Slavery in Gaelic Regions
Gaelic Ireland and Scotland were among the last areas of Christian Europe to give up their institution of slavery. Under Gaelic custom, prisoners of war were routinely taken as slaves. However, ironically, it was during the period that slavery was disappearing across most of western Europe that it was reaching its zenith in Ireland and Scotland; during the Viking invasions and the subsequent warring between Scandinavians and the native Irish the number of captives taken as slaves drastically increased. The Irish church was vehemently opposed to slavery, and blamed the 1169 Norman invasion on the persistence of the practice, as well as the practices of polygyny and divorce.
Read more about this topic: Slavery In Medieval Europe
Famous quotes containing the words slavery in, slavery and/or regions:
“I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name,—if ten honest men only,—ay, if one HONEST man, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done forever.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It would be idle to say that we were not, from time to time, aware that a volcano slumbered fitfully beneath us. There were dark sides to the Slavery Question, for master, as for slave.”
—Marion Harland (1830–1922)
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—Salvador Dali (1904–1989)