I'm not entirely sure that Paul's comment on serfdom not breaking up  
families is supportable. While it is my understanding that generally a  
serf/serf family was tied to a piece of land or a manorial holding,  
I'm not sure that was always true and I have seen at least anecdotal  
reports of serfs being transfered to another holding of the same lord.

Part of the reason we know that slavery breaks up families is that the  
slavery in question (US) ended recently and the records are good.  
Serfdom went out of use in Western Europe hundreds of years ago and  
the records of what happened to individual serfs or families is not  
well documented (at least to my knowledge). Serfdom in Eastern Europe  
and Russia ended more recently, and it is still practiced in some  
parts of the world. But I'm not sure how well it is documented or to  
what extent it has been studied.

On Jun 25, 2008, at 10:07 AM, Paul Finkelman wrote:

> I think there are a number of reasons for the focus on slave traders  
> in the US (and the purchasers of slaves and the slaveowners who sold  
> slaves -- in other words the people involved in the domestic trade  
> -- rather than the original African suppliers.  Here are some of the  
> issues:
>
> 4:  Perhaps the worst aspect of slavery was not the work or even the  
> physical punishment, but the denial of the right of slaves to be  
> truly married and raise their families (this is one reason why  
> American slavery was so much worse than serfdom).  The slave trade  
> was the major vehicle for undermining slave families.

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