Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dk4vv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T05:58:42.776Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The two schools of jurists in the early Roman Principate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2009

Peter Stein
Get access

Extract

The jurists of the early Principate were divided into two groups, the Proculians and the Sabinians, but the nature of the division has proved to be a perennial problem of Roman legal history. Pomponius tells us that the Proculians regarded Labeo as their founder and the Sabinians Capito, and he gives lists of their respective leaders for more than a century. Furthermore, we know of more than two dozen particular problems which provoked disputes between the two groups. But the sources provide little express evidence as to the underlying opposing principles, if indeed there were any, which were espoused by them. Pomponius says that Labeo and Capito “first made, as it were, two sects: for Ateius Capito held fast to what had been handed down to him, whereas Labeo, a genius, with confidence in his own scholarship, a man who had studied several other branches of knowledge, set out to make many innovations” (D.1.2.2.47). Yet, when the various controversies are considered, the school of Labeo does not seem to champion doctrines which are especially progressive and that of Capito does not seem particularly conservative.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Cambridge Law Journal , Volume 31 , Issue 1: Jubilee Issue , April 1972 , pp. 8 - 31
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge Law Journal and Contributors 1972

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Conveniently listed in H. J. Roby, Introduction to the Study of Justinian's Digest (1884), pp. cxxxi–cxli. Cf. also Kübler's, B. survey, Pauly-Wissowa, Real-Encyclopädie, s.v. Rechtsschulen, I.A. 380–394.Google Scholar

2 Sokolowski, Philosophie im Privatrecht, I.69; De Zulueta, F., Digest 41. 1 and 2, p. 13.Google Scholar

3 Historical Introduction to the Study of Roman Law (2nd ed., 1952), p. 389.Google Scholar

4 The Institutes of Gaius, II (1953), p. 10.Google Scholar

5 Honoré, A. M., Gaius (1962), pp. 18–39Google Scholar; for Proculus, Honoré, “Proculus” (1962) 30 Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis 489–493, and Chr. Krampe, Proculi Epistulae, eine frühklassische Juristenschrift (1970), pp. 1–9; for Cassius, D'ippolito, F., Ideologia e diritto in Gaio Cassio Longino (1969).Google Scholar

6 Discussed by Atkinson, K. M. T., “The Education of the Lawyer in Ancient Rome” (1970) 87Google Scholar S.A.L.J. 43 et seq.

7 Seidl, E., Römische Rechtsgeschichte und Römisches Zivilprozessrecht (1962), pp. 72–73Google Scholar; Seidl, “Labeos geistiges Profil,” Studi in onore di E. Volterra (1969), I.63–81Google Scholar; Horak, F., Rationes Decidendi, I (1969)Google Scholar, an exhaustive study of the reasons given for their decisions by all jurists up to and including Labeo (cf. my review in (1970) 36 Studia et Documenta Historiae et Iuris 460–464).

8 Discussed in Horak, op. cit. pp. 279–280.

9 Stein, P., Regulae Iuris: From Juristic Rules to Legal Maxims (1966), pp. 9Google Scholaret seq.; Stein, “The Meaning of lex publica,” Studi in onore de E. Volterra (1969), 2.313–319.Google Scholar

10 Cicero, Partitiones Oratoriae, 37.130: Scriptorum autem privatum aliud est, publicum aliud. Publicum lex, senatusconsultum, foedus: privatum tabulae, pactum conventum, stipulatio.

11 For discussion of the legal situation, Watson, A., The Law of Property in the later Roman Republic (1968), pp. 161et seq.; for natura agri,Google ScholarMaschi, C. A., La concezione naturalistica del diritto e degli istituti giuridici romani (1937), pp. 27Google Scholaret seq.

12 Cf. the doctrine of the lost modern grant in the English law of easements.

13 Stein, Regulae Iuris, p. 63.

14 Ulpian, in D.1.1.6.

15 Vonglis, B., La lettre et l'esprit de la loi dans la jurisprudence classique et la rhétorique (1968).Google Scholar

16 For written and unwritten law in Rome, Stein, P., Roman Law and English Jurisprudence Yesterday and Today, inaugural lecture, Cambridge (1969), pp. 16Google Scholaret seq.

17 Martini, R., Le definizioni dei giuristi romani (1966)Google Scholar, discusses Labeo's definitions of particular notions, pp. 137–148.

18 Stein, Regulae Iuris, pp. 53 et seq.; Stein, “The Relations between Grammar and Law in the Early Principate: the beginnings of Analogy,” Atti del II congr. int. della Soc. it. storia del diritto (1971) pp. 75Google Scholaret seq.

19 H. Nettleship, “The Study of Latin Grammar among the Romans in the First Century A.D.” (1886) 15 Jo. Philology, p. 202; for references to more recent studies, Robins, R. H., A short History of Linguistics (1969), pp. 19Google Scholaret seq., 47 et seq.

20 Iurisprudentia Antehadriana (1898), 2.1.10 et seq.

21 It was Labeo who transmitted the story of how the introduction of the actio iniuriarum was forced on the praetor (because of the inadequacy of the fixed penalties for assault provided by the Twelve Tables), Aulus Gellius, 20.1.13.

