Humanitext Reader

Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §39.5.16.pr

Written Lifetime Gift to Freedmen and Ownership

Passage 6231 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

Ulpian's response stating that, based on a liberal interpretation, the ownership of clothing and other possessions belongs to the specified freedmen when a patron leaves a written statement that he donated them during his lifetime.

[ULPIANUS libro secundo responsorum. ] §39.5.16.prEx hac scriptura: 'sciant heredes mei me nestem uniuersam ac res ceteras, quascumque in diem mortis meae mecum habui, 'illi et illi libertis meis uiuum donasse' dominium ad libertos benigna interpretatione pertinere.
[ULPIANUS in the second book of opinions.] this writing: 'Let my heirs know that I have during my lifetime donated to such and such of my freedmen all my clothing and other things, whatever I had with me up to the day of my death,' it follows by a liberal interpretation that the ownership belongs to the freedmen.

Notes

  1. §39.5.16.prnestem — A scribal error for uestem (clothing, garments).
  2. §39.5.16.pruiuum — The accusative masculine singular of the adjective uiuus agreeing with me, the subject of the infinitive donasse. It means 'during my lifetime' and indicates a donatio inter vivos (gift during life) rather than a legacy.
  3. §39.5.16.prpertinere — An infinitive in an accusative-and-infinitive construction acting as the main conclusion of the jurist's response (responsum), where the governing verb of deciding is implied.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §39.5.16.pr. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:39.5.16.pr

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