As Rome’s relentless expansion continued into the imperial age, so too were Gauls, Britons, Germanic tribespeople, and others sucked into the slave system. Slave piracy was a bane across Europe and the wider Mediterranean. The first-century b.c. Greek historian and philosopher Strabo described slaver brigands terrorizing the lands around Armenia and Syria, rounding up civilians and shipping them off for sale. “[This] proved most profitable,” he wrote, “for not only were they easily captured, but the market, which was large and rich in property, was not extremely far away.”
