Institutes of Roman Law. Gaius

his residence from her domicil [provided it amounts to absence] is immaterial.

      § 174. But an exception is made in favour of an absent patron, who cannot be superseded on the application of a freedwoman.

      § 175. Ranked with patrons is the parent who by mancipation, remancipation, and manumission of a daughter, granddaughter, or great-granddaughter, has become her statutory guardian. His sons only rank as fiduciary guardians, unlike a patron’s sons, who succeed to the same form of guardianship as vested in their father.

      § 176. For a special and limited purpose the senate permits even the place of a patron in his absence to be filled by a substitute; for instance, to authorize the acceptance of an inheritance.

      § 177. The senatusconsult gives similar permission when a patron’s son is himself a ward.

      § 178. For likewise the lex Julia, regulating the marriages of the various orders, permitted a woman whose statutory guardian was himself a ward to apply to the praetor of the city to appoint a guardian for the purpose of constituting her dower.

      § 179. For a patron’s son even before the age of puberty is a freedwoman’s guardian, although unable to authorize any proceeding, being himself disabled from acting without his guardian’s authorization.

      § 180. Also a woman whose statutory guardian is a lunatic or dumb is permitted by the senatusconsult, for the purpose of settling her dower, to apply for a substitutive guardian.

      § 181. In which cases the continued guardianship of the patron or patron’s son is undisputed.

      § 182. The senate further decreed that if the guardian of a male or female ward is suspected of misconduct and removed from office, or if he alleges valid grounds for declining to act and is relieved of his functions, a substitute shall be appointed by the magistrate, and on his appointment the office of the former guardian shall determine.

      § 183. These rules are in force both in Rome and in the provinces, but in Rome application for the appointment of a tutor must be made to the praetor; in the provinces, to the governor of the province.

      § 184. During the era of litigation by statute-process [4, § 10], another cause of appointing a substitute was the imminence of statute-process between the guardian and the woman or ward; for as the guardian could not give his authority in respect of his own suit, another guardian was appointed to authorize the proceedings in the action, who was called a praetorian guardian, because he was appointed by the praetor of the city. But some hold that since the abolition of statute-process this mode of appointing a guardian ceased to be used, others maintain that it is still the practice on the occasion of a statutory suit (4, § 103).

      § 173. Cf. Ulp. 11, 22. The name and date of this senatusconsultum cannot be ascertained.

      § 178. Gaius, as already stated, wrote a special treatise or commentary on this important law relating to marriage.

      § 179. The law was changed by Justinian, who enacted that no one could become guardian who had not attained his majority, i. e. completed twenty-five years of age, Inst. 1, 25, 13; Cod. 5, 30, 5. The fact of not having attained this age had previously been ground of excuse.

      § 182. Cf. Inst. Just. 1, 26. The actio suspecti tutoris for the removal of the guardian from his office could be maintained by any person in the interest of the ward. If removed on account of fraud the guardian was infamis, but not so if it was simply for negligence.

      § 183. The ambiguity of the Latin language leaves it doubtful whether in the foregoing paragraphs, §§ 173, 176, 180, 182, Gaius refers to one or several senatusconsults. From Dig. 26, 1, 17, however, it appears that, complura senatusconsulta facta sunt ut in locum furiosi et muti et surdi tutoris alii tutores dentur: i. e. the subject often occupied the attention of the senate. The reason was that the lex Atilia, presently mentioned, had received, after the wont of the ancient jurists, a strictly literal interpretation, and was not deemed to authorize the substitution of a guardian when the existing guardian was incapacitated.