 121. If there be robbery or theft on urban land around a town, let the surrounding settlements pay it all. 122. On Building a Fortress And where a fortress or tower is toppled, let the citizens of that town rebuild it and the district which belongs to that town. 123. When the Lord Tsar hath a son to marry or to christen and hath need to build a court and houses, let everyone help, both small and great. 124. On Armies In every army the commanders shall have the same authority as the Tsar. What they say, let it be obeyed. If anyone disobey them in whatever, he shall be tried in the same way as those who would disobey the Tsar. In judicial matters in the army, both small and great the commanders shall judge them, and nobody else. 125. Whoever in the army destroys a church, let him be killed or hanged. 126. On Quarrels In the army there shall be no quarrel. If two quarrel, let them fight, and no soldier shall help them in the fight. And if anyone start to succour them in the fight, let them be punished, both their hands be cut off. 127. Whoever buys something from booty taken on foreign soil, and is seized on the lands of the Tsar, let him be free to buy from that booty as if he were on foreign soil. If someone accuse him, saying: That is mine, let him be absolved by the jury according to law, for he bought on foreign soil, and is not a thief, nor a go-between, nor an accomplice. So let him possess it as his own. 128. On Emissaries An emissary proceeding from a foreign country to the Tsar or from the Lord Tsar to his own lord, in whatever village he come, let him be honoured, let him have enough of everything, and he shall have dinner or supper and proceed further to other villages. 129. On Writing Deeds When the Lord Tsar hath written a deed for a patrimonial estate, to whom he hath granted a village in patrimonial estate, let the logothete be paid 30 perpers for the chrysobull; and to whom a district is given, for each village 30 perpers, and to the scribe for the writing, 6 perpers. 130. On the Army If the army going through the Tsar`s land lodge in a village, let not another which follows it, lodge in the same village. In the year 6862, the Seventh of the Indiction 131. The writ of the Tsar shall be obeyed where ever it come, be it to the Lady Tsaritsa, or to the King, or to the lords great and small, and to any man. No one shall disobey what is written in the writ of the Tsar. But if such a writ cannot be fulfilled by someone or if he is not able to give at that very moment, let him go again with the writ to the Tsar, to inform the Tsar. 132. On Chrysobulls The chrysobulls of the Tsar which are granted to the towns of the Tsar: what is written to them may not be contested even by the Lord Tsar or by any other man. Let the chrysobulls of the Tsar be firm. 133. On False Writing If there be found in someones chrysobull a word falsely transcribed and words changed and meaning altered into something the Lord Tsar hath not ordered, let these chrysobulls be torn up, and such a one shall no more possess the patrimonial estate. 134. No master is authorized to do anything contrary to the law to serfs within the Tsar`s land; only what the Tsar has written in the Code, that shall they labour and give to their masters. If he do something illegal to his serf, the Lord Tsar orders that every serf be authorized to litigate with his master, or with the Tsar, or with the Lady Tsaritsa, or with the Church, or with the lords of the Tsar, and with anybody; he shall not be authorized to withold him from the court of the Tsar, but the judges shall judge him according to justice. And if the serf win the lawsuit against his master, let the judge of the Tsar guarantee the way the master shall pay all to the serf at the appointed time; and let that master be not authorized to do any harm to the serf afterwards. 135. On Receiving a Man of Another Imperial order: no one may receive any one`s man; neither the Tsar, nor the Tsaritsa, nor the Church, nor a lord, nor any other man, may receive any ones man without a writ of the Tsar. Let him be punished, whosoever it may be, as a traitor. 136. And also if the market-towns, and headmen, and in the towns, receive a man of another, let them be punished in the same way and give him up. 137. On Lords Bringing to Ruin their Estate To the lords and lesser lords to whom the Tsar hath given land and towns: if any one of them be found to have plundered villages and people and ruined them, outside the Tsar`s Law which he hath enacted in the Council, let his estate be taken from him and let him pay for what he has ruined from his own house and be punished as a runaway. 138. On Brigands And if a brigand be found to cross a border area, and if he rob anywhere, and return again with his booty, let the warden of the marches pay sevenfold. 139. On Fugitives If a lord or a lesser lord or any other man of my Empire be found as a fugitive, and the surrounding villages or a district arise to plunder his home and his cattle which he has left, those who do so shall be punished as traitors to my Empire. 140. On Thieves and Brigands Imperial order: In all lands, and in the towns, and in districts, and in the marches, there shall be no brigands or thieves in anybody`s region. And in this manner shall thieving and brigandage be stopped: In whatsoever village a thief or brigand be found, that village shall be scattered, and the brigand shall be hanged by his feet, and the thief shall be blinded, and the master of the village shall be brought bound to the Tsar and pay for shall be punished as a thief and a brigand. 141. And also prefects, and lieutenants, and bailiffs, and reeves, and headmen who are found to administer villages and summer pasture huts, all these shall be punished in the manner written above if any thief or brigand be found in them. 142. If the bailiffs have informed the masters, and the masters pretended not to know, these masters shall be punished as a brigand and a thief is. 143. On Judges The judges appointed by the Tsar in the land to judge, if they write of anything, of brigands and thieves, or of whatever court decision, and the Church, or a lord, or any other man in the land of the Tsar disobey the writ of the Tsar`s judge , they shall all be punished as disobedient to the Tsar. 144. On Thieves and Brigands In this manner shall a thief and a brigand taken in the act be punished - and to be taken in the act is when something is directly found on them; or if he be taken in the act of robbery, or of theft; or if they are handed over by the districts, or by the villages, or by the masters, or by the lords who are superior to them, as is written above; these brigands and thieves shall not be pardoned but blinded or hanged. 