Aritotle and Black Slavery: A Study in Race Prejudice

William Westerman , The Slave Systems of Greek and Roman Antiquity (Philadelphia, 1955, repr. 1964) pp. 1-5; Milton Meltzer,

Slavery from the Rise of Western Civilization to the Renaissance (New York, 1971), pp. 47-50; M.I. Finley (Ed.), Slavery in Classical Antiquity (New York, 1968), pp. 93, 112-13.

Politics, I. (Classics Club edition, based on the translation of B. Jowett, New York, 1971), p. 253.

'Again, the male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; and the one rules, and the other is ruled; this principle of necessity, extends to all mankind'. Ibid., p. 254. We may doubt whether the Womens' Liberation Movement would agree with Aristotle.

Ibid., p. 254.

Ibid., p. 268.

Ibid., p. 254.

For an account of Francis Williams, see Edward Long, The History of Jamaica (London, 1774), II, Chap. 4.

David Hume , 'Of National Characters', appended to his Essays Moral, Political and Literary (London, 1741-2).

Politics, I, p. 252.

Epistle of Paul to Philemon. Perhaps Paul, like St. Augustine, would reply that slavery was punishment for sin and no one was innocent.

1st Epistle to Peter, 2:18; 1st Cor. 7:20, among others.

See Lewis Hanke , Aristotle and the American Indian: A Study In Race Prejudice In the Modern World (London , 1959), p. 1.

Ibid., p. 14.

See also, David Brion Davis , The Problem of Slavery In Western Culture (New York, 1970), p. 168.

Hanke , op. cit., pp. 16, 30, 129-30.

Ibid., p. 16.

Ibid., pp. 44-5;

See also Davis , op. cit., pp. 172-3. It appears time has not changed this view. Consider for example, the case of the Colombian cowboys who, in 1967 killed 16 Indians including women and children, and 4 years later at their trial for mass murder they were perfectly amazed that it was illegal to kill Indians. 'For me', said one of the accused, 'Indians are animals like deer or iguanas, except that deer don't damage our crops or kill our pigs. Since way back, Indian-hunting has been common practice in these parts'. The result of the case? The defendants were found 'not responsible' for the crime 'because of their invincible ignorance', and the blame should fall on all Colombian governments since the Conquistadores. Time (10 July 1972), p. 33.

Hanke , op. cit., p. 173.

Davis , op. cit., p. 173.

Ibid., p. 172

and Hanke , op. cit., p. 30.

Daniel Mannix and Malcolm Cowley , Black Cargoes: A History of The Atlantic Slave Trade ( New York, 10th ed., 1969), p. 3.

Hanke , op. cit., p. 9.

Davis , op. cit., p. 171. Not all however, were advocates of the Indians in Mexico. The noted Professor, Francisco Cervantes de Salazar, of the University of Mexico, around 1553 supported the Aristotelian doctrine in relation to the Mexican Indian.

Hanke , op. cit., p. 82.

See Donald Robinson , Slavery In the Structure of American Politics, 1765-1820 ( New York, 1971), pp. 18-9.

Davis , op. cit., p. 179.

Hanke , op. cit., p. 10.

Eric Williams , Capitalism and Slavery (4th ed., New York, 1966), pp. 8-9.

Davis , op. cit., p. 178.

Ibid., p. 178.

9 Carl N. Degler , Neither Black Nor White (New York, 1971 ), p. 213.

Charles R. Boxer , The Portuguese Seaborne Empire: 1415-1825 (New York, 1969), p. 266.

Degler , op. cit., p. 213.

Davis , op. cit., p. 176;

also, Robinson , op. cit., pp. 17-8.

Mannix and Cowley , op. cit., p. 2;

Davis , op. cit., pp. 4-5.

Thomas Atwood's view of the Indians, for example, is representative. Writing in 1791, he contended that Indians, were 'men as well as we (the whites) are born with the same degree of sensibility; and by proper encouragement, might be of material benefit to a country which was originally their own'. The History of Dominica (London, 1791 ).

Quoted by Elsa Goveia in A Study of the Historiography of the West Indies to the End of the Nineteenth Century (Mexico, 1956), p. 36. Goveia pointed out that Atwood had no such attitude even towards the free mulattos whom he regarded as 'very idle and insolent'.

Davis , op. cit., pp. 173-5.

Ibid., p. 175.

W.S. Jenkins , Pro-Slavery Thought In the Old South (Chapel Hill, 1960), p. 137.

Politics, I, pp. 254-5.

Keith Irvine , The Rise of the Coloured Races ( New York, 1970), pp. 14-6;

also, Mary R. Gordon , 'The Nationality of Slaves Under the Early Roman Empire' in Finley , op. cit., p. 171.

For an account of Greek slavery see, Westerman , op. cit.,

and Finley , op. cit.

