PROLETARIAT,SLAVE,SERF AND THE HANDICRAFT

THE PROLETARIAT, SLAVE, SERF AND THE HANDICRAFT

Over time in the history of modern world man has walked through various stages of life. At every given stage of life, society was equally at a distinct economic stage. In deed, the history of man proper covers a span of about forty thousand years (Eaton, 1966:10).The primitive man was a savage, he lived in savagery. The spears and the hunting trap were his first instruments for hunting down his preys. He must have felt cold, thus with fire he warmed himself and cooked his food. As time past or went on, he learnt how to make artificial dwelling places to replace his previous dwelling place -the caves and the rocks.

It is necessary to note that, with the development of agriculture, man's ways of acting and feeding transformed. As Eaton (1966) noted, his views about his surrounding began to find expression for each tribal communities in "totemic religions", i.e.

religions of a clan associated with ritualism for animals or plants.

As society transformed further, a differentiation began to emanate between those tribes or communities which had and had not forms of production. Thus, primitive division of labour developed as well as exchange. Of course primitive societies were not conflict free, when conflicts of wars erupted; those who emerged victorious were only cannibalistic on their captives, nothing more could be done to them or with them seeing that society was devoid of exploitation and enslavement.

However, with a further advancement in society, men began to produce with new tools, the method of farming increased to the level where man needed others to do his work for him so as to have more surpluses in his farm products. Hence, during wars, captives were enslaved and use to produce more in the farm for their...