resence of witnesses. If in
the latter case stolen goods were discovered, the thief on conviction
was condemned to pay thrice their value for _furtum conceptum_
(detected theft). But in either case, if the accused householder could
prove that a person other than himself for any reason had placed the
stolen articles in his house, he could obtain from that person on
conviction damages of thrice their value for _furtum oblatum_
("planted" theft). Search by platter and loincloth (_lanx et licium_)
became obsolete; search with witnesses present survived.

[50] The ancient commentators take this statute to mean "double in
kind" not in value: for example, two cows surrendered for one cow
stolen.

[51] That is, neither a thief nor a receiver of stolen goods, whether
acquired through purchase or by other method, can acquire title to
property in stolen goods through long possession of such.

[52] The uncia (whence our "ounce") is the unit of division of the as
and is used also as one-twelfth of anything. One-twelfth of the
principal paid yearly as interest equals 8-1/3%.

[53] This originally is a religious penalty, whereby the person is
sacrificed. But sacer comes to mean "a person disgraced and outlawed
and deprived of his property."

[54] At a sale (_mancipium_ or _mancipatio_) the buyer in the presence
of five adult citizens had his money weighed by another adult citizen
who held scales for this purpose.

This practice obtained originally ere the introduction of coinage.

[55] That is, enactments referring to a single citizen, whether or not
in his favor.

[56] Caput includes also privileges of citizenship (_civitas_).

[57] Commonly known as the _comitia centuriata_, an assembly which
comprised all citizens. To this assembly a citizen convicted in court
on a capital charge had the right of appeal (_ius provocationis_) at
least as early as the passage of the Lex Valeria in 509 B.C., for
Cicero claims that the pontifical as well as the augural books state
that the right of appeal from the regal sentences had been recognized
(De Re Publica, 11. 31. 54).

[58] This statute is quoted by Cicero (De Legibus, III. 4. 11), who
inserts censores (censors) as the subject of the last verb _locassint_
(have placed). But the last clause must have been "modernized" either
by Cicero or in his source, because the promulgation of the Twelve
Tables in 449 B.C. antedated the creation of the censorship, which can
not be traced highe