Institutes of Roman Law – Gaius, Edward Poste (tr.), E.A. Whittuck(ed.), A.H.J. Greenidge (Intr.)
The Institutes are a complete exposition of the elements of Roman law and are divided into four books—the first treating of persons and the differences of the status they may occupy in the eye of the law; the second-of things, and the modes in which rights over them may be acquired, including the law relating to wills; the third of intestate succession and of obligations; the fourth of actions and their forms. For many centuries they had been the familiar textbook of all students of Roman law.
Institutes of Roman Law.
Format: eBook.
Institutes of Roman Law.
ISBN: 9783849654108
Excerpt from the historical introduction
In order to justify the character of this introductory essay it is necessary to say a few words about the intention with which it is written. The reader must regard it mainly in the light of an introduction to the Institutes of Gaius, not in the light of a disinterested sketch of the history of Roman Law. Had it been intended to have the latter character, both some of its omissions and some of its inclusions would be wholly unjustifiable. The most signal of the omissions is the neglect to give an adequate treatment to the stage of Roman Law which yields to no other in importance—the stage at which it passes from the religious to the secular sphere, from Fas to Jus. One of the chief questions which is, or should be, agitating students of Roman Law at the present day, is that of the period at which this transition was effected. For, if it is true that Roman Law retained its priestly character and its religious sanctions to a late period of the Republic Ref. 002, then the traditional history of the Twelve Tables is an improbability, and the account given by Cicero and other writers of the legislation and procedure of the Monarchy and early Republic is an anachronism. The student of Gaius, however, is not very intimately concerned with this far-reaching historical question; and I have been content to state my general adherence to the traditional view without attempting to justify it by evidence.
Amongst subjects included in this sketch, which have little direct bearing on the history of Roman Law, I may mention the descriptions of the structure of the different Comitia at Rome and the account of the manner in which the powers of the Princeps were conferred. From the point of view of the general history of the civil and criminal law in a State it is not of much importance to determine the particular mode in which a legislative assembly is constituted, or the precise manner in which a sovereign (whether nominal or real) is invested with his authority. But these historical questions do to some extent underlie subjects which are treated by Gaius; and, as it was not found convenient to deal with them at any great length in the commentary, a place had to be found for them in this introduction.
§ 1.: The Unification and Extension of Roman Law.
The history of Roman Law begins for us with the traditions that have been preserved concerning the Roman Monarchy. The existence of a Monarchy such as that described for us by annalists like Livy and Dionysius, implies the existence of a consolidated State, with a central legislative and executive power and a tolerably uniform system of law. In the Monarchy, however, and even in the early Republic it seems that the system of law was not marked by perfect uniformity, since the two classes of Patricians and Plebeians, which made up the Roman State, appear to have been distinguished, not only by the possession of different political privileges, but also by the possession of different systems of customary law Ref. 003. It is even possible that a further divergence of practice may have existed in the most primitive society, or societies, out of which the City and Monarchy of Rome developed—that a considerable amount of autonomy in legal relations may have existed in the Clans (Gentes) and Villages (Vici), out of which the earliest Rome was formed. The history of Roman law, from its beginning to its close, would thus be marked by a process of gradually increasing unification. First the customs of the Clans were merged in the customs of a State; but this State consisted of two classes, Patricians and Plebeians; and each of these classes seems to have had a customary law of its own. Then an attempt was made to create a uniform system; and this uniformity was probably secured by making patrician law approximate as closely as possible to plebeian—the law of the few to the law of the many. A further advance was made when Rome had become the mistress of Italy. Italian customs were made ultimately to conform to those of the leading State, and the free cities of Italy became the municipalities of Rome. Lastly, Rome had created an Empire. For a very long period she adopted the wise and cautious policy of recognizing, as far as possible, the local and tribal law of the cities and peoples under her control. The recognition of this local or tribal law was not, however, merely a symptom of the favourite Roman principle of non-interference. It was also a sign that the privileges of Romans and Italians were not possessed by provincials; for the conferment of Roman citizenship, or even of Latin rights, necessarily carried with it the use of the forms of Roman Private Law Ref. 004. Hence, when a time came at which Rome was willing to raise States or individuals in the Provinces to a level with her own citizens, the law of Rome came to take the place of the territorial or tribal law of these political units. The process of a thorough imperial unification by means of a common system of Roman Private Law had begun.
§ 2.: The Epochs in this process of Unification and Extension.
