Juan Alejandro González Nestares

The Visigothic world is a paradigmatic example of how the attempts of explaining the transition from two supposedly unitary modes of production –the ancient and the feudal systems– have led to an overlooking or oversimplification of the dynamics and structures of the intermediate period. Thus, slaves are omnipresent in the sources, but we lack a clear explanation of their role in society. Moreover, past teleological narratives of the Visigothic kingdom, focused on explaining its collapse, created a bias in which certain appearances of slaves in the sources (flight, violent punishments) have been seen as symptomatic of a "failed state".

Therefore, we aim to overcome the problem of interpretation in only qualitative terms of "continuity" and "discontinuity" of slaving in Late Antique Hispania. We intend to review the evolution of slavery situations as a set of relations reproduced organically and institutionally. But where did these processes come from? For the Visigothic state, in constant adaptation to Roman realities and networks of secular and religious elites established after the imperial collapse, it will be fundamental to find out in which cases slaving strategies were at the service of central power and in which cases at the service of micro-politics.

Thus, to understand the situation of the slave population as property and from their humanity, our objective is to revisit traditional questions concerning the existence and extent of slave ownership by a sub-elite, the components of the slave supply, the various uses of slave labor, or its role in the production of commodities. But we also want to shed light on aspects of the sources of slaves, their role in local social life, their role in the ecclesiastical structure, and their situations of alleged systemic marginalisation in relation to patronage in the field of judicial and extrajudicial conflict resolution.

since 2021
PhD in Prehistory and Sciences of Antiquity, Universidad de Salamanca

2020–2021
Master's Degree in Research and Advanced Studies in History (Societies, Powers, Identities), Universidad de Salamanca

2016–2020
Degree in History, Universidad de Salamanca