How did slavery work in imperial China?

Submitted by War_Hymn t3_yl4mx3 in history

I was under the assumption that chattel slavery (to differentiate it from indentured servitude) wasn't common in China during the Ming or Qing, but after taking a read of the translated Qing Penal Code, I find a lot of laws that referenced "slaves" and their rights under the law. For example, such slaves as denoted were not allowed to marry under threat of punishment by Qing law. Slaves were also not allowed to leave the households of their masters without permission as well.

All this hints that Qing society (and I assume other dynasties as well) had some form of chattel slavery system going on. Was it on the same scope as slavery in colonial Americas? Where did slaves come from? How can slave free themselves? Any insight or literature will be appreciated.

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MrMoogyMan t1_iuxhdhb wrote

Hi, amateur (and minor degree holder) of Chinese history, language and culture here. This is somewhat dependent on the historical period, but there is evidence of chattel slavery (along with convict slavery) used for megastructures like the Great Wall and irrigation/land reclamation projects in the flood plains during the Qin and Han. There is also evidence that the caste systems during and preceding the Han supported inherited slave-status, i.e. you were a slave if your mother was one. This shows up in Confucian works occasionally. The popularity of slavery seems to have waxed and waned throughout China's dynastic eras. One of my Chinese professors explained the Chinese word 人民 renmin as proof of social stratification and evidence of feudal slavery. Not sure how right he was on that, but interesting idea.

IMO traditional bondage and commodification of women in China counts as slavery, and that's seen throughout its entire history. Not chattel slavery but slavery nonetheless.

Expansionistic dynasties surely would have taken war slaves, and there seems to be evidence of this in various complied histories like the Tangshi. Of course, you have the Yuan dynasty that enslaved many peoples both endemic and foreign to China, and the rendering of the native Chinese to second class citizens. This occurs during Qing (they were invaders as well), but you see a decline and eventually abolition of slavery post 1909. This did not really end indentured servitude or convict labor systems that were then adapted by the CCP's Laogai system (Chinese analog of the Soviet gulag).

I don't know if one has ever found any evidence for the chattel slavery similar to the American South's systems, but I'm guessing it's probably still possible, although many of the conditions that made the American system monolithic (colonialism, capitalism, industrialist, etc.) may not have been so at any point in Chinese history.

I have not read many scholarly works on slavery in China, but the evidence for multiple systems of slavery do seem to exist throughout its history, from imperial correspondences to pieces of art. It would be worth research, and would make a good history grad thesis.

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MrMoogyMan t1_iuxhvp3 wrote

I did want to add that China has always had a lot of people, so that changes the dynamics of available labor and would therefore change the need for a chattel slavery system ala Dixie.

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War_Hymn OP t1_iuy7w23 wrote

Thanks for your reply. This topic interests me because I've been led to believe that societies with a surplus in labour had little need for slavery on the level that we saw in say, ancient Rome or 17/18th century Americas. This is obviously not completely true. I'm going to see if I can score some primary sources and have my Chinese friends translate it for me :).

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xier_zhanmusi t1_iuybtbe wrote

There is a theory that the character 民 depicts a slaves eye being blinded; this character is recorded back to Shang times where there was ritual sacrifice too. It's recorded in pre-Qin books (see 周礼 in link below) with 人 as 人民 in a way that suggests they are two separate nouns in an unmarked conjunction; this would later have led to the current 2 character word perhaps as the social conditions under which pre-Qin slaves existed disappeared?

https://zi.tools/zi/%E6%B0%91

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%BA%BA%E6%B0%91

I'm no expert so just trying to reconstruct your professors logic, which seems plausible with my limited knowledge.

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Esotewi t1_iuyr1mm wrote

The term "nuo fu" is indentured slave they existed well into the mid-19th century. Slavery was one of the biggest reason why the republic of China collapsed as the government was backed by major landlords who openly promoted the practice. They would be closer to feudal european household servants. Rich households would always have a few household servants to do the house chores and work the stables.

The practice was so common that people never thought of leaving the landlord's property as they could be fed, have a shelter, get an education and even inherit part of the property in some cases. This differs from the slaves in the americas as there was no inherent belief in a racial caste system. In most cases, indentured slaves were either sold by relatives to pay back loans or sold themselves to escape poverty.

