Roman Law and the Legal World of the Romans
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such clauses in cases where they were not already qualified to be buried.
[22] FIRA 3.81g+h
May these gardens serve my ashes free from servitude obli gations, for I will guarantee succession of guardians always to feast from the income of these gardens on my birthday and bring roses. I wish these gardens not be divided or alienated. To the gods of the dead. Marcus Ulpius Symphorus, freed man of the emperor, maker of gold and silver coins [made this] for himself and Ulpia Helpidis, his freedwoman and wife, and for Ulpia, daughter of Arsinoe and Claudius Anthiocianus, son of his freedwoman Helpidis, and the freedpeople of my house of either sex to hold their remains and for such descendants as retain my name, on the condition that they not mortgage this tomb (or “monument”) nor sell it and that there be no other way for anyone to alienate it. This monument does not go to the heir. The waffling between “monument” and “tomb” (cf. the • next text and [23c] ) seems to be a defense against lawyers who might take advantage of the fact that it was the latter word that triggered all the special rules about sacred land. “Monument” is, in Latin as in English, a more general word, but in normal usage both languages would allow the same structure to be called both things).
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