The slave who did acquire wealth often bought his own freedom. The master had to balance the value to him of the ransom paid against the reversion of his entire property at his death. In such a case, of course, the master fixed the price he would accept as a ransom. The slave, however, if married to a slave wife would have to buy her freedom also, and buy each of his slave children if he had any. The prudent slave, therefore, married a free woman. The slave who thus acquired freedom, if a foreigner, might return to his own land, or join the ranks of the poor men who were free. He would thus become a _mushkênu_. This and similar considerations have led several scholars to translate _mushkênu_ by ‘freedman’. But a freedman is not necessarily a slave who has bought his freedom, but solely one who has been freed. The distinction is essential because slaves were often freed for other reasons. A large number of slaves were freed by adoption into the ranks of the _amêlu_. A Babylonian father usually portioned off his sons and daughters on their marriage. The sons, later, at his death, also shared what he had left. Daughters had no further share. As long as the father lived, if he fell into poverty or weak health his sons and daughters naturally were supposed to maintain and care for him. But they might agree that he should adopt a new son or daughter, to whom he would leave his residual estate, in return for maintenance and care as long as he lived. We have spoken of a father, but _mutatis mutandis_ a mother could do likewise. Some scholars think that most of the cases of adoption known to us are examples of a father adopting his natural sons by slave girls. But the adoption is usually accompanied by a ceremony of purification, symbolizing the emancipation from the taint of slavery. This would not be necessary in the case of a natural son of a patrician father. He was free any way at his father’s death, even if not acknowledged as heir. Now in all these cases of adoption of a child to care for one’s old age, we can presume that the adoptive parent is childless, as in the frequent cases of adoption by votaries, or else bereft of children by agreement with the grown-up family, who willingly resigned their reversion to the parent’s estate in exchange for freedom from the care of their aged parent. In some cases, the adoptive parents, hitherto childless, adopt a child with the proviso that if hereafter they do have begotten children, the present adopted one should rank as eldest son or daughter of the family. Many children were also adopted with the consent of their real parents, who were usually paid. This in some respects was a sale by free parents of their children. They had the right to sell a child to be a slave, but this was a sale to be son or daughter in freedom and was often a wise provision for that child’s future on the part of needy parents.