The dates of the three epochs which we have touched on can only be vaguely indicated. We have no knowledge of the year, or even of the century, when the smaller political units, out of which Rome was formed, became so thoroughly marshalled under the rule of a common government that the customs of the Clans were made to conform to the principles laid down and enforced by a single superior authority. For the second epoch—the period, that is, at which an attempt was made to secure a uniform system of law which would be binding equally on Patricians and Plebeians—tradition does supply a date, one, however, that has more than once been doubted by modern writers on Roman History and Law Ref. 005. This traditional date is comprised in the years 451-448 b.c., years which the Romans believed to mark the creation of the Decemviral Commission and the publication of the Law of the Twelve Tables. The third tendency—that of the unification of Rome with Italy,—although it had begun to be felt in isolated cases from a very early period of Roman History, may be said to have received its final impulse at the close of the great war for Italian freedom, generally known as the Social war, in 89 b. c. The last epoch—that of imperial unification—may be said to have been ushered in by the accession of Caesar to supreme power in 49 b. c. It had not been closed even by the time of Gaius, about the middle of the second century a. d.; for, even at that late period the Eastern part of the Empire still abode by Eastern forms of law Ref. 006. It may even be questioned whether the Edict of Caracalla, which is believed to have extended Roman citizenship to all the free inhabitants of that portion of the world that was ruled by Rome, between the years 212 and 217 a d., really eliminated all the local varieties of customary law. Local customs tend to die hard, and it was never in the spirit of the Roman Empire to suppress them. The legal unity of the Empire was always more strongly marked in the matter of Procedure than in the matter of Substantive Law. The processes of the Courts were the same for every Province at a time when the greatest varieties of customary law were recognized by these courts.
§ 3.: Stages of Roman Legal History—The Clan and the Family—Evolution of individual rights.
We may now attempt to treat in greater detail the stages of Roman Legal History which we have outlined. The earliest stage—that marked by the independent or almost independent life of the Clan or Gens—is one for which, by the nature of the case, no definite historical evidence exists. The reality of such a life is merely an inference drawn from the characteristics of the Gens as it appears before us in the historical period. These characteristics seem to prove that the Gens is not a really primitive institution, but a late and advanced stage in the social development of the Latin races; but, on the other hand, they may show that it was in many respects a more primitive unit than the State; that is, that it exercised rights and duties which were ultimately exercised by the State. No political society worthy of the name can deal with Clans as the subjects of rights; it can deal only with Families or Individuals. Hence, if the Roman Gens ever lived a strong corporate life, the authority of the Roman State must in those days have been weak.
The organization of the Gens was based on the patriarchal idea in its extreme form: that is, on the conception that relationship is only binding when it can be traced through the male line. And this is the fact which seems to prove that the Gens marks a late and mature stage in the development of Latin societies; for the patriarchal idea is not one that is readily grasped by the mind of primitive man. Yet, late as the Gens is when considered in reference to the prehistoric development of the Latin race, it perhaps possessed, before the very dawn of history, a unity and power of its own, of which but pale reflections survive in the historical period. In historical times the only test of unity was the common name borne by the Gentiles Ref. 007; the chief signs of corporate action were their guardianship of the insane and their reversionary right of guardianship over women and children Ref. 008 — powers which the Gentiles must have [xiii] exercised by delegating their authority to a personal representative. The further right which they possessed in later times, of succeeding to intestate inheritances in the last resort Ref. 009, was perhaps a right possessed by individual members of the corporation rather than by the corporation itself. But a corporate activity far greater than this has been suspected for earlier times. There is indirect evidence that all Private Land (Ager Privatus) was at one time owned by the Gentes, not by families or individuals Ref. 010, and the view that the primitive Roman Senate was in some way representative of the Gentes is in accordance with the belief of Roman antiquity Ref. 011. The fact that the primitive Roman State was in many ways conditioned by its clan organization seems to be certain. As the State grew stronger, it substituted the Family for the Clan. Between the two there is only a difference of degree. The Family (Familia) is the aggregate of the members of a household under a common head, the Paterfamilias; whereas the Gens is the aggregate of all individuals who bear a common name and who, therefore, if their ancestry could be traced in the male line through all its stages, would be found to be the descendants of some ultimate common ancestor. But the Familia is a far smaller, and therefore a far less powerful, unit than the Gens. It cannot so effectively dominate the State or impede its activities Ref. 012. Again, the heads of families are many in number; the heads of the Gentes (who must have existed at the time when the Gens was the important unit) were necessarily few. The State which deals with families deals with a multitude of individuals, not with an oligarchy representing the interests of a number of corporations. The conception of individual rights, in their modern sense, was, it is true, never fully recognized in Roman Private Law. It was impeded by the Patria Potestas—the life-long power of the father over the son. But much was ultimately done to lessen the rigour of this patriarchal rule; and the principles of Roman Law were finally extended to races which knew nothing of the Patria Potestas. This law ultimately gave the most perfect expression hitherto witnessed by the world of rights which were both universal and individual. The existence of the Empire gave Rome the power, possessed in as high a degree by no other State, of dealing with the individual on universal lines, because she was not hampered by the barriers between man and man thrown up by separate national institutions.
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