FOOTNOTES:
—— Adsit
Regula peccatis quæ pœnas irroget æquas,
Nec Scuticâ dignum horribili sectere Flagello;
Nam, ut Ferulâ cædas meritum majora subire
Verbera, non vereor.
Lib. I. Sat. I. v. 117.
Sectus flagellis hic Triumviralibus
Præconis ad fastidium.
Lib. V. Ode IV. v. 11, 12.
Ibericis peruste funibus latus.
Lib. V. Ode IV. v. 3.
Erunt Bucædæ invitò, potius quàm ego sim Restio.
Mostell. Act. IV. Sc. II.
[21] Verberones, Subverbustos.—The latter word literally signifies, burnt with blows: a figurative expression commonly used among the Romans, when they spoke of flagellations: thus, the words flagrum and flagellum, had been derived from the word flagrare, which signifies to burn, and Horace, in a passage that will be quoted in [page 66], says, to be burnt with rods (virgis uri) for, to be lashed.
Ad sua qui domitos deduxit flagra Quirites.
Juv. Sat. X. v. 99.
This notion of the Romans, of looking upon a scourge as a characteristic appendage of dominion, was so general among them, as is observed above, that they moreover supposed the gods themselves to be supplied with whips; and even Venus had also been thought to be furnished with one. In consequence of this supposition, Horace, who, as we may conclude from thence, had cause to be dissatisfied with some trick his Mistress had played him, or perhaps only with her impertinence in general, desires Venus to chastise her with her whip, “Do, Queen, (says he, addressing Venus) do, for once, give arrogant Chloe a touch with your sublime whip.”
Regina, sublimi flagello
Tange Chloën semel arrogantem.
Od. 26. Lib. III. ad Ven.
[23] The absolute dominion possessed by Masters over the persons of their slaves, led them to use a singular severity in the government of them. So frequently were flagellations the lot of the latter, that appellations and words of reproach drawn from that kind of punishment, were, as hath been above observed, commonly used to denominate them; and expressions of this kind occur in the politest writers: thus, we find in the Plays of Terence, an Author particularly celebrated for his politeness and strict observance of decorum, Slaves frequently called by the words Verberones, Flagriones, or others to the same effect.
As for Plautus, who had been the Servant of a Baker, and who was much acquainted with every thing that related to Slaves, and their flagellations in particular, he has filled his scenes with nicknames of Slaves, drawn from this latter circumstance; and they are almost continually called in his Plays, flagritribæ (a verbis, flagrum & terere) plagipatidæ, ulmitribæ, &c. besides the appellations of Bucædæ and Restiones, above-mentioned.
Sometimes the flagellations of Slaves, or the fear they entertained of incurring them, served Plautus as incidents for the conduct of his plots; thus, in his Epidicus, a Slave who is the principal character in the Play, concludes upon a certain occasion, that his Master has discovered his whole scheme, because he has spied him, in the morning, purchasing a new scourge at the shop in which they were sold. The same flagellations in general, have moreover been an inexhaustible fund of pleasantry for Plautus. In one place, for instance, a Slave, intending to laugh at a fellow-slave, asks him how much he thinks he weighs, when he is suspended naked, by his hands, to the beam, with an hundred weight (centupondium) tied to his feet; which was a precaution taken, as Commentators inform us, in order to prevent the Slave who was flagellated from kicking the Man (Virgator) whose office it was to perform the operation. And in another place, Plautus, alluding to the thongs of ox-leather with which whips were commonly made, introduces a Slave engaged in deep reflection on the surprizing circumstance of “dead bullocks, that make incursions upon living Men.”
Vivos homines mortui incursant boves!
But it was not always upon their Slaves only that Masters, among the Romans, inflicted the punishment of flagellation: they sometimes found means to serve in the same manner the young Men of free condition, who insinuated themselves into their houses, with a design to court their Wives. As the most favourable disguise on such occasions, was to be dressed in Slaves clothes, because a Man thus habited was enabled to get into the house, and go up and down without being noticed, Rakes engaged in amorous pursuits, usually chose to make use of it; but, when the Husband either happened to discover them, or had had previous information of the appointment given by his faithful Spouse, he feigned to mistake the Man for a run-away Slave, or some strange Slave who had got into his house to commit theft, and treated him accordingly. Indeed the opportunity was a most favourable one for revenge; and if to this consideration we add that of the severe temper of the Romans, and the jealous disposition that has always prevailed in that country, we shall easily conclude that such an opportunity, when obtained, was seldom suffered to escape, and that many a Roman Spark, caught in the above disguise, and engaged in the laudable pursuit of seducing his neighbour’s wife, has, with a centupondium to his feet, been sadly rewarded for his ingenuity. A misfortune of that kind actually befell Sallust the Historian. He was caught in a familiar intercourse with Faustina, wife to Milo, and daughter of the Dictator Sylla. The husband caused him to be soundly lashed (loris bene cæsum); nor did he release him till he had made him pay a considerable sum of money. The fact is related by Aulus Gellius, who had extracted it from Varro. To it was very probably owing the violent part which Sallust afterwards took against Milo, while the latter was under prosecution for slaying the Tribune Clodius, and the tumult he raised on that occasion, which prevented Cicero from delivering the speech he had prepared.
