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Justinian I · The Digest of Justinian §50.7.5.pr-50.7.5.6

Qualifications, Deputies, and Limits on Envoys

Passage 8741 of 9271 · Latin

Summary

This chunk describes the qualifications for serving on an embassy (excluding municipal debtors and those without the right of postulating, while allowing treasury debtors), limits on appointing deputies, rules of succession for selection, and the restriction on sending no more than three envoys per city.

[MARCIANUS libro duodecimo institutionum. ] §50.7.5.prSciendum est debitorem rei publicae legatione fungi non posse: et ita diuus Pius Claudio Saturnino et Faustino rescripsit.
[MARCIANUS, from the twelfth book of Institutes.] It must be known that a debtor to a municipality cannot serve on an embassy; and the deified Pius replied by rescript in this sense to Claudius Saturninus and Faustinus.
§50.7.5.1Sed et eos, quibus ius postulandi non est, legatione fungi non posse et ideo harena missum non iure legatum esse missum diui Seuerus et Antoninus rescripserunt.
But also those who do not have the right of postulating cannot serve on an embassy, and therefore one discharged from the arena was not lawfully sent as an envoy, as the deified Severus and Antoninus replied by rescript.
§50.7.5.2Debitores autem fisci non prohibentur legatione fungi.
Debtors to the treasury, however, are not prohibited from serving on an embassy.
§50.7.5.3Si accusatio alicuius publice instituta sit, non est compellendus accusator ad eum legationem suscipere, qui se amicum uel domesticum dicit eius, qui accusatur: et ita diui fratres Aemilio Rufo rescripserunt.
If a public prosecution of someone has been instituted, the accuser is not to be compelled to undertake an embassy to a person who claims to be a friend or a member of the household of the accused; and the deified brothers replied by rescript in this sense to Aemilius Rufus.
§50.7.5.4Legati uicarios dare non alios possunt nisi filios suos.
Envoys cannot appoint any others as deputies except their own sons.
§50.7.5.5Ordine unusquisque munere legationis fungi cogitur: et non alias compellendus est munere legationis fungi, quam si priores, qui in curiam lecti sunt, functi sint.
Everyone is compelled to serve on an embassy in order of succession; and one is not to be compelled to serve on an embassy otherwise than if those of prior rank, who were elected to the senate, have already served.
sed si legatio de primoribus uiris desideret personas et qui ordine uocantur inferiores sint, non esse obseruandum ordinem diuus Hadrianus ad Clazomenios rescripsit.
But if an embassy requires persons from among the leading men, and those who are called in order of succession are of lower rank, the order need not be observed, as the deified Hadrian replied by rescript to the inhabitants of Clazomenae.
§50.7.5.6Praecipitur autem edicto diui Uespasiani omnibus ciuitatibus, ne plures quam ternos legatos mittant.
Moreover, it is commanded by an edict of the deified Vespasian to all cities that they should not send more than three envoys.

Notes

  1. §50.7.5.1harena missum — Literally "one discharged from the arena," referring to a retired gladiator. Because such a person was considered infamous (infamis), they lacked the qualification to serve on an embassy. missum is the accusative masculine singular of the perfect passive participle of mittere, which here serves as the subject of the accusative-with-infinitive construction legatum esse missum (that he was sent as an envoy).
  2. §50.7.5.3ad eum legationem suscipere, qui se amicum uel domesticum dicit eius, qui accusatur — The relative clause qui... modifying ad eum contains a nested relative clause qui accusatur modifying eius. The genitive pronoun eius depends on amicum uel domesticum. The whole structure means "to undertake an embassy to a person who claims to be a friend or a member of the household of the one who is accused."
  3. §50.7.5.5non alias... quam si — A correlative expression of conditional restriction meaning "not otherwise than if" or "only if." non alias is paired with quam si, indicating that the compulsion (compellendus est) applies only when the condition in the following clause with functi sint (perfect subjunctive) is met.

Cite this passage

Justinian I, The Digest of Justinian §50.7.5.pr-50.7.5.6. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi2806.phi002.humanitext-lat1:50.7.5.pr-50.7.5.6

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