It will have been remarked, that both in town and country, the mean and painful drudgery was chiefly performed by slaves,[1] whose origin, condition, and numbers, in the principal Grecian states, it now becomes necessary to describe. The greatest writers of antiquity[2] were on this subject perplexed and undecided. They appear to have comprehended the full extent of the evil,[3] but to have been too much the slaves themselves of habit and prejudice to discover, that no form or modification of servitude is consistent with human happiness or with justice, without which no happiness can be. This is evident from the conversation in Crete between Plato and his Gnosian and Spartan companions. They do not trouble their minds with inquiries respecting the origin of slavery, which, while some tribes of men are stronger and more civilised than others, could never be difficult to be conjectured; but considering its existence easy to be accounted for, they are concerned to discover by what means may be avoided or mitigated the mischiefs they everywhere saw accompanying it.
Most perplexing of all,[4] however, was the Laconian Heloteia; because in that case the comparatively great number of the servile caste rendered it necessary, in the opinion of some, to break their spirit and bring them down to their condition by a system of severity which constitutes the infamy of Sparta.
The discredit, however, of subsisting on slave labour was to a certain extent shared by all the states of Greece, even by Athens. They appear to have supposed that no slaves, no body politic.[5] But in the treatment of those unfortunate men there was as much variation as from the differences of national character might have been inferred. The Athenians in this respect, as in most others, being the antipodes of the Spartans, and falling into the error, if such a thing can be conceived, of extreme humanity and indulgence.
It is no doubt possible by kindness to obliterate many of the ugly features of slavery, so that between the vassal and his lord strong mutual affection may spring up.[6] We hear, accordingly, of slaves whose love for their masters exceeded the love of brothers, or of children;[7] they have toiled, fought, died, for them; nay they have sometimes surpassed them in courage, and taught them, in situations of imminent danger, how to die, as in the case of that military attendant, who, when taken prisoner with his master, and seeing him resolved on death, yet hesitating about the means, dashed his brains out against the wall to show him how it might be done. Another example is recorded of a slave who put on the disguise of his lord, that he might be slain in his stead. But what then? Do these examples prove that in servitude there is anything ennobling? On the contrary, the only inference to be drawn from them is, that in these cases great and worthy souls had been dealt with unjustly by fortune. However, since none but the incorrigibly base can now be found to advocate this worst of all human vices, I may spare my arguments, and proceed at once to trace the history of slavery in Greece.
In very remote ages mankind, according to tradition, dispensed with the labours of domestic slaves,[8] whose place was supplied by the women of the family,[9] who rose before day to grind corn for the household; and as they usually sang while thus engaged, the whole village on such occasions would seem alive with music. As in the East, also, they were accustomed to draw water from the wells, or seek it at a distance at the fountains, as I have already, in speaking of the Hellenic women, observed. But as soon as men began to give quarter in war, and became possessed of prisoners, the idea of employing them, and rendering their labours subservient to their maintenance naturally suggested itself. At the outset, therefore, as a very distinguished historian[10] has remarked, servitude sprung from feelings of humanity; for when it was found that advantages could be derived from captured enemies they were no longer butchered in the field. Hence, from the verb signifying “to be subdued,” they were denominated Dmöes;[11] for “of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.”[12] Of these constant mention is made in Homer. Thus Telemachos speaks of the Dmöes whom his father had left in his charge; and Agamemnon detained in his tent a number of Lesbian women taken captive in war. In the same condition was Briseïs: and to this fate Hector fears Andromache may be reserved after his death.[13]
Possibly the practice was borrowed from the East, where the mention of slaves occurs in the remotest ages. Thus too in later times, Atossa, queen of Persia, is represented to have urged Darius into the Grecian war, that she might possess Athenian, Spartan, Argive, and Corinthian slaves.[14] And the Pythoness foretelling the destruction of Miletus, exclaims:
“And of a numerous long-haired race thy wives shall wash the feet.”[15]
