page_title: Slavery
section_title: Slavery in ancient Rome
hierarchical_section_title: Slavery / Slavery in ancient Rome
caption_attribution_description: Hrvatski: Natpis: SERVVS EO LAETIOR QVO PATENTIOR Prijevod: Ropstvo je sretnije u onog tko je strpljiviji English: Title: SERVVS EO LAETIOR QVO PATENTIOR Translation: Slavery is happier if one is more patient
context_page_description: Slavery is when a person is treated as the property of another person. This person is usually called a slave, with the owner being called a slavemaster. It often means that slaves are forced to work, or else they will be punished by the law or by their master.
  There is evidence that even before there was writing, there was slavery. There have been different types of slavery, and they have been in almost all cultures and continents. Some societies had laws about slavery, or they had an economy that was built on it. Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome had many slaves.
  During the 20th century almost all countries made laws forbidding slavery. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights says that slavery is wrong. Slavery is now banned by international law. Nevertheless, there are still different forms of slavery in some countries.
  The English word "slave" comes from the medieval word for the Slavic peoples of Central Europe and Eastern Europe, because these were the last ethnic group to be captured and enslaved in Central Europe. According to Adam Smith and Auguste Comte, a slave was mainly defined as a captive or prisoner of war. Slave-holders used to buy slaves at slave auctions.
context_section_description: Roman slaves played an important role in society and the economy. Besides manual labor, slaves performed many domestic services. They could work at highly skilled jobs and professions. Teachers, accountants, and physicians were often slaves. Greek slaves were often highly educated. Unskilled slaves, or those sentenced to slavery as punishment, worked on farms, in mines, and at mills. Their living conditions were brutal, and their lives short.
  Slaves were considered property under Roman law and had no legal personhood. Unlike Roman citizens, they could be subjected to corporal punishment, sexual exploitation (prostitutes were often slaves), torture, and summary execution. The testimony of a slave could not be accepted in a court of law unless the slave was tortured—a practice based on the belief that slaves in a position to be privy to their masters' affairs would be too virtuously loyal to reveal damaging evidence unless coerced. Over time, however, slaves gained increased legal protection, including the right to file complaints against their masters. Attitudes changed in part because of the influence among the educated elite of the Stoics, whose egalitarian views of humanity extended to slaves.
  Roman slaves could hold property which, even though it belonged to their masters, they were allowed to use as if it were their own. Skilled or educated slaves were allowed to earn their own money. With enough money they could buy their freedom.
  After the Roman Empire broke up, slavery gradually changed into serfdom.
caption: Adamo Ghisi: Allegory of Slavery, etching, 1573.
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