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All the various forms of slavery, a practice still prevalent in the world today, have been the object of intense study and analysis for centuries. The forms and nature of slavery in the ancient Chinese world, however, have been far less studied and the evidence in transmitted texts is much more limited. In recent years a great number of new sources have been recovered by archaeologists that enable research on the institution and practice of slavery in the early Chinese empires. This paper will initiate an exploration of some of this new data in the light of a few of the questions that have been raised by sociologists, historians, comparativists, and scholars of the ancient Mediterranean world.

Robin Yates specializes in the history of Chinese law, the social and cultural history of pre-modern China including slavery, the history of Chinese military science and technology, and the history of Chinese women. His most recent book, a collaboration with Anthony J. Barbieri-Low, Law, State, and Society in Early Imperial China: A Study with Critical Edition and Translation of the Legal Texts from Zhangjiashan Tomb no. 247, was published by Brill in 2 volumes in 2015 and was awarded Honorable Mention in the Patrick D. Hanan Book Prize for Translation (China and Inner Asia), Association for Asian Studies, in 2018. He is currently researching and publishing on various aspects (such as disability) of the newly discovered and recovered legal and administrative documents dating from the Qin and Han periods, found in tombs and at the site of the Qin County of Qianling, modern Liye, Hunan Province, and those found in Changsha, including the Eastern Han documents from Wuyi Square, and other sites.

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