and the direct barter exchange of imported manufactures for the captives, generally taken from the densely populated manufacturing and trading regions in the interior (the Igbo heartland in particular), severely damaged the earlier evolving interregional trade and division of labour. Hence, the commercializing process and the development and geographical spread of the market economy were stalled and reversed. By the time transatlantic export of captives ended in mid-nineteenth century, West African economies had fallen considerably behind those of the Americas; a reversal of fortune of immense proportions had occurred (Inikori, 2014, pp. 66-69).