[HN Gopher] An intact slave's room found in Pompeii's ruins
___________________________________________________________________
An intact slave's room found in Pompeii's ruins
Author : agomez314
Score : 266 points
Date : 2021-11-06 13:37 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (pompeiisites.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (pompeiisites.org)
| trhway wrote:
| 16sqm for 3 people. Reminds that in USSR the minimum was
| 6/person.
| peter303 wrote:
| About as big as my college dorm room.
| TomK32 wrote:
| and rent-free.
| rexreed wrote:
| with a window
| HABytes wrote:
| "This is a window into the precarious reality of people who
| seldom appear in historical sources that were written almost
| exclusively by men belonging to the elite, and who as a result
| risk remaining invisible in the great historical accounts," -
| declared Director General Gabriel Zuchtriegel - "It is a case in
| which archaeology helps us to discover a part of the ancient
| world which we would otherwise know little about, but which is
| nonetheless extremely important. What is most striking is the
| cramped and precarious nature of this room, which was something
| between a dormitory and a storage room of just 16 sqm, which we
| can now reconstruct thanks to the exceptional state of
| preservation created by the eruption of AD 79. It is certainly
| one of the most exciting discoveries during my life as an
| archaeologist, even without the presence of great 'treasures' -
| the true treasure here is the human experience, in this case of
| the most vulnerable members of ancient society, to which this
| room is a unique testimony."
| uap wrote:
| Looks like my SF market street studio. We sure have come a long
| way...
| kingcharles wrote:
| It's way bigger and nicer than the jail cell I just spent
| several years in.
| easytiger wrote:
| What did you do?
| ohyeshedid wrote:
| What did you do and what did they get you for can be wildly
| different questions and realities.
|
| Unsolicited personal advice: The latter opens more doors of
| meaningful conversation, the former can slam those doors
| before you can walk through them.
| kingcharles wrote:
| Amen, brother. This is very true. What you did or didn't
| do, and what they arrested you for, or prosecuted you
| for, are often wildly different things.
| bserge wrote:
| What'd they get you for?
| ardit33 wrote:
| First thing I thought: They look like modern student dorm rooms
| / living arrangements, but without windows, like that new
| Munger hall that is being built.
| willvarfar wrote:
| > The room was lit by a small upper window
| masklinn wrote:
| On the other hand, extremely limited artificial light, so
| this would have been penumbral the entire day, with the
| possible exception of the moments where the sun really
| faced the window.
|
| According to the plan at the bottom, the window would have
| been east-north-east and thus really only useful early
| morning, if at all.
| kingcharles wrote:
| I just spent 5 years locked in a room with no window and
| 24x7 artificial lighting, so they have it way better than
| some modern folks.
| Iv wrote:
| Let's not be ridiculous. This room has no artificial
| light and almost no natural light, minimal ventilation,
| no water, no electricity, which is the norm nowadays even
| for cheap apartments.
| hourislate wrote:
| In Toronto you could get $1800 a month for that or sell
| it for $600k.
| ant6n wrote:
| ...but not prisons
| secondcoming wrote:
| Were you in prison or did you lose a key?
| kingcharles wrote:
| I lost my ke... wait, no it was a cell in a county jail
| awaiting trial.
| Jupe wrote:
| Are you being sarcastic?
| Jupe wrote:
| Wow - apparently asking questions is a bad thing on HN?
|
| The fact that a "slave's" room from 1,942 years ag, resembles
| the room of a presumably well-educated, skilled and/or
| technically-focused contributor (as I perceive nearly all
| contributors to HN), seems rather odd.
|
| So, my question still stands... Is the comment meant to be
| sarcastic?
|
| Can the the comment be interpreted as:
|
| 1. "They didn't have it as bad as we might think"? 2. "My
| life is little different from a slave of ~2000 years ago"? 3.
| "I feel a connection with the people/person who lived in that
| room"? 4. Something else?
| t8e56vd4ih wrote:
| homework assignment: watch two Monty Python movies and three
| flying circus episodes.
| Jupe wrote:
| Yes, I've seen them all... and "Oh, look, there's some
| lovely muck over here."
|
| But, I don't see the connection?
| DenisM wrote:
| Per HN guidelines: _Assume good faith_
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
|
| If you can't, just don't reply at all.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| peter303 wrote:
| Organic material didnt survive. What missing would be mattresses,
| blankets, cushions, rugs, clothing. These items would be be made
| of basic coarse material for slaves. Upper classes would have
| more refined and comfortable items.
| mindvirus wrote:
| "Sadly, in this room too, a part of the archaeological heritage
| has been lost due to tunnels dug by grave robbers who, throughout
| the villa, have caused a total amount of damage estimated at
| almost 2 million euros."
