The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Roman Empire (6 page)

Slavery pervaded the ancient world, and Rome was no exception. Slaves were involved in every aspect of daily life, at every level of society, in every kind of economic activity. Philosophers and moralists debated on how to treat or conceptualize them, but slaves were so integral to ancient cultures that, for the most part, they were assumed to be a natural part of things.

Though there were no grades of slaves, some slaves had it better than others. In general, the closer the slave was to some kind of personal or business relationship with the owner, the better his chances for decent treatment and eventual freedom. The slaves who had it the worst were those who worked the mines. Such slaves were no more than interchangeable parts to be worked to death and replaced. Other terrible conditions were found on the large plantations and in the gladiatorial schools, where slaves were trained to kill or be killed for entertainment.

 
Great Caesar's Ghost!
The movie
Spartacus
is a romanticized tale of a famous slave revolt. There were a number of slave rebellions that began after Rome imported huge numbers of slaves into Italy for mass labor. Spartacus was a Thracian gladiator in a school at Naples. The rebellion he led there produced an army of 90,000, which defeated the Romans several times. The Roman general Crassus finally captured Spartacus's army in 71
B
.
C
.
E
. In reprisal, over 6,000 captives were crucified along the main road leading from Rome to the rebellion's origin, although Spartacus's body was never found.

Slaves had no status, legal or otherwise. Their bodies and their children were the property of their masters. The Empire period was a time of small improvements in the treatment of slaves. The emperors gave slaves some legal protections, such as protection from being arbitrarily killed by their masters or from being forcibly castrated for profit. Still, draconian laws, such as the killing of every slave (men, women, children) owned by a master if he was murdered by one them, were enforced.

Over time, however, the large number of freed slaves (freedmen) in the empire and a dwindling number of slaves from conquest had a positive influence on slave treatment. Also, philosophical systems, such as Epicureanism and Stoicism, and the teachings of Christianity helped change some attitudes about how slaves were to be treated.

 
Lend Me Your Ears
“ ‘They are slaves,' you say. Well, they are your fellow slaves when you consider that fortune has the same power over both them and you . . . . Please, keep it in mind that the man whom you call your slave was born like you, has the same sky above him as you, breathes as you do, lives and dies as you do! Treat your slave kindly and courteously. Allow him to share your conversations, plans, and company.”

—Seneca, excerpts from
Epistula Moralis,
47, written ca 60

Slaves came from a variety of sources. People could fall into debt and eventually be sold into slavery. Infants and children who were unwanted or could not be cared for by their families were also sold as slaves (children of slaves were already slaves). Conquered peoples were major sources: Aemilius Paulus sold 150,000 slaves after the battle of Pydna (168
B
.
C
.
E
.), and Julius Caesar eventually contributed about a million slaves to the Roman economy from his campaigns in Gaul (58–51
B
.
C
.
E
.). There was also a thriving business throughout the Mediterranean in kidnapping both children and adults and selling them into slavery.

Roman slaves, in contrast to the slaves of other cultures, could become free in several ways. Since they were property with value, their freedom could be purchased by someone else or by themselves with money they earned. Masters sometimes freed slaves as a gesture of good will, often in their wills. Masters also set slaves free for economic advantages, either to work with or under the former master as freedmen or because an old or sick slave had become too burdensome for upkeep.

Although slaves had the legal status of a chair, slaves of wealthy owners were in a position to become successful if they were freed. Freedmen could not vote or run for office, but through their connections they became a wealthy and powerful class during the Empire. Emancipation catapulted them from someone you ordered around to someone who ordered you around—far too quickly for many. “Real” Romans (as other citizens sometimes saw themselves) often resented these newcomers. They complained that freedmen took jobs real Romans needed, corrupted traditional Roman values with foreign ways, bought up the Empire, and talked funny.

 
Roamin' the Romans
If you visit Turkey, visit the ancient city of Ephesus. As you wander around the agora (market), reflect on the magnificent Gate of Mazeus and Mythridates. It was built by a freedman of Augustus, who had enough money as a recent freedman to build this in thanks to his former master.

In the study of ancient culture, the lives of women have often been defined and measured as a subset of the lives of men. When we ask how much power, personal autonomy, or cultural value women had, this is often gauged, not only against how much men had, but by the standards and values that created the measurement in the first place. This can keep women from being studied—and valued—on their own terms. Fortunately, a great deal of scholarship in recent years has yielded a fuller picture of Roman women's lives both in terms of their relationship to men and in terms of themselves.

When talking in general about Roman women, things break down by time periods and by classes. Whether a women was a slave, poor but free, or came from a wealthier class made a great deal of difference. It also made a difference, at least for the women of the middle and upper classes, which period you're talking about. Rome's conquests meant that men were often away for long periods of time and might not come back at all. Women were left in charge of seeing that things got done. After the conquest of Carthage, the enormous wealth brought back to Italy allowed middle- and upper-class women to run things with a great deal more independence and power.

