Italian Codification Flashcards
When and by who was the Pragmatic Sanction issued
In 554 AD by Justinian who briefly re conquered the Italian peninsula
What was the Pragmatic Sanction
It was his code, namely Corpus IURIS Civilis, which was implemented in Italy
What does corpus IURIS Civilis mean
Body of civil law
What was Codex Florentinus
It was copy of the Digest of the Emperor Justinian which was a manuscript of the Justinian codex thats as found in Bologna at the end of the 11th century
Who was Irneus
-he studied the Justinian Digest and started giving lectures on the basis of that book
-he was an Italian jurist and the first glossator
Describe the school of glossators/ Glossary Ordinaria
-Glossa was a style of scholarship wherein the original Digest was in the middle, and commentary by scholars surrounded it.
-Glossa Ordinaria → a standard text summarizing the relevant commentary, used for study of Roman law across Europe
-glossator- A person who writes glosses, especially a scholarly commentator on the texts of classical, civil or canon law
What changed the course of legal history in Europe?
The recovery of roman law which led to it becoming common law in the centuries that followed in Western Europe
What happned after Justinians brief re conquest in Italy
Northern Italy as taken over by a Germanic tribe, called the Lombards
When a legal question emerged as to what law should be applied in the North, what two competing theories emerged:
-personality principle
-territoriality principle
Define the personality principle
law applicable to a person was the customary law of their
tribe of origin.
What was the territoriality principle
law applicable to a person was based on where they lived,
regardless of ethnicity.
What was teh constitutio Antoniniana
-212 AD
-with the constitution, Emperor Caracalla declared that all inhabitants of the roman empire to be roman citizens, therefore to all citizens Roman law was applicable.
Give me an example of the personality principle in law
-Germanic tribes (lombards), codified tehir law (dictum Rothari) and gave exclusivity to it. Therefore their legislation only applied to them
What problem occurred with the personality principle
the higher the number of different population groups who lived within one territory, the higher the number of tribal laws existing alongside each other.
What happened to the personality principle in the end
Eventually the personality principle became completely useless, so there was a switch to the territoriality principle, where the local customary law of a city/region became applicable:
- These customs were based on the ethnic composition of the region + unique custom.
What was universitas
referred to an organisation created by students to ensure they
received a proper education from the teachers they were paying.
How did the university of Bologna emerge?
-first modern Western European university: not as a creation of the government but as a product of the students( student association)
-Irneus, a italian jurist taught thesis new source of law here, therefore Bologna became a hub for legal scholarship
How did the use of customary law come about in Italy
-In the long run, even amongst the population of Italy that was not Roman in origin, Roman law had started to be considered as the Italian secondary law or common law (ius commune)
-therefore, throughout Italy, local customary law started replacing tribal laws (national laws: Lombard)
What two criteria did customary law have to meet in Italy
- diuturnus usus: legal conduct must have been adhered to for a long time
- opinion iuris: general opinion should be that such conduct is legally binding
Who decided whether the requirements of customary law in Italy were fulfilled and if he could apply such common law
Judge
How would judges know if the customary law met the two requirements
Judges would consult lay people with knowledge of local customs that would gather in turba (crowd)
What happened if there was no rule in the primary source of law (customary law) when the judge was deciding a case
Subsidiary law (roman law) would be applied
What were the two causes of legal diversity in Italy
- Various customary laws
- Development of feudalism
Define feudalism
Feudalism can be regarded as the reaction to the collapse of Roman authority in Western Europe in 476 AD.
During this period, there was no powerful central government – in 776 Charlemagne became King of the Lombards and implemented a feudal system (contractual relationship between lord and vassal):
What was the contractual relationship between lord and vassal that’s as established by feudalism
• The king owned the land and gave portions of it (called fiefs) to wealthy lords and nobles.
• In exchange, these lords and nobles promised to provide soldiers and horses to the king’s army.
• Soldiers pledged their loyalty to their lords, and the lowest rank in this system was the peasant.
• Peasants, to safeguard themselves, entered into vassalage(vassalage was a relationship between a lord and a subordinate known as a vassal). They swore an oath of allegiance to their lords, promising to follow them into military service.
• In return, the lords were obligated to provide their vassals (peasants) with protection and support.
So, the feudal system established a structured relationship of mutual obligations between the king, lords, and peasants, with land ownership and military service as key elements.
Who is the vassal
Someone who serves a lord
Who were the lords
People that served the king
After, Charlemagne how were the obligations between a vassal and a lord determined?
the agreements between a vassal (someone who serves a lord) and a lord were decided when the vassal received land (fief). The rules for these agreements depended on what they agreed upon during the investiture (the ceremony of granting the land) and the local customs where the land was given.
Who’s as Charlemagne
-huge figure in medieval Europe because he embarked on his renovatio imperium
-He was crowned ‘Holy Roman Emperor’ by the Pope in 800 AD, and since the
throne of the Eastern Empire was held by a woman, he thought he had full and sole claim to the title.
What two major implications did renovatio imperium have for European history
a. Unified most of Europe under a single polity … therefore Roman law is the
common law of Europe.
b. Signaled the absolute and universal authority of the Roman Catholic Church,
since the Pope crowned the Emperor.