Kitap 7
21.8
Seated at tables in the Forum, they dealt with long-standing debts due to the slackness of the debtor more than to his want of means, either by advancing public money on proper security, or by making a fair valuation of his property. “It appears that one cause of the prevailing distress was the scarcity of the circulating medium. A debtor, therefore, even though he possessed property in land, might yet be practically insolvent, inasmuch as he could not, except at an enormous loss, convert his land into money. Here therefore the five commissioners interposed; they furnished the debtor with ready money, when he had any property to offer as a security, or any friend who would be security for him: and they ordered that land and cattle should be received in payment at a certain valuation. In this manner much property which had hitherto been unavailable was brought into circulation, land and cattle became legal tender at a certain fixed rate of value; and thus a great amount of debt was liquidated, and, as Livy adds, to the satisfaction of the creditor as well as of the debtor.” —Arnold, ibid. p. 73. In this way an immense amount of debt was cleared off without any injustice or even complaints on either side.
