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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §40.4.35.pr

Direct Freedom and Slave Ownership at Will and Death

Passage 6383 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

The passage presents Servius's opinion that direct freedom can be granted by a will only to those slaves who belonged to the testator both at the time the will was made and at the time of death, endorsing this view as correct.

[IDEM libro quinquagensimo ad edictum. ] §40.4.35.prSeruius existimabat iis posse seruis dari testamento directam libertatem, qui utroque tempore, et quo testamentum fit et quo moritur, testatoris fuerunt: quae sententia uera est.
[THE SAME in the fiftieth book on the Edict.] Servius was of the opinion that direct freedom could be given by a will to those slaves who belonged to the testator at both times, namely, when the will is made and when he dies; which opinion is correct.

Notes

  1. §40.4.35.priis posse seruis dari testamento directam libertatem — The subject accusative of the infinitive posse is directam libertatem, and dari is the passive infinitive. iis seruis is a dative depending on dari and is modified by the relative clause qui...
  2. §40.4.35.prtestatoris fuerunt — testatoris is a genitive of possession or characteristic, serving as the complement of the verb fuerunt (third-person plural perfect of esse) to mean "belonged to the testator".
  3. §40.4.35.prutroque tempore, et quo... et quo... — utroque tempore is an ablative of time, which is further explained by the appositive parallel relative clauses et quo [tempore]... et quo [tempore]... quo is the ablative of the relative pronoun referring to the understood noun tempore in each clause.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §40.4.35.pr. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:40.4.35.pr

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