If interested, you can read about the collapse of the Shang Dynasty and the dynamics that slavery played in that era. Ever since the Zhou dynasty took over, they made a point in abolishing slavery and embraced feudal caste systems. Still slaves in all but name. Silver lining is they had the right to not be brutally killed by their masters for ritual purposes. Chattel slavery was indeed abolished, at least according to the laws, some 2500 years ago.

I think some people are mistranslating the term for indentured servitude in the Qing and Ming laws as "chattel slavery". The Qin state's penal punishment for "war criminals" was the closest thing to chattel slavery. But even then, it was the outlier. Not the norm. They only just won a free for all war against 6 other states. There was bound to be widespread repression.

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[deleted] t1_ixc9cn3 wrote

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Esotewi t1_ixebmjk wrote

Thanks. That is the word I was looking for. Was on the tip of my tongue. Yes, they adopted serfdom quite soon as compared to the rest of the world.

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War_Hymn OP t1_iv31ip5 wrote

>I think some people are mistranslating the term for indentured servitude in the Qing and Ming laws as "chattel slavery".

I understand indentured servitude to be: a contract of specified time or monetary amount in which an individual is to work for the contract holder until their obligations are fulfilled. I do know that there was a large segment of indentured workers in China up to the modern era - but are these really the same "slaves" being referenced by the translated Qing legal code? I would think indentured workers had some fundamental rights, like the right to marry (as was the case in Europe and colonial Americas).

Under the Qing legal code, the "slaves" were prohibited from marrying, even with permission from their masters. The "slaves" were also prohibited from misrepresenting themselves as freedmen or "honourable persons" (which I take to mean ordinary citizens). Penalties for injuring or kidnapping a "slave" are also reduced compare to committing same acts on an ordinary citizen. In turn, certain crimes committed by "slaves" have increased penalties relative to an ordinary citizen. These "slaves" as referenced seem to be inherently treated as second class subjects by the Qing legal system.

Could Qing indentured workers or slaves be sold or traded at will by their masters? Were their children born free or become indentured/enslaved themselves?

Thanks for commenting :).

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Esotewi t1_ivb5s7b wrote

I am more knowledgeable about the fall of the Shang dynasty than the Qing. Abolishment of slavery was a centerpiece reform made by the Zhou rulers. Hopefully someone else would have an answer to your question. The Manchu/Jurchens did practice slavery as it was common in the northern steppes to own slaves. Not sure if they kept the practice during the Qing. One could theorize that turkic customs were imported into the empire over the millenia and the laws shifted quite a bit, but I have no evidence nor example to give. Iirc, one of the reasons Genghis Khan declared war on the then Jurchen ruled Jin dynasty was because of rampant slave trade which put many turkic people in bondage in the empire. There were also many Sodgian traders who were famous for introducing slave trade to the then flourishing Tang Dynasty when the culture swinged more liberal and open to foreign culture.

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agreea t1_iuxebhj wrote

Do you have a link to the translated Qing Penal Code? That would be a fascinating read

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War_Hymn OP t1_iuy813i wrote

I was reading an abbreviated version, but found one fully translated copy here: https://lsc.chineselegalculture.org/Asset/Source/lscDocument_ID-12_No-01.pdf

It's indeed a fascinating read. In regards to family law, the state seemed to have a vested interest in maintaining stability and (mostly patriarchal) hierarchy in private households.

Like one, you can't just divorce or leave your first wife for no reason (unless she committed one of the "deadly sins" for a married woman, one of them being talking too much). It's apparently also a CAPITAL punishment to hit your parents or husband's parents. If a husband catches her wife cheating on him with another man, he can kill them both with no legal repercussions. If he only kills the man, than it falls upon the local magistrate to seize the offending wife to be remarried or sold off as a slave (in which case the profits go to the state).

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Snoo89439 t1_iv00psk wrote

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StepSideways77 t1_iuxx62k wrote

The Chinese were not saints. They enslaved when they wanted the labor, just like the rest of the planet.

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War_Hymn OP t1_iuy9jpa wrote

Never said they were, but I always thought slavery had an economic element to it that made it more prevalent in some cultures versus others.

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StepSideways77 t1_iv25l2l wrote

It was an interesting question. Rarely bought up. Romans, everybody in the area back then, enslaved entire cities, I've not heard this of the Chinese. It likely happened. My Chinese history is sketchy.

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