Greek and Roman Slaveries

3 Living with Slavery and Its Consequences

In this chapter, we focus on slaveholders and the consequences of slavery for various aspects of their lives. We commence with exploring the diversity of ancient slaveholders: masters could own from just a few to thousands of slaves (3.1). At the same time, slaveholders included magnates (3.4–5), the middling sort (3.2–3), institutional owners (3.6), and even other slaves (3.6). The diversity of masters had important implications in how slaves were used and for what purposes. Owning slaves defined the identities and practices of ancient slaveholders. It defined their sense of power (3.7) and honor (3.12) and their everyday activities (3.8–9). The proper use of slaves was a major element for projecting images of the self (3.11, 3.14) or criticizing enemies (3.10). Masters conceived slaves as extensions of themselves and their wishes (3.13) and used them to construct relationships with third parties (3.16). In ancient patriarchal societies, owning slaves was a crucial aspect of the intersection between gender and class (3.15).

This brings us to the role of slavery for the structure of ancient households and economies. In the households of slaveholders, relations between husbands and wives and parents and children were affected in important ways by the existence of slaves (3.17, 3.20–1); strategies of reproduction and survival often depended on the role of slaves (3.18–9). The ubiquity of slaves in the living space of ancient households ...