Page 37 - UD Research Magazine Vol5-No2

The better assignments? Being a
poet or musician in the retinue of the most powerful Roman—the emperor. Or having another less physically demanding position in domestic life, as the accountant entrusted to keep the household records or as the hairdresser for a rich family.
The worst jobs were in the mines, “where you’d never have a chance of free- dom,” Petersen says, and in other places that might surprise you.
Take the fullery, or laundry. Fulleries cleaned clothes ranging from the tunic (worn by both free men and slaves) to the stola (worn by women) to the toga, which could be worn only by free men. The toga wasn’t worn frequently, however, Petersen says, because it took over 10 feet of mate- rial to make one, and it was hard to keep clean in the heat and dust.
Urine—high in ammonia—was used as the primary cleaning agent. It was col- lected in large clay jars outside of homes and at public urinals.
Dirty clothing would be soaked in a tub of urine and water in a fulling stall. A worker would stand barefoot in the tub, hands holding onto the stall sides, and stomp on the clothes. Another worker standing in a large basin would rinse the clothes, beating them against the basin sides to wring them out. A mural in Pom- peii shows baskets resembling bird cages over which wet clothes were then draped for drying and finishing. Sulfur would be burned at the bottom of these cages to whiten the clothes.
“Can you imagine the heat and odor these slaves had to bear, and the blisters on their feet?” Petersen says.
The smell of baking bread is unques- tionably better than nostril-burning ammonia, yet literary writings of the day paint a grim picture of the treatment of both man and beast in the bakeries.
In the House of the Baker at Pompeii, Petersen and Joshel map out the work that must take place in and around the mill area to understand the movement of slaves. A number of workers would have been focused on goading the donkeys to walk in circles all day to grind the grain into flour.
In his story of a young man who is magically turned into a donkey, the
writer Apuleius describes how the constant circling of the mill disfigures the donkey’s hooves, and whippings leave
the animal’s flanks bare. Like-
wise, welts mark the slaves’ skin,
their foreheads are branded,
heads shaved and feet shackled.
Flour coats them—“like boxers
covered in sand when they fight
in the arena,” Petersen says.
Attempting to flee a life of hardship was not without its risks. Slaves were valuable property and owners did not take such losses lightly.
Escaped slaves were sought relent- lessly. “Billboards” painted on the outside walls of houses facing major streets might announce missing slaves along with gladi- atorial combat and upcoming elections.
Once recaptured, many slaves were branded with an “FVG” on their forehead for “fugitivus” or “fugitive.”
Kind owners frequently set their slaves free, Petersen says, while some other owners gave their slaves an allowance and let them purchase their freedom.
“Freed slaves could run a business for a former owner and become quite wealthy, which was of concern to the elite,” Petersen says. “When citizens started to tap former slaves on account of their wealth, it set the stage for local politics.”—Tracey Bryant
Slave Shirking Routes. Roman slaveholders complained in their
writings that their slaves were lazy and shirked work. “Whatever the motive for, or even truth of the behavior that so irked slaveholders, they [the slaves] had to avoid the sight lines intended for the owner’s choreography,” say Petersen and Joshel in The Material Life of Roman Slaves. Above is the authors’ plan, based on their firsthand research
in the House of the Menander, marked with routes for possible slave shirking tactics during a banquet in the dining room. The “masterly gaze” of the slaveholder is indicated in pink, and the servant stations and possible routes for slaves to escape the slave owner’s view are shown in green. “Interrupting slaves,” indicated in red, could attempt to disrupt the artfully arranged banquet scene and irk the slaveholder, perhaps by sweeping the floor in view of the diners.
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