TITLE V. CONCERNING FORGERS OF DOCUMENTS.
| I. | Concerning those who Forge Royal Orders and Mandates. |
| II. | Concerning those who Forge Documents, or Attempt to Forge Them. |
| III. | Concerning those who Forge, or Serve, False Orders in the Name of the King, or a Judge. |
| IV. | Concerning those who Falsify a Will against the Consent of a Party while Living, or Disclose the Contents of the Same. |
| V. | Concerning those who Attempt to Forge or Conceal the Will of a Person Already Deceased. |
| VI. | Where Anyone Assumes a Fictitious Name, or Adopts a False Lineage or Relationship. |
| VII. | Concerning Documents Fraudulently Dated, Prior to their Execution. |
| VIII. | Concerning Later Documents Fraudulently Executed. |
| IX. | Concerning those who Falsely Write, or Publish, Decrees and Edicts of the King. |
I. Concerning those who Forge Royal Orders and Mandates.
Whoever shall change, impair the force of, omit something from, or interpolate anything into, any part of our royal decrees or mandates; or shall alter the date of the same; or shall make or attach a forged seal to any of them; if said person is of high rank, he shall forfeit half of all his property, and it shall be confiscated for the benefit of the royal treasury; if, however, he is a person of inferior station, he shall lose the hand with which he committed the crime. Where the judges, or other authorities before whom the hearing was to be had, or for whom the order of the king was intended, die; then either the bishop of the diocese, or any other bishop, or the judges of the territory adjacent to that affected by the order, shall have full authority to act in their stead; to promulgate the decree; and to make such disposition of the matter as, in their judgment, shall appear to be legal and just.
FLAVIUS CHINTASVINTUS, KING.
II. Concerning those who Forge Documents, or Attempt to Forge Them.
Whoever forges a document; or publishes it; or knowingly makes an addition to it; or produces it in court; or anyone who suppresses, abstracts, mutilates, impairs the force of, or changes, a genuine document; and whoever engraves, makes, or attaches a false seal, and is found guilty of such infamous crimes, shall, with all his abettors, lose the fourth part of their property, if they are persons of noble rank. If any person should steal, or deface a document belonging to another, and should afterwards confess, in the presence of the judge, that he had stolen or defaced said document, and this confession should be corroborated by witnesses, said testimony shall have the same force in law as the destroyed or defaced document would have, if it still existed in its integrity. But if the contents of the document cannot be shown with certainty, he who drew it up shall be permitted to prove by his own oath, or by a witness, what said document contained; and the testimony so given shall establish the contents of said document.
When the property of those who have been condemned is not sufficient to pay the fine prescribed by law, they, with such possessions as they have, shall be delivered up, as slaves, to those whom they have defrauded. He who sustained the injury or loss, shall receive, by order of the king or the judge, three quarters of the fourth part of the property hereinbefore mentioned; and the fourth part of the same shall be reserved for the king, to be disposed of at his royal pleasure. Persons of inferior rank, or of infamous character, who have been convicted of these offences, must sign a confession as hereinbefore provided; and shall forever be the slaves of those who suffered by their fraudulent acts. In addition to the above penalties, culprits of inferior, as well as of superior rank, shall receive a hundred lashes with the scourge. If a slave commits such an offence, and it should appear that he was influenced by other persons, all parties implicated in the crime, and who are proved to have either stolen, concealed, or mutilated, the document in question, shall become slaves forever to those who were injured by their unlawful acts. But if it should appear that said acts were committed under the orders of a master, he shall be responsible for all damages sustained. We also decree that this same rule shall apply to all who, for the sake of gain, either suppress or mutilate any documents belonging to others, with the view to inflicting upon them either loss or injury. Such persons also shall be considered forgers, and shall suffer the penalty hereinbefore provided, according to their rank.
Where nothing which is set forth in this chapter appears to have been done; that is to say, if no one is convicted of having mutilated, torn, forged, or concealed, a document belonging to another, or of having committed any other offence described by this law, but that the person accused has merely lost said document through negligence, accident, or want of care; or where he declares that it has been stolen from him; if a witness who subscribed said document be still living, his testimony, taken in court, will be amply sufficient to establish its validity. Where it appears that the witness who subscribed said document is dead, and other lawful and intelligent witnesses can be found, who will testify that they saw said document, and are thoroughly acquainted with its contents; then he who lost the document in question, may prove by the testimony of said witnesses, by a public investigation in court, the former existence and the contents of said document, and thereby establish its validity.
ANCIENT LAW.
III. Concerning those who Forge, or Serve, False Orders in the Name of the King, or a Judge.
He who ignorantly publishes an edict issued in the name of the king or a judge, shall not incur the guilt of forgery; but he must at once disclose who gave him the said edict. If he should be unwilling to name the person, or to admit that he received the edict from him, he himself shall then be punished for forgery, according to his rank; as is hereinbefore provided in the cases of those who make or utter forged documents. But if both the parties should be aware that the forgery had been committed, both shall be considered forgers.
ANCIENT LAW.
IV. Concerning those who Falsify a Will against the Consent of a Party while Living, or Disclose the Contents of the Same.
Whoever shall forge the will, or any document containing an order, or any instructions, of a person still living, or shall disclose the contents of the same contrary to the wishes of said party, shall be deemed guilty of forgery.
ANCIENT LAW.
