Observations on the Dead Emperor Collected from Annals and Laws

doubted that they themselves could live. Wherefore the men kept the corpse unburied for three whole days, hoping they would call his spirit back to the heavens.

And a false announcement of his death must not be allowed to go unpunished.

It happens sometimes that a lying messenger of death travels the lands and stirs up serious turmoil or causes damage. If deceit is present, there is no doubt that the author of the false rumor should be punished the more severely, the closer it approaches the crime of maiestas high treason. See Gothofredus Jacques Godefroy on the law 1 §. 2 On him, by whom it shall have been done, etc. Dio Cassius, Book LVII, p. 616, narrates that Lutorius Priscus was condemned to death because he had written a poem on the death of Drusus, who was not yet dead. Indeed, the Romans considered it wicked even to say a word about the death of a living Caesar, and if anyone consulted mathematicians astrologers about his health, he, along with the one who answered, was punished by death. See Julius Paullus, Received Sentences, Book V, title 21; Julius Firmicus, Book II, Mathesis, last chapter.

Sometimes death is hidden;

Arduous causes sometimes persuade that the passing of a prince be kept silent for a while. Livia is said to have hidden the death of Augustus, lest anything new be attempted, until Tiberius had returned from Dalmatia. Dio Cassius, Book LVI, p. 590. And Suetonius in Claudius, ch. 45:

The death of Claudius was hidden, he says, until everything could be arranged regarding his successor. Thus, prayers were offered as if he were still sick, and actors were brought in by simulation, who would entertain him as if he were desiring it.

The prefect of the chamberlains, Prusskoffsky, labored to hide the passing of Emperor Rudolph II until Matthias had arrived, and for this reason, he had the table prepared as before, according to the annals of Ferdinand Khevenhiller Franz Christoph von Khevenhüller in Part VII to the year 1612. But with difficulty; However, just as the death of such great moment bears no long silence, so the news, once not hidden, is carried very quickly to all nations.

Therefore it is not approved by all common rumor.

And although faith is not to be placed in every rumor, the words of the Aurea Bulla Golden Bull of 1356 ch. 1 §. 19:

But when it shall have reached the point that it has been established in the diocese of Mainz concerning the death of the Emperor or King of the Romans, etc.

seem to have regarded common fame in some way, so that, according to the opinion of Ludewig Johann Peter von Ludewig in his commentary on said law, the Elector of Mainz cannot pretend to be ignorant of a very well-known matter. But it is better that death be signified to those concerned by a certain reason, as necessity and decorum demand.