Encyclopedia Image of the Cotton Industry This romanticized image of slavery in the West Indies cotton industry was published in Diderot and d’Alembert’s Encyclopedia. It shows enslaved men, at right, gathering and picking over cotton bolls, while the woman at left mills the bolls to remove their seeds. The Encyclopedia presented mixed views on slavery; one article described it as “indispensable” to economic development, while others argued passionately for the natural right to freedom of all mankind.
(Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)