The practice was when a number of prisoners had been taken, to make a division of them among the chiefs, generally by lot, and then to sell them for slaves.[16] This Achilles boasts he had frequently done, and old Priam fears will be the destiny of his own sons, as it had been of Lycaon whom the Thessalian hero had seized[17] in his garden. To the same purpose is the lament of Hecuba,[18] who accuses him of having reduced many of her sons to slavery. Examples occur in antiquity of whole cities and states being at once subjected to servitude: thus the inhabitants of Judea were a first and a second time carried away captive to Babylon, where their masters, not perhaps from mockery, required of them to sing for their entertainment some of their national songs, to which, as we learn from the prophet, they replied: “How can we sing the songs of Zion in a strange land?” The citizens likewise of Miletos, after the unsuccessful revolt of Aristagoras, were transported into Persia, as were those also of Eretria and Carystos in Eubœa.[19] Like the Israelites, these Greeks long preserved in captivity their national manners and language, though surrounded by strangers and urged by every inducement to assimilate themselves to their conquerors. A similar fate overtook the inhabitants of Thebes, who were sold into slavery by Alexander, as were those of Mycene by the Argives, and the Corinthians by Mummius.[20]
But the supply produced by war seldom equalled the demand; and in consequence a race of kidnappers sprung up, who, partly merchants and partly pirates, roamed about the shores of the Mediterranean, as similar miscreants do now about the slave-coasts, picking up solitary and unprotected individuals. Sometimes their boldness rose to the wives or daughters of the chiefs; as in the case of Paris, who robbed the house, and carried away the wife of Menelaus; and of those Phœnicians who having landed at Argos and held, during several days, a fair on the beach, ended by stealing the king’s daughter.[21] Mitford’s supposition that both Io and her companions may have been allured on board,[22] is founded on the apologetical narrative of the pirates themselves. The practice of kidnapping certainly prevailed widely. Thus Eumæos was, by the Phœnicians, sold to Laertes, and a similar fate awaited the woman whom the Taphian pirates stole away at the same time.[23] Odysseus himself relates how a Phœnician rogue plotted against his liberty when he was sailing with him towards Libya, and that the Thesprotians had meditated a like design.[24] To enumerate no other instances, Laomedon menaces Apollo and Poseidon with servitude, observing that he will have them bound and shipped to some distant island for sale.[25]
Neither war, however, nor piracy sufficed at length to furnish that vast multitude of slaves, which the growing luxury of the times induced the Greeks to consider necessary. Commerce by degrees conducted them to Caria and other parts of Asia Minor, particularly the southern coasts of the Black Sea, those great nurseries of slaves from that time until now.[26] The first Greeks who engaged in this traffic, which even by the Pagans was supposed to be attended by a curse, are said to have been the Chians, and we shall presently see how ill it prospered with them. They purchased their slaves from the barbarians, among whom the Lydians, the Phrygians, and the natives of Pontos, with many others were accustomed, like the modern Circassians, to carry on a trade in their own people.[27] We find mention made in the Anabasis of a Macronian, who having been a slave at Athens and obtaining his liberty, afterwards became a soldier and served the Ten Thousand as an interpreter at a critical moment during their passage through his native country.[28]
Before proceeding, however, with the history of the slave-trade, it may be proper to describe the power possessed by masters over their domestics during the heroic ages. Every man appears to have been then a king in his own house, and to have exercised his authority most regally. Thus we find the young Telemachos taking pleasure in the idea that he shall be king over his slaves;[29] and Andromache, with a mother’s fondness, fears lest her son should become the drudge of an unfeeling lord.[30] Power generally, when unchecked by law, is fierce and inhuman, and over their household, gentlemen, in those ages, exercised the greatest and most awful power, that of life and death, as they afterwards did at Rome.[31] This is illustrated by an example in the Odyssey, where the hero being, while in disguise, insulted grossly by Melanthios, threatens the slave that he will incite Telemachos to cut him in pieces. Afterwards, when he has recovered his authority, the terrible menace is remembered and fulfilled. The culprit is seized and mutilated with savage barbarity, his members, torn from the body, are thrown to the dogs, and even the poet, upon the whole so humane, does not seem to consider the punishment too great for the offence.[32] It has even been supposed that this kind of mutilation was a punishment peculiar to slaves; for Laomedon, while menacing the gods in the manner above described, adds, that he will cut off their ears.[33] When supposed to deserve death they were executed ignominiously by hanging, as in the case of the domestics of Odysseus, whose offences, though grave, would scarcely in any free country be visited with capital punishment.[34] This was regarded as an impure end. To die honourably was to perish by the sword.[35]
The practice of manumission already in the heroic ages prevailed.[36] Odysseus promises their freedom to his herdsman and swineherd if by their aid he should slaughter the suitors; and, according to Plutarch, Telemachos actually bestowed on Eumæos and his companions both their liberty and the rights of citizenship, and from them, he adds, the celebrated families of the Koliades and Bukoli were descended.[37]
Nor does the illustrious race appear to be yet extinct, Professor Koliades[38] claiming to be a lineal descendant from Eumæos, which may very well be since he must be descended from somebody; and there is no reason why a descendant of Eumæos should not be a professor.
