Roman marriage law

ДИГЕСТИ Римскиот цар Јустинијан I (527-565 г.) бил еден од најенергичните владетели, кој се покажал амбициозен во повеќе области. Но едно од неговите најзначајни достигнувања, со кое се зафаќа набргу штом доаѓа на власт, се однесува на систематското реконструирање и консолидирање на римското право, како и трансформирање на правното образование. Тој зафат претставувал долготрајната работа на правниците, а како резултат бил издаден првиот кодекс, кој подоцна (во XVI век) го добил името Збирката на граѓанско право (Corpus iuris civilis). Дигести е само еден дел од Збирката на граѓанско право, но можеби најзначајниот и секако најобемниот, кој се содржи од педесет книги. Во оваа книга насловена Дигести се опфатени книга 23 и 24, односно оние книги во кои директно се обработува брачното право. Според тоа, содржината на оваа книга претставува првичен извор за изучување не само на бракот и брачното право во антиката, туку и на правната положба на жените во антиката.

Il contributo affronta la ricezione degli elementi greci nell’ordine teatrale del Principato, la sua strumentalizzazione finalizzata all’indagine della società e l’elaborazione in chiave pubblica del diritto matrimoniale e di famiglia da parte di Augusto. Si discute di come il princeps utilizzò la peculiarità architettonica degli edifici teatrali per imporre l’ordine gerarchico della società del Principato e diversi obiettivi politici.

RESUMEN: El adulterio se consideraba un delito muy grave en la sociedad romana y fue duramente castigado por el Derecho. La legislación augustea constituyó un antes y un después en la persecución de estas actuaciones que atentaban directamente contra la moral. En este sentido, las grandes perjudicadas fueron las mujeres que eran infieles a sus parejas. Ellas recibieron un trato desigual con respecto a los hombres y sufrieron una gran discriminación social. El presente trabajo pretende estudiar algunas referencias sobre el adulterio tanto en las fuentes jurídicas como en las literarias.

ABSTRACT: Adultery was a very serious crime in Roman society and it was severly punished by Law. The Augustan legislation pursued these crimes against morals. Women were the hardest hit by the laws. They received unequal treatment with respect to men and they suff ered a great social discrimination. This paper intends to study some references about adultery in legal and literary texts.

Оваа книга е предвидена како "студија на случаи", бидејќи предмет на истражување се конкретни случаи преземени од правните папируси пронајдени во Египет во текот на XIX век, кои припаѓаат на птолемајскиот и на римскиот период. Имено, направен е избор на папируси напишани на грчки и на латински јазик, кои се однесуваат на жената и нејзината положба во антиката во сите области од живеењето, особено од областа на брачното и на имотното право. Оттука, најголемиот дел од папирусите според содржината се: (пред)брачни договори, договори за развод на брак, потоа документи со кои се потврдува деловната (не)способност на жената, документи што претставуваат тестаменти во кои жената е завештател и во кои таа е наследник, барања упатени до официјални лица во врска со насилство врз жената, судски спорови во врска со наследство, законски одредби кои илустрираат одредени правила во договорите, цензорски списоци, кои даваат статистички податоци за склучување и разведување на бракови, за раѓањето на деца, итн.

RESUMEN: Este trabajo pretende estudiar la "infamia" asociada a la mujer romana durante el Alto Imperio. El análisis de las fuentes literarias, jurídicas y epigráficas es fundamental para comprender la situación de estas féminas. Aquellas que no cumplieron con el papel de matrona ideal, impuesto por el "mos maiorum" y la legalidad, fueron duramente criticadas y marginadas por la sociedad romana. La moral y la tradición jugaron un papel decisivo en el desprestigio de estas mujeres "infames".

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this paper is the study the infamia associated with the Roman woman in the Early Empire. It is important the analysis of literary, legal and epigraphic sources to understand the situation of these women. Those who did not fulfill the role of ideal matrona were severely criticized and marginalized by Roman society. Morality and tradition played a decisive role in the discredit of these infames women.