|
| I'm curious what that means. How do you "value" something like
| Pompeii? Are they just saying that they stole gold and silver
| worth that much, or that the damage to the ruins costs that much
| more to repair/recover?
| kixiQu wrote:
| I'm imagining it's parallel to cops announcing the value of
| drug seizures at (variously inaccurate) estimates of "street
| value", but for black market antiques.
| azinman2 wrote:
| It could also be how much it costs to repair the damage they
| did.
| jameshart wrote:
| 'repair' is a bit of a fuzzy concept when you're talking
| about an archaeological site, though, still more when we're
| talking about a site that was caught up in a volcanic
| eruption.
|
| You can literally never repair it to the state it was in
| before the robbery, in the sense of restoring it to a
| pristine condition as it was left by the eruption.
| fragmede wrote:
| You can also literally never step in the same river
| twice, but that's a bit more metaphysical than literal.
| Photos by the robbers before they vandalized the site
| would be invaluable. Nowhere near as good as if they'd
| left it intact, but better than nothing.
| buu700 wrote:
| It could be that they have contemporary documentation on the
| values of various objects and materials. What's the inflation-
| adjusted conversion rate between 2021 USD and the 79 Roman
| denarius?
| [deleted]
| occamrazor wrote:
| Might also be the value of the stolen property on the black
| market. There are unfortunately enough unscrupulous antiquities
| collectors, that one can estimate "market value" of Roman
| amphorae, jewelry, and other items.
| fipar wrote:
| I'd guess it's akin to insuring a museum. This is the best
| reference I've found on a quick search: https://mdpi-
| res.com/d_attachment/heritage/heritage-02-00029...
| walrus01 wrote:
| the beds look almost identical to a 'charpoy' you would see
| anywhere in the modern day Punjab in south asia
|
| "The webbed bases of the beds were made of ropes, the imprints of
| which are partially discernible in the cinerite,"
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charpai
| integricho wrote:
| The slave is intact or the room?
| [deleted]
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| Slaves and slavery were extremely different in Pompeii and
| Herculaneum then what we usually think of as chattel slavery as
| the default and only slavery that ever existed. An interviewee
| either doesn't understand this or made very sweeping claims. >
| "This is a window into the precarious reality of people who
| seldom appear in historical sources that were written almost
| exclusively by men belonging to the elite, and who as a result
| risk remaining invisible in the great historical accounts," -
| Many slaves were captured and famous intellectuals (Aesop is a
| famous example) or educated and used as tutors, they were not as
| modernists assume to be universally ill treated and abused.
| Slaves in Herculaneum were able to become free and it was a very
| racially diverse place where being a former slave of different
| racial background did not mean you were unable to have social
| mobility, many of the wealthy people of Herculaneum were indeed
| former slaves. Slavery was not a permanent state of being and the
| very elite the quoted author complains about often did write
| about slaves at least in name; the former slaves would take the
| last name of the old master and records were excellent.
| throwaway829 wrote:
| How is that different from slaves like William Ellison in the
| USA? Pre-Civil War he became one of the wealthiest property
| owners in South Carolina. Sounds like decent social mobility to
| me.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Ellison
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| How often did this happen vs Roman times? Before the dreadful
| US took over the South, slaves were much better treated and
| had way more upwards mobility, like in Florida when the
| Spanish and French were the colonizers. Places like New
| Orleans was much better for African descendants and many fled
| when they found out they'd be ruled by America.
|
| I don't cite Thomas Jefferson and his treatment of his slaves
| as the normative, in Roman times it was built into the system
| for slaves to buy their freedom and also have upwards
| mobility. That is not institutionalized for slavery in the
| US.
| neaden wrote:
| By definition slaves are ill treated because slavery in itself
| is terrible. To be clear here, even if your master was
| individually kind you existed in a system where you had no
| rights, if you were a witness to a crime you would have to be
| tortured during your testimony to prove it's true, where you
| were not fully protected from the law by assaults from any free
| person, and where you could be sold at any point. It was
| considered perfectly acceptable for a "kind" master to rape and
| beat you at any time. Slavery is always a horrendous thing.
