A very good piece, but I was intrigued by the source of the statistic on the average life expectancy of slaves in Rome. Wikipedia cites James Harper in the American Journal of Philology. Looking it up on JSTOR, he himself references a paper by Jànos Szilàgyi. He remarks that "in a short note in Population L. Henry has shown that such evidence has no value whatever for establishing the average length of life of the population as a whole or of any part of it."
In particular, in relation to the life expectancy of slaves, he points out a problem: freedmen in the same collection of statistics had a life expectancy of 25.2 years, higher than the life expectancy of the freeborn Roman citizens! Harper argues:
"This is not the anomaly that it first appears. Rather it reflects the fact that the class of freedmen, almost by definition, would include few very young persons. (The average age at the naval station of Misenum is similarly high owing to the presence of so many sailors. There, too, the portion of children must have been unnaturally low.) The slave population was young, because manumissions progressively reduced its numbers as age advanced."
This is all a roundabout way to say that the figure on life expectancy is deceptive and should not in itself be taken as evidence of the cruelty Roman slaves endured.
(Harper does add in a footnote the interesting fact that the average age of death of slaves and freedmen in central and southern Italy -- i..e. outside of Rome -- was a full 7 years higher than their counterparts in Rome itself, which indicates how unhealthy the urban environment of Rome must have been compared to the more rural regions, and perhaps also indicates that manumission of slaves generally took place later outside of the metropolis.)
Good points. My intent was actually more to subtly indicate that when we talk about "slaves" we're talking about *lots and lots of children*, but I see the ambiguity there.
Excellent post. One could add comments by our own "great" slave owners, such as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, who acknowledged that slavery was a "great evil" but preferred wealth and privilege to virtue. Also that great abolitionist Samuel Johnson, who not only opposed slavery but was far more aware of the sufferings of the poor than most, giving them all his "change" ("silver") at the end of the day, "so that they may beg on." Still, Johnson thought that civilization was "worth it" because if prevented anarchy. Whether the opulence as well as the power of the ruling classes was "necessary" for civilization to function was never discussed. Somewhere in "The Brothers Karamasov" a character says "In the future everyone will be free, even servants. I don't know how that will be possible, but it will have to be." I think it wasn't until after WWII that one could be "civilized" without servants.
While there is no denying that slavery in ancient Rome was ghastly, doesn't a discussion of the subject require a little nuance? Weren't some slaves employed as tutors for the master's children? Weren't some slaves employed as scribes to make copies of scrolls that we're still reading today in book form? So yes, slavery was bad, but I think it was more complex than that. Consider the Pantheon in Rome. It must have taken a lot of skilled labor to build it. There must have been some system of reward as well as punishment. All it would take would be one apathetic slave getting careless during construction for the entire dome to come crashing down. And yet it didn't fall. Can you really build a structure like this relying on the lash alone for motivation?
> While there is no denying that slavery in ancient Rome was ghastly, doesn't a discussion of the subject require a little nuance?
Nuance, sure - hedging, no. Human attention is not infinitely fine-grained, and some silver linings are so small that to bring them up at all risks giving them too much emphasis. Yes, Hitler built the autobahn; no, that fact does not belong in any discussion of the war running less than several thousand pages. If you want to write an academic monograph analyzing in exacting detail precisely what percentages of Roman slaves were tortured in which ways, be my guest. But this is a blog post.
This is great. The ancient historian Kyle Harper makes a point I hadn't thought about enough in From Shame to Sin: that slavery meant the possibility of effortless sexual gratification at all times for elite Roman men, and this was a vital point where Christian values made an impact. The parts about the conditions of Roman slave brothels will keep you up at night.
Really good post. I thought of Alec Ryrie lecture on the religious history of protestant abolitionism to be a good place to start if others are curious about the history of Christianity and abolitionism.
