It has been suggested that in ancient Egypt the aboriginal inhabitants of the country were made slaves by the conquering race. “Si nous consultons les monuments,” says M. Amélineau, “nous remarquons dans les peintures qui ornent les parois des tombeaux de Saqqarah une certaine race d’hommes sur laquelle Mariette avait déjà appelé l’attention…. Je crois que ce sont là des esclaves, vieux restes des populations primitives soumises par les conquérants nouvellement arrivés dans la vallée du Nil, descendants des premières tribus humaines qui s’étaient installées en Égypt.”78 During the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties, which form the chief period of Egypt’s foreign conquests, mention is frequently made of the employment of prisoners of war as slaves. Every Pharao of these dynasties recounts how he filled the god Amon’s storehouses with male and female slaves from his spoil. These slaves are occasionally represented in tombs; thus in the tomb of Rekhmere some slaves who are making bricks and building a wall are designated as “the spoil which his Majesty brought for the construction of the temple of Amon.”79 M. Amélineau believes that slavery was in Egypt milder than in Greece and Rome.80 According to the Book of the Dead, the pity of the god extends to slaves; not only does he command that no one should ill-treat them himself, but he forbids that their masters should be led to ill-treat them.81

In ancient Chaldæa, beneath the free Semite and Sumerian population, there was a class of slaves largely consisting of captives from foreign races and their descendants, but continually reinforced by individuals of the native race such as foundlings, women sold by their husbands, children sold by their fathers, and probably debtors whom their creditors had deprived of their liberty.82 Their position was evidently not one of excessive hardship.83 As a rule, they were permitted to marry and bring up a family; and it seems that masters, when selling their slaves, as much as possible avoided separating parents and children.84 The master often apprenticed the children of his slaves, and as soon as they knew a trade he set them up in business in his own name, allowing them a share in the profits.85 A slave could hire himself out for wages, and could himself acquire slaves to work for him.86 He was even entitled to purchase his freedom.87 “La loi babylonienne,” says M. Oppert, “lassait aux esclaves sur quelques points plus de prérogatives que le Code français n’en accorde à nos épouses.”88

Among the Hebrews the slave class consisted of captives taken in war;89 of persons bought with money from neighbouring nations or from foreign residents in the land;90 of children of slaves born in the house;91 of native Hebrews who had been sold by their fathers,92 or who either alone or with their wives and children had fallen into slavery in consequence of poverty,93 or who had been sold by the authorities as slaves on account of theft when unable to pay compensation for the stolen property.94 To deprive an Israelite of his freedom for any other reason, to steal him, use him as a slave, or sell him, was a crime punishable with death.95 And even the Israelite who lost his liberty because he had become poor on account of poverty was not to be treated in the same way as the slave of foreign origin. He could not be compelled to serve as a bondservant, only as a hired servant.96 He should not be ruled over with rigour.97 He might not only be redeemed at any time by his relatives, but if not redeemed he was bound to receive his freedom without payment in the seventh year, and then the master should not let him go away empty, but furnish him liberally out of his flock, his floor, and his wine-press.98 Slaves of foreign extraction, on the other hand, were not to be emancipated, but should remain slaves for ever, descending to children and children’s children.99 But in no case had the master absolute power over his slave. Whether the latter was an Israelite or a foreigner, his life, and to some extent his body, were protected by law;100 and if a slave escaped from a hard master, he should not be given up, but be allowed to live unmolested in the place which he should choose in one of the cities of Israel.101 From everything that we read about slaves among the Hebrews it appears that they were regarded as inferior members of the family, and that the house-father cared for their well-being hardly less than for that of his own children.102 In the Talmud masters are repeatedly admonished to treat their slaves with kindness;103 traffic in human beings is regarded as an occupation which incapacitates the dealer to sit as judge;104 and emancipation of slaves is practically encouraged in various ways,105 in spite of the dictum of certain rabbis that he who emancipates his slave transgresses the positive precept of Leviticus xxv. 46, “They shall be your bondmen for ever.”106