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| Epictetus, freedman roman Stoic philosopher seems as a whole
| have an attitude of like "what of it, it's not like you're free
| from obligations even as senator or the caesar". As a slave,
| you are free from all concerns and worries beyond fulfilling
| your duties.
|
| Discourses 4.1 is perhaps the most direct example of this.
| twright wrote:
| After reading Discourses 4.1 I would like to summarize it as
| a defense of the institution of slavery that goes something
| like "Slavery is good because slaves themselves don't know
| what it means to be free and freedom is actually a burden in
| the wrong mindset so it shouldn't be for everyone." (Ignoring
| that slavery, the deprivation of personhood, is an inhumane
| burden somehow comparable to "oh no I'm free and now I have
| to answer to Caesar") Yes, it's an odd opinion from a former
| slave who was maimed by a former master.
|
| Unfortunately this argument is sustained all through history
| and today we have people going something like "actually,
| working multiple minimum wage jobs and struggling to pay rent
| is good".
| dlhavema wrote:
| If thats all a person can do would you rather them sit on a
| couch and live off of/depend on the state? No it's not a
| super fun existence and that's what my life was like right
| after high school in the early college years.
|
| The real problem comes in when someone in that situation
| gives up and does nothing.
| sbacic wrote:
| I don't think Epictetus was actually defending the
| institution of slavery. Rather, stoic philosophy is full of
| these "hacks" for handling unpleasant things in your life.
| Many of them seem quite morbid and bizarre to the untrained
| mind (such as actively thinking about the death and absence
| of a loved one).
| bobthechef wrote:
| I don't know about "hacks", rather observations.
|
| If most people didn't have to work to survive, they
| wouldn't know what to do with the time. An observation
| about slavery is that you've traded in the burden of
| responsibility that liberty introduces for the comfort of
| not having to worry about what to do with yourself
|
| It's easier to just go do what you're told than it is to
| determine what must be done. Most people actually prefer
| that way of living. Left to themselves, they'd either
| become paralyzed with indecision, or they'd piss their
| lives away indulging their appetites and possibly commit
| suicide.
| sbacic wrote:
| > I don't know about "hacks", rather observations.
|
| They are definitely hacks: the Enchiridion lists a few of
| them. Stoicism is anything if not a practical philosophy.
|
| > An observation about slavery is that you've traded in
| the burden of responsibility that liberty introduces for
| the comfort of not having to worry about what to do with
| yourself
|
| I interpreted it as a hedonic treadmill of
| responsibility; okay, you're not a slave anymore but a
| citizen so now you have the responsibilities of a citizen
| to worry about. You're no longer a citizen but a senator,
| so now you have senatorial responsibilities. You're no
| longer a senator but the emperor, so now you have to deal
| with all the problems an emperor needs to deal with it
| (as Marcus Aurelius can attest to).
|
| Moving up in the world just means that you replace one
| set of problems with another set of problems. Slave or
| emperor, it makes no difference if the problems are
| beyond your control.
| GaryTang wrote:
| > _"Unfortunately this argument is sustained all through
| history and today we have people going something like
| "actually, working multiple minimum wage jobs and
| struggling to pay rent is good"."_
|
| It's much worse than that -- today we have people
| justifying why they work for others as opposed to being
| entrepreneurs. "It's not for everyone. It's too much work.
| It's all about luck. You have to be rich already. etc..."
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| It's all about luck and needing to be already wealthy is
| true in America at least. Healthcare costs will
| annihilate you otherwise...
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| I'm not really passing judgement on Epictetus, merely
| relaying his position, as someone with a far more personal
| understanding of roman slavery than anyone discussing it
| 2000 post fact. Difficult to explain to the man how he
| ought to feel about events in his life we have only a
| sketch of an idea about.
|
| Within the framework of Stoicism, where worrying is one of
| the greatest evils, his argument makes every sense.
| lovecg wrote:
| Ah Stoics, they're the best at turning being a resigned
| quitter into dignified philosophy.
| bobthechef wrote:
| I would rather say an ability to be "well-adjusted".
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| I think that's a mis-characterization of stoicism. That
| sounds more like Epicureanism (quit stressful things and
| live a simple life) or cynicism (quit everything and live
| like a stray dog so that you don't have to worry about
| losing anything).
|
| Stoicism because popular with Roman elites specifically
| because it didn't ask the adherents to quit anything, but
| simply to adapt themselves to whatever adversity they might
| face[1].
|
| [1] https://www.exurbe.com/stoicisms-appeal-to-the-rich-
| and-powe...
| sbacic wrote:
| I wouldn't be so harsh; it's better to have _some_ way of
| handling things life throws at you, especially things you
| have little to no control over, than none at all.
| twright wrote:
| https://existentialcomics.com/comic/286
| ludamad wrote:
| Isn't it a bit of a penmanship bias that the slaves you hear
| about in history have more dignity? All writing is propaganda
| to a degree, while we see here evidence of multiple people
| locked in a tiny room
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| You see evidence for the sleep quarters and assume they're
| locked in, what evidence do you have to claim that? Where is
| the evidence of slave abuse you feel is true?
|
| From archeology of Herculaneum they looked at a household
| with a slave and noted that one of the remains was fat, well
| fed man and had many signs of eating a meat rich diet, and a
| girl found was less nourished and had signs of malnutrition.
| They assumed from his healthy bones he was the master and the
| teen girl was the slave. The well fed man was the cook, a
| slave and the young girl was vegetarian by choice and the
| daughter of the master of the household.
