Q.The text has referred to three writers whose work is used to say something about how the Romans treated their workers. Can you identify them? Reread the section for yourself and describe any two methods the Romans used to control labour.
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Start your 14-day free trial to unlock the full solution →The three writers are Pliny the Elder, Columella, and Cato the Elder, and the Romans controlled labour through a mix of harsh supervision, punishment, and economic incentives tied to the land.
The Roman attitude toward labour was never sentimental. It was practical, hierarchical, and deeply tied to the social order of the empire. When we look at how the Romans treated their workers — whether on vast agricultural estates, in mines, or in urban workshops — we are really looking at a system designed for maximum output with minimum resistance. The writers who give us the clearest window into this world are three Romans who wrote about farming and estate management: Cato the Elder, writing in the second century BCE; Varro, a generation later; and Columella, writing in the first century CE. Pliny the Elder, the great encyclopaedist, also touches on the subject, but the core trio for labour management is Cato, Varro, and Columella.
Cato is the earliest and the bluntest. His manual on agriculture is less a treatise and more a set of orders for a slave-run estate. He tells the estate manager to keep the slaves busy, to check their work constantly, and to sell off old or sick slaves rather than keep them at cost. There is no sentiment in Cato — a slave is a tool, like an ox or a plough, and must be maintained only as long as it pays. Varro, writing later, is a little more reflective but no less practical. He advises that slaves should be given rewards for good work and warns against having too many slaves of the same nationality, fearing they might plot together. Columella, writing in the first century CE, is the most detailed and, in some ways, the most humane of the three. He recommends that slaves be given better food and clothing, that they be allowed to keep small savings, and that the manager should talk to them, listen to their complaints, and even consult them on work matters. But even Columella's kindness is a management strategy — he says clearly that a contented slave works harder and is less likely to run away.
These three writers are not describing a single, unchanging system. Cato writes for a small Italian estate, Columella for a larger, more commercial farm. But together they show a consistent Roman logic: labour is a resource to be managed, not a community to be nurtured. …
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