10 - Slavery in the Hellenistic world

Summary

INTRODUCTION

When Alexander of Macedon conquered the former Persian empire in the last third of the fourth century bc, the different forms of dependence that he found there seem likely to have exceeded those familiar to the Greek world from which he came. Following this conquest much was left in place, but the spread of Greek-style chattel slavery represented a real change in the Hellenistic world. While attempting, therefore, to place chattel slavery within a wider context of dependence, this chapter will in part be concerned with one particular aspect of the impact of Greek rule on new areas of the East – the introduction of chattel slavery to areas where previously it had not formed part of the culture. The geographical scope of this inquiry is of necessity wide, since the new Greek-speaking world stretched from Sicily in the west to Afghanistan and the bounds of India in the east. The old world of mainland Greece, the islands of the Aegean and the coasts of Asia Minor and the Black Sea remain relevant, but changes there were of lesser note than those in the new Macedonian kingdoms of the East – in Seleucid Asia, Attalid Pergamum and Ptolemaic Egypt. From Egypt, papyri preserved in the dry desert sands provide an ever-expanding source of information on the role played by slavery in at least this one of the Hellenistic kingdoms.