Twelve Tables
（Duodĕcim Tabŭlae). The Twelve Tables, the
first code of Roman law, adopted in B.C. 451 and 450. They remained the foundation of
Roman jurisprudence (
fons omnis publici privatique iuris,
Livy, iii. 34) until the promulgation of the Corpus Iuris (q. v.) by the
emperor Justinian (about A.D. 530). Livy (iii. 31-37) and Dionysius of Halicarnassus (x.
55-60) narrate the circumstances under which the code was enacted. The measure was a
concession to the plebeians in their struggle with the patrician class. An agitation for
written laws, which might serve as a check on the arbitrary acts of the patrician magistrates,
had begun as early as 462 (
Livy, iii. 9). The principal Greek
communities had long enjoyed the advantages of such laws. In 454 a commission of three men was
sent abroad to study the institutions of Athens and other Greek cities. This commission
returned, and finally, in 451, ten men (
decemviri), of whom Appius
Claudius was the leading spirit, were chosen as the sole magistrates for the year, with power
to draw up laws. The first ten tables were thus produced, and adopted by the Comitia
Centuriata. The following year another board of decemviri, still headed by Appius Claudius,
was elected, and two more tables were added. A divergent account (
Diod.xii. 26) ascribes the composition of the last two tables to Horatius and
Valerius, the consuls of the year 499. The laws were cut on bronze plates, which were hung in
a conspicuous place in the Forum (
Livy, iii. 57). Whether these
original copies survived the sack of Rome by the Gauls in B.C. 390 is disputed, the question
turning on the ambiguous expression of Livy in vi. 1.
The authority of the Twelve Tables during the republican period was very great. Boys learned
them by heart in the schools (
De Leg. ii. 4, 9, and 23, 59). Later, this
practice was discontinued. Though never repealed, the laws were gradually overlaid by
praetorian decisions (
edicta), which modified and supplemented them
according to existing needs. These edicts came to be more important than the laws themselves
(
De Leg. i. 5, 17). There were several ancient commentaries on the Twelve
Tables; the latest of these, by Gaius (second century A.D.), is often quoted in the Digests.
In general, the code of the Twelve Tables is spoken of by ancient writers in terms of
admiration. The eleventh and twelfth tables, the work of the unpopular Second Decemvirate, are
called by Cicero (
Rep. ii. 37, 63)
duae tabulae iniquarum legum; but the chief ground for this estimate of them appears
to be the law, afterwards annulled, forbidding the intermarriage of patricians and plebeians.
It must not be supposed that these two tables were an afterthought; it is clear from the
language of Livy and Dionysius that the first ten tables, at the time of their adoption, were
understood to be only a partial code, and that further legislation was expected. It is a
noteworthy fact that the remarkable set of laws discovered in 1884 at Gortyna in Crete is cut
upon a wall in twelve columns. See
Gortyn.
We cannot exactly define the relation of the Twelve Tables to preëxisting Roman
law. But it is certain that they contained both new and old elements. There existed already a
body of legal usages, and some of these had been formulated in maxims, known as
leges regiae. Some of these maxims would seem from the language of Livy (vi. 1) to
have existed in written form. The Twelve Tables were based in part on this
older law of custom (
τὰ πάτρια ἔθη,
Dionys. x. 55;
οἱ παρὰ σφίσιν αὐτοῖς ἄγραφοι
ἐθισμοί,
ibid. 57). At least one of the
leges regiae, relating to the
patria potestas, was embodied in
them (
Dionys. ii. 27). On the other hand, they contained new
features, and some of these were certainly derived from Greek sources. Thus we are told in
particular by Cicero (
De Leg. ii. 23, 59; 25, 64) that certain clauses
restricting expense at funerals were taken almost word for word from the laws of Solon. Like
statements are made by Gaius (
Dig. x. 1, 13; xlvii. 22, 4) about two other
laws. An Ephesian Greek named Hermodorus is said to have aided the decemviri in their work (
Strab. p. 642; Pliny ,
Pliny H. N. xxxiv.
