Chapter 191: The Treatment of Prisoners Digging the Canal

Before nightfall, Roy's large fleet returned to the port of Piraeus in a mighty manner.

After letting Aries and a thousand soldiers stay in the port to guard the warships, Loy took the remaining soldiers and sent more than a thousand prisoners to a prisoner-of-war camp outside Athens.

Outside Athens.

POW camp.

After two thousand prisoners of war gathered together, Roy couldn't help but feel tremendous pressure.

If Roy wanted to use these two thousand prisoners to dig the Corinth Canal, he would have to make them eat three kilograms of grain every day. Two thousand prisoners of war would consume six thousand kilograms of grain every day.

These two thousand prisoners not only brought huge food pressure to the city of Athens, but also constituted a huge security risk.

If these two thousand captives unite to rebel, even without weapons, they can cause huge damage to the city of Athens.

Now Roy couldn't even help himself and had the idea of ​​selling them all to slave traders.

Thinking that Crete would become his territory in the future and these captives would become his people, Roy suppressed the idea of ​​selling the captives to slave traders and walked into the prisoner of war camp and said loudly.

"Prisoners! I don't care whether you are from Crete or a vassal island of Knossos. To me, your status is the same, so I will give you the same treatment. You have become mine. Prisoners, you should never blame me, but you should resent Deucalion for taking you into a losing war. I could have killed you to save food, or sold you to slave traders in exchange for food or supplies. Other things. But I don't want to kill you, nor do I want you to become slaves. I want to give you a new choice. If you are willing to work for me, you only need to work for five years to redeem your freedom. Go to your hometown and family. During these five years, I will provide you with food, clothing, housing and transportation. At the end of the five years, I will not only send you home, but also give you property worth six thousand kilograms of grain as a gift. Your reward for working for me.”

After hearing Roy's words, the prisoners all looked at each other, suspecting that they were dreaming.

By working for Roy for five years, not only can he redeem his freedom, but he can also receive six thousand kilograms of grain as a reward for five years of work——

Is there really such a good thing in the world?

Seeing the reactions of the prisoners, Roy continued.

"Prisoners! I can promise you in the name of Metis, the great goddess of the city of Athens, that I will never betray my promise to you. But at the same time, I cannot tolerate the defection of the captives. So some of you defect. , I will give those who defected the cruelest punishment.”

someone among the prisoners asked.

"What kind of work do you want us to do for you? If the job you give us is very dangerous, then we might as well become slaves. After all, we are likely to find good masters as slaves."

"The job I want to give you is to dig a canal six kilometers long and six meters wide. In order to reduce your work pressure, I will give you five years to dig this canal. If you dig it in four years For this canal, I will give you freedom in four years and give you property worth six thousand kilograms of grain as a reward. If you dig this canal in three years, you will be free in three years. body."

After Roy finished speaking, the prisoners all breathed a sigh of relief.

Even if the ground depth of the canal Roy wanted to dig was one hundred meters, on average, each prisoner would only need to dig 1,800 cubic meters.

It took five years to dig 1,800 cubic meters. On average, only one cubic meter was dug every day.

Since the work content was so easy, and not only food and accommodation were included, but also one hundred kilograms of grain as payment every month, the captives naturally had no reason to reject the choice given by Roy.

"Great King of Athens, you are really a benevolent ruler. If we dig the canal in only two and a half years, our monthly reward will be two hundred catties of grain. We are not like prisoners, but even more so. It’s like finding a good job that includes food and accommodation, and the monthly salary is two hundred catties of grain.”

"Even if we return to our hometown, it will be difficult to find a good job that provides food and accommodation, and the monthly salary is two hundred kilograms of grain."

"The king of Athens gave us such a good job, only a fool would become a defecting prisoner."

"If the King of Athens can help me bring a message to my family in my hometown and let them know that I am still alive, I am willing to swear never to defect."

After hearing the prisoners' request, Roy said immediately.

"After the war between Athens and Knossos is over, I can arrange for manpower to take your message to your family back home. If you do this for two months, I can also give your reward to your family. , so that you don’t have to worry about your family’s life.”

Listening to Roy's promise to the prisoners, even some Athenian soldiers couldn't help but complain.

"Are they really captives? When other city-state kings want captives to work, they directly turn them into slaves. If they are fed and clothed, they are treated very well."

"These prisoners really looked like a group of well-paid workers."

Hearing the complaints from the Athenian soldiers, Roy was not angry at all.

Because ordinary Athenian soldiers had no idea how much profit digging the Corinth Canal could bring Loy.

Compared with the benefits brought by the Corinth Canal, even if the rewards for the captives were increased hundreds of times, it would still be a hugely profitable deal for Roy.

Others couldn't understand Roy's approach, just because in this era, there was no need to pay any compensation for using slaves.

In the myth of another world, King Odysseus of Ithaca had a loyal slave, the swineherd Eumaeus.

Eumaeus was a slave raised by Odysseus' parents since childhood, and his position was the chief swineherd of Odysseus. It can be seen that Eumaeus was a slave with a high status around Odysseus.

But Eumaeus worked for Odysseus until he was forty years old, and he still had no wife.

Eumaeus had no wife, so naturally he had no children. Without a wife and children, he did not need his own property.

Even a loyal and highly valued slave who worked for his master Odysseus all his life did not have his own wife, children and property. This is the true portrayal of slaves in this era.

Roy could have turned captives into slaves and then exploited their life value, but he gave them freedom and paid them for their work. It is no wonder that people in this era could not understand Roy.

In fact, Roy could not understand the cruel exploitation of slaves by people in this era.

If Eumaeus was Roy's slave, after he worked loyally for five years, Roy would let Eumaeus become a free man, and let him have a wife, children and private property.

Eumaeus claimed to be the son of the king of Syria and was abducted by a Phoenician maid in the palace and became a slave.

If Eumaeus did not lie, Roy would arrange for Eumaeus to return to his hometown to inherit the throne.

Odysseus knew Eumaeus's identity, but he did not help Eumaeus return to his family, and even inherited the throne to become the king of Syria.

Perhaps Odysseus did not want to lose his loyal slaves, or perhaps he did not want to see his slaves become the king of an island with equal status to himself.

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