Monday, July 27, 2009


Russian Slavery

An ongoing problem for the Russian peoples since the days of Ottoman-Turk rule over Russian sovereignty. In the work titled "The Crimean Tatars and their Russian-Captive Slaves" Eizo Matsuki, of the Mediterranean Studies Group at Hitotsubashi University. Matsuki's research into the Legal Codes of the Russian nations aptly named "Law Code of Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich". The specific Code of reference is a seven article piece, "The Redemption of Military Captives". The language calls for a tax to pay for the return of Russian captives. The Crimean Khanate, the Ottoman Empire, and various other slave traders some from Greek origins would receive the taxed income in return for Russian slaves.

Matsuki reveals a twisted history of slavery between the Western Kingdoms of France, Spain, Italy, Egypt, and throughout much of the Byzantine Empire, the victims all of Russian, Circassian, and Tatar origins. The span of Matsuki's essay covers the 11th through to 17th century. Matsuki, quotes S. Herbstein, an ambassador from the Emperor of Germany to the Russain throne describing a specific slave traders legendary number of captives "they say the number exceeded eight hundred thousand" (pg. 7 Matsuki). Whether the number was near millions of in the area of a few hundred means very little to the people involved in the horrific economies that condone slave trafficking. Regardless of the age, the Russian slave in the 12th century deserves the same mercy as the Russian slave in the 21st century.

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