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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §1.3.34.pr

Validity of Local Custom and Confirmation in Court

Passage 53 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

Ulpian explains that when a local or provincial custom is relied upon, one must first investigate whether it has been confirmed even after being contested in a court of law.

[IDEM libro IIII de officio proconsulis. ] §1.3.34.prCum de consuetudine ciuitatis uel prouinciae confidere quis uidetur, primum quidem illud explorandum arbitror, an etiam contradicto aliquando iudicio consuetudo firmata sit.
[THE SAME, On the Office of Proconsul, book 4] When someone appears to rely on a custom of a city or a province, I think that this must first of all be investigated: whether the custom has been confirmed even when on some occasion it was contested in court.

Notes

  1. §1.3.34.prcontradicto aliquando iudicio — An ablative absolute construction consisting of contradicto (perfect passive participle of contradicere, "to contest/contradict") and iudicio ("trial, judgment"). It carries a concessive nuance ("even though contested in court on some occasion"), meaning whether the custom survived judicial challenge.
  2. §1.3.34.prillud explorandum — A passive periphrastic construction with the gerundive explorandum (with esse omitted) in an accusative-with-infinitive clause. The pronoun illud acts as the subject of this clause and anticipates (prolepsis) the subsequent indirect question clause introduced by an.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §1.3.34.pr. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:1.3.34.pr

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