Roman slavery

The institution of slavery was so prevalent in ancient Greece and Rome that they
could accurately be called slave societies. Roman slavery was credited or in
credited to Greek slavery even though they have difference in some aspects. With
Rome's rise, a new cycle of urban imperial expansion began that involved more than just shifting the
A new mode of production that gives or
centre of gravity from the ancient world to Italy.
brought in a new type of development in the socio- economic arena marked by rise
of towns, trade and growth in agrarian production facilitated by the employment of
large number of slaves primarily as gang slaves on large tracts of roman land called
as Latifundias. In contrast in Greece agriculture was practiced on much smaller
scale which was also linked with the structure of Greek polis with its absence of
huge concentration of wealth in few hands. It was the roman republic who first
united large scale property with gang slavery in country side in a major scale. The
advent of slavery as an organized mode of production was first seen in Greece but
it was in Rome that heralded the classical phase of roman civilization the pinnacle
of its far culture. An examination of slavery growth throws light of all networks of
changes that affected all specifics of the society.
Keith Hopkins concentrated on the processes that in his view affected the growth
of slavery namely 1) continuous wars, 2) the influx of war booty 3)the investment
in land 4)the formation of large estates 5)the impoverishment of peasants 6) the
emigration of peasants to towns and provinces 7)growth of urban market.
Mass slavery in Rome was a product of conquest. In about 200 years Romans
conquered almost whole of the Mediterranean basin. Slaves were concentrated in
roman Italy, the heart land of the empire. Most of them were captured after the
battles or an immediate aftermath the conquest. Among the agricultural slaves
males predominated and while the empire was being expanded they were replaced
by fresh captives of wars and their supply was supplemented by trade and
breeding. Therefore an important element was the expansion in slave population.
By the end of 1st century BCE, there were 2 million slaves out of 6 million people.
An important feature of roman slavery is a very wide latifundation for the first time
in antiquity which was related with developments in empire. The continuous wars
accentuated the declined peasants. Constant warfare required endless mobilization
and citizens called to legions were died in 1000s or while those who survived were
not able to maintain their farms at home. The rich invested a considerable part of
war booty in agricultural land in Italy. Earlier period fertile land around Rome was
densely occupied by citizen peasants. Now the rich bought these lands either by
force or by violence. These small land holdings were reorganized by larger and
more profitable farms. The peasants who survived or subsisted were now evicted
to make route for slaves to produce surplus for markets. The latifundia in many
ways represented a new social phenomenon. It didn’t necessarily formed
consolidated blocks of land found as single units. The typical pattern for the
latifundists was to possess a large number of medium sized villa states. Sometimes
contiguous by equally often distributed across the country. The establishment of
latifundia had wide ranging consequences for the peasantry. Large number of
peasants who had been displaced by the slaves migrated to the city of Rome to take
advantage of the increased expenditure there and to some other Italian towns or
they joined the army or migrated to the newly pacified north Italian plane. This
displacement embittered the poor and by the end of 2 nd century BCE ignited a
spark of series of political disruptions. It also provided a plan for the political
activists of whom Tiberius Grachhus is a best example who tried in vain to limit
the amount of public land that rich could cultivate. Movement of the population
may be seen as the simultaneous creation of the new surplus as well as a new
market for its consumption. Land owners now achieved the surplus by raising the
productivity of labour. Fewer men produced more food as underemployed peasants
were expelled with their families from the plots and replaced by fewer slaves.
Collumella is a text which is based on agriculture recommended that an arable
farm of 200 ugera which would be 120 acres could be cultivated by 8 adult male
slaves which was the same area of land that other wisely comprise of 80 free
peasant families or citizens. Thus the manpower saved by placing the slaves was
substantial. It was necessary to sell the surplus created to acquire return on
investment in land of slaves. The peasants who migrated to rome and the new
urban slaves provided the base for the formation of a market. It was they who
consumed the surplus. One can safely state without doubt that rome was the
biggest market. This was supported by the fact that there was free and subsidized
wheat to the citizens living in the city of rome while it underwrote the capacity of
the poor to buy wheat and bread it left them with enough money to but wines and
olives.
