The Case of the Boar That Fell Into the Trap (Digest 41.1.55)

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.