|
| Your assumptions of it being propaganda are not factually
| accurate.
| tablespoon wrote:
| >> Isn't it a bit of a penmanship bias that the slaves you
| hear about in history have more dignity? All writing is
| propaganda to a degree, while we see here evidence of
| multiple people locked in a tiny room
|
| > You see evidence for the sleep quarters and assume
| they're locked in, what evidence do you have to claim that?
| Where is the evidence of slave abuse you feel is true?
|
| People can be locked in by things other than a physical
| lock one the door. Didn't some slaves in classical times
| receive tattoos like "I belong to so and so, return me to
| him for a reward."?
|
| Edit: here's a citation:
| https://archive.archaeology.org/9903/abstracts/tattoo.html
|
| > A legal inscription from Ephesus indicates that during
| the early Roman Empire all slaves exported to Asia were
| tattooed with the words "tax paid." "Stop me, I'm a
| runaway" was another standard motto etched on the brows of
| Roman slaves. New research indicates that Roman authorities
| punished early Christians with forehead tattoos that
| condemned them to the mines. In A.D. 330, the first
| Christian emperor, Constantine, banned the practice of
| tattooing the faces of convicts, gladiators, and soldiers.
| Because the human face reflected "the image of divine
| beauty," he said, "it should not be defiled."
| ludamad wrote:
| You're right, evidence of locked is not there. And I'm not
| fully convinced they're slaves, either, as many conditions
| bind people to work. There's definitely a lot of ambiguity
| from these time periods, but whitewashing slavery in
| written text is a well-known phenomenon
| cletus wrote:
| I've heard this quite a few times now and I'm not sure where
| the idea comes from that slavery in the Roman Republic and
| Empire were somehow humane but that wasn't the case at all.
|
| Roman slaves were property and could be treated as such,
| including sexual exploitation (eg made to be prostitutes) and
| being summarily executed.
|
| And yes, slaves could be freed but that was also true in the
| American slave era. Just because something is possible doesn't
| mean it's accessible, particularly by the slave themselves.
| Also, freedmen in Rome had less rights than citizens.
|
| The history of Rome is a fascinating one but it's hard to look
| at through the eyes of modern morality. I think this generally
| applies to the Ancient World: if somehow we could be
| transported back to that time I'm sure we'd find it quite
| alien.
|
| My favourite example of this is the origin of the word
| "decimate" [1]. If, say, a military unit rebelled against Rome,
| groups of 10 would have to decide which one of the 10 would die
| and to kill them.
|
| Slavery has always been brutal.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimation_(punishment)
| acdha wrote:
| I think there's a strong linkage in America's history of both
| slavery and explicitly modeling our image as continuing some
| kind of tradition from Rome & Ancient Greece. Slavery can't
| be so bad if the governments we view as inspiration practiced
| it, just as many white Americans will downplay the horrors of
| the American system rather than fully acknowledge what their
| ancestors profited from.
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| You claim most slaves in Roman times were not freed, do you
| know the history or are you just assuming with no evidence
| that's the case?
| tablespoon wrote:
| > You claim most slaves in Roman times were not freed, do
| you know the history or are you just assuming with no
| evidence that's the case?
|
| Honestly, I think you're the one who needs to be providing
| the evidence, especially if you're claiming anything close
| to the opposite of that (i.e. that most slaves in Roman
| times _were_ freed).
| wisty wrote:
| Decimation was rarely used IIRC.
|
| But as far as I can tell, the Romans were similar in a lot of
| ways to the Spartans. Probably everyone was in the region,
| the Spartans were just a bit more extreme, and had the best
| propaganda.
|
| But look at what the Romans had - pater familias (the father
| of a household could legally murder a weak infant, or
| technically anyone under them including any adult male sons),
| legends like Troy and Horatius Cocles, plantation slavery to
| keep the city fed, and a violent and hierarchical society run
| almost entirely by veteran officers from noble families - see
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cursus_honorum
| Gibbon1 wrote:
| > And yes, slaves could be freed but that was also true in
| the American slave era. Just because something is possible
| doesn't mean it's accessible, particularly by the slave
| themselves. Also, freedmen in Rome had less rights than
| citizens.
|
| In the US slaves were used as collateral for loans. In a way
| slaves weren't owned by plantation owners, they were owned by
| the banks. That if anything explains some of the pernicious
| aspects of US slavery. Also likely the US banking system. And
| the mistreatment of blacks after the civil war.
| watwut wrote:
| In particular, Sparta was Roman and they were very cruel.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > Many slaves were captured and famous intellectuals (Aesop is
| a famous example) or educated and used as tutors, they were not
| as modernists assume to be universally ill treated and abused.
