Observations sur un manuscrit intitulé Traitté du péculat

Anonymous first edition. The work bears number 2023 in the catalogue of Elzevirian editions (Willems, Vol. II). For the author, see Barbier, Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes.
Contemporary full vellum binding with flaps. Smooth spine. Title in faded red ink.
Rolland Le Vayer de Boutigny (1627-1685) was Master of Requests to Louis XIV and one of his influential advisors. Author of novels, plays and short stories, as well as political and legal treatises, this book reveals that Boutigny was trained as a jurist. Peculatus designates the theft of public funds by those who administer them; it was punished by death under Roman law, but not under French law. "Under the Ancien Régime, how many ministers were condemned for peculatus and extortion! How many chambers of justice were instituted to make the financiers who pillaged the treasury disgorge their gains, in complicity with the superintendents of finance!" (Dictionnaire de droit criminel, Doucet). The treatise on peculatus caused scandal; Boutigny was accused of defending Fouquet, who a few years earlier had been arrested and accused of embezzlement, which is why he wrote these Observations in dialogue form, where he discusses the validity of the death penalty, banishment, and the history of French law regarding peculatus...