Evolution of Roman Jurisprudence and Legal Tradition

The Role of Magistrates and Jurisprudence

Specific formulas for each situation, rather than the law itself, dictated the solution in each case. Consequently, the jurisprudence of the magistrates was completely independent of laws and became an immediate source of law.

In the second century AD, the magistrates completed their task of renewing the old ius civile. The Perpetuum Edictum encoded praetorian law actions.

Case-Law and Creative Legal Solutions

The legal system gained a case-law character that encouraged a very narrow investigation of justice in specific cases. The timing of the resolution of cases was highly creative, since the law did not limit the magistrate, who enjoyed relative freedom to imagine solutions for every situation.

This led to the development of an enormous literary output by lawyers trained in practical advice to the parties and the magistrate himself. These experts discussed the best solutions to solve real or hypothetical cases, regarding themselves as specialists in distinguishing right from wrong. They produced thousands of pages of questions, opinions, issue resolutions, rules of law, and comments on the edict of the praetor.

The Legacy of Roman Law in Europe

This law was applied by lawyers and officials of Rome; however, outside of this sphere, local and traditional forms of dispute resolution were predominantly used. Classic Roman iurisprudentia contributed to the unification of European legal systems to this day—not necessarily through dissemination by the Empire during its glory, but because it was a literary treasure that subsequently inspired European jurists.

The Crisis and the Rise of Vulgar Roman Law

The crisis of the Roman Empire from the third century and the subsequent fall of the Western Empire in 476 AD put this great legal knowledge into crisis. Language training, cultural shifts, and legal particularism prevented further mass production of these works.

The Transformation of Law After the Fall

Thereafter, the nature of law changed significantly:

• The system became administrativized: knowledge from an intellectual tradition developed into a bureaucratic technical implementation of power orders.
• In general, automation replaced the fine-tuning of cases and intellectual development.
• The law became less demanding, simplified, and more accessible to the layman.
• Legal knowledge lost its rigor and depth of analysis.
• The popularized law formed a vulgar Roman law, which maintains a relationship with classical Roman law similar to that of the Romance languages with Latin.