According to Islam, a Muhammedan who is born free can never become a slave. “The slave,” says Mr. Lane, “is either a person taken captive in war or carried off by force from a foreign country, and being at the time of capture an infidel; or the offspring of a female slave by another slave, or by any man who is not her owner, or by her owner if he do not acknowledge himself to be the father.”107 The slave should be treated with kindness; the Prophet said, “A man who behaves ill to his slave will not enter into Paradise.”108 The master should give to his slaves of the food which he eats himself, and of the clothes with which he clothes himself.109 He should not order them to do anything beyond their power, and in the hot season, during the hottest hours of the day, he should let them rest.110 He may marry them to whom he will, but he may not separate them when married.111 He may, generally, give them away or sell them as he pleases, but he must not separate a mother from her child. The Prophet said, “Whoever is the cause of separation between mother and child, by selling or giving, God will separate him from his friends on the day of resurrection.”112 Nor is a master allowed to alienate a female slave who has borne to him a child which he recognises as his own; and at his death the mother is entitled to emancipation.113 To liberate a slave is regarded as an act highly acceptable to God, and as an expiation for certain sins.114 These rules, it should be added, are not only recognised in theory, but derive additional support from general usage. In the Muhammedan world the slave generally lives on easy terms with his master. He is often treated as a member of the family, and occasionally exercises much influence upon its affairs.115 In certain countries at least, it is held disreputable or disgraceful for a person to sell his slave, except perhaps in case of absolute necessity or in consequence of intolerable behaviour on the part of the slave.116 In Persia custom demands that on certain festive occasions, such as the birth of a child or a wedding, one or several of the slaves of the family should be set free;117 and both there and in other Muhammedan countries testamentary manumissions are of frequent occurrence.118 In Morocco a slave is sometimes allowed a certain amount of liberty that he may earn enough to buy his freedom;119 whilst among the Bedouins of the Arabian Desert described by Burckhardt, slaves are always emancipated after a certain lapse of time.120 No stigma attaches to the emancipated slave. It has been truly said that in Islam slavery is regarded as an accident, not as a “constitution of nature,”121 hence the freedman is socially on an equal footing with a free-born citizen. He may without discredit marry his former master’s daughter, and become the head of the family. Emancipated slaves have repeatedly risen to the highest offices, they have ruled kingdoms and founded dynasties.122

According to the Laws of Manu, the mythical legislator of ancient India, there are slaves of seven kinds, namely, “he who is made a captive under a standard, he who serves for his daily food, he who is born in the house, he who is bought and he who is given, he who is inherited from ancestors, and he who is enslaved by way of punishment.”123 The last mentioned class consists of persons who have lost their freedom because they have been unable to pay a debt or a fine, or because they have left a religious order.124 The slave is not necessarily a Sûdra, or member of the lowest of the four Indian castes, but Kshatriyas may become the slaves of Brâhmanas and Vaisyas of Brâhmanas and Kshatriyas.125 On the other hand, the Sûdras as such were not slaves, though it was their duty to serve the other castes; they chose the persons to whom they would offer service, and claimed adequate compensation.126 The power which a house-holder in India possessed over his slaves is not exactly defined; but he is admonished not to have quarrels with them, and if offended by any of them, to bear it without resentment.127 In Âpastamba’s Aphorisms it is said that a person may at his pleasure stint himself, his wife, or his children, “but by no means a slave who does his work.”128 Elphinstone wrote in 1839 in his ‘History of India’:—“Domestic slaves are treated exactly like servants, except that they are more regarded as belonging to the family. I doubt if they are ever sold; and they attract little observation, as there is nothing apparent to distinguish them from freemen.”129 The priesthood of modern Buddhism teach that there are five ways in which a master ought to assist his slave:—“He must not appoint the work of children to men, or of men to children, but to each according to his strength; he must give each one his food and wages, according as they are required; when sick, he must free him from work, and provide him with proper medicine; when the master has any agreeable and savoury food, he must not consume the whole himself, but must impart a portion to others, even to his slaves; and if they work properly for a long period, or for a given period, they must be set free.”130

In Greece, especially in earlier times, capture in war, piracy, and kidnapping were common causes of slavery,131 and the condition was hereditary. Other legitimate sources were exposure of infants, except at Thebes,132 and sale of children by their parents.133 At Athens insolvent debtors became the slaves of their creditors up to the time of Solon;134 and metics—that is, resident aliens—who did not discharge the obligations imposed on them by the State, were sold as slaves, as were also foreigners who had fraudulently possessed themselves of the rights of citizens.135 At least in a later age the majority of slaves seem to have been of barbarian origin;136 indeed, after the Peloponnesian war the principle that captives taken in wars between Greek states should be ransomed and not enslaved was commonly recognised, though not always followed in practice.137 As we have seen, the master had not the power of life and death over his slave.138 At sanctuaries the latter found a refuge from cruel oppression.139 If maltreated he could demand to be sold; and he could purchase his liberty with his peculium by agreement with his master.140 But by manumission he only entered into an intermediate condition between slavery and complete freedom; thus, at Athens the freedman was in relation to the State a metic and in relation to his master a client.141 Domestic slaves often lived on terms of intimacy with their masters,142 but as a class slaves were regarded with contempt even by men like Plato and Aristotle. The former, whilst warning his hearers against insolent and unjust behaviour towards slaves, observes that they should be treated with severity, not admonished as if they were freemen, but punished, and only addressed in words of command.143 Aristotle compares the relation of the master to his slave with that of the soul to the body and of the craftsman to his tool, and adds that there can be friendship between them only in so far as the slave is regarded not as a slave but as a fellow human being.144 But whilst the state of slavery always entailed disgrace, the question was raised whether the master’s power over his slave was based on justice or on force, and in Greece, for the first time, we meet with the opinion that the institution of slavery is contrary to Nature, and that it is the law which, unjustly, makes one man a slave and another free.145 However, Aristotle was no doubt in general agreement with his age when he declared that the barbarians, on account of their inferiority, are intended by Nature to be the slaves of the Greeks.146