Whatever you choice Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Whatever you choice - Term Paper Example All these were slaves but had different degree of privilege. The essay gives an account of how the Romans farmed. The main source of labour for the Romans was slaves. The slaves were acquired in three ways. First, through conquest in war, this is whereby many landowners went for war and brought back captives (White 1). The captives were sold to other citizens or worked on the capture’s farm. Second, the slaves were bought from the market. Third, by birth that is children born by the slaves also became slaves (Phillips 221). As earlier discussed, each slave had different degree of privilege for proper administration of the farms. Before the establishment of large-scale farming, Romans practiced small-scale farming. There were different reasons for the adoption of large-scale farming. First, the wars brought a drastic decrease in free labor. Second, many farmers were ruined due to the devastation of Italy by Hannibal (McGeough 99). After the war, the rich citizen bought the land and leased it to the government. The government used the slaves as their main source of labour (White 1). Due to the great competition, the small-scale farmers gave up. The rich farmers improved the fencing and drainage system for more productivity. Water was conserved by building of dams and cisterns. Trees were planted around the farms to act as windbreakers. Romans were among the first people to employ mixed farming. This is because due to the depilation of the farms they became infertile (White 23). Because of this, they used farmyard manure from the farm animals to keep their farms fertile. Where stock was not kept, farmers made compost manure using banana leaves, weeds straw and other rubbish, which do not decay easily. Although they did not have knowledge on nitrogen-fixing bacteria, they knew how to plant legumes (McGeough 97). They had mechanisms to test sourness of the soil though they did not have litmus paper. They employed