In addition to the slaves there were likewise free labourers who worked for hire, and were called Thetes.[39] These sometimes seem to have been placed on the extremities of estates, as the guardians of boundaries, a post which Eurymachos offers with good wages to Odysseus.[40] And it is the condition of one of these hinds that Achilles prefers in Hades to the empire of the shades.[41] The gods also in their sojourn upon earth sometimes submitted to the hardships of this condition. Thus Phœbos Apollo kept the flocks of Admetos, king of Thessaly,[42] and the belief in this humble condition of the gods on earth is objected by Lucian and Dionysius of Halicarnassus,[43] as blameworthy to the Greeks. Herodotus, too, relates that the three sons of Temenos—Gavanes, Aëropos, and Perdiccas—fled from Argos into Illyria and thence into Upper Macedonia to the city of Lebæa, where they served the king for hire, the first tending the royal stud, the second the cattle, and the third the sheep and goats.[44]
From the history of Minos, which, whether true or fabulous, still illustrates the manners of the times, we learn, that the tribute exacted by a victorious enemy sometimes consisted of slaves. Thus the Cretan king, having made a successful descent on the Attic coast, was propitiated (as by our own ancestors were the Danes and other Northern savages) by an annual offering of fourteen youths and virgins, who, being conveyed to Crete, were there said to be destroyed by a monster born of Pasiphaë, daughter of the sun.[45] Theseus, the great hero of the Ionic race, delivered his country from this obnoxious tax, and on his return to Athens was received by the people with unbounded gratitude; sacrifices and processions were instituted in his honour, and the memory of his noble achievement was religiously preserved as long as paganism endured.[46]
And in some such ways as the above, slaves, in early times, must have been procured; for, as Timæos of Taormina[47] remarks, the Greeks of those ages obtained none in the regular course of traffic. He further adds, that Aristotle was generally accused of having misunderstood the usages of the Locrians, among whom, as among the Phocians,[48] it was not of old the custom to possess slaves, whether male or female. The practice, however, prevailed in later times; and the wife of that Philomelos who took Delphi is said to have been the first who was attended by two servile handmaids.[49] But when men commence evil courses, they seldom know where to stop. Mnason, a Phocian, and friend of Aristotle,[50] ambitious of rivalling Nicias, the son of Niceratos, purchased for his own service a thousand slaves, for which he was accused by his countrymen of lavishing upon them what would have supported an equal number of free persons.[51] In that country, therefore, it is clear there existed a class of labourers like the Thetes described by Homer, who were ready to work for hire.[52] In their domestic economy the simplicity of their manners enabled the Phocians and Locrians to dispense with the services of slaves, it being the custom among them, as among the rustics of Eubœa, whom we have described above, for the younger members of the family to wait on the elder.[53]
The Chians, as I have already observed, are said to have been the first Grecian people who engaged in a regular slave-trade.[54] For, although the Thessalians and Spartans possessed, at a period much anterior, their Penestæ and their Helots, they obtained them by different means: the latter, by reducing to subjection the ancient Achæan inhabitants of Peloponnesos;[55] the former, by their conquests over the Magnesians, Perrhæbians, and Bœotians of Arnè. But the Chians possessed only such barbarian slaves as they had purchased with money, in which they more nearly resembled the slave-holding nations of modern times.[56] Other circumstances, likewise, in the history of slavery among the Chians,[57] strongly suggest the parallel, and deserve to be studied with more care than appears to have been bestowed upon them. We have here, perhaps, the first type of the Maroon wars, though on a smaller scale, and marked by fewer outbreaks of atrocity. It is not, indeed, stated that the females were flogged, though throughout Greece the males were so corrected; but, whatever the nature of the severities practised on them may have been,[58] the yoke of bondage was found too galling to be borne,[59] and whole gangs took refuge in the mountains. Fortunately for them, the interior of the island abounded in fastnesses, and was, in those days, covered with forest.
