Well here we go again folks! It seems that any mention of country, race, colour or creed here on Mudcat will bring out plenty of people of similar country, race, creed or colour in defence, regardless of any proven facts. Why is it when any such is mentioned, people feel that they have to leap in, even regarding events that happened hundreds of years ago.

Unless you can build up a reasonable argument, such utterances will only be your own opinion, and should be treated as such. So here's my opinion. (Why should I be any different?)

Sure, some Irish were involved in slavery round about the third century. They were Celts. Anybody with any romantic notions of what Celts were like should read about their head-hunting, cattle raiding and slavery. But slavery was rife in those days, most societies in Western Europe and probably most other parts of the world were doing similar things.

The Arabs/Muslims have a well-documented history of slavery, both in Africa and the Mediterranean. That isn't to say that all Arab/Muslim people are slavers, or condone slavery. That would be stupid. One aspect of Muslim slavery not yet addressed you can read about here Ward the Pirate and this must be true, because there's a folk song about him! Now I feel no need to defend Captain Ward or apologise for his actions, even though he's English and shares the same surname as me.

We could all use the Mudcat to pass on information to each other to make us better informed. But just because someone said something here, or for that matter in most other places on the Internet, doesn't make it true. Now play nicely...

Les Ward