|
| And far, _far_ more slaves worked the fields or lived short
| nasty lives in mines, for instance:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mines_of_Laurion (near Athens):
|
| > Shafts were driven down into the ground and galleries opened
| where slaves, chained, naked, and branded, worked the seams
| illuminated only by guttering oil lamps. An unrecorded number
| were children. It was a miserable, dangerous, and brief life.
|
| > ...The Romans provided cheap slave labor and new technologies
| gave the Greeks new means of extracting silver in more
| efficient ways.
| dr_dshiv wrote:
| The philosophers Plato and Epictetus were, for a time, slaves.
| imbnwa wrote:
| I've never read anywhere that Plato was a slave. He came from
| an aristocratic family and was one of the noble youths the
| Athenians were so concerned about the historical Socrates
| corrupting with his epistemic skepticism. He had family that
| were apart of the anti-democratic coup d'etat.
| npongratz wrote:
| I was also unaware of Plato's possible slavery, and found
| this [0], but I do not have the background knowledge judge
| the veracity of the information:
|
| > One source of the story of Plato being sold into slavery
| is _Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers_ by Diogenes
| Laertius. An English translation is available online [1] on
| Project Perseus. You can find the full story in Book 3 that
| discusses the life of Plato.
|
| [0] https://history.stackexchange.com/a/37499
|
| [1] http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3A
| text%...
| imbnwa wrote:
| These sources just highlight that he was, at best, under
| threat of being a slave though, not that he was actually
| sold and performed as a slave. He's ransomed for at the
| last minute by someone recognizing him at the market.
|
| If Plato had actually been a slave, his lifelong
| commitment to anti-democratic political organization
| would've been a little different, though maybe not,
| considering even this experience didn't change his
| philosophy, to the point that's likely not worth
| mentioning as a significant experience, unlike Epictectus
| who was _born_ into slavery.
| dr_dshiv wrote:
| Sorry being up for sale in a slave market isn't enough--I
| think it is fascinating and important.
| watwut wrote:
| Framing that conflict and history as about "epistemic
| skepticism" is modern simplification. It makes modern point
| and avoids any hint of actual conflicts in that city.
|
| It completely ignores very real and deadly politics of that
| city prior and reasons why Socrates was hated.
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| Many aristocrats could be captured as war prizes, enslaved,
| and used to tutor the children of the winning army. They
| weren't all forced to pick cotton or worked to death.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Fate of a Roman slave was decidedly different depending on what
| the slave did.
|
| _House and urban slaves_ weren 't much worse off than a
| regular citizen, having a good chance of manumission (release),
| after which they became freedmen - still not full citizens, but
| their children would be, and some freedmen became very rich.
|
| Given that those slaves are the ones that we know the most
| about (from both archeology and written sources), it skews our
| perception of Roman slavery to being more benign than it
| actually was.
|
| _Rural slaves_ which worked in agriculture were worked very
| hard and they were much more numerous than house slaves. Not an
| enviable fate, though one must admit that ancient agriculture
| was a backbreaking work regardless of personal status.
|
| _Slaves sent to mines_ were basically sentenced to death. Few
| of them would last more than five years. Ancient Rome had very
| extensive mining operations and mines "ate" men by the
| thousands. These were mostly enslaved men, because they were
| cheaper and could not say "no". Mining safety back then was
| basically zero.
| johnny53169 wrote:
| > Slaves sent to mines were basically sentenced to death.
|
| It's less bad now, but being a miner is not much better
| nowadays, even more so since most of the mines are in poor
| countries with little care for the workers and rich countries
| would prefer not to think too hard where the iron for their
| eco-conscious steel bottle is coming from.
| germinalphrase wrote:
| It's beside the point, but historically a lot of the iron
| ore used in US steel manufacturing has come from northern
| Minnesota.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| I grew up in a mining city (Ostrava, black coal). Now the
| mines are closed, but when I was a kid, they were in full
| operation.
|
| Disasters happened infrequently, but when they did, they
| were ugly. A spark at a wrong time in a wrong place, and
| sixty fathers would never come back home again.
|
| Mining is freaking dangerous. The forces of nature involved
| are enormous, and human is but a small ant facing them.
| sologoub wrote:
| A bit off-topic, but how did the city cope with the mine
| closure and loss of so many jobs?