 
Great Caesar's Ghost!
Latin words for different kinds of women have found their way into English in ways that still carry some of their original meaning. Here are four examples:

• Matrona:
  the married female head of the house, from whom we get the dignified words “matron” and “matronly”
  
• Virgo:
  a young woman, who was to be both virgin and virginal
  
• Ancilla:
  a female house slave, whose supportive but minor role is conveyed to us in the word “ancillary”
  
• Soror:
  a sister, from whom we get “sorority”
  

While Roman women were viewed as inferior to men on men's terms, their status was complex. Women and men mixed with each other in the home and society at all levels in ways that would have been unthinkable to some other cultures of the time.

In addition, although laws originally made a daughter the property of her father and a wife the property of her husband, other laws and customs developed over time that provided some loopholes. These opportunities were available primarily to the upper classes. Middle-class women, about whom we know comparatively little, are praised on gravestones for their traditional domestic and family-raising duties, and it seems that these domestic and maternal roles remained at the heart of a woman's cultural identity.

Roman women's lives are much more relevant to the present than you might think. Contemporary women and men will find much to sympathize with and to learn from them. Not only do we have very personal insights into women's and men's lives from Syria to Britain, but modern readers will recognize many current issues. Expanding roles for women, cultural backlashes, tensions between culturally defined roles and present realities, and differences between women of different socioeconomic classes make Roman women a worthwhile study for all.

The Roman emperors’ lives and actions have been a source of fascination since their own time. The entire authority of the Roman state was vested in the figure of the emperor, and almost every aspect of Roman public and private life hung on his decisions. The emperor oversaw foreign and domestic affairs, urban and regional planning, civil and legal administration, economic policy, cultural events, and military campaigns. Foreign representatives, city councils, administrators, and citizens (like St. Paul) could appeal directly to his judgement, and many did. Paul’s appeal (recorded in the book of
Acts
in the New Testament) landed him in Rome where, according to tradition, he wrote several epistles before he was executed.

Military, civil, legal, and symbolic power combined to make the emperors some of the most powerful rulers to walk the planet. With so much power, it’s no wonder that some emperors thought themselves divine. The combination of power, responsibility, and pressure proved too much for some, but many handled it remarkably well. Nevertheless, this power was always subject to the capriciousness of individuals with egos the size of Rome itself, and they were often manipulated by those close to them, upon whom they depended for advice and information.

 
Veto!
The prevalent picture of the emperors as degenerate and powermad autocrats comes primarily from the Roman historian Tacitus, the biographer Suetonius, and early Christian writers. This reputation is partly warranted, but the picture is often simplistic. Many emperors were talented and intelligent governors, administrators, and legislators, and their accomplishments were often minimized or glossed over by later hostile critics.

The Roman state was originally a Republic. This Republic ended in 31
B
.
C
.
E
. when Octavian, the adopted son of the assassinated Julius Caesar, defeated Marc Antony and Cleopatra. He changed his name to Augustus, and until
C
.
E
. 14 governed Rome as a kind of “first citizen,” or
princeps
. (See Chapter 1, “Dead Culture, Dead Language, Dead Emperors: Why Bother?” for more on the Roman Republic.)

Augustus kept alive many of the civil forms of the Republic (magistrates, for example, continued to be elected and the senate continued to meet and debate) and in fact claimed to have “restored” the Republic back to the Roman people. Nevertheless, Augustus maintained firm control of the state’s essential legislative and military
powers. After Augustus’ death in
C
.
E
. 14, his position was handed on, first to successors in his family, then to others. The successors to Augustus were known in different contexts as
Caesar
(Caesar),
Dominus
(Lord), and
Imperator
(Commander), but we know them as the Emperors.

 
When in Rome
The
Praetorian Guard
evolved from the bodyguards that protected a general. Augustus established several units from his own troops, and they became the later emperors’ personal elite force.

 
Great Caesar’s Ghost!
The emperor Vespasian, an earthy and practical man, was the first to introduce public pay toilets to Rome. He was ridiculed by the upper crust. They gave the toilets his name (akin to what happened to Col. John Crapper, the inventor of the modern toilet) and the name stuck. It may have been meant as ridicule, but any traveler to Rome can still think fondly of the emperor when asking where to find a
vespasiano
.

Well, that isn’t easy to summarize. Emperors were supposed to be declared and recognized by the people and the Senate. Each emperor indicated who was to be his successor, but after his death, it was the imperial family, imperial guards, and the legions who finalized the decision. When these groups disagreed, the issue was settled by force or palace intrigue. The low point came when the
Praetorian Guard
auctioned the post to the highest bidder. (See Chapter 16, “The [Mostly] Not-So-Good Emperors: Commodus to Aurelian,” for the case of Didius Julianus.)

Roman emperors are a study in both character and caricature. There were the notorious emperors like Gaius (Caligula), Nero, Commodus, and Heliogabalus, whose cruel megalomanias became legendary. But there were also hard and practical men like Vespasian and Severus; educated men like Claudius and Marcus Aurelius; and men like the fabulously wealthy Didius Julianus. Julianus purchased the emperorship from the Praetorian Guard at the urging of his wife (who wanted him to amount to something) and was assassinated within a few weeks. Each emperor is worth looking into and any generalization of them omits much.