What Couldn’t Owners Do to Slaves in Ancient Rome?

PART 2:

 That doesn’t mean that it never happened, but it strongly suggests that it was incredibly rare. During the imperial era, there are two well-known cases where an emperor who also had sensorial powers personally stepped in to protect a slave. The first took place at a banquet hosted by the equestrian Vidius Polio. When one of his slaves accidentally broke an expensive crystal goblet, Polio enraged ordered the man to be thrown into a tank of lampre as punishment.

 Emperor Augustus, who was present, intervened. He not only spared the slave’s life, but granted him freedom. and as a final rebuke ordered all the remaining crystal goblets in the house to be smashed in front of polio. In the second case, Emperor Hadrien exiled a Roman matron named Umbra from the city for 5 years after she brutally beat a slave girl over a trivial matter.

 These were rare instances, but they highlight a key reality. While sensors and emperors technically had the authority to protect slaves, they almost never exercised it unless the violence was public and impossible to ignore. Around the turn of the era, a handful of new laws began to offer slaves minimal legal protection and place some limits on a master’s unchecked cruelty.

 In 4 BC and 2 BC, the Lexalia Centia and Lex Fufia Caninia were passed to regulate manum mission, restricting how many slaves can be freed at once, especially by will. Later, under Emperor Claudius, a law was introduced stating that if a master abandoned a six slave and the slave managed to recover without assistance, that slave would automatically be granted their freedom.

 The master was also responsible for burying their slave. If they refused to do so, anyone else could carry out the burial and then sue the master to recover the expenses. In 61 AD, the Lex Petronia prohibited owners from sending their slaves to be torn apart by wild animals without a judge’s approval.

 Emperors Domiss and later Hadrien banned the castration of slaves. In 161 AD, Emperor Antonyinus pious prohibited the unjustified killing of slaves. A master who was found guilty of deliberately killing their own slave was held to the same legal standard as if they had killed someone else’s slave. Such an owner could be fined and was also required to pay the value of the murdered slave.

 In 319 AD, Emperor Constantine’s law went even further, equating the killing of a slave with the murder of a free person. However, both Constantine’s and Antonyinus Pius’s laws held the master accountable only if the killing was intentional. For example, if the slave was stabbed with a dagger, hanged, thrown from a great height, or fed to wild beasts.

 On the other hand, if a slave died as a result of punishments that were considered normal in Roman society, such as being beaten to death with whips, the law placed no blame on the master. In addition to laws that offered slaves a minimal degree of protection, classical Roman law also included four standard clauses that could be added to a contract for the sale of a slave.

 One such clause, nim manuimator, prohibited the buyer from freeing the purchased slave. The condition could be added at the seller’s request for a variety of reasons. For instance, when it’s selling an elderly slave, the seller might include this cause to prevent the slave from being freed, ensuring that they would at least have some minimal care and support in old age.

 Since masters were legally required to provide for their slaves, many elderly slaves who could no longer work were simply freed to reduce the burden. On the other hand, a seller might include the ne manuipur clause, a ban on manumission, if they believed the slave didn’t deserve freedom. By contrast, the UOT manuator clause required the buyer to free the slave after a set period of time as specified in the sale contract.

 The UOT exportator clause obligated the buyer to remove the slave from a specific city or region and barred them from bringing the slave back. In some cases, even if the slave was later freed, returning to that area could result in reinslavement. Finally, the nerva prostitutor clause explicitly prohibited the buyer from forcing a female slave into prostitution.

 These clauses remained legally binding even if the slave was resold. For instance, if a buyer purchased a slave girl and later sold her without disclosing the nervuit clause and the new owner forced her into prostitution, the courts could intervene. In such cases, the slave would be granted her freedom and legally become a freed woman under her original seller.

 Interestingly, there were no equivalent clauses restricting a slave’s use in other professions. Only prostitution drew this level of legal attention. In early Roman law, the penalties for violating these clauses were typically laid out in the contract itself. For example, breaking the nerva prostitutor clause could result in a fine, the return of the slave to her previous owner or immediate manumission.

Under Emperor Constantine, this clause was eventually standardized. If violated, the slave was automatically freed and her legal patron would be her original seller. So, while a few laws in the Roman Empire imposed limited restrictions on a master’s cruelty, the reality of slavery remained brutally harsh.

 Roman legal commentaries made it clear that these rules weren’t motivated by concern for the slave’s well-being. They were designed to prevent unrest and preserve public order. And the most effective legal protections like nervator or utmanumitur weren’t universal. They applied only when a previous owner took the initiative to include them in a sale.

 Most slaves had no such safeguards. Even in its most progressive moments, Roman law treated slaves not as human beings, but as tools. And the few rules it did enforce were simply there to stop owners from breaking those tools unnecessarily. Once again, if you’ve made it to the end of this video, we really appreciate it if you liked and subscribed.

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