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Lots of drinking and a significant loss of younger
| population that went to study elsewhere and never
| returned. A sad sight.
|
| The environment is much better, though. The air is mostly
| clean, while it smelled like burnt tires in my childhood.
| iso1210 wrote:
| Not just dangerous for the miners too. Aberfan had a
| major effect on the UK. A slag heap near the village
| collapsed, burying a school and killing 144, almost all
| of them schoolchildren
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster
| LilBytes wrote:
| This is region specific. Miners in Australia are all
| managed by unions and are some of the best paid
| professionals in the Country. (1)
|
| And with that said due to the level of influence from the
| unions, also have great safety ratings compared to other
| regions. Though admitedly still quite dangerous, but less
| so than cinsteuction, agriculture and warehouse work (3).
|
| (1) https://www.minerals.org.au/news/australian-mining-
| provides-...
|
| (2) https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/industry_business/
| minin...
|
| (3) https://www.finder.com.au/most-dangerous-jobs-australia
| johnny53169 wrote:
| That's nice to hear, and to correct my previous comment,
| Australia is the biggest producer of iron:
|
| > In 2019, the country was the 2nd largest world producer
| of gold;[1] 8th largest world producer of silver;[2] 6th
| largest world producer of copper;[3] the world's largest
| producer of iron ore;[4] the world's largest producer of
| bauxite;[5] the 2nd largest world producer of
| manganese;[6] 2nd largest world producer of lead;[7] 3rd
| largest world producer of zinc;[8] 3rd largest world
| producer of cobalt;[9] 3rd largest producer of
| uranium;[10] 6th largest producer of nickel;[11] 8th
| largest world producer of tin;[12] 14th largest world
| producer of phosphate;[13] 15th largest world producer of
| sulfur;[14] in addition to being the 5th largest world
| producer of salt.[15]
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_in_Australia
| vondur wrote:
| My grandfather was a coal miner back in the 50s in rural
| Oklahoma. He died of black lung in his early 50s. I'm
| hoping today it's not nearly as dangerous.
| arein3 wrote:
| >being a miner is not much better nowadays
|
| it's allright there are rough aspects but in the end it's
| worth it, especially since bitcoin is doing well
| secondcoming wrote:
| Still, it's probably safer than farming
| Ichthypresbyter wrote:
| Possibly true now, but not in Roman times- cave-ins are
| more dangerous than angry draft animals.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Also, suffocation risk. We are much better at detecting
| O2 levels, presence of unwanted gases such as CO, and
| supplying O2 artificially. Ancient Romans lacked both the
| knowledge and the technology, and most dangerous gases
| are actually invisible.
| brabel wrote:
| > Mining safety back then was basically zero.
|
| I don't believe that. People who work in any activity will
| always learn what's dangerous and take precautions to avoid
| dying. 2,000 years is not as long a time length as we
| sometimes think, people then were pretty much exactly like
| us, except for their culture. And I don't think there's any
| culture where people don't tend to try to not die.
| hugh-avherald wrote:
| WW2 had plenty of examples of essentially slave labour with
| high levels of mortality.
| mulmen wrote:
| Huh? So, if the mine was unstable the slaves would do what
| exactly? Go work at another mine?
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| I've always found the idea that 'slavery isn't so bad' to be
| easy for armchair anthropologists to think. I'm reminded of
| the Pompei skeleton of a boy found in a stable behind the
| skeleton of a mule, with a mule hoofprint in his skull. "Hey
| you slaveboy! The volcano is making the mule upset! Go in
| there and calm him down!" The slave didn't end up any better
| off than the mule, both abandoned to die/already dead when
| the citizens fled.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| People even today underestimate the badness of living in
| the lowest income quintile of almost any society. It is not
| just about cashflow, but about (lack of) respect and
| dignity.
| woah wrote:
| That's ridiculous. The standard of living has increased
| astronomically over the past few hundred years in the
| developed world. People in the lower quintile can afford
| refrigeration, cheap food, unlimited free entertainment,
| heating and air conditioning, laundry, plumbing, etc etc.
|
| This is not to take away from the stress and precarity of
| their situation, but materially, almost everyone in the
| US is better off than almost everyone in ancient rome.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| To rule in hell or to serve in heaven.
| pleb_nz wrote:
| So nothing's changed? :-/
| nverno wrote:
| It amazes me, when reading stuff from ancient Rome
| (currently I'm reading Marcus Aurelius' Meditations,
| which was basically his diary), how similar a lot of
| society, day-to-day worries and the like, are to ours
| today. However, I think the normal person's worldview
| nowadays is much more similar to that of the most elite
| in those societies than the plebians, mostly because
| general education has improved so drastically.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| For the starving, exploited third world workers in the
| state of illegal immigrants with no rights - probably not
| so much.
|
| Or for the fate of one of the real slaves.
|
| What is different today, is that slavery is mostly viewed
| as a bad thing. That is a accomplishment, but it doesn't
| mean we got rid of the misery.
| User23 wrote:
| And then there were the superstar slaves, such as champion
| gladiators and charioteers. They were idolized by the masses
| and they likely lived more comfortable lives than the
| majority of the capite censi and maybe some of the poorer
| knights.
|
| > These were mostly enslaved men, because they were cheaper
| and could not say "no"
|
| Huh, that's new to me. Did enslaved women have some kind of
| legal right to opt out of the mines, or was it just that
| other uses were found for them?
