Typically women had no rights, and were held legally as chattels. Sometimes the purpose of a battle, if not of a war, was to capture women, a practice known as raptio the Rape of the Sabines involved, according to tradition, a large mass-abduction by the founders of Rome. Typically, victors made little distinction between enemy combatants and enemy civilians, although they were more likely to spare women and children. Homer's Iliad describes Greek and Trojan soldiers offering rewards of wealth to opposing forces who have defeated them on the battlefield in exchange for mercy, but their offers are not always accepted see Lycaon for example. Early Roman gladiators could be prisoners of war, categorised according to their ethnic roots as Samnites, Thracians, and Gauls ( Galli). 5.3 Treatment of POWs by the Western AlliesĮngraving of Nubian prisoners, Abu Simbel, Egypt, 13th century BCįor most of human history, depending on the culture of the victors, enemy fighters on the losing side in a battle who had surrendered and been taken as prisoners of war could expect to be either slaughtered or enslaved.5.2.1 Germans, Romanians, Italians, Hungarians, Finns.5.2 Treatment of POWs by the Soviet Union.3.2 French Revolutionary wars and Napoleonic wars.

3.1 European settlers captured in North America.

Age of warring empire exchange codes