The most popular plays of Plautus and Terence focus on the role of slaves. In The Rope by Plautus, the beautiful young girl that the hero is in love with is a slave, who he seeks to buy from her owner. It then turns out that she had been born free but was kidnapped as a child and sold into slavery. In The Brothers and Phormio by Terence, once again the love interest centers around slave girls and the challenge is not that of winning hearts but rather bargaining with the procurers who own them. While Plautus and Terence both borrowed their plots from Greek sources, they modified them in accordance with Roman slave laws, and legal niceties are often key to the resolution.
Slaves can have, earn, and save money.
If they save enough, they can buy their own freedom. The procedure for an owner freeing a slave is quite simple and informal. But in addition to paying their master, they also have to pay a substantial tax to the Roman government to legalize the transaction. Slaves can be trusted advisors, teachers, and companions of their owners, but they cannot plead a case and their testimony is inadmissible in a court of law. There is no obvious physical difference between slaves and freedmen.