mentions (II, 9) that disobedient penestae were beaten and that generally speaking, they were treated like chattel slaves. They appear to have been much less numerous than the free Thessalians.

From a passage in Demosthenes, it appears that the penestae sometimes accompanied their masters to battle, and fought on horseback as their knights or vassals. The penestae of Thessaly also resembled the Spartan helots