Here, therefore, the fugitives, erecting themselves dwellings, or taking possession of caverns among almost inaccessible cliffs, successfully defended themselves, subsisting on the plunder of their former owners. Shortly before the time of the writer, to whom we are indebted for these details, a bondsman, named Drimacos, made his escape from the city and reached the mountains, where, by valour and conduct, he soon placed himself at the head of the servile insurgents over whom he ruled like a king.[60] The Chians led several expeditions against him in vain. He defeated them in the field with great slaughter; but, at length, to spare the useless effusion of human blood, invited them to a conference, wherein he observed, that the slaves, being encouraged in their revolt by an oracle, would never lay down their arms or submit to the drudgery of servitude. Nevertheless, the war might be terminated. “For, if my advice,” said he, “be followed, and we be suffered to enjoy tranquillity, numerous advantages will thence accrue to the state.”
There being little prospect of a satisfactory settlement of the matter by arms, the Chians consented to enter into a truce as with a public enemy. Humbled by their losses and defeats, Drimacos found them submissive to reason. He, therefore, provided himself with weights, measures, and a signet,[61] and exhibiting them to his former masters, said, “When, in future, our necessities require that I should supply myself from your stores, it shall always be by these weights and measures, and having possessed myself of the necessary quantity of provisions, I shall be careful to leave your warehouses sealed with this signet. With respect to such of your slaves as may fly and offer themselves to me, I will institute a rigid examination into their story, and if, upon inquiry, they appear to have had just grounds for complaint, I will protect them—if not, they shall be sent back to their proprietors.”
To these conditions the magistrates readily acceded, upon which the slaves who still remained with their masters grew more obedient, and seldom took to flight, dreading the decision of Drimacos.[62] Over his own followers he exercised a despotic authority. They, in fact, stood far more in fear of him than when in bondage of their lords, and performed his bidding without question or murmur, as soldiers obey their commander. For he was severe in the punishment of the unruly, and permitted no man to plunder or lay waste the country, or commit any act of injustice,—in short, to do anything without his order. The public festivals he was careful to observe, going round and collecting from the proprietors of the land, who bestowed upon him voluntarily both wine and the finest victims; but if, on these occasions, he discovered that a plot was hatching, or any ambush laid for him, he would take speedy vengeance.
So far the affairs of the Chians and their revolted bondsmen proceeded smoothly. But things continued not always on this footing. Observing old age to be creeping upon Drimacos, and rendered wanton apparently by prosperity, the government issued a proclamation, offering a great reward to any one who should capture him, or bring them his head.[63] The old general, discerning, perhaps, signals of treachery, or convinced that, at last, it must come to that, took aside a young man whom he loved, and said, “I have ever regarded you with a stronger affection than any other man, and to me you have been, instead of a son, a brother, and every other tie. But now, the days of my life are at an end, nor would I have them prolonged. With you, however, it is not so. Youth and the bloom of youth are yours. What then is to be done? You must prove yourself to possess valour and greatness of soul; and since the state offers riches and freedom to whomsoever shall slay me and bear them my head, let the reward be yours. Strike it off, and be happy!”