A question is why slaves settled on land of peasants evicted? Some writers assert
that conquering roman in course of their conquest enslaved the defeated and
carried them to their farms for working in there. But this didn’t explain various
issues involved such as though the romans had captured land occupied by nearly
50 million people why did they has only 2 million slaves effectively. To the rich ,
slave labour had obvious advantage that dependant peasants didn’t have. Though
slaves were expensive and unwilling to work hard there by incurring cost of
supervision yet they were not liable to be called away for military service like
peasants. And they were forced to work harder throughout the whole year. In the
period of the imperial expansion continuous wars were there to conquer the slaves
for the rich families. Unlike most peasant families slaves could be formed
permanent work gangs several times the size of the family. Gangs of 10 slaves each
were need to work on the nearly acquired farms of the rich. In the period of roman
expansion, continuous wars made slavery an easy and attractive way for the rich
man to organize labour on forms of too large to be cultivated by free family. This
was specially seen because under Roman law house hold employees were
considered as slaves. The incoming of large numbers of agro slaves implies drastic
reorganization of land holdings. Because where there was a system of small family
farms slave labour could not be adequately exploited. Therefore maximization of
productivity of slave gangs was possible only through amalgamation of small
holdings. The high capital cost of slaves led to the creation of lended units large
enough to provide them with work throughout the year. An important and highly
significant feature of roman slavery was that its impact on daily life of romans it
had social, political and cultural implications. Many citizens viewed slaves as
nothing more than forcibly imported aliens who were exploited to a degree. The
presence of a substantial number of slaves in roman society defines free citizens
even as poor than superior. This sense of superiority limited the willingness of free
citizens to compete with slaves. It persisted as a method of displaying wealth in the
Roman Empire long after it had seized to be a major method of producing wealth
even though slaves were employed because it is very fashionable or respectable.
Wars led to a sudden influx of wealth that not only disrupted large established
factors of consumption, production and exploitation but also led to the formation of
a new ruling elite often described as nobles. These elite converted its newly found
wealth into the only asset that conventionally gain high social status moreover
compared to public office, land ownership provided a steady income. Roman
nobles increased their wealth towards a level commensurate to their control over a
huge empire. The political power of citizen body limited the extent to which nobles
could exploit citizens. The roman plebs had sufficient political and military power
to have their shares in their imperial booty and many concessions were extracted to
the state. For example roman citizens were exempted from paying direct taxes after
167 BC. From 122 BC they received subsidized wheat and from 58 BC free wheat.
Those who had fought war got lands in colonies outside central Italy.
One of the most striking aspect of roman slavery was the frequency with which
slaves were freed by the masters (manumission). The impression from the sources
is that a large number of ex slaves mingled with the free population of city of
Rome. The free barricade of 7000 men established in AD 6 was initially recruited
from the ex slaves. During the period of Augustus a law was passed forbidding a
master for freeing more than a 100 slaves. Almost all ex slaves freed by masters
attained roman citizenship. Many of them gained considerable wealth and social
prominence. In roman senate it was reported that many knights and some senators
were the descendants of ex slaves. In the 1 st century AD, ex slaves of emperors’
households filled important positions as secretaries of states in the central
administration. Slaves of emperors frequently married women of free birth and
kept slaves as business agents. They were also put in charge of other slaves as
overseers or supervisors. Sources say that at humbler levels of society, ex slaves
dominated the commercial sectors of rome. They also became leaders in religious
groups. But a question can be arised. Why there was manumission of slaves in very
large number? Because they were expensive and were an investment. The views on
slave manumission (humanitarian or economic) required some elaboration. Most
roman slaves were freed only by death. Sub humans have no realistic prospect of
liberty. The cruelty to slaves was too much. Roman literature shows it very well.
Gladiators show that slaves were killed for the pleasure of the free men. Some
slaves like miners didn’t survive long. They were under the complete mercy of
their masters.
There was both collective and individual resistance. Between 135 and 70 BC, there
were 3 major slave rebellions in Italy and Sicily. However the initial success of the
rebellions was no longer remained because they were ruthlessly crushed. In one
notorious case in 61 AD, 400 household slaves were executed. One advantage the
slave posses was there was no distinguishing and obvious signs of being a slave.
Both as slaves and free men, slaves could easily merge with population. The stoic
philosophers stressed the common humanity of slaves and free men: masters buy
and sell only slave’s body. The mind was its own master and it’s free”. Later
Christianity however helped to soften the hardness of roman law concerning
slaves. It was forbidden to sell slaves to gladiators and prostitutes without a cause
and masters could not punish excessively or kill them. Separation of slaves and
children were discouraged and magistrates could order mistreated slave to be sold
to another masters.
Slaves form the lower stratum of the of the roman social pyramid. A different kind
of status adopted by slaves was inherent in the institution of “Peculium”. This
allow a slave a working capital borrowed from his master and gave him a decisive
advantage over the free poor as well as a prominent position in the field of
commerce. In return master got a share of an inherent of the income. Peculium was
an expression of freedom of an action of slaves to regulate their own property.
There are evidences for masters paying wages to slaves in some cases. in 1st
century AD there was a proposal to rein slave the free slaves which hotly debated
in 56 AD. It was threatened by large number of slaves so nero rejected it. Another
law was masters were given power to punish ungreatful ex slaves .in addition
masters could also detail specific condition as a pre requisite to freedom including
service to his master and his family after attaining freedom.