Ancient Slavery, Usury and

Property Regimes

PHIL 2011
2006-07
Elaboration on ancient slavery
In Athens
 Debated and codified
 Personal dependence
 Essential element of oikos
(household)
 Manumission rare &
contracts offered few
advantages
 Closed system—did not
offer passage to
citizenship.
Elsewhere
 Slavery included
dependent communities
 E.g. Spartan Helots
 Different from personal
servitude; communities
had their own identities,
customs, gods, etc.
 Romans used
manumission strategically
to create patron-client
networks.
 Uniform characteristics of
ancient slavery
 No rights or privileges
 Could not marry
 Could not attain citizenship
 At disposal of master
 Had no kin, no family gods (had to worship
those of master’s family)
 Owner gives him/her his/her name.
Manumisssion, to manumit
 Latin: man mittere < man , ablative singular
of manus the power of a father or master
(lit. ‘hand’: cf. MANUS n.1 2) + mittere to
release, send (see MISSION n.); man
     1. trans.    a. To release (a person) from
slavery, bondage, or servitude; to set free.
Also intr.: to obtain one's release from
slavery, etc. Oxford English Dictionary
online.
 Manumission Contracts
 “…Sophrona…hands over to the Pythian Apollo
to be free the female house-born slave named
Onasiphoron, priced at three silver minae, and has
received the whole price…if anyone touches
Onasiphoron in order to enslave her, then she who
has sold her and the guarantor together are to
ensure that the sale to the god is valid…”
 “…many of these contracts survive, inscribed
on…public buildings at Delphi and similar
religious centres” (Thomas Wiedemann, Greek
and Roman Slavery, p. 46-7).
Manumission, cont.
 But,
 “Onasiphoron is to remain with Sophrona for the
whole period of the latter’s life, doing whatever
she is ordered to do without giving cause for
complaint. If she does not do so, then Sophrona is
to have the power to punish her in whatever way
she wishes to. And Onasiphoron is to give
Sophrona a child” (quoted in Wiedemann, pp. 46-
7).
 The slave might have to remain with the master’s
heirs as well!
Questions?

Comments?
Unnatural Acquisition: usury
 Barter between persons (natural);
 Coinage enabled retail and international trade
(starting to be unnatural);
 Banking/usury (lending money at interest): “the most
hated sort [of wealth-getting]..which makes gain out
of money itself, and not from the natural object of it.”
 Forbidden by the medieval Church;
 Usury today means to exceed a certain rate of interest
and is still a crime;
 What is the usury rate in HK?
The case of Islamic Finance
 Koran (the source of Islamic law and practice)
forbids riba, or interest;
 Like Aristotle, Koran rejects money as
commodity; also forbids gambling;
 Koran sees money as store of value. Does
Aristotle?
 HSBC, Deutsche Bank offer special investment
vehicles for Islamic investors: “equity financing,
not debt”;
See: Financial Times, 24 Sept. 2006, pp. W5-6.
Unnatural Trade 1.9
 Example of unnatural use of an object:
 A shoe is made for wear, not for exchange;
 “Hence, we may infer that retail trade is not a natural part
of the art of getting wealth; had it been so, men would
have ceased to exchange when they had enough”;
 How would Aristotle define ‘enough’?
 How would we? Do we accept this notion?
 Cf. idea of ‘limits to growth’ put forward by
environmentalists.
Why not stockpile money (1.9)?
 Some assume riches = large quantity of coin;
 Others say coin = convention (recall slavery
argument), and hence nothing;
 Example of Midas: “how can that be wealth of
which a man may have a great abundance and yet
perish with hunger…?”
 These are “riches of the spurious [false] kind.”
 Other objections to
wealth-getting (1.9)
 Object of life: To lead a good life (not just ANY life);
 This is also the purpose of the household;
“…some persons are led to believe [by confusion over
means] that getting wealth is the object of household
management, and the whole idea of their lives is that they
ought either to increase their money without limit, or at
any rate not to lose it. The origin of this disposition in
men is that they are intent upon living only, and not upon
living well….”
Legitimate wealth-getting (1.11)
 Tillage of soil;
 Animal Husbandry; which animals yield best, and in
which environments;
 Treatises of Chares, Apollodorus;
 Natural resources: timber, mining
 Thales of Miletus, whose knowledge of meteorology
enabled him to predict the olive harvest, hire presses
and create a monopoly;
 Thales “showed the world that philosophers can
easily be rich if they like, but that their ambition is of
another sort”!
Today’s Question
 On page 25, Aristotle calls usury, "the most hated sort [of]
wealth-getting" and describes it as unnatural. Is this a valid
and sound argument? His writing focuses on practical points
regarding the state and household, and money is practically
useful in easing transactions, as person A and person B may
both not need what the other has at the same time.
Would honour and desire for the good life be enough to
ensure repayment of borrowed money (which may be
necessary, for example, for a farmer during a drought), or is
interest necessary to motivate those who borrow money to
pay it back? Would usury then be natural since it arises from
human nature?
 Political Philosophy and the
Institution of Property
 Plato (4th century BCE)
– Guardians should have common property so that they
will all regard the same things as their own, thereby
unifying the state.
 Aristotle (4th century BCE)
– Property should not be common because of free-riding,
and other social and moral problems, but its fruits can
be.
 John Locke (17th century CE)
– Private property is the basis of the state, and the reason
for the state to exist.
Property Regime Options
All things in Some in None in
common, e.g. in common, some common
Plato’s Republic not

Conceivable, but Possible, e.g. Impossible—

plagued with fruits of soil, as must at least
problems, e.g. at Sparta, 2.5 have city in
free-riding, 2.3 common
Today’s Question:
 Plato believes that common property creates
citizens that are more co-operative and kinder to
their fellow citizens. The concept of common
property has in recent history held much greater
sway in mainlaind China than in Hong Kong.
With this in mind, do you believe the attitudes of
Hong Kongers and Mainlanders differ with regard
to their relationship with close family and friends,
and also with that of other fellow citizens? If so, is
the cause political [property-related]?