Slavery in ancient Rome

book of the New Testament attributed to Paul

institutionalized servitude in ancient Rome

thumb|Letter where one can read that the slave Geraldo will be free with the condition of working for another 6 years (Brazil). Arquivo Público do Estado de São Paulo|Arquivo Público do Estado de São Paulo|APESP Manumission, or enfranchisement, is the act of freeing slaves by their owners. Different approaches to manumission were developed, each specific to the time and place of a particular society. Historian Verene Shepherd states that the most widely used term is gratuitous manumission, "the conferment of freedom on the enslaved by enslavers before the end of the slave system".

tenant farmers in the late Roman Empire and the Early Middle Ages

historical time period of instability from approximately 134 BC to 44 BC, encompassing the fall of the Roman Republic and the formation of the Roman Empire

An ergastulum (plural: ergastula) was a Roman workhouse building used as a type of factory with slaves held in chains or to punish slaves. The ergastulum was usually built as a deep, roofed pit below ground level, large enough to allow the slaves to work within it, and containing narrow spaces in which they slept. Ergastula were common structures on all slave-using farms (latifundia). The etymology is disputed between two possible Greek roots: ergasterios "workshop" and ergastylos "pillar to which slaves are tethered."

late 1st century Roman senator

Roman law established in 4 AD

Roman law passed in 2 BC

thumb|upright|A vilicus named Felix dedicated this altar to Mens|Mens Bona, the goddess of good thinking (Castello Malaspina) In ancient Rome, the vilicus (, epitropos, or oikonomos) was a manager, supervisor, or overseer. Ausonius in 4th-century Bordeaux writes that his "pretentious" vilicus preferred to be called by the Greek title epitropos.

thumb|upright|In this inscription from AD 232, Walldürn, Roman Germany, Alexandrian dediticii join two scouts ([[exploratores) in a dedication to Dea Fortuna after the restoration of the decrepit baths at their military outpost.]]

Roman law (brought forward in 19 AD)