Re: Two different opposites (again)

Tim May scripsit:

> Does anyone know any languages with a regular strategy for this kind
> of thing?  I know German has _kaufen_/_verkaufen_, and
> _mieten_/_vermieten_ for "rent" (which is a case where it's English that
> makes no distinction, although we can say _let_ for "vermieten") but I
> don't know how productive this is.
Really?  I thought it was strictly an Americanism to say that you'd
rented a car, and in Britain it's Hertz (or whoever) that rents cars,
whereas members of the public hire them.  Or has this distinction gone
the way of the dodo?

In Roman law, the contract of _locatio conductio_ covered any situation
in which someone (the _locator_) has something which then passes to
the other party (the _conductor_) and then back to the _locator_, and
a fixed sum of money is involved.  However, which way the money moves
depends on the circumstances.

Thus, if Lucius Locator owns land, and Caius Conductor is his tenant
farmer, then Caius pays Lucius.  Likewise, if Lucius owns a house, or
a horse, or any other object -- Roman law doesn't make the common-law
distinctions between real and personal property -- Caius pays Lucius
for the use of that house or horse.  (In the case of land, however,
it was common for the "money" to be a share of the produce instead.)

On the other hand, if Lucius owns some cloth, which he takes to Caius
the tailor, and gets back a shirt, it is Lucius who pays Caius in
this situation.  (If Caius provides the shirting instead of Lucius,
then this is not _locatio conductio_, but an ordinary sale of a shirt.)

--
Go, and never darken my towels again!           John Cowan
        --Rufus T. Firefly                      www.ccil.org/~cowan

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