Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/52

CHAPTER IV.

Slavery in Rome.

Slavery under the kings and in the early ages of the Republic. — Its spread, and effect on the poorer class of Freemen. — The Licinian law. — Prevalence of the two extremes, immense wealth and abject poverty. — Immense number of Slaves in Sicily. — They revolt. — Eunus, their leader. — Their arms. — Horrible atrocities committed by them. — The insurrection crushed. — Fate of Eunus. — Increase of Slaves in Rome. — Their employment in the arts. — Numbers trained for the Amphitheatre. — The Gladiators rebel. — Spartacus, his history. — Laws passed to restrain the cruelty of masters. — Effects of Christianity on their condition. — Their numbers increased by the invasion of northern hordes. — Sale of prisoners of war into slavery. — Slave-dealers follow the armies. — Foreign Slave trade. — Slave auctions. — The Slave markets. — Value of Slaves at different periods. — Slaves owned by the State, and their condition and occupations. — Private Slaves, their grades and occupations. — Treatment of Slaves, public and private. — Punishment of offenses. — Fugitives and Criminals. — Festival of Saturnus, their privileges. — Their dress. — Their sepulchres. — The Gladiators, their combats.

Slaves existed at Rome in the earliest times of which we have any record; but they do not appear to have been numerous under the kings and in the earliest ages of the Republic. The different trades and the mechanic arts were chiefly carried on by the clients of the patricians; and the small farms in the country were cultivated for the most part by the labors of the proprietor and of his family. But as the territories of the Roman state were extended, the patricians obtained possession of large estates out of the public domain; since it was a practice of the Romans to deprive a conquered people of a part of their lands. These estates required a larger number of hands for their cultivation than could readily be obtained among the free population, and since the freemen were constantly liable to be called away from their work to serve in the armies, the lands began to be cultivated almost entirely by slave labor. Through war and commerce, slaves could be obtained easily, and at a cheap rate, and their numbers soon became so great, that the poorer class of freemen was thrown almost entirely out of employment. This state of things was one of the chief arguments used by Licinius and the Gracchi for limiting the quantity of public land which a person might possess. In the Licinian Rogations there was a provision that a certain number of freemen should be employed on every estate. This regulation, however, was of little avail, as the lands still continued to be cultivated almost exclusively by slaves. The elder Gracchus, in traveling through Italy, was led to observe the evils which slavery inflicted upon the provinces of his country. The great body of the people were impoverished. Instead of little farms studding the country with their pleasant aspect, and nursing an independent race, he beheld nearly all the lands of Italy monopolized by large proprietors; and the plow was in the hands of slaves. This was one hundred and thirty-four years before the Christian era. The palaces of the wealthy towered in solitary grandeur: the freemen hici themselves in miserable hovels. Deprived of the dignity of proprietors, they