Both these volumes attempt to re-evaluate the role of labour in the Graeco-Roman world, contributing valuably to a growing list of recent scholarship (e.g. K. Verboven and C. Laes [edd.], Work, Labour, and Professions in the Roman World [2016] and S.D. Gartland and D.W. Tandy [edd.], Voiceless, Invisible, and Countless in Ancient Greece: the Experience of Subordinates, 700–300 bce [2024]). Flohr and Bowes’s volume is geared towards an academic audience, with sections that thoroughly re-examine Graeco-Roman literature and its reception (Section 1), the definition of labour (Section 2), and its relationship with agriculture (Section 3) and civic values (Section 4). The audience for Bond’s highly readable book ranges from the general public to academics, as the book revises Roman history (from the Struggle of the Orders to Justinian) in light of labour associations and resistance. Overall, both works are effective in offering different interpretations of labour in the Graeco-Roman world.
The first major theme of both works is to re-evaluate the meaning of labour in antiquity. Flohr and Bowes clearly define labour in the introduction (pp. 3–5), with a welcome and insightful analysis of the distinction between work and labour in the ancient world, in contrast to the modern capitalist understanding of these concepts. To summarise, labour and work are used interchangeably throughout the volume and describe activities directed to particular ends and/or desires. This broad definition allows for nuance and diversity in discussing how ancient Greeks and Romans valued and identified with their labour (both free and unfree). In part, the volume analyses these nuances by examining ‘evidence produced by working people themselves and thus reflect their communities’ own value discourse about labour’ (p. 11). Here, the chapters by S. Levin-Richardson (Chapter 6), B. Reitz-Joosse (Chapter 7), N.G. Brown (Chapter 12), L. Brent and T. Prowse (Chapter 13), N. Massar (Chapter 15) and F. Opdenhoff (Chapter 17) deserve attention. Levin-Richardson investigates emotional bonds in Roman prostitution through both literary evidence and Pompeian graffiti, analysing these texts through the concept of emotional labour. Reitz-Joosse demonstrates how depictions of glassmakers differ across media in the early Roman empire. Literary works connect glassmaking with myth and philosophy, whereas an oil lamp from Asseria highlights the collaborative nature of a workshop. Brown discusses how a calendar mosaic from an estate in Saint-Romain-en-Gal (France) provided an elite audience with an immersive experience (i.e. spectacle) of seasonal changes in agricultural labour, serving to demonstrate cultural value to rural labour in an aristocratic context. Brent and Prowse show how rural workers at Vagnari, a vicus with an imperial Roman estate (first to fifth centuries ce), were honoured by their community (family and peers) with burial objects that reflected the value of their labour, not intended simply to identify specific agricultural work. Massar analyses the signatures of craftsmen and how they evolved as markers of identity from the Archaic to the Hellenistic periods. These signatures highlighted professional identities, the value of the craftsmen’s labour and even civic recognition. Finally, Opdenhoff argues that inscriptions and funerary reliefs in second-century ce Roman Gaul, with an emphasis on the stele of Amabilis (Bordeaux), communicated individual (and regional) ideas associated with the deceased’s labour (e.g. entrepreneurship and expertise).