An allusion is made to the above practices in one of Horace’s Satyrs. He supposes in it, that his Slave, availing himself of the opportunity of the Saturnalia, to speak his mind freely to him, gives him a lecture on the bad courses in which he thinks him engaged, and uses, among others, the following arguments.
‘When you have stripped off the marks of your dignity, your equestrian ring, and your whole Roman dress, and from a Man invested with the office of Judge, shew yourself at once under the appearance of the Slave Dama; disgraced as you are, and hiding your perfumed head under your cloak, you are not the Man whom you feign to be: you are at least introduced full of terror, and your whole frame shakes through the struggles of two opposite passions. In fact, what advantage is it to you, whether you are cut to pieces with rods, or slaughtered with iron weapons?’
Tu cum projectis insignibus, annulo Equestri
Romanoque habitu, prodis ex judice Dama,
Turpis, odoratum caput obscurante lacernâ
Non es quod simulas; metuens induceris, atque
Altercante libidinibus tremis ossa pavore.
Quid refert uri virgis, ferroque necari?
Lib. II. Sat. 7.
The above uncontrouled power of inflicting punishments on their Slaves, enjoyed by Masters in Rome, was at last abused by them to the greatest degree. The smallest faults committed in their families by Slaves, such as breaking glasses, seasoning dishes too much, or the like, exposed them to grievous punishments; and it even was no unusual thing for Masters (as we may judge from the description of Trimalcion’s entertainment in the Satire of Petronius) to order such of their Slaves as had been guilty of faults of the above kind, to be stripped, and whipped in the presence of their guests, when they happened to entertain any at their houses.
Women in particular seem to have abused this power of flagellation in a strange manner; which caused express provisions to be made, at different times, in order to restrain them; of which the Canon above-quoted is an instance. It was often sufficient, to induce the Roman Ladies to cause their Slaves to be whipped, that they were dissatisfied with the present state of their own charms; or, as Juvenal expresses it, that their nose displeased them: and when they happened to fancy themselves neglected by their husbands, then indeed their Slaves fared badly. This latter observation of Juvenal, Dryden, in his translation of that Author’s Satires, has expressed by the following lines:
‘For, if over night the husband has been slack, }
Or counterfeited sleep, or turn’d his back, }
Next day, be sure, the servants go to wrack.’ }
Here follows the literal translation of the passage of Juvenal, in which he describes in a very lively manner, the havock which an incensed Woman usually made on the above occasion. “If her husband has, the night before, turned his back on her, woe to her waiting Woman; the dressing Maids lay down their tunicks; the errand Slave is charged with having returned too late; the straps break on the back of some; others redden under the lash of the leather scourge, and others, of the twisted parchment.”
Si nocte maritus
Aversus jacuit, periit Libraria; ponunt
Cosmetæ tunicas; tardè venisse Liburnus
Dicitur; hic frangit ferulas; rubet ille flagellis,
Hic scuticâ.
Juv. Sat. VI.
The wantonness of power was carried still farther by the Roman Ladies, if we may credit the same Juvenal. It was a customary thing with several among them, when they proposed to have their hair dressed both with nicety and expedition, to have the dressing Maid who was charged with that care, stripped naked to the waist, ready for flagellation, in case she became guilty of any fault or mistake, in performing her task. The following is the passage in Juvenal on that subject. “For, if she has determined to be dressed more nicely than usual, and is in haste, being expected in the public gardens, the unfortunate Psechas then dresses her head, with her own hair in the utmost disorder, and her shoulders and breasts bare. Why is that ringlet too high?—The leather-thongs instantly punish the crime of a hair, and an ill-shaped curl.”
Nam si constituit solitoque decentiùs optat
Ornari & properat, jamque expectatur in hortis,
Componit crinem, laceratis ipsa capillis,
Nuda humeros, Psechas infœlix, nudisque mamillis:
Altior hic quare cicinnus? taurea punit
Continuò flexi crimen, facinusque capilli.
These abuses which Masters, in Rome, made of the power they possessed over their Slaves, were at last carried by them to such a pitch, either by making them wantonly suffer death, or torturing them in numberless different ways, that, in the beginning of the reign of the Emperors, it was found necessary to restrain their licence.
Under the reign of Claudius (for it is not clear whether any provision to that effect was made under Augustus) it was ordained, that Masters who forsook their Slaves when sick, should lose all right over them, in case they recovered; and that those who deliberately put them to death, should be banished from Rome.
Under the Emperor Adrian, the cruelties exercised by Umbricia, a Roman Lady, over her female Slaves, caused new laws to be made on that subject, as well as the former ones to be put in force, and Umbricia was, by a rescript of the Emperor, banished for five years. (l. 2. in fine, Dig. L. I. t. 6.)
New laws to the same ends were likewise made under the following Emperors, among which Civilians make particular mention of a constitution of Antonius Pius (Divus Pius); and in subsequent times, the Church also employed its authority to prevent the like excesses, as we may see from the Canon above-recited (Si quæ domina, &c.) which was framed in the Council held at Elvira, a small Town in Spain, that has been since destroyed. But the disorder was of such a nature as was not to be cured so long as the custom itself of slavery was allowed to subsist; and it has been remedied at last, only by the thorough abolition of an usage which was a continual insult on Humanity: an advantage which (to be, once at least, very serious in the course of this learned and useful Work) we are indebted for, to the establishment of Christianity, whatever other evils certain Writers may reproach it with having occasioned.