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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §48.10.18.pr-48.10.18.1

Writing Legacies to Wives and Self-Appointment as Tutor

Passage 8284 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

The text discusses the permissibility of writing a legacy to one's wife in another's will, and how to handle someone who has self-nominated as a tutor for the testator's underage son.

[IDEM libro tertio sententiarum. ] §48.10.18.prUxori legatum in alieno testamento scribere non prohibemur.
[THE SAME, Opinions, Book III] We are not prohibited from writing a legacy to our wife in another person's will.
§48.10.18.1Qui se filio testatoris impuberi tutorem adscripsit, etsi suspectus esse praesumitur, quod ultro tutelam uidebitur affectasse, tamen, si idoneus esse adprobetur, non ex testamento, sed ex decreto tutor dandus est.
He who has written himself down as tutor to the underage son of the testator, even though he is presumed to be suspect because he will seem to have voluntarily sought the tutelage, nevertheless, if he is approved as fit, must be appointed tutor not by virtue of the will, but by decree.
nec excusatio eius admittetur, quia consensisse uidetur uoluntati testatoris.
Nor will his excuse be admitted, because he is deemed to have consented to the will of the testator.

Notes

  1. §48.10.18.prUxori — Dative case. It can be interpreted either as modifying the noun legatum ('a legacy to his wife') or as a dative of advantage modifying the infinitive scribere ('to write for his wife'). In either case, the practical meaning remains the same: writing a bequest for one's wife in another's will.
  2. §48.10.18.1Qui se filio testatoris impuberi tutorem adscripsit, ..., tutor dandus est — The relative clause beginning with 'qui' lacks an antecedent (such as 'is') and functions as the logical subject of the main clause's verb 'tutor dandus est'. The structure is interrupted by the insertion of the 'etsi' clause and the 'tamen, si' conditional clause, but the core syntactic skeleton is 'He who has written himself down as ... must be appointed tutor.'
  3. §48.10.18.1uidebitur affectasse — The verb in the reason clause with 'quod' is in the future tense 'uidebitur', combined with the perfect infinitive 'affectasse'. This indicates that when his past action of self-nomination is legally evaluated, he 'will be seen' as having voluntarily sought the office.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §48.10.18.pr-48.10.18.1. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:48.10.18.pr-48.10.18.1

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