Bond’s book proposes a clear definition of work stoppages and collective action through a brief longue durée argument connecting the examples of the strikes at Deir el-Medina (1157/1155 bce) in Egypt to the stoppages in Sunderland in 1768 ce (pp. 1–2). This definition is accompanied by a welcome defence of the inclusion of archaeological evidence (pp. 4–5) to broaden the perspective on the ancient world, its economy and the role of everyday people and labourers in Roman history (pp. 5–7). Chapters 4, ‘Anxiety and Associations in the Early Roman Empire’, 5, ‘Strikes, Riots, and Associations in the Roman Imperial Period’, and 6, ‘Castes, Law, and Compulsory Labor in Late Antiquity’, are the strongest in the book, especially in terms of incorporating a variety of evidence (epigraphic, papyrological etc.) to tell the story of ‘Roman laborers, their associations, and their labor conflicts’ (p. 7). In one example among many, Bond’s analysis of the near-riots in Ephesus during Paul of Tarsus’ visit to the city demonstrates how our literary and legal sources do not always align with other forms of evidence. Bond reconstructs the events by analysing the literary account alongside contemporary epigraphic evidence regarding the associations of silversmiths. After Paul condemned the crafting of idols, a silversmith, Demetrius, rallied local silversmiths and other artists to protest against Paul’s sermons, which were affecting their business interests. A riot nearly broke out, but an official scribe invoked the prohibition of ‘illicit gatherings’ to disperse the crowd, a ban similarly found in the Caesarian law of collegia (c. 46 bce) and in the municipal laws at Irni (Spain), dating to the Flavian era. The implication is that these artisan associations, pursuing collective action, violated Caesar’s law that associations must be ‘lawful’ or ‘ancient’, but Bond offers a different perspective, showing that contemporary epigraphic evidence points to the existence of trade associations of silversmiths and other artisans (pp. 117–21).
A guiding ethos of both works is to reject the largely negative view of labour in the ancient world, best exemplified by M.I. Finley’s The Ancient Economy (1973) in the Anglosphere. In their introduction Flohr and Bowes outline how the volume seeks to move beyond the Primitivist vs Modernist debate while still respecting the distinctiveness between the ancient and the modern worlds (pp. 4–5). This brings us to the second theme: cultural analysis as the basis of economic history. Cultural analysis is the main theoretical framework that connects the various chapters in Flohr and Bowes’s volume (pp. 6–11). Here, Section 1 (‘Revisiting the Canon’) is one of the strongest in the volume, where the authors successfully re-examine ‘many of the canonical texts upon which the twentieth-century scholars constructed their largely negative view of labour’ (p. 10). I. Sluiter (Chapter 2) re-evaluates technai in Plato’s dialogues to contrast them with the well-known negative view of labour in The Republic. This chapter opens the volume beautifully by showing how cultural analysis can revisit ancient texts and understand them in their rhetorical and political contexts. J.J. Mulhern (Chapter 3) follows with a thorough reconsideration of Aristotle’s view of labour (πόνος), highlighting the complexities of Aristotle’s views on work as his interpretations depend on its relationship with other philosophical or political categories such as citizenship, happiness and justice. R.M. Rosen (Chapter 4) forcefully argues how Galen viewed the human body, specifically human hands, as an important element of what made humanity an ‘intelligent animal’. Our hands produced culture (ranging from farming and shipbuilding to writing and weaving), which is distinctly human and ‘good’. L.H. Petersen (Chapter 5) challenges the traditional narrative of Roman art that privileged its elite patrons (found in Pliny the Elder and later Giorgio Vasari). This attitude devalued and ignored the names of Roman artists, which was taken as a sign of their lack of artistic skill (mere copyists of ‘Greek originals’). Petersen argues that material evidence of signed works, such as frescoes, and depictions of artists on funerary monuments indicate that Roman artists were valued and honoured for their craft. Petersen’s chapter functions as an effective bridge between Sections 1 and 2, challenging the literary evidence while introducing archaeological material that offers a different interpretation and signals the volume’s second thematic focus. The chapters by A. Bensch-Schaus (Chapter 10), R.A. Faber (Chapter 11) and H. Hochscheid (Chapter 14) also re-evaluate literary sources. Bensch-Schaus and Faber both demonstrate how bucolic poetry confronted the hard realities of agricultural labour. Hochscheid argues that Athenian craftsmen were valued members of the community and an important element in Athenian civic identity, demonstrating this by revisiting Plutarch’s description of the craftsmen labouring in the large building projects of early democratic Athens.
