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ROMAN LAW.   Term Paper ID:24943 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Sources, development & codification of law from 500 B.C. to 284 A.D.... More...

6 Pages / 1350 Words 7 sources, 28 Citations, MLA Format $24.00 Return to List of Papers

Paper Abstract: Sources, development & codification of law from 500 B.C. to 284 A.D. Paper Introduction: Scholars conventionally treat the development of Roman law as having undergone three major phases: the Republic, the Principate, and the Dominate. The Republic (510 B.C.) represented the birth of codification and legal thought, and a period of limited direct participation by the people in the lawmaking process. Under the Principate (27 B.C.), the participation of the people was all but eliminated, in favor of the emperor’s control over most of the state machinery. While the Principate emperors’ absolutism was disguised behind a facade of Republicanism, the Dominate period (284 A.D.) saw no attempts to hide the fact of imperial totalitarianism. The early Roman Republic was characterized by the “Struggle of the Orders,” an ongoing cleavage between patricians and plebeians. Patricians enjoyed numerous advantages over plebeians, Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. Even during the 1st century A.D., somelaws were still enacted by the vote of the people (Wolff 69), but the sheersize of the empire and the attendant population explosion had eliminatedthe efficacy of direct participation long before. The Consuls held an extremely high office,presiding over the legislative bodies of the comitia centuriata and thecomitia tributa. These men occupied a prestigious place in Romansociety, as revered as augurs and pontifices. London: Sweet and Maxwell, Limited, 1921.Kaegi, Walter Emil. Roman Law: An Historical Introduction. Washington, D.C.: Washington Law Book Company, 1928.Wolff, Hans Julius. Even before the Dominate period, strides were made toward unabashedabsolutism, beginning with the abolition of popular assemblies by Augustus'successor (Gibbon 675). Territorialexpansion was, if not the motive, then certainly the result of two warswith Carthage during the 3rd century B.C., Rome's "only rival for controlof the Western Mediterranean" (Nicholas 7). The Twelve Tables (circa 451 B.C.), a list of laws inscribed onbronze plaques, are believed to have been the first true Roman legislation(Wolff 55), and grew out of the plebeians' demand to know their rights andthe laws they lived under. During the era of the Republic, all lawsuits had originated inthe office of the praetor, who had the duty of evaluating the claims ofeither side and determining whether a trial was warranted. Pax Romana. Patriciansenjoyed numerous advantages over plebeians, not only economically butsocially and politically as well. This power is clearly seen in the praetorial edict, in whicha praetor, upon taking office, stated "the rules by which he would guidehimself in granting or refusing legal remedies"(Hunter 14). Diocletian, the first emperor of the Dominate, acceeded to an officethat was at the mercy of the army. The Republic (51 B.C.) represented the birth of codification andlegal thought, and a period of limited direct participation by the peoplein the lawmaking process. A Panorama of the World's Legal Systems. While the civil legal tradition was rigidlyformal and conservative, the praetor was invested with the power tointerpret the law, and thus to amend it or adapt it to existingcircumstances. If he sodecided, the trial then was presided over by a private citizen, the iudexprivatus, who had the authority to render judgment (Wolff 72). The independence of the judiciary suffered its final blow under theDominate. Since the emperors of the Principate had already enjoyed an indirectlegislative prerogative before Hadrian, however, the more striking resultof the Perpetual Edict was that praetors were no longer able to interpretthe law as they wished. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976.Wigmore, John Henry. The bulk of legislativeactivity had passed to the senate, whose resolutions were enacted in theform of senatus consulta. As a remedy, the "transformation of theEmperor from princeps to dominus...[made him] a figure whose very aspectwas sacred...The forms of Republican government were finally discarded. The Principate, beginning with Augustus, ruledunder the guise of Republicanism. Wars, expansion, and theattendant commercial growth led to the presence of foreigners on Romansoil. Justinian ruled the Eastern empire from Byzantium, whose citizens nolonger conducted their lives in the Roman language. A patrician creditor was all butguaranteed victory in any legal dispute with his plebeian debtor, by virtueof the fact that all magistrates were of the patrician class (Wolff 57).Most Romans were not aware of their rights under the law, nor indeed of thespecific provisions of the law, as the law was kept in the custody of theCollege of Pontiffs, another patrician body (Hunter 8). The praetor, who shielded citizens from unwarranted attack and aided them in their justified claims, did the same for aliens...we know that in 242 B.C. An Introduction to Roman Law. Diocletian's aim, the justification for the Dominate, was tounite the empire under one absolute power and the tradition of Roman law. They had now to follow a prescribed edict, or setof parameters, elaborated by Hadrian's jurist Saluius Iulianus; just as theius respondendi was the end of jurisconsult reform, "this work of Iulianusmay be taken to mark the end of Praetorian reform"(Hunter 15). Works CitedGibbon, Edward. During the era of the early Republic, ordinary citizens as well asmagistrates (Hunter 1 ) had relied on jurisconsults to inform and advisethem on matters of law. The office of praetor was a particularly influential one with respectto the evolution of Roman law. