Special module:
Acte & Roman manumission
Watch this video to learn about Roman slavery and manumission with Javal Coleman of the University of Texas at Austin.
About the scholar:
Javal Coleman is a PhD student in Classics at the University of Texas at Austin. He earned an MA in Classics from the same institution and a BA in History from the University of North Texas in 2020. His research interests include ancient and modern slavery, the legal history of slavery, and gender and sexuality in the ancient world. He has written on slavery and manumission in both ancient Greece and Rome and has published several public-facing pieces, including for the Society for Classical Studies (see his most recent post, "What is it like to be the only Black person in your department?" here) and Pasts Imperfect (see his post, "Analyzing Manumission," here).
Further Reading:
Huemoeller, K.P.D. 2020. “Freedom in marriage? Manumission for marriage in the Roman world.” JRS 110: 123-39. (Journal in Pitt's collection here)
Kamen, D. and S. Levin-Richardson. 2022. “Epigraphy and critical fabulation: imagining narratives of Greco-Roman sexual slavery.” In E. Cousins, ed., Dynamic Epigraphy: New Approaches to Inscriptions, 201-21. (Ebook in Pitt's collection here)
MacLean, R. 2018. Freed Slaves and Roman Imperial Culture: Social Integration and the Transformation of Values. Cambridge.
MacRae, D. 2018. “The freedmanʼs story: an accusation of witchcraft in the social world of early imperial Roman Italy (CIL 11.4639).” JRS 108: 53-73. (Journal in Pitt's collection here)
Latin Vocabulary:
Words in bold on DCC Latin Core Vocabulary List
Proper Names:
Actē, Actēs, f. - Acte, a formerly enslaved woman mentioned in an inscription
Nouns:
ancilla, ancillae, f. - a female slave
lībertīnus, lībertīnī, m. or lībertīnā, lībertīnae, f. - a freedman/freedwoman
patrōnus, patrōnī, m. - a patron, (often, a freedperson's former owner)
servus, servī, m. or serva, servae, f. - a slave (not 'servant' and that difference matters!)
Adjectives:
līber, lībera, līberum - free (in the masculine plural, often used to refer to freeborn children)
manūmissus, manūmissa, manūmissum - freed, emancipated, manumitted (perfect passive participle form of manūmittō, below)
scrīptus, scrīpta, scrīptum - written (perfect passive participle form of scrībō, scrībere, scrīpsī, scrīptum)
Verbs:
manūmittō, manūmittere, manūmīsī, manūmissum - to free, emancipate, manumit
serviō, servīre, serviī, servītum - to be enslaved to, serve (+ dative object)