history of slavery

Slaves are people who work for no pay for a master or mistress that then In turn provides food shelter and clothing.  Slavery has been around since the Greek and Roman times.  In these society slavery was not based on ethnic race as much but more origin of the people.  When Sparta would conquer an area the people from that region would stay on there land but work for no money under the control of a Spartan master.  In Athens the slaves were used as miners, soldiers, and the police force but mainly they were personal assistance to the    people of Athens.

The Romans were the first to use slaves as people think of them today.  The ones who worked in the mine were wiped and beaten, and the ones that worked on farms were chained together.  Many slaves, often prisoners of war, also were forced fight in the arena against lions and other exotic creatures.

After the fall of Rome, during the medieval period, the act of owning slaves declined, there were some slaves still left around the Mediterranean, but not to many.  The slaves that were left were mainly helpers around the house, office, or they were soldiers.  Not many worked on farms or in mines.

Slavery did not rise back up again until the cotton and tobacco were found in the Americas.  When this happened, boatloads of African people were taken from their homeland, brought to America to work under conditions that were closely related to the roman way of owning slaves.

Slavery did not stop until the civil war in America and it is still prevalent today in many parts of the world.