145. And if anyone sue a brigand and a thief in the court, and he be not taken in the act, then they shall justify themselves by undergoing ordeal by iron as decreed by the Tsar; they shall take it at the door of the church from the fire, and place it upon the Holy Table. 146. On Jury The imperial order: From now henceforward let there be a jury for great matters and small ones. For a great matter, let there be 24 jurors, and for a lesser matter 12 jurors, and for a small matter 6 jurors. And these jurors shall not be authorized to make peace between the parties, but to acquit or else convict. And let every jury be in a church, and the priest in robes shall swear them, and whatever the majority of the jury swear to and whoever they acquit, that shall be believed. 147. As was the law under the grandfather of the Tsar, under the Sainted King, so let great lords be jurors for great lords, and for middle persons their own peers, while for commoners their peers. And on a jury let there be neither kinsmen nor enemies. 148. The Law For heterodox persons and merchants, jurors shall be made half of Christians, and half of their peers, according to the law of the Sainted King. 149. The Law When jurors acquit some one on oath according to the law, and after the acquittal, guilt be proved genuinely against the one whom they have acquitted, let the Tsar exact from those jurors a fine of one thousand perpers each, and afterwards those jurors shall not be believed. And if they be found to have knowingly wrongfully acquitted, or given up, or taken any bribe, after having paid as aforesaid, they shall be confined in another unfamiliar region. 150. On Maintenances From now on and henceforward there shall be no maintenance or escort, but when a great lord standard-bearer come into a district, or a lesser lord, who holds his fief separately and they have no community between them and between their fiefs, they shall pay. 151. In the lands of the Tsar, that is in the villages with serfs, lords shall take no maintenance or any other pay, but they shall pay from their own means. 152. Where there be mixed districts, with villages of the Church, and of the Tsar, and of the lords, and the villages be mixed, and there be not one master over that district, but if there be prefects and judges of the Tsar whom the Tsar hath appointed, let them post guards on all roads and let them hand over the roads to the prefects to protect them with the guards; and if anyone be attacked by brigands or suffer some theft or any other evil, let them go forthwith to the prefects, who shall pay from their own means, and the prefects shall seek from the guards, and from the brigands and the thieves. 153. On Guards If there be an unpopulated hill between districts, the surrounding villages which are around that hill shall stand guard. If they fail to stand guard, whatever happens on that bill, in a deserted place, by way of damage, or robbery, or theft, or any other evil, let the surrounding villages pay to whom it was ordered to guard the road. 154. On Merchants When merchants in passing by at night come for lodging for the night, if the reeve or master of that village does not allow them to spend the night in the village, according to the law of the Tsar, as it is in the Code, if the traveller lose anything, all shall be paid by that master, and reeve, and village, for not having admitted them to the village. 155. On Guests and on Brigands
If it so happen to any guest or merchant or monk and he be robbed of anything
by brigand or thief, or be in any way hindered, let them all come to the
Tsar, that the Tsar repay them for what they have lost. And the Tsar shall
seek it from the prefects and lords to whom the road was handed over and
the guards. And let every guest, and merchant, and Latin come to the first
guard with all that he has and bears, to escort him; and let the guard
deliver him to the next guard with all his belongings. And if it so happen
that they lose anything, let them have the jury of trustworthy men: whatsoever
they shall say upon their soul to have lost, that shall the prefects and
guards pay them.
156. On Court Litigation When litigants are suing in court, the one who has brought the legal action pleading his own case, and the other, the defendant, who rejects the accusation, let not the defendant be authorized to falsely charge his adversary by some other plea, or breach of faith, or for any other matter, but he shall only answer him. And when the case is finished, if he have anything to say, let him speak after that with him before the judges of the Tsar; but he shall not be believed in anything he is saying until the case is finished. 157. Clerks may go nowhere without a writ of the judge, or without a writ of the Tsar; but wheresoever the judges send them, they shall give them a writ, and the clerk shall undertake nothing save what is written in the writ. And the judges shall also keep copies of the writs that they have given to the clerk whom they have sent on business through the land, and if the clerk be suspected to have done something other than the writ prescribes, or if they altered the writ, let this serve for their exculpation: they shall go before the judges, and if they have acted as is written in the writ of the judge which the judges keep, they shall be justified; but if it be found that they have altered the decision of the court, let both their hands be cut off or their tongue slit. 158. Every judge who administers justice shall write his judgments and keep them with him, and the second copy, after having been written by him, shall be given to him who has justified himself in the court. 159.
160. On Impostors
If any impostor be found to pursue someone by using deceit, and lying,
and fraud, such a one shall be punished as a thief and a brigand.
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