Debtors, who
increased in number during famine, which occurred regularly,
became slaves by giving up the freeman's sword and spear, picking
up a slave's mattock [pick ax for the soils], and placing their
head within a lord's or lady's hands. They were called wite-
theows. The original meaning of the word lord was "loaf-giver".
Children with a slave parent were slaves. The slaves lived in huts
around the homes of big landholders, which were made of logs and
consisted on one large room or hall. An open hearth was in the
middle of the earthen floor of the hall, which was strewn with
rushes. There was a hole in the roof to let out the smoke. Here
the landholder and his men would eat meat, bread, salt, hot spiced
ale, and mead while listening to minstrels sing about the heroic
deeds of their ancestors. Richer men drank wine. There were
festivals which lasted several days, in which warriors feasted,
drank, gambled, boasted, and slept where they fell. Physical
strength and endurance in adversity were admired traits.
Slaves often were used as grain grinders, ploughmen, sowers,
haywards, woodwards, shepherds, goatherds, swineherds, oxherds,
cowherds, dairymaids, and barnmen. Slaves had no legal rights. A
lord could kill his slave at will. A wrong done to a slave was
regarded as done to his owner. If a person killed another man's
slave, he had to compensate him with the slave's purchase price.
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