Slaves, Stories, and Cults
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3850159 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Sara Forsdyke (American School of Classical Studies at Athens, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 21 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 19-43 |
| Publication date | 2015-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Common Knowledge (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0961-754X • E-ISSN: 1538-4578 |
| Publisher | Duke University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1215/0961754x-2818001 |
| OpenAlex | W2089214954 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 27 |
This article examines a dramatic story about a slave rebellion on the island of Chios and argues that such stories were the medium through which masters and slaves negotiated compromise between the slaves' desire to be free and the masters' desire to control their slaves. This interpretation arises from a recognition of the complexity of a story that on the one hand celebrates the triumphs of a heroic slave over his masters, but on the other hand suggests that such resistance can be contained if masters treat their slaves humanely. Numerous parallels are drawn with contemporaneous and later historical societies involving compromises between subordinate groups and those who would control them. Finally, the article demonstrates that religious cults could be a medium for negotiating a middle ground, and that the story of the slave hero on Chios illustrates this function by making the slave the object of cultic worship by both masters and slaves
Ancient history · Art · Compromise · Cult · HERO · Literature · Negotiation · Parallels · Political science · Sociology · Worship · Caribbean history, culture, and politics · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · History · Law · Philosophy
The black hunter
Slaves, warfare, and ideology in the Greek historians
The politics and poetics of transgression
From rebellion to revolution
Athenaeus and his world
Polytheism and Society at Athens
Roll, Jordan, roll
Customs in common
The reversible world
The Middle Ground
Slaves Tell Tales
The Cambridge Companion to Herodotus
The Comparative Histories of Slavery in Brazil, Cuba, and the United States
Domination and the Arts of Resistance
Black Culture and Black Consciousness
Society and Culture in Early Modern France
Slavery and Social Death
Remains of Old Latin
The Ideology of Slavery
Religion and Colonization in Ancient Greece
Singing for the gods
Bandits in the Roman Empire
Novel Evidence for Roman Slavery
The Heroes of Attica
Tomb cult and the 'Greek renaissance
Ancient Slavery and Modern Ideology
The Moral Economy of the Peasant
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |