588 A SKETCH OF BABYLONIAN SOCIETY. 



We must consider industry in Babylon as highly developed. A large 

 number of certificates of delivery have' come down to us, from which it 

 appears (1) that private individuals in Babylonia possessed industrial 

 establishments of the nature of factories, and (2) that the temples were 

 great factories. The slaves were let out to work by their masters, and 

 the hire either given to the slave, in case he himself delivered to his 

 master the profit due from him as slave and maintained himself, or, on 

 the other hand, given to the master if the latter provided for the slave's 

 maintenance. Finally, the employer might give the slave his mainte- 

 nance and the surplus earnings of the slave to the master. In this case 

 the slave also received something for his labors. Thus the slave might 

 accumulate a little capital. Besides, slavery was not as harsh in the 

 Orient as in the Occident. The slave might buy his own freedom, and 

 could be adopted and become a member of the family and rise to the 

 highest places. 



If one compares the employer's expenses when slaves were hired with 

 the cost of free laborers, the latter are in most cases considerably more 

 expensive. This appears to contradict an economic law that work 

 under like conditions should receive equal compensation. I believe 

 that I am able to solve the riddle in the following manner: If a free 

 man entered into service, he had no claim for compensation if he be- 

 came sick or disabled by his work. The slave, on the contrary, must 

 be maintained by his master, and there were laws according to which 

 whoever hired a slave was required to pay an indemnity to his master 

 during the continuance of any disability incurred by the slave while a 

 servant. Slaves were well protected by these exceedingly humane 

 laws. Everyone who hired slaves belonging to others took good care 

 not to disable them by overburdening their strength. As a conse- 

 quence, the wages for a slave were smaller than those of a free man, 

 who was obliged to forego indemnity if he received an injury from his 

 work. 



As for the glebae adscripti, they correspond to our tenants by villein 

 service; they had to perform a kind of corvee, that is, they were 

 obliged to work for the landowner on certain days. In most cases, 

 these slaves belonged to a temple and, on this acoount, the temple had 

 also jurisdiction over the slaves belonging to it. Fugitive and refrac- 

 tory slaves were put in chains, but might be released upon the guar- 

 anty of a comrade. Documents referring to such cases are extant. 



Upon military matters in Babylon little has been handed down to us. 

 The foreign rulers of the successive periods had their own national 

 troops, and probably seldom drafted the Babylonians themselves into 

 military service. These troops gradually became property owners and 

 Babylonians, which explains the clinging to the most ancient custom, 

 namely, that the possession of landed property implied the obligation 

 to furnish soldiers. 



From the manner of the origin of the central powers, as sketched 