The  subject  of  this  paper  is  adultery  in  Roman  law,  which  was considered  as  lawful  cause  (iusta  causa)  for  unilateral  divorce  in  all  periods  of Roman  legal  history.  After  his  accession,  Augustus  enacted  the lex  Iulia  de adulteriis  coercendis (18  BC)  whereby  divorce  was  made  obligatory  in  the  case  of adultery.  Since  then,  adultery  was  not  only  moral  offence,  but  crime  (crimen, ἔγκλημα), which was penalized by the state. Hence, adultery was not res privata but res  publica,  and  continued  to  be  regarded  as  such  even  in  the legislations  of Christian  Emperors.  Anyhow,  there  are  fundamental  differences  between  pre-Christian  and  Christian  legislation  concerning  adultery  and  marriage,  which  are  to be  analyzed  in  the  following  text.  Finally,  I  give  explanation  to  the  words adulterium and repudium, and  correlate  them  with  equivalents  in  Macedonian language in order to explain the nature of Roman law and Roman view on adultery.

This paper examines the Roman provincial law applied in papyrus BGU I 183. This is a double deed document which contains marriage agreement between full brother and sister, and property distribution made by their mother. The aim of the paper is to explain why the siblings made marriage agreement after 23 years of marriage, and to clarify the link between the two deeds.

The economy of ancient Rome, with its long-range trade, widespread moneylending, and companies of government contractors, was surprisingly modern. Yet Romans also exchanged goods and services within a traditional system of gifts and favors, which sustained the supportive relationships necessary for survival in the absence of extensive state and social institutions. In Gift and Gain: How Money Transformed Ancient Rome, Neil Coffee shows how a vibrant commercial culture progressively displaced systems of gift giving over the course of Rome's classical era. The change was propelled by the Roman elite, through their engagement in a variety of profit-making enterprises. Members of the same elite, however, remained habituated to traditional gift relationships, relying on them to exercise influence and build their social worlds. They resisted the transformation, through legislation, political movements, and philosophical argument. The result was a recurring clash across the contexts of Roman social and economic life.

Neil Coffee's comprehensive volume traces the conflict between gift and gain from Rome's prehistory down through the conflicts of the late Republic and into the early Empire, showing its effects in areas as diverse as politics, law, philosophy, personal and civic patronage, marriage, and the Latin language. These investigations show Rome shifting, unevenly but steadily, away from its pre-historic reliance on mutual aid and toward the sort of commercial and contractual relations typical of the modern world.

The Council of Trent established the requirements that a marriage be celebrated by the parish priest and two or more witnesses be present at the marriage (1563), but neglected to specify who the parish priest was. The decrees provoked confusion among both laymen and churchmen. Traces thereof can be found in the hitherto essentially unexplored documentation of The Congregation of the Council. This institution was founded in 1564 specifically to resolve the questions that arose all over the catholic world by the application of the decrees promulgated at Trent. The related records are held in the Vatican Secret Archive. Through an examination of this documentation, complemented by files of the Holy Office the author analyzes how the new rules were understood, experienced, used, circumvented, and manipulated both by laymen and churchmen in order to end an unwanted marriage, to facilitate a union that was socially transgressive, opposed by family, or even heterodox, and to respond to pastoral concerns.

The Emperor Justinian in Novel 154 addresses the inhabitants of Mesopotamia and Osrhoene in order to prevent and punish the unlawful marriages that were conducted there. This is not the first time in Roman legal history this problem to be addressed. As a matter of fact, Diocletian in 295 AD enacted an edict treating the incestuous marriages and their offspring. The emperor Justin II who succeeded Justinian, enacted a Novel (3) on unlawful marriages as well. The questions that arise are: Why the need for repetition of already existing law? Why is he addressing the inhabitants of this particular province? Comparison with other Novels demonstrates that the punishment varied regarding the wealth-status of the population, although it is not explicitly said. The rural population in Osrhoene and Mesopotamia were to be punished with capital punishment, but the Jews in Syndis and Tyre were pardoned for the same matter and forced to pay their crimes with gold.

