Chronology

The secular law that applied to Roman citizens (cives Romani) consists of two parts, ius civile, that is, the law for Roman cives (‘‘citizens’’), which was based on custom, the Twelve Tables, and statutes, and ius honorarium, the law developed by the praetors with the authority of their office (honor). (Religious law is not covered in this chapter.) The history of Roman Law has been divided into four periods, which, however, do not correspond to the four traditional periods of Roman political and constitutional history (Monarchy, Republic, and Empire [divided into Principate and Dominate]). A typical outline of these periods is:

Archaic (foundation of Rome to 200 bc)

Formative (200 bc to ad 130)

Classical (ad 130-235)

Post-classical (ad 235-534)

This periodization is based on the following turning points. The archaic period presumably began with the foundation of Rome, although it emerges for us only with the Twelve Tables owing to the limitation of our source materials. The formative period begins with the reconstruction of Italy after Rome’s victory in the Second Punic War and with Rome’s expansion into the Greek East. This chapter will deal primarily with this period, or at least that part of it which fell within the Republic. The formative period can be divided into three sub-periods, according to the engine driving legal change within private law: first, legislation, from about 200; then the praetor’s edict,2 from the Aebutian Law (below) up to the Cornelian Law on the Administration of Justice of 67 (below), and finally the activity of the jurisconsults. The formative period saw the development of four innovative mechanisms in Roman Law: the ‘‘statement of issue’’ (formula) as an alternative to the ‘‘writ’’ ( legis actio), the praetor’s annual standing edict (edictum perpetuum), the development of the standing criminal court, and the semi-professionalization of the jurisconsult and a concomitant body of juristic literature. Frier argues that the wide powers developed by the praetors and consequent legal instability in the second sub-period were checked by the jurisconsults, who supplied calm and continuity through their legal science.3 The classical period begins with the fixing of the praetor’s edictum perpe-tuum under Hadrian around ad 130.4 The fall of the Severan emperors marks the beginning of the post-classical era.