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[German version] describes according to Gai. Inst. 4,15 an agreement of the parties to appear on the day after next before a iudex (Fest. 355,1; Prob. 4,9: in diem tertium sive perendinum; for Roman calculations of court dates cf. Gell. NA 10,24,9), as had already been provided for in the Twelve Tables. It did not require the form of a stipulation because the consequences of missing it were considered sufficient as a sanction. How the transition from the procedure in iure to apud iudicem specifically came about in the formular procedure is unclear, because the comperendinatio is no longer…

[German version] The principle of sentencing to a fine associated with formulary procedure (Gai. Inst. 4,48) made it necessary in civil procedure for all actions not aimed at a fixed sum to be expressed in money value. Both process and result of the estimate required for this are called aestimatio litis.; it was carried out by the judge, or sometimes by the plaintiff ( iusiurandum in litem, estimate under oath of the amount involved). If the defendant refused to meet his duty of payment in kind, but instead paid the sum of the fine, the plaintiff finally lost …

[German version] (literally: ‘death of a lawsuit’). According to Gai. Inst. 4,104 a means introduced by the l. Iulia iudiciorum privatorum specially for the iudicium legitimum ( iudicium ), to limit the duration of lawsuits. Whereas all other lawsuits were limited by the period in office of the magistrates who appointed judges, ML was what happened when after 18 months there had been no judgment. From the lex Irnitana (ch. 91, l.2) it followed that this regulation was transferred - evidently by pretending that the municipal process was identical to the iudicium legitimum - also to this…

[German version] A court orator who appears in court as a champion of a party. Whilst Cic. De or. 1,202 uses the term in an obviously derogatory sense as being distinct from a true orator, and whilst a similar evaluation is evident in Gai. Dig. 1,2,1 ( causas dicentibus), causidicus is later applied in inscriptions (CIL 5,5894) and constitutions as a neutral vocational title alongside (Cod. Iust. 2,6,6) or identical (Cod. Theod. 2,10,5) to   advocatus . As such, a causidicus belonged to the state controlled professional association (Cod. Iust. 2,7,11, 1) of orators appearin…

[German version] ( surety, bail). A legal transaction agreed in a stipulatio , by which one party in a Roman formulary procedure (Procedural law IV.) commits itself to appear at a certain location in order to enable legal proceedings to take place. This self-committal replaced the practice of providing guarantors ( vades) as had been the practice in the legis actio . A distinction was made between different kinds of vadimonium. The voluntary summoning vadimonium consisted of the promise (regularly sanctioned by fines) to appear near the law court for a final attempt a…

[German version] is a free citizen who pleads in court the case, in particular the liberation, of a slave, who is incapable of being a party to a lawsuit: as plaintiff in the vindicatio in libertatem including the manumissio vindicta, as defendant in the vindicatio in servitutem. On the possibilities of abuse in liberation cases Liv. 3,44 ff. Following preceding relaxation, Justinian ultimately declared slaves capable of acting in liberation cases (Cod. Iust. 7,17).  Vindicatio;  Manumissio Paulus, Christoph Georg (Berlin) Bibliography E. Ferenczy, in: Studi Donatuti, 1973,…

[German version] The written formula is the essential component of the type of trial which replaced the   legis actio procedure; by means of the lex Aebutia, 2nd cent. BC, as well as the two leges Iuliae, 17 BC) and which consequently is generally described as a formula trial. Despite a slow development, this classical procedural type is distinguished from its predecessor by having far greater flexibility and by being more adaptable to individual cases in the late Republic and the Principate. The text of the suit was no longer ceremonial and…

[German version] In Roman law, the 'call' (in the sense of summons) to stand trial. The VII addressed the problem, fundamental in every jurisdiction (but most particularly at early stages of development), of how to bring an accused person before the court: as long as no direct compulsion is available or permitted, sanctions with at least indirect effect must accompany the summons. Both variants are found in the development of Roman law: for the oldest type of trial, the legis actio (action under the (XII-Table) law), the Twelve Tables (tab. 1,1 ff.; Tabulae duodecim, c.450 BC) prescribes…

[German version] This type of Roman trial developed from the reign of Hadrian (2nd cent. AD) as a special form of the civil inquiry of cognizance ( cognitio ). Its peculiarity consisted in the fact that the decisive legal issue (i.e. not also the correctness of the facts) was clarified in advance for the specific case by the princeps, by means of a written response ( rescriptum ) to the written enquiry of the party who would henceforth be the plaintiff, with the consequence that henceforth all that required examination was the correctness of …

[German version] is the debtor in a process of legal action who, after being convicted, had not paid the sum owed within 30 days and had consequently been brought before the magistrate by the creditor by means of manus iniectio and had been handed over by the magistrate by   addicere to the creditor for enforcement. If the debtor did not pay or provide a vindex at the latest before the magistrate, the creditor could take the addictus home with him and, according to detailed terms in the Twelve Tables (3,3-5; Gell. NA 20,1,45), hold the man prisoner, albeit still as a free man. If the addictus was un…

