arise...) Sesudamente dixeron... (The ancient wise men sagely said...) Oluidança et atreuimiento... (Forgetfulness and boldness...) Each partida is divided into articles (182 in total), and these are composed of laws (2802 in all). Its provisions are normally accompanied by references to authors and texts, allegories and examples, and, especially, a reasoned explanation of their origins and background—etymological, religious, philosophical and historical—for they are not meant to be merely prescriptive laws. The contradictions that exist between the various provisions were the result of the way the task of composition was organized, whereby each partida was written by a different person. Part I, Title I, Law xi: What the Law-Maker Should Be The law-maker should love God and keep Him before his eyes when he makes the laws, in order that they may be just and perfect. He should moreover love justice and the common benefit of all. He should be learned, in order to know how to distinguish right from wrong, and he should not be ashamed to change and amend his laws, whenever he thinks or a reason given him, that he should do so; for it is especially just that he who has to set others right and correct them should know how to do this in his own case, whenever he is wrong. Part I, Title I, Law xx: For What Reason Men Cannot Escape the Operation of the Laws by Saying That They Were Ignorant of Them No one can escape the penalties of the laws by saying that he did not know of them, for, since men have to be preserved by them by receiving as well as doing justice, it is reasonable that they should know them and read them, either by acquiring their meaning from those who have read them, or by hearing them discussed in some other way without reading; for men have excuses for many things which happen in this world; but they cannot excuse themselves from sending others in their places to assert their rights in court; and if they should have no one to send, they should communicate with some of their friends who may happen to be in the place where they are to be judged by the laws, that they too may represent them and argue their cases for them, and they must give them authority to do so. And since by themselves, or by their representatives, or