Coll 34/3 'Slavery and Slave Trade: Red Sea and Arabia: Attitude of Ibn Saud' [‎32r] (68/886)

11. A slave has no civil rights and is regarded as a piece of his master’s
property. He has no legal redress against his master for ill-treatment, and cannot
run away without risk of apprehension and return to his master for a punishment
which may vary from a warning, through increased work and less food, to hand
cuffing and beating according to the taste of the master and the frequency of the
offence. He may buy and sell property, but such property as he buys is considered
as belonging to his master, and anything he may earn is his master’s unless the
latter expressly allows him to keep it. A slave may be sold, or given as a present,
or used as currency for a bet; it was related in 1931 how the King bet
Sheikh Yusuf Yasin a young slave-girl if he would but pass the night with her
in a reputedly haunted cave. He may marry a free or slave woman; though any
children born of it are slaves of the woman’s owner, while' the marriage is
automatically dissolved if one of the partners is sold elsewhere.
Treatment of Slaves.
12. There is thus ample scope for the ill-treatment of slaves. In practice,
however it seems clear that the generality of slaves enjoy treatment which is at
least no’worse than that habitually meted out by the strong to the weak m so
primitive a societv as that of Saudi Arabia. Brutal masters can and may ill-
treat their slaves.' A discontented slave has, however, the right to appeal to the
administrative officer or the Sharia Court and demand to be sold to another
master, which demand can only be resisted by a master strong enough to be above
the law In the vicinity of Jedda the presence of the Legation and the refuge
it is known to afford to runaway slaves provides a salutary inducement to masters
to content their slaves. Above these reasons, however, lie the many Koranic
injunctions towards the humane treatment of slaves and the merit to be acquired
hv freeing them which seem to induce m the average master a feeling ot
Lcurltfof tenure of holding slaves “ on sufferance” as Mr Eldon Butter puts
it which expresses itself in kindness and indulgence towards thenn
13. Ibn Sand’s own slaves, particularly his personal bodyguard, are the b
example of well-treated and contented slaves whose lot is ^ of
tribesmen; so well provided are they with clothing and P ’ .^ ^ t p
the Bedouin Arab has few desires. It must not, of c “ ^.^?fdesert in
slaves are in so happy a position. Amongst the average
particular, life is so hard and its standard so low that the ^ v ° f f "XjJ t p e d in
all hours as herdsman, camel-driver or porter, mad^ua^^
rags, cannot but be unpleasant; but here again e . s a , them equally
nomad, for where only the bare necessities of life exist all share 1 h ^ } most
14. The way in which slavery is interpreted by the Arabs
strikingly exemplified in the smaller households of ^ tow sc e id ble
can only afford to keep one or two slaves, m ^^P^cbase of whmh a ^“
part of the family fortunes are invested to do ^ do " is
the family income by plying a trade pntsid . wearing 1 the same clothes
treated simply as one of the family, eating the sam y p ^The master will
as any member of it and sharing the fortunes example by having him
often concern himself closely with the slave s we _ , dave-wife or bv allowing
taught to read and chant the Koran, by finding paragraph 21 (d) below) to
him to keep some of his earnings so as even J? a s i a ve to inherit some
purchase his freedom; and it is no uncommon ? ■ \ n one family such slaves
or all of his master’s estate. After many years ^ authority, the younger
are often awarded a position of great , ue ment( 0 f the family affairs
members being taught to defer to them and e & • particularly notice-
or business being partly or entirely entrusted to them. It m^pa ^ ^ A
able that such families regard the * honour ^ ^ - ^ t0 their female slave,
Jedda family recently declined to give local manum ^ ^ Jedda ag a f ee
who had taken refuge in the Legation an w •£ gbe subsequently left the
woman, on the grounds that their honom won t £ £ be CO untry. Suen
paths of virtue* and insisted that she should be sent out^^ they d
families make a point of maintaining then 0 ^ starve ” are for the most
suggestions that old slaves are frequently a sometimes fall on hard times
part groundless, though it is true that o s ^ wo re cent occurrences may ,
when their master dies and the family bieav P- ^ slaves become identilie
perhaps, be worth quoting as showing the w y B 2
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