22 De Visscher, F., Le régime romain de la noxalité (1947), pp. 295–297Google Scholar; Yaron, R., “Si pater filium ter venum duit” (1968) 36Google ScholarTijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis 59, n. 8.

23 Noted by Arangio-Ruiz (1912) Studi econ.-giur. Univ. Cagliari 84 et seq. (=Rariora, 34).

24 Wieacker, F., “Spezifikation: Schulprobleme und Sachprobleme,” Festschrift E. Rabel (1954)Google Scholar, 2.289 et seq.

25 Betti, E., “Sul valore dogmatico della categoria ‘contrahere’” (1915) 28 Bullettino istituto del diritto romano 27, 88.Google Scholar

26 Huvelin, P., Etudes sur le furtum, I (1915), pp. 778–779.Google Scholar

27 Betti, op. cit., p. 25; Thomas, J. A. C., “The Nature of Merces” (1958) Acta Juridica 191Google Scholaret seq.

28 Stein, P., Fault in the Formation of Contract in Roman Law and Scots Law (1958), pp. 64, 76, 79–82.Google Scholar

29 Daube, D., Studies in the Roman Law of Sale in Memory of De Zulueta (1959), pp. 26–45.Google Scholar

30 Discussed by Wunner, Sven Erik, Contractus: sein Wortgebrauch und Willensgehalt im klassischen römischen Recht (1964), pp. 33–41.Google Scholar

31 Discussion of the case, Watson, A., The Contract of Mandate in Roman Law (1961), pp. 186–190.Google Scholar

32 Voci, P., Diritto ereditario romano, II (1963), pp. 372Google Scholaret seq., 388 et seq.

33 Possibly to the ancient consortium ercto non cito of co-heirs, Leuba, J. F., Origine et nature du legs per praeceptionem (1962)Google Scholar; rev. Luzzatto, G. I. (1963) 29 Studia et documenta historiae et iuris 394–400Google Scholar; Grosso, G. (1963) 14 IURA 284–288.Google Scholar

34 Huvelin, Etudes, cit., ante, n. 26, p. 778; Mayer-Maly, T., “Die Grundlagen der Aufstellung von Altersgrenzen durch das Recht” (1970) Zeitschrift für das gesamte Familienrecht 618Google Scholar, sees the dispute as a choice between “individualising” and “type-formation.”

35 Most succinctly expounded by Koschaker, P. (1938) 58 Zeitschrift der Savigny Stiftung (rom.Abt.) 267, n. 1.Google Scholar

36 “Animalia quae collo dorsove domantur” (1967) 18 IURA, 45–107,Google Scholarcf. White, K. D., Roman Farming (1970), pp. 276Google Scholaret seq.

37 Daube, D., “Derelictio, occupatio and traditio: Romans and Rabbis” (1961) 77 L.Q.R. 389Google Scholar, suggesting that the object of abandonment was to avoid land-tax. But Italic land, alone the object of dominium, was not subject to tributum, and in any case it is difficult to imagine treasury officials falling for such a ruse.

38 Cf. the opinion of Proculus in D.3.5.9.1, and that of Labeo in D.8.5.6.2 (on abandonment to avoid liability in respect of a servitude oneris faciendi).

39 Romano, S., Studi sulla derelizione net diritto romano (1933), pp. 50, 142–145.Google Scholar

40 The Proculian school was particularly interested in the jurisprudential analysis of possession, especially with regard to the mental element. It was probably Labeo who first formulated the proposition that we acquire possession animo of certain things, such as those which we have bought and placed a guard over (D.41.2.51). Proculus and Neratius laid down that, provided that naturalis possessio already exists, possession can be acquired solo animo (D.41.2.3.3). Maccormack, G., in his careful study of “The role of animus in the classical law of possession” (1969) 86 Zeitschrift der Savigny Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte (rom.Abt.) 105–145Google Scholar, points out that “the Proculians were cautious in the use they made of the notion of animus,” and concludes: “The evidence is not sufficient to establish that there was a clear cut controversy between the schools on the question of animus; merely that the Proculian jurists were responsible for developing the early rules of possession framed in terms of animus (which have survived) and that on occasion the Sabinian jurists or some of them objected to their conclusions” (pp. 119–120).

41 Discussion in Crifò, G., “Attività normativa del senato in età repubblicana” (1968) 71 Bullettino istituto del diritto romano 80–103.Google Scholar

42 Stein, Regulae iuris, cit., pp. 49 et seq.; cf. Wieacker, F., rev. (1967) 84 Zeitschrift der Savigny Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte (rom.Abt.) 438.Google Scholar

43 As argued by M. Schanz, “Die Analogisten und Anomalisten in römischen Recht” (1884) 42 Philologus 312 et seq.; for a more reasonable view, H. Dirksen, “Uber die Schulen der römischen Juristen,” Beiträge zur Kunde des römischen Rechts (1825), pp. 1–158.

44 Op. cit., ante, n. 29, p. 33.

45 I am most grateful to Mr. J. A. Crook, f.b.a., for commenting critically on this paper.