At first the youth rejected the proposal, but ultimately Drimacos prevailed. The old man fell, and his friend on presenting his head received the sum which had been offered by the state, together with his freedom, and thereupon after burying his benefactor’s remains, he sailed away to his own country. Now, however, the Chians underwent the just punishment of their treachery. No longer guided by the wisdom and authority of Drimacos, the fugitive slaves returned to their original habits of plunder and devastation; whereupon, remembering the moderation of the dead, they erected an Heroön upon his grave, and denominated him the propitious hero. The insurgents, too, holding his memory in no less veneration, continued for ages to offer up the first-fruits of their spoil at his tomb. He was, in fact, honoured with a kind of apotheosis, and canonized among the gods of the island; for it was believed that his shade often appeared to men in dreams for the purpose of revealing some servile conspiracy while yet in the bud: and they to whom he vouchsafed these warning visits, more grateful than when he yet lived, never failed to proceed to his chapel, and offer sacrifice to his manes.[64]
In another department of iniquity the Chians would appear to have been engaged about the period of Xerxes’ expedition into Greece; I mean the making of eunuchs for the Eastern market. Panionios, a miscreant engaged in this traffic, who had mutilated and sold into slavery a young man named Hermotimos, at length expiated his offence against human nature by being himself, together with his four sons, subjected to the same operation.[65] His countrymen, also, in process of time, were, in like manner, compelled to drain the bitter cup of servitude. For, as we find recorded by Nicolaos the Peripatetic, and Posidonios the Stoic, having been subjugated by Mithridates of Cappadocia, they were delivered up to their own slaves to be carried away captive into Colchis, which Athenæus, a man not overburdened with religion, considers the just punishment of their wickedness in having been the first who introduced the slave-trade into Greece, when they might have been better served by freemen for hire. From this ancient villany of the Chians is supposed to have arisen the proverb—“the Chian has bought himself a master,” which Eupolis introduced into his drama called the “Friends.”[66]
The servile war which took place among the Samians, had a more fortunate issue, though but few particulars respecting it have come down to us. It was related, however, by Malacos, in his annals of the Siphnians, that Ephesos was first founded by a number of Samian slaves, who having retired to a mountain on the island to the number of a thousand, inflicted numerous evils on their former tyrants. These in the sixth year of the war, having consulted the oracle, came to an understanding with their slaves, who being permitted to depart in safety from the island, sailed away, and became the founders of the city and people of Ephesos.[67]
In Attica, the institution of slavery,[68] though attended, as it everywhere must be, by innumerable evils, nevertheless exhibited itself under the mildest form which it anywhere assumed in the ancient world.[69] With their characteristic attention to the interests of humanity, the Athenians enacted a law, in virtue of which slaves could indict their masters for assault and battery. Hyperides, accordingly, observed in his oration against Mantitheos, “our laws making no distinction in this respect between freemen and slaves, grant to all alike the privilege of bringing an action against those who insult or injure them.”[70] To the same effect spoke Lycurgus[71] in his first oration against Lycophron; but Demosthenes has preserved the law which empowered any Athenian, not labouring under legal disability, to denounce to the Thesmothetæ the person who offered violence to man, woman, or boy, whether slave or free. The action was tried before the court of Heliæa, and numerous were the examples of men who had suffered death for crimes committed against bondsmen. Not, therefore, without reason did the orator eulogise the humane spirit of the law, or dwell upon the beneficial effects which a knowledge of its existence must produce among those barbarous nations who furnished Greece with servile labourers.[72] Another privilege enjoyed by the slave class in Attica was that of purchasing their own freedom, as often as, by the careful management of the peculium secured them by law, they were enabled to offer to their owners an equivalent for their services.[73]
