METICS (METOIKOI) Kamen, Deborah
Status in Classical Athens,
07/2013
Book Chapter
In this chapter we turn tometoikoi, foreigners who, unlikexenoi, were official residents of Athens, rather than just passing through.¹ In its broad sense, the termmetoikosencompassed two ...subcategories of resident alien, distinguished from each other not only legally but also (more significantly) socially: 1) freeborn foreigners (metoikoior metics in the narrow sense); and 2) freed slaves, most likely those who were not (or who were no longer) bound to their previous masters.² It is unfortunately unclear to us whether freed slaves became metics (in the broad sense) automatically after being released from remaining obligations to their
CHATTEL SLAVES Kamen, Deborah
Status in Classical Athens,
07/2013
Book Chapter
Although war among the various Greek poleis was common, the Greeks were nonetheless (in principle) averse to the enslavement of their fellow Greeks (see, e.g., Pl.Rep. 469b–c; ...Xen.Hell.1.6.14,Ages.7.6).¹ Most chattel slaves, therefore, were of “barbarian”—that is, non-Greek—origin, acquired mainly through Mediterranean trading networks.² In the archaic period (ca. 630–480 BCE), slaves were primarily Scythians and Thracians, coming from areas northeast of Greece. After the Persian Wars, traders began to acquire more slaves from the east, particularly from those areas (like Caria) near the Greek cities of Asia Minor. And in the
