Page 233 - Latent Defect or Excessive Price?Exploring Early Modern Legal Approach to Remedying Defects in Goods Exchanged for Money - Bruijn

CHAPTER FIVE
defect or for how much less the buyer would have bought the horse \[my emphasis\]'.91
Conversely, Bijnkershoek's Observationes provide a wholly different picture. We have already learned that most Dutch scholars who wrote at the time before Bijnkershoek presided the Supreme Court had done away with a subjective assessment of a sold thing's price. The cases reported in the Observationes tumultuariae further fuel the view that the days of a subjective approach were counted.
One case brought before the Court in 1730 was about the sale of baleen plates for the produce of whalebone.92 A merchant, Titius, who had bought baleen plates, started proceedings against the seller, Maevius, because the sold plates were all curved, which was apparently a bad thing. The Supreme Court decided that Titius was right and that Maevius had to compensate the damages incurred because of non-delivery of what was agreed, i.e. baleen plates of merchantable condition. To determine Titius' losses, the price of merchantable baleen plates had to be established. Bijnkershoek considered as follows:
'Maevius \[defendant\]... proposed the testimony of four merchants... Titius \[plaintiff\] used the testimony of fourteen merchants that the price at the time of the sale was 190 guilders or higher and he produced four prices running at the time. Since the baleen plates stood between 190 and 215 guilders he wanted to fix the price at 200 guilders. The opinions varied but it pleased the majority, in condemning the defendants, to follow the minimum and, having taken notice of the other testimonies and the running prices, to set the price at 190 guilders, thereby refuting the testimony of the four merchants who were also disproved of on other accounts'.93
Titius' loss was calculated with the price of 190 guilders a piece. The Supreme Court determined the price of baleen plates in merchantable condition on the basis of the evidence put forward by the parties, which evidence was derived from objective standards, sc. from testimonies and current prices. No individual assessment of price takes place.
In a similarly objective manner a garden should have been assessed by the judges themselves94, brandy with the help of a third person appointed by both parties95, and land
91 Zutphen, Nederlandsche practycque, p. 409: '...alsdan wordt gheageert tot soo veel minder als het peerdt weerdich is om het ghebreck ofte tot soo veel minder als den cooper soude ghecocht ghehadt hebben'.
92 Bijnkershoek, Observationes, vol. 3, nos. 2582 and 2658, pp. 408, 463.
93 Bijnkershoek, Observationes, vol. 3, no. 2658, p. 463: 'Maevius...adferebat testimonium quator
mercatorum... Titius utebatur testimonio XIV mercatorum, dat de prijs op die tijd was geweest 190 guldens en daar boven, et adducebat vier prijsen courant van die tijd, daar de walvis-baarden stonden van 190 tot 215 guldens en wilde oversulks de prijs fixeren op 200 guldens. Sententiis variatum est, sed plerisque placuit, rejecto testimonio quator mercatorum, qui etiam varia refutabantur, in condemnandis reis id, quod minimum est, sequi, en sulks op de andere verklaring en de prijsen courant reguard nemende, de prijs te stellen op 190 guldens',
94 In the end the Supreme Court judges backed from such a tedious task and decided to conveniently accept the lower Court's assessment. Bijnkershoek, Observationes tumultuariae, vol. 1, no. 906, p. 496: 'Sed quia lis erat exigui plane momenti, et difficillimum, quanto minoris fuisset praediolium om den last van het banwerk...satis visum est Senatui 18 Nov. 1712 simpliciter confirmare Curiae'.
95 Bijnkershoek, Observationes, vol. 3, no. 2107, p. 58: 'Deinde ajebat dat er geen behoorlijk taxatie van de brandewijn was gedaan, sed et in eo fallebatur, nam et ipse hominem quendam suum in eam rem constituerat'.
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