Still, even in Attica, the yoke of bondage was a heavy yoke, the law itself, in other matters, drawing distinctions between freemen and slaves doubly galling because palpably unnecessary. Legally, for example, they were not allowed to wear long hair,[74] or a garment with two sleeves,[75] to drink wine, save at the festival of Pithœgia on the first day of the month Anthesterion; to anoint themselves as in the gymnasia, to be present at the procession in honour of the Eumenides, or in the case of females to enter the temple of Demeter during the celebration of the Thesmophoria.[76] A similar spirit pervaded the servile code in other parts of Greece. Thus, in the island of Cos they were prohibited from joining in the sacrifices to Hera, and from tasting the victims. They were, likewise, forbidden to be present when offerings were presented to the Manes of Phorbas. But from the very words of the law which authorised the temple wardens to exclude them on these occasions, it is clear that on all others they might freely enter.[77] At Athens, with the exceptions above mentioned, every temple in the city appears to have been open to them. Occasionally, moreover, certain of their number were selected to accompany their masters to consult the oracle at Delphi, when even they were permitted, like free citizens, to wear crowns upon their heads, which, for the time conferred upon them exemption from blows or stripes.[78] Among their more serious grievances, was their liability to personal chastisement, which, besides being inflicted as our punishment of the treadmill, or whipping,[79] at the carts’-tail, by an order of the magistrates,[80] was too much left to the discretion of their owners, whose mercies in many cases would be none of the most tender. In time of war, however, this planter’s luxury could not be enjoyed,[81] since the flogged slaves might go over to the enemy, as sometimes happened.[82] They are said, besides, to have worked the mines in fetters; probably, however, only in consequence of the revolt described by Posidonios, in which they slew the overseers of the mines, and taking possession of the acropolis of Sunium,[83] laid waste for a considerable time the whole of the adjacent districts. This took place simultaneously with the second insurrection of the slaves in Sicily (there was, perhaps, an understanding between them) in the quelling of which nearly a million of their number were destroyed.[84] Other grievances they endured, which will be noticed as we proceed; but in addition to those that actually existed, a learned modern writer has imagined another, which, in his opinion, reduces their condition beneath that of the Helots. “Nearly all the ties of family were broken,” he says, “among the slaves of Athens;” and further explaining himself in a note remarks, that the marriage of slaves was there an uncommon event.[85] We find, however, from contemporary writers, that except in cases of incorrigible perverseness, slaves were, on the contrary, encouraged to marry, it being supposed they would thus become more attached to their masters.[86] The same bold and ingenious writer endeavours to give a reason for what has been quoted above, by saying, “it was cheaper to purchase than to bring up slaves.” This was not the opinion of the ancients, “we,” say they, “prefer and put more trust in slaves born and brought up in the house, than in such as are purchased.”[87]
It has been observed that, from the most grievous insults and contumely, slaves were protected by the laws; but if, in spite of legal protection, their masters found means to render their lives a burden, the state provided them with an asylum in the temples of Theseus and the Eumenides.[88] Having there taken sanctuary, their oppressors could not force them thence without incurring the guilt of sacrilege.[89] Thus, in a fragment of Aristophanes’ Seasons we find a slave deliberating whether he should not take refuge in the Theseion, and there remain till he could procure his transfer to a new master;[90] for any one who conducted himself too harshly towards his slaves was by law compelled to sell them.[91] Nay and not only so, but the slave could institute an action against his lord called αἰκιάς δίκη, or against any other citizen who had behaved unjustly or injuriously towards him. But the right of sanctuary was no doubt limited, and only extended from the time of the slave’s flight to the next New Moon, when a periodical slave-auction appears to have been held.[92]
On this occasion the slaves were stationed, as I have seen them in the bazaars of modern Egypt, in a circle in the market-place, and the one whose turn it was to be sold mounted a table, which seems to have been of stone, where he exhibited himself and was knocked down to the best bidder. Sometimes when the articles were lively they made great sport for the company, as in the case of Diogenes who bawled aloud “whoever among you wants a master, let him buy me.”[93]
To the friskiness whether natural or assumed which the young barbarians often exhibited on this occasion, Menander alludes in the following fragment of his Ephesian:[94]
Slaves of little or no value were contemptuously called “salt-bought,” from a custom prevalent among the inland Thracians, of bartering their captives for salt;[95] whence it may be inferred, that domestics from that part of the world were considered inferior.
