章節 29: Information for Public Disclosure: From Slavery to Serfdom

Out of the 100,000,000 inhabitants of the combined populace of both the Ancient Empire and Old Empire, roughly 40% were subjected to enslavement and forced labor. Half of these numbers were owned by the western and eastern Imperial Courts, and the rest are divided among the higher and even the commoner class of society. These slaves were forcibly slogged from menial errand duties to more arduous tasks vital to the military, economy, society and the luxury of the nobility; which for instance included acting as slave soldiers for the land army and rowing the oars for war galleys owned by the navy, ploughing the fields and harvesting crops, working in the mines, quarries and sites of construction, or merely tending to domestic chores for the clergy, mercantile class, soldierly, and the noble caste. However, even though the practice of slavery survived after the fall of the two empires, and many nations have still employed forced labor and slave trade for the past centuries until it deteriorated due to countless slave revolts that amounted to thousands of civilian and military casualties, it became apparent to be counterproductive for a nation's growth. As a compromise and to recompense at the loss labor, however, slavery was replaced by serfdom as the concept of feudalism and manorialism slowly rose into prominence throughout Neutomia.