Roman Law and the Legal World of the Romans

by Andrew M. Riggsby

In this book, Andrew Riggsby offers a survey of the main areas of Roman law, both substantive and procedural, and how the legal world interacted with the rest of Roman life. Emphasizing basic concepts, he recounts its historical development and focuses in particular on the later Republic and early centuries of the Roman Empire. The volume is designed as an introductory work, with brief chapters that will be accessible to college students with little knowledge of legal matters or Roman antiquity. The text is also free of technical language and Latin terminology. It can be used in courses on Roman law, Roman history, or comparative law, but it will also serve as a useful reference for more advanced students and scholars.

Genres: Law, History, Nonfiction

283 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Tina]

Good to know that the legal system barely changed in the last 2 millennia. Totally functional and not broken 👍🏻

Enjoyed the chapter on Family Law. Unilateral divorce by intention alone? Spouses not entitled to each other’s property as they don’t automatically assume ownership post-marriage? We need to get back on that.
(Loved that the author specifically called out Christianity for goofing up family values)

[Harry B]

Very much an introductory work. Easy to follow in the beginning, but with all things in substantive law - especially when this is a consice version of the law - it started to become harder to understand or to piece together the parts of the law. Nonetheless, it helps in placing the pieces on your radar that would (hopefully) help later on when a more precise and informative textbook on Roman law is used to understand it entirely. Overall, and valuable book to the lay person and useful for those who want to start learning the law of Ancient Rome.

[Mark Blane]

This is a very basic introduction of ancient Roman Law that explains (briefly) the 4 periods of Roman Law:

1. Archaic
2. Pre-Classical
3.Classical
4. Post-Classical

It then goes into the Sources of Roman Law such as the 12 Tables and Edicts. It meanders over the legal education process and the people who were like lawyers. My curiosity was focused on Usus and Usufructs, and Crimes and Punishment.

All in all, a very basic introduction.

[Nathan]

I really enjoyed reading this book. It is very broad and general, however. I was expecting a little more specifics of Roman Law, e.g. quoting actual passages, exegesis, analysis, and then clarification. Wouldn't recommend as a scholarly work, yet I would recommend as an overview/introduction.

[Christopher]

Okay general introduction to Roman law in broad outline. The book has twenty substantive chapters, each about ten or so pages long. After a general introduction and treatments of topics like "how do we know what we do?" it covers fairly narrow topics like "status" and family law". The blurb on the back says the book can be used in a course on Roman law, but I find that hard to believe. It's fine for somebody who wants a general overview but isn't substantive enough as a proper course book. It's written in an "ipse dixit" format, which is fine as far as it goes, but it has no footnotes and no indication of academic disputes (these are occasionally alluded to but never really explained). Also, even when specific incidents are mentioned, there are no ancient references. I would have liked a general indication of where to read up more on a given topic (like what book of the Digest contains information about, say, delicts), but certainly when a specific incident is cited, a parenthetical indication of its location would not have burdened the generalist reader and would have helped out one with an interest in pursuing the topic.

There's a glossary at the end (Latin is avoided in the text in the interest of not confusing the generalist reader), and there's a collection of 26 documents in translation. These are cited occasionally in the main text, but I doubt they actually do the intended audience much good. Something like half come from the Tabulae Sulpiciorum, and these are rather technical, which is also the case with the rest. Though there are a few explanatory notes, I expect that these are too much for an audience that can't handle a few technical expressions in Latin.

So, if you just want a cursory overall introduction to the Roman legal system as a preliminary step before launching in to more elaborate treatments, this is probably a good bet.