| bluGill wrote:
| Hormones mean women are less strong and thus less able to
| do the job. You get more work out of males.
|
| Plus women were more suited for sex, these were not
| enlightened times so rape of slave women was not frowned
| on.
| jterrys wrote:
| I have a simple question: Is it possible that they were
| servants and not slaves? I'm not very knowledgeable about
| ancient Roman history but it seems somewhat presumptuous to
| assume these are slave rooms.
|
| Was there no such thing as a lower economic class of free
| people that were working as either attendants or servants? This
| is after all, a villa in a resort area. Its not as if people
| throughout the annals of history didn't work as attendants
| alongside slaves.
|
| All of a sudden "An intact servants quarters found in Pompeii's
| ruins" doesn't sound all that enticing of headline.
| prox wrote:
| This is the official site of Pompeii archeological park :
| http://pompeiisites.org/en/
| karmelapple wrote:
| If you're near Naples, I recommend visiting the site! You can
| get a tour guide, but just walking around the massive grounds
| and exploring is fun by itself.
| chmod775 wrote:
| A whole room to themselves?
|
| Those are better conditions than what is typical of modern-day
| wage/debt slavery in places like Saudi Arabia and China.
| lostlogin wrote:
| Modern slavery is a lot closer to home her in New Zealand.
| Yesterday there was a disturbing story about bottle store
| owners doing it. Tying residency to paid work with a specific
| employer is part the problem.
|
| https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/126844667/a-plywood-box-in-a-...
| pleb_nz wrote:
| I would say slavery is as old as or nearly as old as the
| species and nearly every culture has been subjected to it.
|
| Quite a shame. I do wonder if we'll ever eliminate it from
| the planet. Likely not in my life time.
|
| And then there are the animals we hold in slavery well need
| to address as well.
| 542458 wrote:
| With all due respect, the article is pretty clear here:
|
| > ...within the room, where three wooden beds have been
| found...
|
| But additionally, "slave" here could describe a wide range of
| socioeconomic statuses. It does not necessarily mean that one
| was the poorest of the poor, the way a modern slave or pseudo-
| slave would be. Assuming that this represented the poorest
| housing conditions available may not be accurate.
| masklinn wrote:
| It is theorised to have been a family which is not bad, but
| the room is only 16sqm for 3, and apparently doubled up as
| storage of sorts.
|
| They could also have had more room than average due to their
| job (taking care of horses and chariots) so they got to use
| one of the stables's rooms.
|
| Looking at the floor plan at the end of the article, there
| are two other rooms of similar dimensions (b and d), and the
| horses (f) and chariot seem to have been granted a lot more
| space.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Historically the 16 sqm for 3 persons doesn't really sound
| too bad. Even currently in many places people live in less
| space. And little back it was even more common.
|
| Also, I don't think they spend too much time in the room
| other than sleeping.
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| He's stating the slaves had privacy and their own quarters.
| For comparison: https://i.pinimg.com/736x/53/3e/33/533e33c68d
| bf1f6889f26eb26...
| gruez wrote:
| Having to share a room with 3 other slaves counts as
| "privacy and their own quarters"?
| ertian wrote:
| It's suggested in the article that it was probably a
| family.
| tylerrobinson wrote:
| Is there a source or related content for this photo?
| GhettoComputers wrote:
| They're from Hong Kong.
| https://allthatsinteresting.com/cage-homes-hong-kong#9
|
| >Cage homes were initially constructed for single men
| coming over from mainland China in the 1950s. As poverty
| rose and housing supply fell, the demand for cage homes
| grew.
|
| >Incredibly, the 16-square-foot cages rent for around
| $170-$190 USD, which if calculated by cost per square
| foot makes them more expensive than the most posh
| apartments in Hong Kong.
| rightbyte wrote:
| How do they know slaves lived there? Is it just an assumption?
| The article does not mention any clues.
| antasvara wrote:
| The article mentions the large amount of storage containers in
| the room, something (presumably) not present in other rooms in
| the building. There's also pieces of metal and fabric
| consistent with being part of a chariot. That evidence,
| combined with the size of the room and presence of three beds,
| seems to be consistent with the idea that this is a slave's
| room.
| robotastronaut wrote:
| Actually, there were many clues listed, but they didn't
| directly connect them to "slaves" as such. The rough timber
| used in the bedding, the amphorae under the bed, a chamber pot,
| and lots of evidence suggesting the room was used for storage
| in addition to sleeping. These all point towards someone of
| much lower class (slaves of some kind) than the owner of the
| villa.
| IncRnd wrote:
| Why is there the assumption that people of lower classes were
| slaves?
| tata71 wrote:
| Matter of definition, I suppose.
