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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §47.9.12.pr-47.9.12.1

Recovery of Shipwrecked Goods and Status-Based Arson Penalties

Passage 7999 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

Ulpian discusses the legality of recovering one's own shipwrecked property and the status-based punishments for arsonists, ranging from being thrown to wild beasts to death or deportation.

[ULPIANUS libro octauo de officio proconsulis. ] §47.9.12.prLicere unicuique naufragium suum impune colligere constat: idque imperator Antoninus cum diuo patre suo rescripsit.
[ULPIAN, On the Office of Proconsul, book eight.] It is established that everyone is permitted to recover their own shipwrecked property with impunity, and the Emperor Antoninus, along with his deified father, stated this in a rescript.
§47.9.12.1Qui data opera in ciuitate incendium fecerint, si humiliore loco sint, bestiis obici solent: si in aliquo gradu id fecerint, capite puniuntur aut certe in insulam deportantur.
Those who intentionally cause a fire in a city are customarily thrown to the beasts if they are of lower status; if they do so while holding some higher rank, they are punished with death or at least deported to an island.

Notes

  1. §47.9.12.prnaufragium — Although the word literally means the event of a 'shipwreck', it is used here metonymically to refer to the shipwrecked property, cargo, or debris.
  2. §47.9.12.1data opera — An idiomatic ablative phrase combining data (perfect passive participle of dare) and opera (effort, attention), meaning adverbially 'intentionally' or 'on purpose'.
  3. §47.9.12.1humiliore loco ... in aliquo gradu — This reflects the distinction in punishments based on social status (honestiores vs. humiliores) in the high and late Roman Empire. Both loco and gradu are ablatives of status/rank; the former indicates a 'lower station', while the latter refers to holding 'some (higher) rank'.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §47.9.12.pr-47.9.12.1. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:47.9.12.pr-47.9.12.1

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