The Lifestyles of Slaves in Early Christianity

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Recommended: relationships between the slaves themselves and with their masters.

Throughout obtaining research about the lifestyle of slaves within early Christianity, there were a few authors within published books that focused on slaves’ lifestyle in early Christianity, specifically funerary inscriptions from anecdotal historical evidence, slave contracts, journals, and other book references on this topic. These authors assisted with the discovery of family structures, slave roles in different specific household families, sexual availability for male and female slaves and obedient slaves. There is a lot of uncertain information that many, scholars who read on the lifestyles of slaves in the early Christianity, can’t obtain because the lack of anecdotal historical information that isn’t provided in many sources. Therefore, there is a great extent of details that can help the readers obtain and effectively comprehend more about the different aspects of slavery during this time period. The information obtained for this research is very effective because it’s historical primary evidence that gives readers different perspectives to analyze. The goal of this research paper is to scrutinize the lifestyles of slaves in different perspectives, using primary sources and anecdotal history to support the evidence given.
To attain this goal, the paper is structured in three main components. In the first component, there is information given from Dale B. Martin about the three different types of slave families and slaves in families. The evidence was contained from anecdotal historiographical funerary inscriptions which helped researchers consider the variety of slave families by the ancestors provided in the inscriptions. In the second component, the focus is on female slaves and different authors’ thesis’s pertaining ...

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...nce of slaves.

Works Cited

Glancy, Jennifer A. "Female Bodies." Slavery in Early Christianity. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006. 16-21.
Glancy, Jennifer A. "Sexual Serrogates." Slavery in Early Christianity. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006. 21-24.
Martin, David B. "Slave Families and Slave in Families." Balch, Carolyn Osiek and David L. Early Christian Families in Context: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 2003. 207-231.
Osiek, Caolyn. "Female Slaves, Porneia, and the Limits of Obedience." Balch, Carolyn Osiek and David L. Early Christian Families in Context: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub., 2003.
Robinson, Keith R. "The Contract of a Wet Nurse, Possibly Jewish/Judean." Kraemer, Ross Shepard. Women's Religions in the Greco-Roman World: A Sourcebook. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 2004. 125-126.

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