Plural of coffle; groups of people or animals chained or connected together in a line, typically for forced movement.
Plural form of coffle from Arabic 'qāfilah'. The term was commonly used in 18th and 19th-century documentation of the slave trade and colonial expansion.
The plural form appears repeatedly in historical records describing forced labor migrations, making it a word that documents actual human suffering in archival language—a sobering reminder of how ordinary words can describe extraordinary cruelty.
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