Freed slaves, their status and state control in Ancient Greece

Freed slaves in the ancient Greek world usually held the legal status of foreigners or non-citizen residents. The Greek states adopted various means to control social distinctions, and in many cases actively engaged in the process of manumission and its publication, thus applying public interests to private concerns. This is evident from many manumission documents, which allude to the involvement of political institutions in manumission, and to payments made by freed slaves to the treasurers or other officials. It can also be inferred from documents in which ex-owners seemingly grant to their freed slaves several civic rights and sometimes even citizenship.