When did slavery start?

1. When did slavery start?

2. Before there were towns, slaves were not needed • Hunter-gatherers and primitive farmers have no use for a slave. • They collect or grow just enough food for themselves. • One more pair of hands is one more mouth. • There is no economic advantage in owning another human being.

3. But once there were towns … • …. a surplus of food created in the countryside (often now on large estates) makes possible a wide range of crafts in the town. • On a large farm or in a workshop there is real benefit in a reliable source of cheap labour, costing no more than the minimum of food and lodging. • These are the conditions for slavery. • Every ancient civilization uses slaves.

4. And slaves were quite easy to come by .. • War is the main source of supply, and wars are frequent and brutal in early civilizations. • When a town falls to a hostile army, it is normal to take into slavery those inhabitants who will make useful workers and to kill the rest.

5. And slaves were quite easy to come by .. • There are several other ways in which slaves are acquired. • Pirates offer their captives for sale. • A criminal may be sentenced to slavery. • An unpaid debt can bring the end of liberty. • The impoverished sell their own children. • And the children of slaves are themselves slaves - though with a cheap supply of labour available through war, not many owners will allow their slaves the diversion of raising a family.

6. Babylonian slaves 1800 – 600BC(or BCE) • These are the first ones we know much about. There were 3 classes: awilu (upper class), musheknu (free, but of little means, usually craftsmen or farmers) and wardu (slaves). • It seems they treated their slaves quite well – a healthy slave could work harder!

7. Evidence of Egyptian slaves at a market When? 1550 BC Who and where? The ancient Egyptians in ancient Egypt Where did they come from? They came from slave-masters selling captured Israelites from I would suppose ancient Israel How did they get their slaves? From raiding villages and enslaving the population or being sold into slavery by someone else to settle his or selling themselves into slavery to pay their own debt. By Kane

8. Greek Slaves thanks Alex & Luke • Both the leading states of Greece - Sparta and Athens - depend entirely upon forced labour. Those belonging to Sparta were more like the villains in Mediaeval England – they lived on their own land but produced goods for their landlord. • Slaves in Athens were mostly house slaves or their were assistants in businesses and banks. • There was also an elite archery corp who were slaves

9. Roman Slaves (200BC – 400AD) • The most privileged slaves are the secretarial staff of the emperor. • But these are the exception. • In the mines they are whipped into continuing effort by overseers • In the fields they work in chain gangs • In the public arenas they are forced to engage in terrifying combat as gladiators. • There are several slave uprisings in these two centuries, the most famous of them led by Spartacus.

10. '... the Romans always feared another Spartacus' • In 73-71 BC the gladiator Spartacus famously led an uprising of thousands of slaves in central Italy, formed an army that defeated several Roman legions, and at one point threatened Rome itself. • Earlier there had been similar large-scale rebellions on the island of Sicily. But open rebellion was also the most dangerous form of resistance, because the stakes were enormously high. The greater the size of the rebellion, the greater the likelihood was of betrayal from within, and the greater the threat was of serious retaliation, re-enslavement or death.

11. '... the Romans always feared another Spartacus' • Spartacus himself died in battle, and thousands of his captured followers were crucified. The slave rebels in Sicily were likewise thoroughly suppressed. It isn't surprising that they had no successors, or that their rebellions achieved nothing of lasting value for Roman slaves. • Still, the Romans always feared another Spartacus. The philosopher Seneca tells of a proposal that was once made in the Roman senate requiring slaves to wear distinctive clothing so that they could be easily recognised. But once the senators realised that the slaves might then become conscious of their strength, and make common cause against their masters, they abandoned the idea.

12. A slave attending her mistresses hair • The Roman writer Seneca believed that masters should treat their slaves well as a well treated slave would work better for a good master rather than just doing enough begrudgingly for someone who treated their slaves badly. • “The result is that slaves who cannot talk before his (the master) face talk about him behind his back. It is this sort of treatment which makes people say, “You’ve as many enemies as you’ve slaves.” They are not our enemies when we get them; we make them so.” (Seneca) It is thought that 25% of all people in Rome were slaves

13. Slaves in the Middle Ages: 6th - 15th century AD • In the period after the collapse of the Roman empire, slavery continues in the countries around the Mediterranean. But the slaves were employed almost exclusively in households, offices and armies. • The gang slavery characteristic of large Roman estates seems to have largely disappeared • Nevertheless the slave trade thrived, and the Mediterranean was a natural focal point. • Civilized regions surround the central sea. • To the north and south stretch vast areas populated by relatively unsophisticated tribes. Border warfare resulted in tribal captives being enslaved. • Market forces encouraged the tribes to seize prisoners of their own to service a developing slave trade.

