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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §3.3.70.pr

Action on Delegated Debt Conditioned on Tutor Defense

Passage 553 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

A case where a father appointed his creditor as tutor, and after successive inheritances, the debt was left to Titius; the response states that Titius cannot exercise the delegated action unless he defends the heirs who delegated it against the guardianship action.

[SCAEUOLA libro primo responsorum. ] §3.3.70.prPater filio suo pupillo tutorem dedit Sempronium creditorem suum: is administrata tutela reliquit fratrem suum heredem, qui et ipse decessit et per fideicommissum nomen debitoris Titio reliquit eique mandatae sunt actiones ab heredibus: quaero, cum tam tutelae actio quam pecuniae creditae ex hereditate Sempronii descendant, an non aliter mandata actio ei detur, quam si defendat heredes, a quibus ei actiones mandatae sunt.
[SCAEUOLA in the first book of Opinions.] A father appointed his creditor Sempronius as tutor to his pupil son. This man, after administering the guardianship, left his brother as his heir; who himself also died, and by a fideicommissum left the debt of the debtor to Titius, and the actions were mandated to Titius by the heirs. I ask, since both the action of guardianship and the action for loaned money derive from the inheritance of Sempronius, whether the mandated action should not be granted to him otherwise than if he defends the heirs by whom the actions were mandated to him.
respondi debere defendere.
I answered that he ought to defend them.

Notes

  1. §3.3.70.prnomen debitoris — The word 'nomen' (literally, name) refers to an entry in an account book, meaning a 'claim' or 'debt'. In this context, 'debitor' refers to the deceased father, so 'nomen debitoris' means the claim against the debtor (the father).
  2. §3.3.70.pran non aliter ... quam si — This is a combination of the interrogative particle 'an' and the restrictive conditional construction 'non aliter... quam si' (not otherwise... than if). It indicates that the delegated action should be granted to Titius only on the condition that he defends the heirs.
  3. §3.3.70.prrespondi debere defendere — An accusative with infinitive construction where both the subject and the object are omitted. Based on the context, the implied subject of 'debere' is Titius (referring to 'ei' in the previous sentence), and the object of 'defendere' is the heirs ('heredes').

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §3.3.70.pr. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:3.3.70.pr

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