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Roman law is the legal system of ancient Rome, including the legal developments spanning over a thousand years of jurisprudence, from the Twelve Tables, to the Corpus Juris Civilis ordered by Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian I. Roman law forms the basic framework for civil law, the most widely used legal system today, and the terms are sometimes used synonymously. The historical importance of Roman law is reflected by the continued use of Latin legal terminology in many legal systems influenced by it, including common law.
A brocard is a legal maxim in Latin that is, in a strict sense, derived from traditional legal authorities, even from ancient Rome. The word is a variant of the Latinized name of Burchard of Worms, Bishop of Worms, Germany, who compiled 20 volumes of Ecclesiastical Rules.
The patricians were originally a group of ruling class families in ancient Rome. The distinction was highly significant in the Roman Kingdom, and the early Republic, but its relevance waned after the Conflict of the Orders. By the time of the late Republic and Empire, membership in the patriciate was of only nominal significance.
Citizenship in ancient Rome was a privileged political and legal status afforded to free individuals with respect to laws, property, and governance.
The Concilium Plebis was the principal assembly of the common people of the ancient Roman Republic. It functioned as a legislative/judicial assembly, through which the plebeians (commoners) could pass legislation, elect plebeian tribunes and plebeian aediles, and try judicial cases. The Plebeian Council was originally organized on the basis of the Curia but in 471 BC adopted an organizational system based on residential districts or tribes. The Plebeian Council usually met in the well of the Comitium and could only be convoked by the Tribune of the Plebs. The patricians were excluded from the Council.
The Lex Papia et Poppaea was a Roman law introduced in 9 AD to encourage and strengthen marriage. It included provisions against adultery and against celibacy after a certain age and complemented and supplemented Augustus' Lex Julia de Maritandis Ordinibus of 18 BC and the Lex Iulia de Adulteriis Coercendis of 17 BC. The law was introduced by the suffect consuls of that year, Marcus Papius Mutilus and Quintus Poppaeus Secundus, although they themselves were unmarried.
The Codex Euricianus or Code of Euric was a collection of laws governing the Visigoths compiled at the order of Euric, King of the Visigoths, sometime before 480, probably at Toulouse ; it is one of the earliest examples of early Germanic law. The compilation itself was the work of Leo, a Roman lawyer and principal counsellor of the king. The customs of the Visigothic nation were recognised and affirmed. The Code is largely confused and it appears that it was merely a recollection of Gothic custom altered by Roman law.
In Roman Law, Lex Iunia Norbana of 19 AD classified all freedmen into two classes according to their mode of enfranchisement: enfranchised citizens, and enfranchised Latini.
A Lex Julia was an ancient Roman law that was introduced by any member of the Julian family. Most often, "Julian laws", Lex Iulia or Leges Iuliae refer to moral legislation introduced by Augustus in 23 BC, or to a law from the dictatorship of Julius Caesar.
Secessio plebis was an informal exercise of power by Rome's plebeian citizens, similar in concept to the general strike. During the secessio plebis, the plebs would abandon the city en masse in a protest emigration and leave the patrician order to themselves. Therefore, a secessio meant that all shops and workshops would shut down and commercial transactions would largely cease. This was an effective strategy in the Conflict of the Orders due to strength in numbers; plebeian citizens made up the vast majority of Rome's populace and produced most of its food and resources, while a patrician citizen was a member of the minority upper class, the equivalent of the landed gentry of later times. Authors report different numbers for how many secessions there were. Cary & Scullard state there were five between 494 BC and 287 BC.
The Lex Claudia also known as the plebiscitum Claudianum or the lex Claudia de nave senatoris, was a Roman law passed in 218 BC. Proposed at the start of the Second Punic War, the law prohibited senators and their sons from owning an "ocean-going ship" which had a capacity of more than 300 amphorae. It was proposed by the tribune Quintus Claudius and supported by a senator Gaius Flaminius. There are no surviving contemporary sources for the law; the only ancient source to explicitly discuss it being the historian Livy. While Cicero does mention the law in his prosecution of Verres in 70 BC, this is only an indirect reference. As such, the ancient evidence is limited and only dates from nearly two centuries later. Nonetheless, modern scholarship has continued to debate the purpose and significance of the lex Claudia.
In ancient Roman law, ambitus was a crime of political corruption, mainly a candidate's attempt to influence the outcome of an election through bribery or other forms of soft power. The Latin word ambitus is the origin of the English word "ambition" which is another of its original meanings; ambitus was the process of "going around and commending oneself or one's protégés to the people," an activity liable to unethical excesses. In practice, bringing a charge of ambitus against a public figure became a favored tactic for undermining a political opponent.
Sacrosanctity was the declaration of physical inviolability of a temple, a sacred object, or a person through the lex sacrata, which had religious connotations. Festus explained that: “Sacred laws are laws which have the sanction that anyone who broke them becomes accursed to one of the gods, together with his family and property”. In some cases the law may have been applied to protect temples from being defiled. It could also be applied to protect a person who was declared sacrosanct (inviolable). Those who harmed a sacrosanct person became sacer (accursed) through the declaration sacer esto!. The offender was considered as having harmed the gods or a god, as well as the sacrosanct person and therefore accursed to the gods or a god. This meant that the offender became forfeit to the god(s) and on his death he was surrendered to the god(s) in question. The implication was that anyone who killed him was considered as performing a sacred duty and enjoyed impunity.
The Lex Licinia Mucia was a Roman law which set up a quaestio to investigate Latin and Italian allies registered as Romans on the citizen rolls. It was established by consuls Lucius Licinius Crassus and Quintus Mucius Scaevola Pontifex in 95 BC. This law is regarded as a cause of the Social War.
The Lex Scantinia is a poorly documented ancient Roman law that penalized a sex crime (stuprum) against a freeborn male minor. The law may also have been used to prosecute adult male citizens who willingly took a passive role in having sex with other men. It was thus aimed at protecting the citizen's body from sexual abuse (stuprum), but did not prohibit homosexual behavior as such, as long as the passive partner was not a citizen in good standing. The primary use of the Lex Scantinia seems to have been harassing political opponents whose lifestyles opened them to criticism as passive homosexuals or pederasts in the Hellenistic manner.
The Tribal Assembly was an assembly consisting of all Roman citizens convened by tribes (tribus).
Leges Clodiae were a series of laws (plebiscites) passed by the Plebeian Council of the Roman Republic under the tribune Publius Clodius Pulcher in 58 BC. Clodius was a member of the patrician family ("gens") Claudius; the alternative spelling of his name is sometimes regarded as a political gesture. With the support of Julius Caesar, who held his first consulship in 59 BC, Clodius had himself adopted into a plebeian family in order to qualify for the office of tribune of the plebs, which was not open to patricians. Clodius was famously a bitter opponent of Cicero.
Quintus Varius Severus was a politician in the late Roman Republic. He was also called Hybrida because his mother was Spanish.
Early Germanic law was the form of law followed by the early Germanic peoples. It was an important element of early Germanic culture.
References
- ↑ Elizabeth Rawson, "Discrimina ordinum: The Lex Julia Theatralis," Papers of the British School at Rome 55 (1987), p. 102.
- ↑ Cicero, Pro Murena, 19