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Ireland and the Making of Britain
The non-free population in Ireland was divided into
three classes: Bothach, Sencleithe, and Fudir. The
individuals belonging to the first two divisions were herds-
men, laborers, squatters on waste lands, horseboys, hangers-on,
and jobbers of various kinds all poor and
dependent. But they enjoyed the great advantage of
belonging to the clan tho debarred from most of its privi-
leges.
The third class the Fudirs constituted the lowest of
the three. They were not members of the clan and con-
sequently had no right of residence, tho they were permitted
by the chief to live within the territory from
which they might be expelled at any moment. The
Fudirs themselves were again divided into two classes,
a higher and a lower, called saer-fudir and daer-fudirs
(free and bond). The daer-fudirs,
the lowest and most
dependent of all, consisted of escaped criminals, captives
taken in battle or raids, convicts respited from death, and
purchased slaves. The fudirs were nearly all strangers
or foreigners, and it was to this class that the English
slaves in Ireland belonged. 1
The Anglo-Saxons were a leading slave race of the
Middle Ages and in respect to the civilized world of
Ireland, Gaul and Italy, occupied a position akin to that
of the colored aborigines of Africa in respect to the civi-
lized nations of Europe in recent times. Traffic in English
slaves was as prevalent throughout Europe in the Middle
Ages as negro slavery became in Africa and America at
a later epoch, but in no land were English slaves more
numerous than in Ireland. The traffic continued till at
least the thirteenth century and probably dated back to
the fifth, for references to widespread Anglo-Saxon slav-
i Joyce, Social History, I, 162-166.
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