[German version] A criminal offence that corresponds with modern obstruction of evidence and so implies a more or less definite obstruction of evidence in Roman civil procedure. Tabulae are written notes that served, e.g., to safeguard evidence; as such they belong to the evidence classified by Quintilian ( instrumenta, Inst. 5,5,1ff.). Paulus, Christoph Georg (Berlin) Bibliography G. Klingenberg, Das Beweisproblem beim Urkundendiebstahl, in: ZRG 96, 1979, 229-257 C. Paulus, Die Beweisvereitelung in der Struktur des dt. Zivilprozesses, in: Archiv für die civil…

[German version] is an argument and interchange which can take place in the Senate or in judicial (criminal or civil) proceedings. In the latter case altercatio stands in contrast to the self-contained lecture oratio continua regularly given at the beginning of a hearing by the counsel of both parties. As proceedings progressed they repeatedly gave rise to debate, due to evidence recorded or other findings, on the status of the dispute and the legal situation; it took place in the form of an altercatio, shown as an example in Dig. 28,4,3. Oratio like altercatio was the field of action f…

[German version] [1] Guarantor in Roman procedural law A vindex, (probably with the same etymology as vindicta ) was a guarantor in Roman procedural law. He played a role in two parts of the trial--in the summoning and in the execution, each time in the context of the manus iniectio (the physical bringing forward of the defendant). According to the Twelve Tables (tab. 1,1; tabulae duodecim ), the latter was permitted when the defendant did not voluntarily follow the order of the plaintiff to appear in front of the court magistrate ( vocatio in ius ). The defendant co…

[German version] [1] Dismissal from Roman military service The word missio was a technical term for dismissal from Roman military service. During the Principate, honesta missio usually followed after completion of the normal period of service (20 years in the legions, 16 in the praetoriae cohortes, 25 in the Auxilia and the equites singulares Augusti, 26, later 28, years in the navy), often even several years later. Invalids received early missio causaria. Severe misconduct was punished by dishonourable discharge ( missio ignominiosa). Veterans who were dimissi honesta missione or e…

[German version] I. In civil law Defensor is not a technical legal term for the defence counsel (but probably nevertheless thus in Quint. Inst. 5,3,13), but rather had various meanings, especially as the sponsor of the defendant primarily in a civil case, and here particularly of the absent defendant ( indefensus). To take on such a defence was the duty of a friend (Dig. 4,6,22 pr.). Termed defensor civitatis, he is also the judicial representative of corporations ( universitates, Dig. 3,4,1,3), above all of statutory public bodies (e.g. communities, provinces; cf. CIL X,1201 and passim)…

('probation'; 'test'; 'evidence'; 'proof'.) [German version] I. Law In Roman law, probatio included, without clear distinction, the central phase in every civil trial: the hearing of the evidence as a whole, the issue of apportioning the burden of proof and, finally, the list of submissions of evidence. The hearing of evidence by the iudex ('judge') is scarcely treated in the juridical writings; it was not regarded as an issue of law. The apportioning of the burden of proof was probably not observed as strictly as it is today…

[German version] [1] Legal term There are many different senses of deductio in specialized legal language: in civil case-law the expression in iudicium deducere usually indicates the transition of the dispute to the judgement stage, and so approximately corresponds to the modern concept of pendency. Deductio in domum is the ceremonial introduction of a wife into her husband's house (Dig. 23,2,5). A further frequent use of deductio is to denote the ‘deduction’ of specific components of a debt owed to a provider of services: for example the deduction of costs (D…

[German version] I. Alter Orient Even in the cuneiform laws (Cuneiform, legal texts in) going back to the middle of the 3rd millennium, it is impossible to discern an epoch in which it was true that virtually only the strong were able to claim their rights [7]. On the basis of Old Babylonian letters and some stipulations of the Codex Ḫammurapi it is certainly the case that self-help played a legally recognized role [8], and modulated self-help is furthermore mooted for Hittite law [5]. Widespread use of the word 'judge' (DI.KU5/ dajjānum) from the Old Akkadian period (24th/22nd cents.…

in Latin referred both to an order (e.g. the marching order or that of a legal process) as well as to groups or corporations, into which several or many persons were organized (also in the plural ordines), e.g. the Roman equites ( ordo equester). [German version] I. Procedural law In a procedural context the term ordo is traditionally used in the composition of the ' ordo iudiciorum' (Cod. Iust. 7,45,4). It signified the proper types of legal procedure (cf. still today: 'proper' jurisdiction) both of the formulary procedure ( formula ) as well as of the actions at law proceedings ( legis actio …

[German version] [1] Public announcement by magistrates Edictum (from edicere) is a binding public announcement by Roman office bearers (  magistratus ), which presented either concrete orders or a ‘governmental agenda’ [1. 58] for the coming term of office. The word suggests an originally oral announcement [2. 178], but the historically documented form is a recording on an   album (‘white wooden plate’) at the magistrate's office. Literary tradition refers to edicts by   consules ,   aediles ,   praetores , provincial governors, tribuni plebis (  tribunus ),   censores …