Though being a slave didn’t rule out being a writer, as illustrated by the cases of Esopus, Epictetus, and others, the evidence suggests that none of those slaves ever wrote about their condition as slaves, nor did anyone else.

The authors of this comparative history of slavery in Greece and Rome worked from the only existing documentation, which had predominantly to do with the slaves’ legal status. From this departure point the authors made some remarkable finds in other areas, such as the slaves’ economic role in society, their important contributions to Greek and Roman culture, their civil and social status, their daily and family lives, and more. In all areas, but especially economic, they discovered that slavery in Rome and Greece evolved much differently than was previously thought.