| usrusr wrote:
| Nominally free lower classes would have lived in an
| entirely different part of town. We know quite a lot about
| the society in question from written sources, this is far
| from blank slate archaeology (where everything we find
| seems to default to "used for some ceremonial purpose")
| rightbyte wrote:
| I assume that in 79 A.D. the things you list, like beds no
| matter the timber roughness, were a luxury. Like, imagine
| living in a stone house? In a room with decorated walls
| (looks like carved out patterns on them).
|
| Surely the scrappiest room in the villa was for servants,
| some distant poor relative or rented out to students or what
| not. I just don't buy that the inhabitants for sure were
| slaves.
| djur wrote:
| Slaves, plebians, and patricians were very distinct social
| classes. There really wasn't such a thing as a free
| servant, with the occasional exception of some freedmen.
| Roman villas had two separate living areas, one for the
| owner's family and one for the slaves. We know enough about
| Roman architecture to identify this as the pars rustica,
| the slaves' quarters.
| throw63738 wrote:
| Bed luxury? Wood was cheap and with basic tools it takes a
| few hours to make.
| rightbyte wrote:
| Ye OK beds in general were no luxury. But:
|
| "The webbed bases of the beds were made of ropes"
|
| Does not sound like cheap 79 AD bed to me.
| spenczar5 wrote:
| Why not? Was rope particularly expensive?
| jasonhansel wrote:
| That's how _all_ beds were made prior to the advent of
| box springs (or modern mattresses, which don 't require a
| separate box spring). Very old beds still have the hooks
| necessary to hold up the ropes that supported the
| mattress.
| verve_rat wrote:
| Not wooden slats with straw mattress?
| frostburg wrote:
| Pompeii was a place where rich people lived, not an average
| town.
| Tagbert wrote:
| I assume that they have compared these accommodations to
| others already found and see a noticeable difference in the
| quality of the furnishings and other components.
|
| Slaves made up 30-40% of the population so it not
| unreasonable to conclude that the shabby accommodations
| would be intended for slaves.
| rightbyte wrote:
| Sure, it is likely that slaves lived there. But I would
| not state it as a fact.
| DevKoala wrote:
| I have seen smaller living spaces in San Francisco.
| [deleted]
| almeria wrote:
| _The room was lit by a small upper window, and shows no evidence
| of having had any wall decorations._
|
| So even slaves at Pompeii had a window to get light from, we see.
| Kaibeezy wrote:
| You can just barely make it out in the corner there:
|
| _CAROLVS MVNGER ARCHITECTVS_
| rexreed wrote:
| I thought he was anti-window?
| Kaibeezy wrote:
| This was somewhat earlier in his career. People grow
| professionally. Some downward.
| [deleted]
| bluGill wrote:
| Roman salves in some case could become full citizens. Slavery
| was different for different cultures treatment varied greatly
| from situation to situation. The closer the slave was to the
| rich the better they were treated in general
| brazzy wrote:
| Probably cheaper than providing them with candles or oil lamps.
| kingkawn wrote:
| Better than attending USC
| [deleted]
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| That would have been an absolute necessity at the time.
| Artificial lighting was obscenely expensive in antiquity[1].
|
| [1] https://www.statista.com/chart/10567/the-cost-of-light-
| throu...
| User23 wrote:
| I wonder how they came up with that 1750 BC figure of 400
| hours of work for one hour of light. Any ideas? It sounds
| ridiculously high, so I assume I'm missing something. What
| are they even talking about? Olive oil or tallow lamps?
| Firewood? Something else?
| hutzlibu wrote:
| "One hour of light (referred to as the quantity of light
| shed by a 100 watt bulb in one hour) cost 3200 times as
| much in 1800 in England than it does today"
|
| Oil lamps are not so bright, and you would need lots of
| them to reach the same brightness as a 100 watt bulb.
|
| In other words, they still had light, but not so much and
| not so often.
| iasmseanyoung wrote:
| Roman plasterwork was applied in layers, and in first layer
| (which is quite rough) a diamond pattern is scratched. This is
| to increase the adhesion of the next layer (also known as the
| key). This is also true of lime plasterwork done through the
| ages.
|
| As far as I can see only the first layer with the diamond
| pattern is visible one the left wall. The other layers may have
| not survived. Why would you bother to create a diamond pattern
| if you're not going to put more layers on?
|
| In fact, the wall at the far end does show more layers, and
| also some decoration right in the the middle.
| supperburg wrote:
| Because different stages could have been handled by different
| teams or contractors.
| _jal wrote:
| Probably for the same reason you sometimes see unfinished
| drywall in basements and attics.
| xvector wrote:
| site is down, no one saved it on wayback machine
| throwaway-jim wrote:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20211106150432/https://pompeiisi...
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