"transatlantic passage"

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

this seems to be query day...

in discussions at the Stanford Humanities Center of a fellow's
presentation on John Singleton Copley's "Boy With a Squirrel", the
question came up of who was the first to use the term "transatlantic
passage" with reference to the slave trade (or, at least, when and in
what context did it become a standard way of referring to the
carrying of slaves across the atlantic).  not in the OED, so far as i
can tell.

(yes, it's relevant to the painting.)

arnold

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