SC - period slavery

[Stefan li Rous]

> > Was slavery still going on from within Europe as late as the 17th and
> > 18th centuries? I thought that it had pretty much stopped even from
> > Eastern Europe well before then.
> 
> Well, the last mention of slaves in Silesia appears to be in the late
> thirteenth century; but the Domostroi (Rus, late 16th-Early 17th century
> depending on which bit you are reading) talks about slaves  and the
> master's responsibility toward them... I'm not sure when slavery was
> abolished in Russia, but I would guess post-period.
> 
> Jadwiga Zajaczkowa, mka Jennifer Heise	      jenne at tulgey.browser.net

Thanks. I am curious which sources you are using to say late 16th and
Early 17th century Russia. Reading this article and my rememberance of
the class indicated that the slaves were much better treated and that
the numbers were declining by the 12th and 13th century. It doesn't
give any dates for when the slavery stopped, though. So I guess it
could have been held onto much longer than that.

For those who might be interested, this article is in the CULTURES section
of my files and is from Pennsic class notes from last Pennsic:
Kiev-Slavery-art  (22K)  9/ 8/99    "Slavery in Kievan Rus" by Peotr
Alexeivich 
                                       Novgrodski.

It seems to be well written and contains a number of referances. It
also appears that the keeping of slaves was often more of a status 
thing than an economic imperative. In fact the monetary cost of keeping
slaves could be quite high.
- -- 
Lord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
Mark S. Harris             Austin, Texas           stefan at texas.net
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****