# The Digest (Pandects) is promulgated

Date: 533

## The fact

On 16 December 533 Constitutio Tanta promulgated the Digest: fifty books of excerpts from classical jurists, given exclusive force, with effect from 30 December. Justinian’s Deo auctore of 530 had commissioned Tribonian’s sixteen. Interpolation and omission were policy. This is not the Codex of 529 and not the Institutes of 21 November. Later museums, UNESCO lists, Loeb editions, and translations are not this Fact. Tribonian, Belisarius, Narses, John the Cappadocian, and unnamed officials may share the file; they do not erase a dated constitution, and they are not a licence to treat every general’s siege as the emperor’s javelin.

## Context

Juristic literature was vast and contradictory. The commission cut it. What vanished is a loss to later historians and a gain to imperial monopoly of citation. Western medieval revival is reception. Mommsen’s edition is a nineteenth-century tool, not the lifetime act. Later museums, UNESCO lists, Loeb editions, and translations are not this Fact. Tribonian, Belisarius, Narses, John the Cappadocian, and unnamed officials may share the file; they do not erase a dated constitution, and they are not a licence to treat every general’s siege as the emperor’s javelin.

## Evidence and sources

Scott’s English Digest is a public carrier; Mommsen-based editions independently confirm Tanta’s date. Britannica independently describes the compilation. Constitutio Tanta itself states the work’s size in imperial rhetoric, not as a Factrail line-count. Later museums, UNESCO lists, Loeb editions, and translations are not this Fact. Tribonian, Belisarius, Narses, John the Cappadocian, and unnamed officials may share the file; they do not erase a dated constitution, and they are not a licence to treat every general’s siege as the emperor’s javelin.

Official or archival record: Digest of Justinian, English of S. P. Scott (Grenoble Roman-law carrier) (https://droitromain.univ-grenoble-alpes.fr/Anglica/digest_Scott.htm; Université Grenoble Alpes / droitromain).

## Significance

Improving legal-data path of high weight. Direct contribution. High confidence on promulgation. Later museums, UNESCO lists, Loeb editions, and translations are not this Fact. Tribonian, Belisarius, Narses, John the Cappadocian, and unnamed officials may share the file; they do not erase a dated constitution, and they are not a licence to treat every general’s siege as the emperor’s javelin.

If a number is not in the two records named above, it is not supplied here.

## What is established and what is not

Established: the Digest was promulgated in December 533 under Justinian. Not established: that every fragment is uninterpolated, or that a 1870 printed page is the 533 instrument. Later museums, UNESCO lists, Loeb editions, and translations are not this Fact. Tribonian, Belisarius, Narses, John the Cappadocian, and unnamed officials may share the file; they do not erase a dated constitution, and they are not a licence to treat every general’s siege as the emperor’s javelin.

Confidence is stated on the impact path, not hidden in adjectives. Do not twin Digest with Codex or Institutes. Do not treat Mommsen’s 1870 edition as the 533 act. Mixed effects of The Digest (Pandects) is promulgated are separate paths.

Later competitions, monuments, translations, UNESCO listings, museums, and adaptations are not converted into extra lifetime acts.

The contribution type is direct. The attached driver is [personal-data-protection](/drivers/personal-data-protection). The welfare reading used in this dossier is improving. That reading is an impact-path choice, not a property stored on the Fact itself.

Shared responsibility is part of The Digest (Pandects) is promulgated. Naming Justinian I does not delete co-authors, institutions, or later transmitters. The lag from 0533-12-16 to any measured indicator is not treated as zero. Alternative explanations — weather, other armies, later statutes, or independent cultural change — remain live where the sources do not close them.

## People

- Justinian I: https://factrail.ai/people/justinian-i

## Drivers

- Personal-Data Protection: https://factrail.ai/drivers/personal-data-protection

## Sources

- https://www.britannica.com/topic/Code-of-Justinian
- https://droitromain.univ-grenoble-alpes.fr/Anglica/digest_Scott.htm

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/er-justinian-digest-0533