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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. …