Respecting the price of slaves an important passage occurs in the Memorabilia, where Socrates, conversing with Antisthenes, on the subject of friendship, inquires whether friends were to be valued at so much per head, like slaves, some of whom he says were not worth a demimina, while others would fetch two, five, or even ten minæ,[96] that is, the price varied from forty shillings to forty pounds. Nay it is even said that Nicias, son of Niceratos, bought an overseer for his silver mines at the price of a talent, or two hundred and forty-one pounds sterling.[97] This passage is in substance quoted by Boeckh,[98] who observes that, exclusively of the fluctuations caused by the variations in the supply and the demand, the market-price of slaves was affected by their age, health, strength, beauty, natural abilities, mechanical ingenuity, and moral qualities. The meanest and cheapest class were those who worked in the mills,[99] where mere bodily strength was required, and therefore by setting Samson at this labour the Philistines intimated their extreme contempt for his blind energy. A very low value was set upon such slaves as worked in the mines, about 150 drachmas in the age of Demosthenes.[100] Ordinary house-slaves, whether male or female, might be valued at about the same price. Demosthenes, in fact, considered two minæ and a half a large sum for a person of this class. Of the sword-cutlers possessed by the orator’s father some were valued at six minæ, others at five, while the lowest were worth above three. Chair-makers sold for about two minæ.
In his discussion on this point, Boeckh[101] charges Demosthenes with intentional falsehood, because, in his oration against Aphobos, he reckons fourteen sword-cutlers at forty minæ, something less than three minæ a-piece. But among those possessed by his father at his death some were reckoned at only three minæ. His guardians made use of them for ten years, that is, till they were grown old, by which time the best would have deteriorated, and the others become of no value.[102] This being the case, I do not see upon what ground Boeckh bases his accusation. The wages of slaves, when let out by their masters on hire, varied greatly, as did also the profit derived from them. A miner was supposed to yield his master an obolos per day, a leather-worker two oboli, and a foreman or overseer three. Expert manufacturers of fine goods, such as head-nets, stuffs of Amorgos, and variegated fabrics like our flowered muslins, must have produced their owners much greater returns.[103]
Slaves, at Athens, were divided into two classes, private and public. The latter, who were the property of the state, performed several kinds of service supposed to be unworthy of freemen: they were, for example, employed as vergers, messengers, apparitors, scribes, clerks of public works,[104] and inferior servants of the gods. Most of the temples of Greece possessed, in fact, a great number of slaves or serfs, who cultivated the sacred domains, exercised various humbler offices of religion, and were, in short, ready on all occasions to execute the orders of the priests.[105] At Corinth, where the worship of Aphrodite chiefly prevailed, these slaves consisted almost exclusively of women,[106] who having, on certain occasions, burnt frankincense, and offered up public prayers to the goddess, were sumptuously feasted within the precincts of her fane.
