human chattel
People as property
Human chattel refers to people legally classified as property—enslaved persons who could be bought, sold, inherited, or used as collateral.
The term emphasizes the dehumanizing reduction of people to movable goods.
The plantation's inventory listed human chattel alongside livestock and farm equipment.
Chattel slavery distinguished enslaved people from serfs bound to land, treating them instead as personal possessions with no legal personhood.
- thrallOne held captive
- convict leasingHiring out imprisoned people
- servitudeCompulsory labor under masters
- enslavementForced human ownership
- bondmanMale held in servitude
servant · fugitive slave laws · slave catcher · serfdom · manacle · shackles · subjugation · chains · helot · fetters · manumission · debt bondage · transatlantic slave trade · cotton plantation · yoke · indenture · slave auctions · forced labor
human chattelslaveholder
Owner of enslaved persons
master · slave owner · slaveowner · enslaver · plantation owner
human chattelproperty owner
One who holds title
wage earner · entrepreneur · employer · capitalist · freeholder
human, humans, humane, humanly, humanity, humanities, humanize, humanized, humanizing