M. Tullius Cicero, De Lege Agraria, Charles Duke Yonge (Translator), 9

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[9] For those farms in truth are held by the best right, which are held on the best conditions. Free tenures are held by a better tenure than servile ones. By this clause all tenures which have hitherto been servile ¹ tenures will be so no longer. Enfranchised estates are in a better condition than those which are liable to no obligations; by the same clause all lands subject to the payment of any fine, if only they were assigned by Sulla, are released from such payments. Lands which are exempt from payment are in a better condition than those which pay a fine. I, in my Tusculan villa, must pay a tax for the Crabran ² water, because I received my estate subject to this liability; but, if I had only had the land given me by Sulla, I should not pay it, according to the law of Rullus.

De Lege Agraria. M. Tullius Cicero. Charles Duke Yonge (Translator). London. 1856.

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Current edition Perseus

On the Agrarian Law (English) (Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 2. Yonge, Charles Duke, translator. London: Bell, 1856.)

Editions (1)

De Lege Agraria Perseus (Cicero. M. Tulli Ciceronis Orationes, Volume 4. Clark, Albert Curtis, editor. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1909.) — 9 focus

[9] id enim caves. optimo enim iure ea sunt profecto praedia quae optima condicione sunt. Libera meliore iure sunt quam serva; capite hoc omnia quae serviebant non servient. soluta meliore in causa sunt quam obligata; eodem capite subsignata omnia, si modo Sullana sunt, liberantur. immunia commodiore condicione sunt quam illa quae pensitant; ego Tusculanis pro aqua Crabra vectigal pendam, quia mancipio fundum accepi; si a Sulla mihi datus esset, Rulli lege non penderem.

Notes on the current edition

On the Agrarian Law

1. Serva praedia mean such estates as were liable to certain burdens or duties; held by the performance of certain services.

2. The Crabra aqua is several times mentioned by Cicero in his letters as a small artificial stream running through his Tusculan property. He even had a law-suit respecting it, as appears from one of his letters.

M. Tullius Cicero De Lege Agraria 9

Charles Duke Yonge (Translator)

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