Untitled - African American History

SLAVERY IN GREAT BRITAIN. CXX111
exposed in the slave-market of Eome. 1 The rule of the
Saxons did not change the social system of Britain in
this respect. Among no people were the orders or
classes more distinctly divided. The edhiUng, or nobi-
lity; ihefrilingi, or freed slaves; and the lazzi, or slaves,
were among their earliest distinctions. 3 The slaves are
mentioned by other names, in the ancient laws, such as
Meow, thrcel, men, and esne. 3 There were great numbers
of these slaves, being a large majority of the population.
Single individuals owned large numbers. Alcuin, an
Anglo-Saxon abbot, had ten thousand.
The usual sources of slavery were recognized among
the Saxon laws. Birth, sale, captivity in war, the penalty
for crime, are all mentioned as legitimate sources of
slavery. From the laws of Henry I, it would appear that a
great variety of causes of slavery were recognized at that
"
Servi alii natura", alii facto, et alii empcione, et
time :
alii redempcione, alii, suai vel alterius dacione servi, et si
qui sunt aliae species hujusmodi." He reduced them all
to two, " servi, alii casu, alii genituraV' 4
The condition of the Saxon slave was that of pure
slavery. His very existence was merged in the master,
so that the maxim of their law "
was, omne damnum
quod servus fecerit, dominus emendet." The master
could inflict corporal punishment ad libitum; and while
their laws prescribed the "wegreaf" or " weregild" of
a theow, when slain by a stranger, no punishment was
affixed for his homicide by his master. 5 He was the
1
They were considered, in Rome, as stupid. Thus Cicero, speaking
of the captive Britons, "Ex quibus nullos puto te literis aut musicis eru-
dites expectare." Ad Art. Lib. IV, 16.
2 Turner's Anglo-Saxons, Bk. VII, ch. ix ; Nithard's Hist. Lib. IV.
From lazzi, comes the English word lazy, so often applied to servants.
See Rees's Cyclopaedia, " Lazzi.' 7
3
Turner, as above ; Ancient Laws and Institutes of England, passim.
4
Leg. Hen. I, 76.
5 Laws of Kings Hlothheare and Eadric, \ 1, and note thereto. Wihtr.
ch. xxiii. The slayer of a slave, by the law of Aethelbert, paid three