Among the Athenians, the slaves of the republic, generally captives taken in war, received a careful education, and were sometimes entrusted with important duties. Out of their number were selected the secretaries,[107] who, in time of war, accompanied the generals and treasurers of the army, and made exact minutes of their expenditure, in order that, when on their return these officers should come to render an account of their proceedings, their books might be compared with those of the secretaries. In cases of difficulty, moreover, these unfortunate individuals were subjected to torture, in order to obtain that kind of evidence which the ancients deemed most satisfactory.[108]
The servile vocabulary was necessarily abundant: διάκονος,[109] a servant in general; ὑπηρέτης,[110] a personal attendant or valet; ἀργυρώ-νητης,[111] a slave bought with money; ὤνιος, the same; οἰκότριψ,[112] οἰκοτραφὴς, a male slave born in the house. The name given to the female slave in the same condition was σηκὶς, or οἰκογενὴς.[113] The housekeeper, likewise a slave, received the appellation of ταμεία[114] from her office. A lady’s maid they called παιδίσκη,[115] though it be doubtful, according to Pollux, whether the orator Lysias, who uses the word, does so with reference to the girl’s youth or condition.[116] A slave born of slaves in the house is called οἰκοτριβαίος.[117] Chrysippos makes a distinction between οἰκέτης[118] and δοῦλος,[119] but without much foundation. Clitarchus enumerates various names by which slaves were known in Greece: ἄζοι, θεραπόντες,[120] ἀκόλουθοι,[121] πάλμονες, and λάτρεις. Rural slaves were called ἐρκίται. Hermon, in his Cretan Glossaries, observes, that slaves, born of free parents (εὐγένεις), were, in the island of Crete, called μνῶται. Seleucus informs us, that ἄζοι signifies servants male and female.[122] The latter were also denominated ἀποφράσαι and βολίζαι. A male slave, born of a slave, was termed σινδρὼν; a female attendant on a lady, ἀμφίπολος; a slave-girl who walked before her mistress, πρόπολος. Female slaves were, at Lacedæmon, called χαλκίδες. The term οἰκέτης was applied to any person employed about a house, whether slave or free.
A very pleasant and significant custom prevailed when a slave newly purchased was first brought into the house. They placed him before the hearth, where his future master, mistress, and fellow-servants, poured baskets of ripe fruit, dates, figs, filberts, walnuts, and so on, upon his head, to intimate that he was come into the abode of plenty.[123] The occasion was converted by his fellow-slaves into a holiday and a feast; for custom appropriated to them whatever was thus cast upon the new-comer, and as there were sweetmeats among the rest, they had wherewith to make merry.[124]
Their food was commonly, as might be expected, inferior to that of their masters. Thus the dates grown in Greece, which ripened but imperfectly, were appropriated to their use; and for their drink they had a small thin wine called Lora,[125] by the Romans made of the husks of grapes, laid, after they had been pressed, to soak in water,[126] and then squeezed again, like our Bunnel, in the perry country.[127] That they generally ate barley-bread in Attica was no peculiar hardship,[128] since the citizens themselves frequently did the same. We find, moreover, that to give a relish to their coarse meal, plain broth, and salt fish,[129] they were indulged with pickled gherkins. In the early ages of the commonwealth they imitated the frugal manner of their lords, so that no slave who valued his reputation would be seen to enter a tavern; but in later times they naturally shared largely in the general depravity of morals, and placed their summum bonum in eating and drinking. Their whole creed, on this point, has been summed up in a few words by the poet Sotion.[130] “Wherefore,” exclaims a slave, “dole forth these absurdities, these ravings of sophists, prating up and down the Lyceum, the Academy, and the gates of the Odeion? In all these there is nothing of value. Let us drink, let us drink deeply, O Sicon, Sicon![131] Let us rejoice, whilst it is yet permitted us to delight our souls. Enjoy thyself, O Manes! Nothing is sweeter than the belly, which alone is to thee as thy father and thy mother. Virtues, embassies, generalships, are vain pomps, resembling the plaudits of a dream. Heaven, at the fated hour, will deliver thee to the cold grasp of death, and thou wilt bear with thee nothing but what thou hast drunk and eaten! All else is dust, like Pericles, Codros, and Cimon.”
The employment of household slaves necessarily varied according to the rank and condition of their lords. In the dwellings of the wealthy and luxurious they were accustomed to fan their masters and mistresses, and to drive away the flies with branches of myrtle, instead of which, in the East, they make use of flappers of palm-leaves. Among the Roman ladies it was customary to retain a female attendant for the sole purpose of looking after the Melitensian lap-dogs[132] of their mistresses, in which they were less ambitious than that dame in Lucian, who kept a philosopher for this purpose.[133] Female cup-bearers filled the place of our saucy footmen.[134] Ladies’ maids were likewise slaves. They were initiated in all the arts of the toilette; and it is told of Julia, whose hair turned prematurely grey, that her ornatrix was sometimes surprised plucking out the white hairs by the entrance of her father.[135] The offices of these ornamenters is thus described by Manilius: