“As the empire changed, and social conditions along with it, the spread of slavery slowed and eventually was transformed. The Christian church and its policies regarding bondage helped alter the conditional mindset of the populace, despite the fact that it and its priest often owned slaves as well. More importantly perhaps than the religious notions, however, were the economic and even military conditions of the time. As Roman military objectives were altered from one of conquest to border defense, the continual mass influx of new slave labor ceased. The cost to purchase slaves along with a completely destablized economy made employment of the free masses at cheap wages a far more attractive alternative. The shift from central Roman Imperial power to local lords, kings and feudalism brought about a new condition of serf or peasant labor where the masses were not necessarily owned slaves but were tied directly to the land owned by these local lords. While in theory this evolution from ancient slavery to middle age European serfdom may have been more attractive, the conditions of the time and the drastically limited personal opportunities may have been far worse, or at least no better than the ancient Roman form of slavery.”