This paper collects unpublished manuscripts on Giambattista Vico and Friedrich Schelling by the German philologist Walter Friedrich Otto (1874-1958), most of which were written in the early 1930s. The manuscripts are edited in German with Italian translation, a commentary, and an introduction. They consist in a comparative analysis of Vico’s and Schelling’s interpretations of the origin of human civilization. Otto stresses that Vico’s approach is based on jurisprudence, while Schelling’s on philosophy. Otto deals extensively with Vico’s account of the origin of civilisation, focusing in particular on the sacred institution of marriage in ancient Roman Law. According to Otto, this institution does not found the community (as Vico claims), but presupposes it, since every marital union can exist only if legitimated by the gens and the gentilitial law. Schelling’s account of the origin of civilization has a different approach. Otto holds that Schelling recalls the construction of the tower of Babel to show that the confusion of languages hindered mankind to be part of a common civilization. Since it was God who created the dispersion of tongues, language(s) should be regarded as the mythical origin of civilization. Otto is explicit about his preference for Schelling’s interpretation, an author who played a major role in the seminal work on Greek religion, Dionysus (1933), which Otto wrote under the influence of Schelling. Despite his preference for Schelling, Otto went on dealing with Vico over the years: this paper features writings (most of which are fragmentary or short notes) on the following seminal topics of Vico's Scienza Nuova: verum-factum, probability, critique of Descartes’ cogito ergo sum, the origin of religion, and political theory (= note on Witzenmann's book on Vico: Politischer Aktivismus und sozialer Mythos, 1935).

The Rabbinical Jewish marriage procedure consists of two parts: Kiddushin and Nissuin. Kiddushin was understood in antiquity as a binding betrothal after which the wife was prohibited to live with all men, including her husband, and required an official divorce in case the marriage was to be dissolved. The Nissuin was the actual marriage where the wife became permitted to her husband and could now go live with him. During the Talmudic period the Kiddushin and the Nissuin were performed six months apart. After the Kiddushin was performed the wife stayed in her father's house and the husband was obligated to send her and his new in-laws gifts for the period of six months. After the six months were up, a second procedure, the Nissuin, otherwise known as the Chupah (canopy), was performed in which the couple were officially married and the wife now moved out from her father's house into her husband's.

An inscription recently published by Werner Eck throws new light on the timing of Ovid's exile. The exile can now be seen as part of Augustus' struggles to reform Roman morality at this particular time; the gap after the publication of the Ars Amatoria is no longer a problem. However, it is also shown that the standard date of AD 8 for the exile is inadequately supported, and suggested that there are better arguments for AD 9.

This essay deals with the marriage legislation issued by Augustus during
his Principate, also known as lex Iulia et Papia. The recent discovery of an
inscription containing the lex municipii Troesmensium together with some references
to a previously unknown commentarius of 5 A.D. sheds new light on
the Augustean legislation. The text of this inscription reveals a probable
connection between the above-mentioned commentarius, on the one hand,
and both the lex de maritandis ordinibus (18 BC) and the lex Papia Poppeaea (9
A.D.), on the other hand. One may also argue from the sources at our disposal
that C. Ateius Capito, consul suffectus in 5 A.D., played an essential role
in the elaboration of the marriage legislation. He actually was the author of
a decretum on this topic, as we can infer from Ulpian, D. 23.2.29. The last
part of this work is devoted to some remarks concerning the ratio of the
Augustean marriage legislation and its philosophical foundations.

Tra la fine dell’età repubblicana e l’inizio di quella imperiale si ingenera la convinzione dell’importanza di una piena comunione morale e materiale tra sposi; è significativo come tale esigenza sia stata recepita anche nel pensiero giuridico coevo. D’altro canto, però, non si può non constatare che la dignità del matrimonio come bene in sé sarà compiutamente affermata solo in seguito, in particolare da Agostino, il quale rivaluterà esplicitamente anche l’unione coniugale priva di prole, sia in nome della fedeltà e del vincolo di società naturale che unisce gli sposi, sia soprattutto in virtù del sacramento cristiano.
Questa posizione, tuttavia, verrà accolta solo in parte dagli imperatori cristiani, che, se nel 410 d.C. accettarono di eliminare le restrizioni successorie nei confronti delle coppie senza figli, non vieteranno mai il ripudio della moglie per ragioni di infertilità, estendendo, al contrario, alle donne il diritto di ripudiare i mariti impotenti.

Classical and Hellenistic Greek laws and dowry practices were generally more progressive and provided more protections for wives than early Roman marriage law and practice. Roman dowry law then witnessed a series of significant developments over the course of the republic, beginning with the time when the Romans were coming into increased contact with Greek culture. Changes in social attitudes towards the conditions for women in marriage, their ability to control their dowries, and their right to own property, seem to have been responsible for these transformations in Roman family law. As Romans became increasingly Hellenized, their dowry and marriage practices in general came to resemble patterns prevailing in the Greek world, perhaps as a result of individuals’ emulation of Greek laws and customs. The shift from the overall predominance of marriage in manu to marriage sine manu may therefore be explained partly by influences from the Greek world.