Roman Law and the Legal World of the Romans

Roman Law and the Legal World of the Romans

sale of future produce of some field, but in that case there can be no argument about what is included in the sale, even if one does not immediately know how large or small it will turn out to be. The price also had to be stated (or at least knowable in theory) at the time of agreement. Here there was potentially a real exception to the rule in the case of the sale of future pro duce. The price could be absolutely fixed (and would be paid even if the crop failed entirely), or one could agree to pay by unit (say, $53 per pound), so that the price would not be known until the crop came in. (In this case, conveniently for the buyer, the price for a failed crop would be $53 x no pounds = $0.) The price was generally up to the parties to negotiate, but in cases of extremely low price, the deal might be construed by the courts as really a gift, merely disguised as a sale. This could matter (a) if the merchandise had not yet been delivered, since the promise of a gift was not enforceable, or (b) if the agreement was between husband and wife, whose gifts to each other were not given legal force. Other terms that came to be read into contracts of sale include warranty against bad title and against “latent defects” (i.e., defects known to the seller but not revealed or vis ible on inspection). Standard terms that might be added to a contract of sale included further warranties, redistribu tion of risk, the location where disputes were to be liti gated, schedules of payment or delivery, severability of some individually unenforceable provisions, and conditions of use (say, requiring a new building owner to allow pre vious tenants to continue occupying, not allowing a slave

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