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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §40.5.7.pr

Security for Manumission upon Partial Recovery of Legacy

Passage 6417 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

It addresses a legacy conditional on purchasing and manumitting a third party's slave, establishing that if the heir's estate is insolvent and paid only in part, the legatee must provide security to manumit, provided the received amount is sufficient for the slave's price.

[ULPIANUS libro sexagesimo tertio ad edictum. ] §40.5.7.prSi cui legata sint centum ita, ut seruum alienum redimat et manumittat, et bonis heredis uenditis partem, non totum persequatur, non alias debet consequi legatum, quam si cauerit se manumissurum (sed hoc tunc demum, si largiatur portio quam accepit ad serui pretium paratusque sit dominus tanti eum uendere): alioquin exceptione doli debebit legatarius repelli.
[ULPIANUS in the sixty-third book on the Edict.] If one hundred [units] have been bequeathed to someone on the condition that he purchase and manumit another's slave, and, the property of the heir having been sold, he recovers only a part and not the whole, he ought not to obtain the legacy otherwise than if he has given security that he will manumit him (but this only if the portion which he received is sufficient for the price of the slave, and the owner is prepared to sell him for that price); otherwise, the legatee must be repelled by the plea of fraud.

Notes

  1. §40.5.7.prbonis heredis uenditis — An ablative absolute indicating a situation where the heir's property is sold (bonorum venditio) due to insolvency, as a result of which the legatee recovers only a part (partem) as a dividend rather than the whole (totum).
  2. §40.5.7.prnon alias... quam si — A correlative construction meaning "not otherwise than if...", expressing a strict condition. Here it indicates that providing security (cauerit) is an indispensable condition for obtaining the legacy.
  3. §40.5.7.prlargiatur — Present subjunctive third-person singular of the deponent verb largiri (to give bountifully). Here it is used in the sense of "to be sufficient or adequate (for the price of the slave)," with the preceding portio (portion) as its subject.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §40.5.7.pr. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:40.5.7.pr

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