Roman Law and the Legal World of the Romans

Roman Law and the Legal World of the Romans

Latin status) were made from the end of the Republic on. Early on, these grants were typically made to individuals or small groups, but early in the first century bc the non-Roman parts of Italy were absorbed en masse, and under the Empire citizen status came to be given to whole communities and occasionally even to whole regions. Finally, in ad 212 an imperial decree made citizens of virtually all free inhabitants of the empire. In theory, this could have eliminated indigenous traditions of non-Roman law instantly, though we will see later that things were not actually so simple. Second, Roman political authorities increasingly used their own law to settle disputes in which the two parties were not both from the same foreign state, and so there was no (single) “foreign” system to follow – for example, cases between a Roman and a provincial, between provincials from two differ ent cities, and cases including persons from outside the empire entirely. We also know of cities that decided minor cases them selves, but had to refer more important matters to the Roman authorities. Third, even communities that retained formal judicial independence sometimes changed their laws to resemble those of Rome, especially in the western half of the empire. This con formity seems to have been encouraged but not required by the central government. Finally, the losing party in any dispute might appeal to Roman authority just to have a second chance to win. In these last two instances, subjects and subject states colluded in weak ening their own legal systems.

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