COMPLAW3

COMPARATIVE LAW
W.B. Fisch, Winter1999
Assignment #3

Ch. 3: THE CIVIL LAW TRADITION IN EUROPE BEFORE THE REVOLUTION

A. The Roman Civil Law, Canon Law, and Commercial Law Subtraditions

The Roman Civil Law (private law) (principal part of jus commune)

founding document for European study: Justinian's Corpus Juris Civilis (532ff.)

a codification and compilation, primarily of pre-Byzantine sources selected and edited, after the fall of Rome and the "western" empire
organization: 4 major sections

Institutes (textbook, modeled on Gaius's Institutes from 2d c.)
Digest (largest part, most fruitful source for study of "civil law")
Code (legislation of previous emperors, etc.)
Novels (Justinian's own imperial enactments)

subsequent fate of CJC

lost direct authority with collapse of Eastern Empire
rediscovery of text of Digest, university study in Italy late 11th c.
stages of assimilation into working law of pre-nationalist Europe:

Glossators
Commentators
[Humanists in France]

The Canon Law (second part of jus commune)

governed church and its communicants
influenced general family law, law of succession, criminal law

Commercial Law ("law merchant"): autonomous, international

B. The Roman Civil Law Legacy

Constitutional history

Republic

conflict between the orders
constitutional order

magistracy

consuls (3 limitations!)
praetors (law)

urbanus
peregrinus

curule aediles (public works)

Senate
Assembly

pressures of growth in Later Republic

Principate
Dominate