Reinhold Niebuhr , Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study In Ethics and Politics (New York, 1960), p. 8.

There is no real reliable statistical source, but the figures given by the authorities seem to range between 80 and 100,000. See for example , Warde W. Fowler, The City State of the Greeks and Romans (London and New York, 1966), p. 1-78, who said that the slave population in Athens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war was 100,000 against 135,000 free people;

Westerman , 'Athenaeus and the Slaves of Athens', in Finley, op. cit., would seem to consider this number inflated, and offered that slaves did not comprise more than a third, possibly a quarter, of the total population;

while Finley in 'Was Greek Civilization Based on Slave Labour', Finley, op. cit., considered the total in fifth century Athens to have been between 80 and 100,000 which is closer to Fowler's. Doubt should be cast on Westerman's 'computation' because he, like so many modern classicists, seemed rather apologetic of Athenian slaves.

By modern standards Athenian democracy was nothing more than a slave-holding aristocracy, denying the vote to women and resident foreigners, although they might know no other country.

Robert Schlaifer , 'Greek Theories of Slavery From Homer to Aristotle', in Finley, op. cit.

Politics, I, p. 256.

Ibid., p. 253.

George H. Sabine , History of Political Theory (London, 1964), p. 245.

George Fitzhugh , Cannibals All! or Slaves Without Masters, edited by C. Vann Woodward (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1968), p. XIX.

Ibid., p. XXXII.

Ibid., p. XVI.

Ibid., p. 71.

John Locke , Two Treaties of Government, with an introduction by Peter Laslett (Cambridge, 1967 ), p. 159.

Ibid., pp. 29-30;

Robinson , op. cit., pp. 20 and 42.

Locke , op. cit., p. 43;

also Maurice Cranston , John Locke, A Biography (London, 1968 ), pp. 119-20.

Cranston , op. cit., pp. 155-6.

Fitzhugh , op. cit., pp. XIX-XX.

Ibid., p. XXX; and Harvey Wish (ed.), Ante-Bellum (New York, 1960), p. 10.

Fitzhugh , op. cit., p. XIII.

Jenkins Pro-Slavery Thought, p. 135;

see also McKitrick, Eric , Slavery Defended: The Views of the Old South ( Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1963) for a further account of Holmes.

Jenkins , op. cit., p. 135.

Davis , op. cit., pp. 114-5.

Sterling Lamprecht , The Moral and Political Philosophy of John Locke (New York, 1962), p. 15.

August O. Spain , The Political Theory of John Calhoun (New York, 1968), p. 13.

Ibid., p. 35.

'Mud-sill' was a term probably first used by James Henry Hammond (1807-1867) in justifying slavery for the South. Hammond did not quote Aristotle but his thinking was suspiciously similar: every society should have its 'mud-sill' or an 'inferior race' upon which to build 'progress, civilization and refinement' .... 'Fortunately for the South, she found a race adapted to that purpose to her hand. A race inferior to her own, but eminently qualified in temper, in vigor, in docility, in capacity .... to answer all her purposes. We use them for our purpose and call them slaves.' Eric L. McKitrick , Slavery Defended, p. 122.

See Spain , op. cit., pp. 227-31;

Jenkins , op. cit., pp. 80, 290n;

Arthur Young Lloyd , The Slavery Controversy, 1831-1960 (Chapel Hill , 1939), p. 261.

See, W.W. Fowler , The City State (London , 1966), pp. 174-5.

Davis , op. cit., p. 44U.

Ibid., pp. 440-1;

also Jenkins , op. cit., p. 28.

Jenkins , op. cit., pp. 27-30;

also Winthrop Jordan , White Over Black (Chapel Hill, 1968 ), p. 309.

Ibid., pp. 309-10;

Davis , op. cit., pp. 440-1.

Gilbert Murray , The Rise of the Greek Epic ( Oxford, 1911), p. 54.

Davis , op. cit., p. 20.

This was used by J.L. Myers in The Dawn of History, quoted by R.H. Barrow, Slavery In the Roman Empire New York and London, 1968), p. 197.

Ibid.

Not only biology but also anthropology. A school of Anthropologists developed in the South in the 1850's, committed to showing that the 'Negro' was not a real human being but 'a domestic animal'. The chief among these was George Gliddon who cited Aristotle's natural slavery theory as a 'justification'. See, among others, Hanke, op. cit., p. 102.

This school also embraced the polygenetic theory of origin, supported by Dr. Josiah Nott, Professor of Anatomy, who, with Gliddon published Types of Mankind in 1856, the 'definitive' work to show permanent 'Negro' inferiority. See Wish , op. cit., pp. 11-1;

Young , op. cit., pp. 228-9;

Jenkins , op. cit.

Jenkins , op. cit., p. 243.

Ibid., p. 244.