Fact 1014 — What Did the Rus’ Justice Protect?

The Rus’ Justice code prescribed fines for stealing valuable property: the Short Pravda lists a dog, hawk, and falcon, while the later Expanded Pravda also lists a beaver. These are rules against taking another person’s property, not bans on hunting beavers or “rare” birds in the modern conservation sense. The provisions belong to different redactions; they are not all part of Yaroslav’s original text.