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The Case of the Boar That Fell Into the Trap (Digest 41.1.55)
Donahue, Charles Jr.
Donahue, Charles Jr.
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Abstract
Proculus was a Roman jurist and law-teacher of the mid-first century CE,
who was much respected and cited by later jurists. Relatively little survives of his writings,
but there are thirty-three extracts from his Letters that
Justinian's compilers placed in the Digest, including the one just quoted.
Many of the extracts are abridged, but enough of them have the original
form that the structure of the work is clear. Someone asks Proculus a
question normally using some form of the verb quaerere ("I ask," in the
translation). Proculus' answer is usually marked with some form of the verb
respondere (''the answer given was," in the translation). The questions often
have multiple parts, as does Digest 41.1.55. Proculus always answers the
question or questions in the order presented, normally in a quite oracular
fashion. That is characteristic of all the extracts except for this one. This one
begins with a series of distinctions, beginning with "let us see" in the
quotation. Proculus uses none of these distinctions in the answers that he
gives to the questions.