Note 191-3 — Chapter IV

Thus the emperor Basil, in the year 867, as Justinian had before him, forbade the further payment of interest, once the amount already paid equaled the principal. (L. 29 seq.; Cod. IV, 32, Nov., 121, 2.) Compare Sachsenspiegel, I, 54. Edward the Confessor is said to have issued the first prohibition of interest. (Anderson, Origin of Commerce, a. 1045.) Edward III. forbade all interest as the ruin of commerce. (Idem a., 1341.) About 1391, the lower House had its zeal aroused against the "shameful vice of usury;" and again, in 1488, all interest on money and all rent-purchases stipulated for on unlawful conditions, were threatened with a fine of £20, the pillory, and six months imprisonment. (Anderson, a., 1488.) In France, the edict of Philip IV. of 1312. Compare Beaumanoir, Coûtumes, ch. 67, des Usures, No. 2.