V. Concerning those who Attempt to Forge or Conceal the Will of a Person Already Deceased.
Whoever shall conceal the will of a deceased person, or shall insert any forged matter therein, shall lose whatever property he would have been entitled to, through the bequest of the testator in said will, and said property shall belong to those whom he attempted to defraud; and he shall, besides, bear the infamy attaching to the crime of forgery. Even if he should have little or nothing to gain from such an act, he shall nevertheless be condemned as a forger.
ANCIENT LAW.
VI. Where Anyone Assumes a Fictitious Name, or Adopts a False Lineage, or Relationship.
Whoever assumes a false name; or changes his lineage; or claims a fictitious parentage; or is guilty of any other imposture; shall be considered a forger.
FLAVIUS CHINTASVINTUS, KING.
VII. Concerning Documents Fraudulently Dated, Prior to their Execution.
The cunning of certain persons often requires the enactment of new laws, as soon as the employment of new and wicked forms of fraud, contrived for the deception of others, becomes publicly known. Henceforth, for the reason that many persons, with the intent to deceive their creditors, enter into false obligations in writing, which allege their indebtedness to others; we hereby promulgate the following law, which is to be perpetually valid, to wit: Wherever anyone who is indebted to another, should fraudulently draw up any writing in which he asserts that he is indebted to a third party, and, thereby anyone should be deceived; and, by means of said fraudulent document, he should contrive to nullify the claim of a party to whom he is justly indebted; or if it should happen that anyone should craftily, and fraudulently deceive another to the above mentioned end, not in writing but verbally; the party guilty of such offences shall be publicly branded as infamous, shall be liable in damages to him whom he has defrauded, and shall also be punished as provided in the law concerning forgery. He, also, shall be liable to similar damages and penalty, who has been convicted of having stated that he was indebted to another, by means of a fraudulent paper, executed subsequently to the one evidencing his indebtedness to his genuine creditor. He who shall be convicted of having made such a fraudulent document, as well as he for whose benefit it is alleged to have been executed; where the latter is known to be cognizant of the fraud; shall be liable to the damages and penalty hereinbefore provided; and the fraudulent document, having been declared void, the validity of the other, although it was apparently subsequently executed, shall be firmly established.
FLAVIUS RECESVINTUS, KING.
VIII. Concerning Later Documents Fraudulently Executed.
It is but just that he who is recognized as the heir of a deceased person, should discharge the debts of the latter. For the reason, therefore, that fraud ought, under no circumstances, to be excused, we hereby decree that the following law shall be forever observed, to wit: That whoever gives to any person, by any instrument in writing, any property whatever, no matter where said property may be situated, and he who gave such property shall not be the owner thereof; or if he was the owner, what he has given, he has already pledged to another by a former written document, or has conveyed it to anyone else under some contract; and he should subsequently dispose of said property, which was either not his own, or had been previously pledged to another, as aforesaid; as soon as the commission of said fraudulent act shall become known; he who is guilty, should he still be living, shall be liable for the amount mentioned in said instrument executed by him, and shall suffer whatever penalty it prescribes. But if the fraud should not become known until after his death, either his heirs shall be compelled to execute, for the benefit of the complainant, whatever the maker of said fraudulent instrument promised therein; or if the amount promised, or the penalty set forth in said forged paper, shall be greater in amount than the property left by said person, and his heirs should be unwilling to make satisfactory amends for the act of their ancestor; they shall be forced to surrender, at once, their entire inheritance to the complainant. Where there are no heirs, the entire property of the deceased shall, by the provisions of the present law, be given up by those to whom it was left by the deceased, or by those who have possession of the same.
This rule shall also apply in cases where it is found that he for whose benefit the prior instrument was drawn up, is implicated in the fraud; so that he who actually drew up the paper, as well as he who knew that this was done, shall both be liable for the satisfaction of the obligation, and to the imposition of the penalty set forth in the instrument subsequently executed; and both shall likewise undergo, in person and in property, the penalties provided by a former law in the case of those who are guilty of forgery.
ANCIENT LAW.
IX. Concerning those who Falsely Write, or Publish, Decrees and Edicts of the King.
The unlawful and wicked conduct of certain persons renders it necessary that laws should be enacted for the restraint of future generations; so that those over whom reproof has no influence, may be amenable to legal censure and coercion. And, for the reason that it is well known that many not only write out royal orders themselves, but also promulgate them, and publish documents confirmed by the signatures of notaries, whereby many things have been introduced into the laws of our kingdom, and many provisions have been written, or attempted to be added, which have not received the sanction of our authority; nor are suitable to our people, not having been dictated by the principles of justice or truth; and, in consequence, our subjects have been greatly vexed by injuries, spoliation, and other annoyances; we therefore promulgate the following edict: that, now and hereafter, no notary whosoever, no matter to what rank or race he may belong, (with the exception of the public notaries, or those attached to the royal service and their sons, and such as have received special commissions from the king, or any orders or appointments issued by the royal authority) shall write or publish any spurious document, purporting to have been issued by the king, or shall attempt to offer any such document to any notary, to be confirmed by his signature; but only the public notaries, and our own notaries, and those of our successors, and such as have been especially appointed by us, shall have authority to write or publish any royal order or edict. Whoever shall be found guilty of violating this law, whether he be freeman or slave, shall receive two hundred lashes, by order of the king or the judge; shall be scalped as a mark of infamy; and have, in addition, the thumb of his right hand cut off; as punishment for having attempted to commit unlawful acts which were contrary to the dignity of the throne.[41]