Wednesday, March 7, 2012

What were two early forms of slavery?

What were two early forms of slavery?
Slavery  has been noted in many civilizations in Europe and America.  Even today, it continues to exist even though it is illegal.  Some view the relationship between bankers and those in monetary debt as a slave system.  The people who are in debt slave over paying it back and give up their processions to do so.   Sex slaves are still present in all countries, mainly in Asia.  Corrupt parents may sell their child into this type of slavery for money against the child’s will.   It has almost been described as human nature, however how sad it may be, to want to have complete power over other humans to the point of serfdom.  The most talked about is the form of manual labor.  This type of slavery can be found in ancient Rome and in the Aztec empire (1).

Slavery in ancient Rome was viewed at as natural, and was never questioned by anyone as being wrong (6).  Slaves, like many others, in Rome were used for farming on plantations.  The amount of slaves in Rome was roughly about 25% to 40% percent, which equaled the amount of freedmen (7).  Slaves consisted often of prisoners of war (8)(7), or unwanted children (6), and were taken just because of simple greediness.  The Roman belief is that slaves were living dead.  They were considered dead, but were spared from actually dying (6).  Therefore they did not have worth.  Even though race did not play a big part in slavery, it did play a role in which task a certain slave was assigned.  Barbarian slaves were often assigned tasks that required a lot of strength and endurance.  The master of the household determined how a slave would be treated (7).  Slaves, who were treated the most poorly, consisted of those who worked in mines (6)(8).  Some slaves were even privileged enough to be considered part of their master’s family and been seen as a pet (7).  Slaves could also be socially reborn into higher stature (6).

Slavery played a large role in the Aztec culture as well.  The Aztec class system was divided into three parts:  the emperor on top of the class pyramid, priests and nobles in the middle of the pyramid, and merchants, craftsmen and servants at the very bottom (2).  Unlike in America, slavery did not discriminate into one race.  Most Aztec slaves, who wore very little clothing (5), were criminals who were being punishment.  Other slaves were just so poor (2)(4) that they did it just to keep food in their mouths.  Another percentage of slaves were just captured or in debt (3)(4).  Aztec slaves commonly had to harvest corn (3) and farm.  Unlike African American slavery in America, Aztec slaves were granted marriage and possession of property (2).  Slaves could also have children and not worry about them being enslaved as well (2) (4). Slaves that did not do good work or were hated by their masters would be sold.  Before the slave could go to market, they would have to be publicly beaten three times. (2). 



Aztec Slavery

Roman Slavery


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