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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §18.2.17.pr

Effects of a Bulk Better Offer for Separately Sold Slaves

Passage 2686 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

Julian discusses the validity of prior sales when a third party makes a higher bulk offer for two slaves who had been conditionally knocked down to two different buyers. He explains that the scope of rescission depends on whether the price increase applies to one slave or both, and that the original purchases remain valid if the allocation of the increase is uncertain.

[IULIANUS libro quinto decimo digestorum. ] §18.2.17.prCum duo serui duobus separatim denis in diem addicti sint et exstiterit qui pro utroque triginta det, refert, unius pretio decem an singulorum quina adiciat: secundum superiorem adiectionem is seruus inemptus erit, cuius pretio adiectio facta fuerit, secundum posteriorem adiectionem uterque ad posteriorem emptorem pertinebit: quod si incertum sit, ad utrius pretium addiderit, a priore emptione non uidetur esse discessum.
[JULIAN, Digest, book 15.] When two slaves have been conditionally sold to two persons separately for ten each, subject to a better offer by a certain day, and someone appears who offers thirty for both, it makes a difference whether he adds ten to the price of one or five to each of them: according to the former addition, that slave in respect of whose price the addition was made will be unbought; according to the latter addition, both will belong to the later purchaser; but if it is uncertain to which one's price he made the addition, there is deemed to have been no departure from the prior purchase.

Notes

  1. §18.2.17.prduobus separatim denis — duobus is a dative substantival use meaning "to two different buyers." denis is the ablative of price of the distributive numeral deni (ten each), meaning "separately for ten each."
  2. §18.2.17.prinemptus erit — inemptus (the negative prefix in- + emptus "bought") expresses the state of being "unbought" or "unsold," meaning that under the clause of conditional sale (in diem addictio), the prior contract is retroactively invalidated due to the better offer.
  3. §18.2.17.pra priore emptione non uidetur esse discessum — discessum [esse] is an impersonal passive infinitive of the intransitive verb discedere (to depart, withdraw). discedere ab emptione is a legal idiom meaning "to withdraw from (or rescind) a sale," and the phrase means "there is deemed to have been no withdrawal from the prior purchase."

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §18.2.17.pr. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:18.2.17.pr

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