\doc\web\99\15\wslav.txt From: "John Derbyshire" To: Subject: RE: [h-bd] It wasn't me Date sent: Mon, 11 Oct 1999 13:15:21 -0700 > Arthur Hu wrote: > > Let's not forget the biblical enslavement of the Jews, isn't > that largely the same economic arrangement? > Which one? The Jews were enslaved at least three times (Egyptians, Babylonians, Romans). Following the crushing of the 79 A.D. uprising, a Roman reported the slave market was so glutted that Jews were cheaper than horses. We English were also enslaved by the Romans. Ca. 595 A.D. Gregory the Great, at that point still only a Bishop, was strolling in the slave market at Rome when he saw two beautiful fair-haired children for sale. "What kind of people are these?" he asked the vendor. "Angli," said the man. [=English] "Non Angli sed angeli," replied the quick-witted pontiff-to-be. [Not English-- angels!] When he became Pope, Gregory dispatched Augustine to England to convert us... and that is how England became a Christian country. English schoolchildren used to learn this story at an early age. Now, I suppose they read Maya Angelou instead. It wasn't just the Romans, either. Irish slave-traders were a menace in 4th-century Britain, raiding across the Irish sea. St Patrick was first taken to Ireland as a slave (his family were well-born Britons). "British slave-girl" was a unit of currency in early-medieval Ireland-- the "cumal", equivalent to three cows*. Gerry Adams please note. *THE AGE OF ARTHUR by John Morris, ch. 8. John Derbyshire 15 Chestnut Street Huntington, NY 11743-7104 Phone: (516) 427-6481 Fax: (516) 351-4006 (but call first) Email: olimu@li.net Web site: http://olimu.com