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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §38.1.15.pr-38.1.15.1

Freedman's Illness Exemption and Indivisibility of Services

Passage 5900 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

Ulpian discusses the exemption of a freedman who cannot render services due to illness, and explains that since a service is indivisible, multiple services must be divided by number among multiple heirs or co-patrons, citing Papinian and Celsus.

[ULPIANUS libro trigensimo octauo ad edictum. ] §38.1.15.prLibertus, qui post indictionem operarum ualetudine impeditur, quo minus praestet operas, non tenetur: nec enim potest uideri per eum stare, quo minus operas praestet.
[ULPIANUS, in the thirty-eighth book on the Edict.] A freedman who, after the announcement of the services, is prevented by ill health from rendering them, is not liable; for it cannot be considered to be due to his own fault that he does not render the services.
§38.1.15.1Neque promitti neque solui nec deberi nec peti pro parte poterit opera.
A service can neither be promised, nor performed, nor owed, nor demanded in part.
ideo Papinianus subicit: si non una, sed plures operae sint et plures heredes existant patrono qui operas stipulatus est, uerum est obligationem operarum numero diuidi.
Therefore, Papinian adds: if there is not just one, but several services, and several heirs of the patron who stipulated for the services exist, it is true that the obligation of the services is divided by number.
denique Celsus libro duodecimo scribit, si communis libertus patronis duobus operas mille daturum se iurauerit aut communi eorum seruo promiserit, quingenas potius deberi, quam singularum operarum dimidias.
Finally, Celsus writes in his twelfth book that if a common freedman has sworn that he will give one thousand services to two patrons, or has promised them to their common slave, five hundred each are owed rather than halves of individual services.

Notes

  1. §38.1.15.prquo minus — A conjunction taking the subjunctive, used after verbs or expressions of hindering or preventing (here impeditur and per eum stare with a negative) to mean 'from doing...' or 'lest...'.
  2. §38.1.15.prper eum stare — An idiomatic expression meaning 'to be due to him that [something is not done]' or 'to be his fault that...'. It is typically followed by quo minus with the subjunctive. Here, negated by non... potest uideri, it means 'it cannot be seen as being due to his fault that he does not render them'.
  3. §38.1.15.1opera — The singular form refers to 'a single service' (typically a day's work). It denotes that this single unit of service is legally and physically indivisible (pro parte), meaning it cannot be promised, performed, or demanded in part.
  4. §38.1.15.1quingenas potius deberi, quam singularum operarum dimidias — In this comparative clause, deberi is understood after quam. By using the distributive numeral quingenae (five hundred each), it asserts that an obligation of five hundred whole services arises for each of the two patrons, rather than dividing each individual service into halves (dimidias).

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §38.1.15.pr-38.1.15.1. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:38.1.15.pr-38.1.15.1

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