The Georgian Period of the British Empire is defined by the rule of the Hanoverian kings, all named George. The late Georgian era runs from 1763, with the reigns of George III, George IV, and William IV until the coronation of Queen Elizabeth in 1837. The Georgian era was a time of British expansion throughout the world. During this period mercantilism dominated British and Western European economic policies. British imperial trade was regulated by the Navigation Act of 1651, which restricted colonial trade for nearly 200 years. But it was in 1763, with the end of the Seven Years' War, that the modern era of imperial colonialism truly began. Mercantilism sparked the creation and expansion of colonies and caused wars between many of the large European countries. Mercantilism is a system in which the mother country benefits from prohibiting its colonies from trading with countries outside the mother country and its other colonies. Raw materials were processed domestically and finished products were sold within the homeland's colonies, excess goods were exported to provide more gold to the homeland's economy. Britain employed mercantilism in the so-called triangular trade. Ships from Liverpool would bring textiles, rum and finished products to Africa. Then, on the West African coast, these goods were exchanged for men, women and children captured by slave traders or purchased from African chiefs, in exchange for finished goods. It often took a captain a long time to fill his ship. Slavers often spent three or four months sailing along the coast, searching for the most suitable and cheapest slaves. There was often violent resistance by Africans against slave ships and their crews. They were attacks coming from......middle of paper......t any other European country. The American colonies declared and gained independence from the empire. Britain outlawed the slave trade, effectively ending the Triangle trade. The doctrine of free trade eventually replaced mercantilism. The Triangular Trade accounted for over 2 million slaves sold to plantations in the British West Indies and 500,000 slaves on North American plantations. This was a dark period in British and American history that many argue the countries have not fully recovered from to this day. Slavery was the worst aspect of several forms of exploitation of the colonies and colonists by the British Empire through its mercantilism and discriminatory taxation and regulation of its colonies, which was ultimately destined to fail and be replaced by a system that treated colonies and settlers with at least a little more fairness and equality.