Publications [#303189] of Joshua D. Sosin

Papers Published

1. Sosin, JD, Ransom at Athens ([Dem.] 53.11), Historia: Zeitschrift fuer Alte Geschichte, vol. 66 no. 2 (April, 2017), pp. 130-146, ISSN 0018-2311
   (last updated on 2024/04/24)

   Abstract:
   “The laws even command that he who is ransomed belongs to the one who ransomed him from the enemy, if he does not pay the ransom” ([Dem] 53.11). This is widely regarded as an exception to Solon’ s law against enslavement for debt. Harris has made a strong case that the law cited by Apollodoros’ opponent did not concern debt-slavery. This paper suggests, furthermore, that the law did not apply to him and his situation at all; that we have misunderstood what this law “commands;” that ransom was a more varied process than scholars have allowed; and that the law on ransom, so often thought to have been an exception to the ban on debt-slavery, may in fact have been essential to the broader objective of which the ban was part.