Gratitude for Freedom: Men, Women, and the Looming Possibility of Re-enslavement скачать в хорошем качестве

Gratitude for Freedom: Men, Women, and the Looming Possibility of Re-enslavement

As part of the BCDSS' Joseph C. Miller Memorial Lecture Series, Matthew J. Perry, from the City University of New York (CUNY), USA, gave a Lecture on How Roman law perceive the distinction between freedom and enslavement. While initially stark, this division was permeable, allowing individuals to transition between statuses. This talk delves into the fluidity of this line, focusing on gratitude and obligation, particularly the concept of the "ungrateful freedperson." Despite cultural assumptions that freed individuals owed perpetual gratitude to their former masters, Roman law empowered patrons to charge ingratitude, leading to various penalties, even re-enslavement. The dynamics were most apparent in marriages between freedwomen and their patrons, shedding light on Roman notions of liberty and enslavement. Matthew J. Perry is an associate professor at the City University of New York (CUNY), with appointments at the Graduate Center (Classics) and John Jay College of Criminal Justice (History). His research focuses on Roman social and legal history, especially issues of gender, citizenship and slavery. He published Gender, Manumission, and the Roman Freedwoman with Cambridge University Press in 2014. His most recent article, “The Lex Scantinia and the Public Response to Stuprum” will appear in the 2023 volume of Eugesta: The Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity