But either each one will employ those known to be free men, or will dismiss him who feigns freedom, fearing that he will be liable to those punishments which are ordained by the law. If, therefore, any known fugitive be found anywhere, his detainer shall bring to our fisc twelve pounds of silver, but we decree that to him whose slave he is he shall bring another of the same value in addition to that same fugitive.
Codex Justinianus:
Application of Patria Potestas to the Coloni, c. 530
Among the steps taken to protect the family of the colonus was the passing of a law upholding, according to Roman ideas, paternal authority. But in the event of a transfer, which was only permitted in certain cases, of coloni from one estate to another the family might be broken up.
Xl.48.xiii. We define that, among inquilini and coloni, to vindicate the birth of whom it pertains as much to the one as to the other, and the condition appears to be the same without distinction, although there be discrimination in name, adopted children shall recognize paternal authority whether both or neither parent be enrolled in the census.
It must also be observed that, if (when the same lord of two estates transfers, to that which is hard-pressed, coloni from a possession well supplied with cultivators) the same estates should pass under the jurisdiction of different lords by any chance, the transfer made shall remain an accomplished fact, but in such a way that the lord of that estate, from which the coloni are proved to have been transferred, may recover the male children of those transferred.
Codex Justinianus:
Children of the Unfree, c. 530
In marriages between those of unfree status, when within that category the parents were of different social classes, the children followed the condition of the mother. For all practical purposes slaves and adscripticii were equal before the law.
Xl.48.xxi. Lest there be any further doubt, if any one is descended from a bondwoman and a slave or adscripticius and a female slave, who is (and this might be worse fortune) either of bond or of servile rank, we decree that those things which were provided in former laws for such offspring, born of bondwoman and freeman, shall be left in their present state, and the offspring procreated from such connection shall be of bond status.
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