We often have the image that slaves were treated cruelly in ancient Mesopotamia. That is an idea that comes from the Assyrians and Babylonians, who spared no lashes with them. The Sumerians, on the other hand, had a somewhat curious attitude towards slavery. To begin with, aside from the obvious fact of being born to slave parents, there were two methods of getting there:through warfare or voluntarily.
A voluntary slave was one who accepted a slave contract to settle a debt. And pay attention to the data, because it was done through a contract where the duration of the contract was carefully specified, as well as the possible penalties. Once the contract ended, the individual continued with his normal life. While that person was a slave, his family was still free.
Blackheads weren't fond of taking prisoners after a battle. And it was not out of pity, since they had little of charitable nuns and liked to impale and/or skin their neighbor, but a mere practical matter:taking prisoners implies that you have to feed them, even if it is bad, and then you have to deal with slave traders, who along with the executioners have never had a good image and are not usually invited to society cocktails. Once they become slaves, you have to watch over them, feed them (again) and cure their illnesses... Quite a headache! But once they had decided to take them as slaves, they didn't treat them too badly. Numerous tablets have been preserved specifying the food rations that were provided to the labor personnel of temples or palaces, and it seems that the slaves ate the same as the humble workers. They did not starve, although their diet was monotonous:bread, onions, barley porridge, turnip soup...
Another curious aspect is that the laws gave them the opportunity to free themselves. To do this they only had to pay their master the price he had given for them.How did a slave get that silver? Well, asking for a loan. The idea of a slave applying for a loan may be shocking to us, but for that society it was normal. The money could be supplied by a lender, who charged up to 22% interest , or a temple. We have not found a single tablet where a temple demanded more than 3.5% interest .
It was also customary to grant freedom to concubines. A Sumerian woman, fed up with having children, could give her husband a concubine. The children of the slave were free and had all the rights of inheritance, thus creating the situation that an heir could have a slave mother. To avoid that, it was normal for them to be given their freedom. Abraham, who was from Ur and knew of this custom, must have “forgotten” about it when he did not want to set the Egyptian slave Hagar free. Then some Bible readers wonder why Ishmael was so angry all day [Ironic Mode Off].
Another topic that is curious is that of the marriage of slaves with free people. A free man, or a free woman, could easily marry someone in slavery. The only problem is that the male or female slave was not allowed to leave the work area, which presumably created problems in conjugal coexistence. If that marriage had offspring, said offspring was free. In Neo-Sumerian times, King Ur-Nammu he decreed that the children be free except for the first, who remained the owner as compensation. However, we have found tablets that imply that a payment, in silver or goods, was accepted to replace the firstborn. When a slave was given his freedom, the act of freedom was read by a town crier in a public square and immediately afterwards a barber cut the new citizen's aputtu , which was a kind of ponytail that distinguished slaves from free people. If a slave ran away and was captured, the custom was to blind him and make him draw water from a well. For some reason that escapes us, the blind, free or slave, were in charge of this task.
Finally, it should be noted that the slaves who submitted did not receive too much ill-treatment. The laws strictly prohibited mistreating a voluntary slave on site. Another matter was mentioning his family. As for forced slaves, custom dictated that they be treated fairly. A Sumerian proverb says:“If you don't mistreat your donkey, why mistreat your slave? ”. It was considered that mistreatment made a labor asset lose value and productivity. The people of the black heads, with that practical sense that characterized them, thought that a slave had to be kept happy most of the time. Now you know why your bank insists on giving you a tablet.
Contributed by Joshua BedwyR author of In a Dark Blue World