Were plantation owners with many slaves considered wealthy?

 Yes, plantation owners with many slaves were generally considered wealthy during the era when slavery was practiced, particularly in the United States before the Civil War. The wealth of plantation owners came from the agricultural output of their land, which was largely produced through the forced labor of enslaved people. The more slaves a plantation owner had, the greater their ability to cultivate large amounts of land and produce lucrative crops like cotton, tobacco, sugar cane, and rice, which were labor-intensive.

As a measure of wealth, the number of enslaved individuals a person owned was often used as an indicator of their social status and economic power. Plantation owners also derived wealth from the increase in property value of their slaves. Since enslaved people were legally considered property at the time, owners could buy, sell, and use them as collateral for loans, further increasing the owner's financial capacity.