When it comes to cultural analysis, the chapters by C. Freu (Chapter 8), M.J. Groen-Vallinga (Chapter 9) and A. Argyriou-Casmeridis (Chapter 16) deserve recognition. Freu argues forcefully for ‘the emergence of the unskilled, interchangeable worker in different sectors of activity: services and transportation, as well as some agricultural and craft-making tasks’ (p. 151) in the early Roman Empire. The core of Freu’s chapter is a revisit and analysis of the Second Sophistic, drawing on a wide range of genres, including oratory, philosophy and legal theory. Groen-Vallinga investigates unpaid and unrecorded labour by women and children in elite Roman households through an analysis of columbarium epitaphs, complemented by a comparison with the well-documented household of English aristocrat Joyce Jeffreys, to demonstrate how the category of ‘work’ often exceeds formal occupational titles. Groen-Vallinga deserves praise for framing the analysis to the cultural rules and constraints of the Roman familia, acknowledging the topic’s antiquity and avoiding the ‘modernizing trap’. Argyriou-Casmeridis focuses on how Hellenistic honorific decrees recognised the value of professional work, specifically that of doctors, historians, architects, sculptors, musicians, actors, poets, teachers and philosophers. These honorifics emphasised notable virtues, such as artistic excellence/skill (ἀρετή/aretê), thus celebrating certain professions within the Greek cultural framework. A connection between Freu, Hochscheid and Argyriou-Casmeridis is the evidence of the positive recognition of paid labour.
Bond’s specific aim is to ‘tell the stories of Roman laborers, their associations, and their labor conflicts alongside the traditional, canonical story of Rome’s emperors and political power players’ (p. 7). Bond says that applying the term ‘labour union’ to Roman associations, such as athletic associations and various collegia, is a ‘strategic anachronism’ (p. 9). The similarities between Roman associations and modern labour unions are meant to show how ‘labor organization, collective actions, economic networks, and unionizing behaviors such as wage bargaining or contract negotiations’ (p. 11) are not simply products of modern capitalism. Nevertheless, neither this passage nor the book’s subtitle should convince readers that Bond is ‘modernizing’ the Roman economy. Throughout the book Bond’s arguments are rooted in cultural and institutional analysis, with a focus on religion, law, the familia and various Roman associations, notably the collegia. The passage above appears in the introductory section, where Bond clearly defines a Roman association and how it differs (often greatly) from medieval guilds and modern labour unions. This section is followed by a good analysis and reconsideration of the mythological origins of the collegium in the Roman regal period under king Numa. Bond argues that, although collegia had strong religious undertones, late Republican and early Imperial legislation to curb ‘seditious’ associations inspired the self-serving myth of a ‘good old past’ in which associations were created solely for religious purposes under king Numa (pp. 14–19).
Bond begins the analysis with religion, examining how religious practices and beliefs are embedded in Roman economic life. Religion appears throughout the book, most prominently in Chapters 4, 5 and 7, as Judaism and early Christianity enter the story. Religion is not the only way in which Bond analyses Roman labour. Both legal sources and the concept of the Roman familia feature prominently. The institutional framework of the familia is effectively used to discuss the growing prominence of slaves in the middle and late Republican economy, as enslaved peoples were placed under the rules of the Roman familia, governed as property under the Lex Aquilia (pp. 44–55). It was within the familial framework that enslaved people organised themselves into a corporate structure, with multiple enslaved familiae forming an association. This is seen during the three Servile Wars (135–132, 104–100 and 73–71 bce) according to Bond (pp. 59–69). In one example Bond highlights that Diodorus referred to the enslaved rebels of the First Servile War as an ekklesia, a term used in the early Roman Empire to identify certain associations and collectives. This term is attested in both literary and epigraphic evidence (p. 64).