14. Slaves in the Middle Ages: 6th - 15th century AD • During the eastward expansion of the Germans in the 10th century many Slavs were captured. This is where the name ‘slave’ came from • At the same period the delivery of slaves to the Black Sea region is an important part of the early economy of Russia. • South of the Mediterranean, the dynasties of Arabs along the coast stimulated an African slave trade. The town of Zawila developed in the Sahara in about AD 700 specifically as a trading station for slaves.

15. 13th century slave market in Yemen Yemen is on the Saudi Arabian Peninsula What do you notice about the people being sold?

16. Slaves in the Middle Ages: 6th - 15th century AD • Captured in the region around Lake Chad, they were sold to Arab households in a Muslim world which by the 8th century stretched from Spain to Persia. • Slavery was an accepted part of life in Arabia during the time of Muhammad, in the 7th century, and the Qur'an offers no arguments against the practice. It merely stated, particularly in relation to female slaves, that they must be well treated. • In general that has been the case, compared with the barbaric treatment of slaves in some Christian communities.

17. Slaves were not always the losers! • Meanwhile the Muslim habit of using slaves in the army has led to one unusual result - in itself an indication of the trust accorded to slaves in Middle Eastern communities. • In 1250 the slave leaders of the Egyptian army, known as Mamelukes, depose the sultan and seize power. • A succession of rulers from their own ranks control much of the Middle East, as the Mameluke dynasty, for nearly three centuries.

18. Christians and slaves • The Christian Gospels make no specific mention of slavery, though slaves may be expected to benefit from the general bias in favour of the poor and the oppressed. • During the early Middle Ages the missionaries and bishops of the Roman Catholic church argue against the ownership of slaves in the emerging dynasties of northern Europe. • At first they make little headway. • But gradually slavery disappears in western European countries - largely replaced by the serfdom of the feudal manor.

19. The Portuguese slave trade: 15th - 17th century AD • The Portuguese expeditions of the 15th century bring European ships for the first time into regular contact with sub-Saharan Africa. This region has long been the source of slaves for the route through the Sahara to the Mediterranean. The arrival of the Portuguese opens up another channel. • Nature even provides a new collection point for this human cargo. The volcanic Cape Verde Islands, with their rocky and forbidding coastlines, are uninhabited. But they contain lush tropical valleys. And they are well placed on the sea routes between West Africa, Europe and America.

20. The Portuguese slave trade: 15th - 17th century AD • Portuguese settlers move into the Cape Verde islands in about 1460. In 1466 they are given an economic advantage which guarantees their prosperity. They are granted a monopoly of a new slave trade. On the coast of Guinea the Portuguese are now setting up trading stations to buy captive Negroes. • Some of these slaves are used to work the settlers' estates in the Cape Verde islands. Others are sent north for sale in Madeira, or in Portugal and Spain - where Seville now becomes an important market. Negroes have been imported by this sea route into Europe since at least 1444, when one of Henry the Navigator's expeditions returns with slaves exchanged for Moorish prisoners.

21. Cape Verde islands

22. The labour of the slaves in the Cape Verde Islands primed a profitable trade with the African region which became known as Portuguese Guinea or the Slave Coast. The slaves worked in the Cape Verde plantations, growing cotton and indigo in the fertile valleys. They were also employed in weaving and dying factories, where these commodities were transformed into cloth. • The cloth was exchanged in Guinea for slaves. And the slaves were sold for cash to the slaving ships which paid regular visits to the Cape Verde Islands. • This African trade, together with the prosperity of the Cape Verde Islands, expanded greatly with the development of labour-intensive plantations growing sugar, cotton and tobacco in the Caribbean and America. The Portuguese enforced a monopoly of the transport of African slaves to their own colony of Brazil. But other nations with transatlantic interests soon became the main visitors to the Slave Coast.