Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/221

 superior to that of a slave, but the distinction was so little practical that the lawyers of the period were unable to discriminate the difference. Any freeman who settled in a neighbourhood to work for hire on an estate lost his liberty and became a serf bound to the soil, unless he migrated again before the expiration of thirty years. The use and possession of arms was interdicted to private persons throughout the Empire, and only such small knives as were useless for weapons of war were allowed to be exposed for sale.

In every department of the State the same principle of hereditary bondage was applied to the lower grades of the service, and even in some cases to officials of considerable rank. Here, however, a release was conceded to those who could provide an acceptable substitute, a condition but rarely possible to fulfil. Armourers, mintmen, weavers, dyers, purple-gatherers, miners, and muleteers, in government employ could neither resign their posts nor even intermarry

The name of modern works on slavery and serfdom is legion.]*
 * [Footnote: antiquity; cf. Savigny, Römische Colonat u.s.w. Berlin Acad., 1822-3.