Legal History Commons^™

The Origins Of Usus, Alan Watson

Scholarly Works

It has long been recognized that the XII Tables was not a complete statement of the law, and that some topics of great legal importance were either not set out or were very partially treated. The general opinion has been, however, that the fragmentary state of our knowledge of the XII Tables' provisions makes it impossible to be precise as to the the topics not dealt with or treated only in part. Recently, though, I have tried to show that we have some information on the great majority of the clauses in the XII Tables: hence on this view, where …

Emptio, "Taking", Alan Watson

Scholarly Works

According to Festus, "Emere, quod nunc est mer cari, antiqui acdpiebant pro sumere" and modern philologists do accept some such meaning as the original in Latin. The Thesaurus Linguae Latinae however, thinks there is no certain example of this sense of emere and considers the instances adduced by Skutsch to be scarcely convincing. I should like to produce for consideration a different instance drawn from the derivative emptio or emptor. The instance in question may not take us as far back as emere = sumere but will at least to emere = accipere. Roman legal tradition tells us that the …

Tignum Iunctum: The Xii Tables And A Lost Word, Alan Watson

Scholarly Works

A text of the scholar Festus, which is famous among Latinists and lawyers alike, reads:

Tignum non solum in aedificiis, quo utuntur, appellatur, sed etiam in vineis, ut est in XII: "Tignum iunctum aedibus vineave et concapit ne solvito".

For the quotation from the XII Tables, the manuscripts showsome variation for 'vineave': 'victum' in W, 'vineaque' in V and 'minerve' in X. But these we can happily leave aside and com to the crux of the text, 'concapit', which appears in all the manuscripts. "'Concapit', a corrupt word, and difficult of explanation" say Lewis and Short! And the emendations proposed …

The Original Meaning Of Pauperies, Alan Watson

Scholarly Works

The very name, 'actio de pauperie', presents us squarely with the problem. Why should this action -- dealing with damage caused by animals -- and this action alone come to be called 'the action on poverty'? For the word 'pauperies' in the later Republic and the Empire does have the primary meaning of 'poverty'. This problem does not stand by itself. The 'actio de pauperie' is old, and goes back at least to the XII Tables. Why does it -- apparently at least -- give a remedy for damage of all kinds, whereas the later lex Aquilia of 287 B.C. …