Nevertheless, the beginning of associating slavery with race in Europe began near the time of the discovery of the New World. The key change was the collapse of the Silk Road as a leading trade route in the Old World and the rise of transatlantic trade. The origin of Western race-based slavery began slightly earlier in the 15th century, with the Portuguese engaging more with Africa. From the beginning, slaves were often captured by other Africans in their inter-tribal wars. However, the New World presented itself as a vast area that needed a lot of labor and this substantially pushed the slave trade to new levels. For much of the African slave trade's history, European slave traders simply traded with Africans for slaves, where the slaves were then shipped to the New World as it became a major economic and political focus. The trade of slaves to the New World became associated with high intensity agricultural labor, such as the production of coffee and sugar cane, which were two emerging products in Europe in the 15-16th centuries (Figure 2).