No longer a man; now just an object
The Romans didn't regard their slaves as human. They were seen as property and regarded as such. A slave's legal status was known as "re mortales" meaning a mortal thing. If a slave was hurt, any injuries sustained were regarded as "damage to property".
A further sign of their inferior status is illustrated by the following example of a slave using an ox to plow a field.
The plow was called an "instrumentum" meaning a tool.
The ox pulling the plow was known as "instrumentum semivocalis".
And the slave driving the ox was "instrumentum vocalis" meaning a talking tool.
Artwork by Amalaric: the text is mine.
Artwork by Amalaric: the text is mine.
Absolutely true and perfectly historically correct.
ReplyDeleteAllow me to reproduce also here what I wrote as a comment to another post, because my comment seems even more opportune here.
Since the first “war of conquest” fought between prehistoric men, our ancestors realized that it was extremely convenient, profitable and a great source of power, welfare, wealth and even luxury to capture and TAME not only wild animals (like cattle, horses, donkeys, camels etc.) but also OTHER MEN ! capturing, trading, considering, treating and exploiting / using those captured men exactly like those ANIMALS !
And in fact a Roman author naively but sincerely said that “animals are divided into two categories: beasts and slaves” or – as you rightly mention in another post- “semi-vocalia instrumenta” (“semi-talking tools” i.e. beasts) and “vocalia instrumenta” (“talking tools” i.e. slaves).
Moreover, in capturing and using newer and newer slaves, Masters realized also that often slaves had several and important advantages over other animals for hard labors.
E.g. a muscular slave (given his slenderer physical size) might turn for 12 hours per day and even more an individual conical grindstone for wheat, that –in Roman farms- were gathered in groups of 10 or even 20 grindstones in one room, so close one to the other that a donkey or a mule could have never been able to turn given its bigger body and to pass between two adjacent grindstones..
Of course a horse, an ox or a mule could have never rowed on a ship ! ……. or could have never dug in a mine or broken and cut stones in a quarry.
Even for other hard labors in farms traditionally destined to beasts like oxen or draft-horses, like e.g. pulling a plow, often Masters (especially Roman ones) soon realized that frequently it was much more profitable ……. at equal “animal strength” ……… yoke to a plow a couple of very muscular young slaves, in the place of a horse, or four very brawny enslaved men in the place of an ox (if the plow was heavier).
Often, especially at the climax of Roman power and military conquests, at equal “animal strength”, the “animal strength” given by two or four very strong and muscular slaves was MUCH CHEAPER than the one of a horse, an ox, or a mule !
As Cicero is said to have asserted: “Unfortunately there are no wild tribes of oxen or of horses that we can capture and enslave for the hard-labors in our properties.”.
Slaves were the most abundant and often the cheapest source of muscular strength for all possible hard labors.
Last but not least, slaves had another and important advantage over the other animals: being animals with a HUMAN LOOK, and often quite “attractive”, they were animals that could be used for SEX ! ……. differently of course for all other species of beasts !
Karel
It is my understanding that some Greek philosophers wrote that the thing that divided humans from the other animals (what defined Humanity) was the ability to utilize "tools" to amplify their power. "Tools" were of two types...inanimate (ax, sword, plow, etc.) or animate (oxen, donkeys, slaves, etc.).
ReplyDeleteThe other advantage of slaves as "tools" was that they could both understand commands and also speak if needed.
Exactly. The great Aristotle, in his eight books on "POLITICS" clearly theorized that when a man is enslaved, the gods of the Olympus deptive him of his "HUMANITY", of his "SOUL" that is the only element that differentiates MEN from all ANIMALS, like donkeys, horses and SLAVES !
ReplyDeleteThe fact that those bizarre beasts, called "SLAVES", continue to be able to talk (like Humans !) and sometimes seem even to have some "reason" (almost like Humans !) is however only an illusion.
There is nothing that distinguishes Slaves from other animals ..... while there is an abyss between them and Humans.
Karel