Legal Quote of the Week - an Aggressive Bankruptcy Code

"Whoever takes goods (on credit) and becomes bankrupt, then again takes goods and again becomes bankrupt, then takes goods again and yet again becomes bankrupt is to be put to death after the third time."
-The Yasa, medieval Mongolian law code c. 1220 (statute reported by the Egyptian historian al-Maqrizi, c. 1400)

Attorneys who represent creditors and debtors, respectively, will likely have different views on this particular piece of legal history.

For further information, see V.A. Riasanovsky, Fundamental Principles of Mongol Law (Routledge 1997); Jack Weatherford, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World (Broadway, 2005).

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