A very good piece, but I was intrigued by the source of the statistic on the average life expectancy of slaves in Rome. Wikipedia cites James Harper in the American Journal of Philology. Looking it up on JSTOR, he himself references a paper by Jànos Szilàgyi. He remarks that "in a short note in Population L. Henry has shown that such evidence has no value whatever for establishing the average length of life of the population as a whole or of any part of it."
In particular, in relation to the life expectancy of slaves, he points out a problem: freedmen in the same collection of statistics had a life expectancy of 25.2 years, higher than the life expectancy of the freeborn Roman citizens! Harper argues:
"This is not the anomaly that it first appears. Rather it reflects the fact that the class of freedmen, almost by definition, would include few very young persons. (The average age at the naval station of Misenum is similarly high owing to the presence of so many sailors. There, too, the portion of children must have been unnaturally low.) The slave population was young, because manumissions progressively reduced its numbers as age advanced."
This is all a roundabout way to say that the figure on life expectancy is deceptive and should not in itself be taken as evidence of the cruelty Roman slaves endured.
(Harper does add in a footnote the interesting fact that the average age of death of slaves and freedmen in central and southern Italy -- i..e. outside of Rome -- was a full 7 years higher than their counterparts in Rome itself, which indicates how unhealthy the urban environment of Rome must have been compared to the more rural regions, and perhaps also indicates that manumission of slaves generally took place later outside of the metropolis.)
Good points. My intent was actually more to subtly indicate that when we talk about "slaves" we're talking about *lots and lots of children*, but I see the ambiguity there.
Excellent post. One could add comments by our own "great" slave owners, such as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, who acknowledged that slavery was a "great evil" but preferred wealth and privilege to virtue. Also that great abolitionist Samuel Johnson, who not only opposed slavery but was far more aware of the sufferings of the poor than most, giving them all his "change" ("silver") at the end of the day, "so that they may beg on." Still, Johnson thought that civilization was "worth it" because if prevented anarchy. Whether the opulence as well as the power of the ruling classes was "necessary" for civilization to function was never discussed. Somewhere in "The Brothers Karamasov" a character says "In the future everyone will be free, even servants. I don't know how that will be possible, but it will have to be." I think it wasn't until after WWII that one could be "civilized" without servants.
Is this a apologia sub Rosa?
no
While there is no denying that slavery in ancient Rome was ghastly, doesn't a discussion of the subject require a little nuance? Weren't some slaves employed as tutors for the master's children? Weren't some slaves employed as scribes to make copies of scrolls that we're still reading today in book form? So yes, slavery was bad, but I think it was more complex than that. Consider the Pantheon in Rome. It must have taken a lot of skilled labor to build it. There must have been some system of reward as well as punishment. All it would take would be one apathetic slave getting careless during construction for the entire dome to come crashing down. And yet it didn't fall. Can you really build a structure like this relying on the lash alone for motivation?
> While there is no denying that slavery in ancient Rome was ghastly, doesn't a discussion of the subject require a little nuance?
Nuance, sure - hedging, no. Human attention is not infinitely fine-grained, and some silver linings are so small that to bring them up at all risks giving them too much emphasis. Yes, Hitler built the autobahn; no, that fact does not belong in any discussion of the war running less than several thousand pages. If you want to write an academic monograph analyzing in exacting detail precisely what percentages of Roman slaves were tortured in which ways, be my guest. But this is a blog post.
This is great. The ancient historian Kyle Harper makes a point I hadn't thought about enough in From Shame to Sin: that slavery meant the possibility of effortless sexual gratification at all times for elite Roman men, and this was a vital point where Christian values made an impact. The parts about the conditions of Roman slave brothels will keep you up at night.
Really good post. I thought of Alec Ryrie lecture on the religious history of protestant abolitionism to be a good place to start if others are curious about the history of Christianity and abolitionism.
I recently re-read The Iliad and I'm not so sure it glorifies war. But that said, this is outstanding.
Wow. A poet, in the guise of a scholar. Kudos.
Fantastic.