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Under the Principate (27 B.C.), the participationof the people was all but eliminated, in favor of the emperor's controlover most of the state machinery. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1951. In fact, many famous menpracticed more than one of the three vocations: "Cicero,...when he soughtto prepare as an advocate, attached himself first to Quintus Scaevola, theaugur, and after his death to the other Scaevola, the pontifexmaximus,...to absorb from their utterances the traditions of the law"(Wigmore 396). Introduction to Roman Law. After 367 B.C., having essentially settled the political unrestwithin its borders, Rome turned its attention outward. Both of these bodies consisted of the whole citizen body,patricians and plebeians, but voting tended to favor the patricians due toan unequal system of weighting (Gibbon 674). The establishment of the empire, however, saw the endof such discretion on the part of praetors. Allpower was in the Emperor and was administered by him through a civilservice responsible only to him"(Nicholas 12). Thistreatment of the law was in keeping with the philosophy of the rulers ofthe Dominate: "the old law - as well as new institutions - had becomecompletely dependent on the absolute will of the ruler"(Wolff 9 ). The nature of the jurisconsults' work invariably brought some elementof interpretation to the law, and thus jurisconsults played as significanta role in Roman legal evolution as did praetors. The later empire was characterized by increased foreign influence onthe development of Roman law, most notably that of Christianity: "theChristian princes'...institutions appear[ed] to fluctuate between thecustom of the empire and the wishes of the church"(Gibbon 7 3). By theDominate period, however, one official judge, or praetor, presided over theentire process (Wolff 85). Byzantium and the Decline of Rome. The existing legal structure had not been prepared for such aneventuality, so adaptations were made to fit the new circumstances. The empire covered by thistime an enormous geographical area, and its rule was a challenging task forthe emperor. alien business had grown to such dimensions that a new office, especially charged with jurisdiction over aliens, was created; namely, that of the praetor peregrinus or alien praetor (Wolff 71). Naturally, jurisconsults wereeager for the endorsement to be conferred upon them, and thus theindependent, discretionary role of jurisconsults was effectivelyneutralized by the emperor. Its provisions are mainly procedural, statingfor example that "[a]fter midday, the cause shall be adjudged to the partypresent [in a lawsuit] if the other has failed to appear" (Wigmore 375).The fact that this code was not moral in nature, like the Ten Commandments,demonstrates departure from the conception of law as merely an aspect ofreligious duty, and commencement of legal thought as a distinct field initself. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962.Petit, Paul. It is said in history books that the senate wasbut a "mouthpiece of the emperor"(Wolff 69), and that the emperor was themain, if not sole, agent of legislation in this period. Scholars conventionally treat the development of Roman law as havingundergone three major phases: the Republic, the Principate, and theDominate. Augustus, however, devisedthe idea of endowing certain jurisconsults with the imperial seal ofapproval, or ius respondendi (Nicholas 31). Historians divide the Empire into two periods, that of the Principateand that of the Dominate. However, by 287 B.C., with thelex Hortensia, the resolutions of the concilium plebis, the all-plebeianvoting unit, achieved full legislative force with those of the two comitia.This was a significant victory, as the lawmaking process up to that pointhad involved the formal submission of a bill for the approval of thepatrician senate, while plebiscites needed no senatorial sanction (Wolff65). The early Roman Republic was characterized by the "Struggle of theOrders," an ongoing cleavage between patricians and plebeians. New York: The Modern Library, (197?).Hunter, William A. The scholars who workedon his codification of Roman law, the accomplishment for which Justinian ismost renowned, were all Byzantine Greeks, and even "the Preface to theDigest was promulgated in Greek"(Wigmore 446). While the Principate emperors' absolutismwas disguised behind a facade of Republicanism, the Dominate period (284A.D.) saw no attempts to hide the fact of imperial totalitarianism. Justinian's motivation incommissioning the codification is attributed by scholars to his desire topreserve the Roman tradition, as well as to adapt it to the bureaucracy ofa world empire (Wolff 175). Already apotent instrument, the edict was not even binding upon the praetor whoissued it: he could deviate from his own proclaimed set of rules withoutcensure (Wolff 81). In 367 B.C., the plebeians' struggle for equality was met with theleges Liciniae Sextiae, which stated that one of the Consuls selected eachyear must be a plebeian. Inaddition, a corpus of extremely harsh anti-pagan laws were passed,restricting not only pagans' freedoms but those of any Christians whotolerated pagan activities on their lands(Kaegi 6 ). Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968.Nicholas, Barry. Still later, Hadrian is credited with having beenthe first to openly assert imperial legislative authority, by not onlyinstituting an "invariable standard of jurisprudence" (Gibbon 677) in theform of the Perpetual Edict, but also declaring in that document that"constitutions of the emperors had equal force with public laws...that theyhad 'the place of a law'" (Wolff 87). In the interests of such a task, Justinian allowed no interpretationof the laws contained therein other than his own (Gibbon 693). If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.