5Pliny H. N., 11). The fact of Greek influence in the
decemviral legislation is further brought out by striking resemblances between the Twelve
Tables and the inscriptional code of Gortyna just mentioned—resemblances extending
even to particular expressions (
se fraude esto=
ἄπατων ἤμην).
We possess about 100 fragments of the Twelve Tables, some containing quotations of their
exact words, others only statements of content. The most important sources are Gellius
(especially the interesting chapter xx. 1), Festus, Cicero, and Gaius. The arrangement of
these fragments and their distribution among the Twelve Tables have been much discussed. The
following is the system of Dirksen, which has obtained a considerable currency: Tables i. and
ii., civil process; iii., procedure for debt; iv.,
patria potestas; v.,
guardianship and inheritance; vi., rights of property; vii., contracts; viii.,
delicta and
crimina; ix.,
ius publicum; x.,
ius sacrum (including burial); xi. and xii., supplements and additions.
This system is based on two things:
1.
a few citations in which the number of the table is expressly stated; and
2.
the citations from Gaius 's commentary, the assumption being that the six books of that
commentary corresponded to the twelve tablets of laws taken in pairs. But the validity of
this assumption respecting Gaius 's six books has been denied by many recent scholars, and
even the hypothesis which underlies this and all previous attempts at
arrangement—that the disposition of the code was strictly systematic, and that the
contents of each tablet constituted a sort of unity, like a chapter— has been shown
to be unsupported by analogies. (See, on all this, Schoell's
Prolegomena, pp.
67, 68.) It may be added that the arrangement of the Gortynian Code, already mentioned, shows
little system, and that its twelve columns are like pages of a book, and have nothing to do
with the divisions of the subject-matter. It should therefore be borne in mind that all that
we certainly know respecting the location of the different fragments is this: the law
permitting the release of a son from
patria potestas by three
mancipations (sales) stood in the fourth table (
Dionys. ii. 27);
the sumptuary laws regulating funerals in the tenth (
De Leg. ii. 25, 64); the
prohibition of
conubium between patricians and plebeians in one of the
last two tables (
Dionys. x. 60). Probably, also, the law defining
proper causes of postponement for a suit was in the second table (Festus, p. 273, but the
text is conjectural). Lastly, that the first table began with the words
si in
ius vocat, ito may be fairly inferred from
De Leg. ii. 4, 9. It is the
opinion of Mommsen that the
Fasti or Calendar were contained in the Twelve
Tables (cf.
Cic. Ad Att. vi. 1, 8; Macrob.
Sat. i. 13, 21), and Schoell assigns them to the eleventh table.
The language of the Twelve Tables abounded in archaisms. As examples may serve
im=eum, nox =noctu, endo=in (endo iacito inicito), escit=est, lessus=luctus,
ast as conditional particle, ‘and if.’ The condensation of
expression is extreme: for instance, the subject is constantly omitted, even where there is a
sudden change; as,
si nox furtum faxsit, si im occisit, iure caesus
esto. The laws contain some noteworthy provisions. Thus, gold must not be buried with a
corpse, except that used to fasten teeth. The person of a debtor was forfeited to his
creditors, who might divide his body among them. No actual occurrence of this, we are told,
was on record in historical times.
The fragments of the Twelve Tables have been often edited, but the editions which mark a
distinct advance are: J. Gothofredus,
Fragmenta XII Tabularum
(Heidelberg, 1616) (reprinted in Otto's
Thesaurus Iuris Romani, vol.
iii.); H. E. Dirksen,
Uebersicht der bisherigen Versuche zur Kritik und
Herstellung des Textes der Zwölftafeln-Fragmente (Leipzig, 1824);
Rudolf Schoell,
Legis Duodecim Tabularum Reliquiae (with valuable Prolegomena)
(Leipzig, 1866).