The extensive use of legal sources is found throughout the monograph, from Chapter 1, on the Twelve Tables and the recognition of collegium members to enter into agreements (pp. 31–4), to Chapter 6, on the ‘anti-corruption’ legislation of Constantine and its effects on Roman associations (pp. 147–55). A common theme throughout is the Roman state’s use of state power to suppress what it deemed seditious. This theme is part of Bond’s central argument that ancient and modern states alike use the legal system to suppress labourers and their collective action (articulated clearly in Bond’s conclusion on pp. 181–8). Bond reviews various examples, such as the senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus (186 bce), which outlawed the meeting places used for the worship of Bacchus, to show how the Roman state sought to control and curb assemblies that ‘threatened’ elite rule. An important focal point in the book is Caesar’s prohibition of various collegia (Lex Iulia de collegiis), except those deemed of ‘ancient origin’ or ‘lawful’ (pp. 84–7). This ban was reinforced by Augustus (pp. 93–9) and persisted into the early Roman Empire, as evidenced by the municipal ban on collegia found at Irni (Spain) from c. 91 ce (p. 116). Nevertheless, Bond shows how the social reality is far more complex than the legal sources suggest. One example comes from Arles in the late second or early third century ce, when an association of shipowners in Arelate, responsible for supplying grain to Rome as part of the imperial annona, petitioned the prefect of the grain trade, Claudius Julianus. The shipowners complained of mistreatment by Roman officials and threatened to suspend grain shipments if the abuse continued. Claudius Julianus intervened swiftly to resolve the dispute (pp. 127–8). The ambiguity of ‘lawful’ can be a form of state control, but it is also a means for associations to use their ‘essential work’ to bargain for better conditions.
As much as I found Bond’s book readable, well-researched and overall successful in re-examining the history of the Roman labourer (both free and unfree), I have some reservations about Chapter 3 (‘Freedom of Assembly during the Fall of the Republic’). Bond writes that ‘Cicero later remarked on this law in his defense of Publius Sestius in 56 bce, two years after Clodius’s tribunate. He said that the boni (good men) – otherwise known as the wealthy optimates – were hesitant to give out grain, lest the plebs be led “from industry to idleness”. Even today, this is still a conservative argument for eschewing social welfare programs” (p. 73). Later in the chapter Bond writes that ‘Defenders of the elite cause, men called the optimates, reacted with horror. Cicero claimed that passage of Clodius’s laws giving equal suffrage to freedmen would result in the freeborn being “subject to their slaves”’ (p. 77). Bond is correct that the terms boni and optimates are often used interchangeably by Cicero, but I have reservations with the framing of the elite cause as optimates in contrast with the populist anti-elites. The terms boni and optimates in the Pro Sestio (the source of the first quotation) are used in a highly personalised fashion. M.A. Robb has argued persuasively that the terms populares (not used in Bond’s chapter), optimates and boni are highly problematic when employed to understand the ideological differences during the last decades of the Roman Republic (M.A. Robb, Beyond Populares and Optimates [2010]; absent from the chapter). Cicero adduces the terms depending on the media or his political needs. In the Pro Sestio Cicero uses optimates to isolate Clodius from the ‘good men’ as Cicero is motivated by his antagonism with Clodius. The ‘good men’ (boni) are often used interchangeably with optimates in the speech, but they are not employed to describe a political grouping. Here, the terms specifically refer to Cicero’s supporters (Robb [2010], pp. 15–68 [Chapter 2: ‘Populares and optimates in the Pro Sestio’]). If we compare Cicero’s use of the term optimates in the De re publica, where it appears most frequently in Cicero’s corpus, optimates is linked to ἄριστοι. No doubt, Clodius would have been a member of these optimates (Robb [2010], pp. 95–9). The essence is that literary and rhetorical context is vital to this discussion, which Bond explores successfully throughout the monograph, as this review considers. This point of criticism does not diminish the well-written and engaging book Bond has produced.
Overall, both books should be applauded for offering a different view of labour in the Graeco-Roman world, rooted in cultural analysis, and a reappraisal of the primary evidence. Flohr and Bowes’s volume is a valuable contribution to the scholarship on ancient economic thinking (alongside J. Andreau, J. France and S. Pittia [edd.], Mentalités et Choix Économiques Des Romains [2004]), a topic often neglected in favour of studies on economic performance. Petersen’s chapter will hopefully impact how scholars value and understand Roman art and artists. Similarly, Groen-Vallinga’s chapter is a must-read for those who study the economics of aristocratic households (both Roman and Greek). Bond’s study will hopefully inspire discussions about how to write history from a different perspective (not solely from the elite class) and about retelling a familiar story. Although the sources are scarce for the ‘everyday’ person in terms of literary evidence (something Bond acknowledges in the introduction), this should not dissuade us from attempting to analyse their stories as Bond has done superbly in this book.
