No doubt this inequality carried over into legal matters, and people likely accepted, far more easily than in modern western cultures, with their ideas of equality before the law, that sometimes individuals were treated unfairly, perhaps even suffering under an illegal act, because of their inability to protect themselves adequately.
#ROMAN LAW IELEMENTS IN USA FREE#
There were wealthy and poor, there were citizens and non-citizens, there were free and slave. 1 Third, Roman society was extremely unequal. The limited amount of policing found throughout the ancient world suggests that other such forces were at work. The institution of patronage was central in protecting the interests of those wronged. Second, within Roman society the community played a far greater role in regulating the behaviour of its members than is seen in modern western cultures. Why? First, a sizable portion of the inhabitants of the Roman world had either no (slaves) or limited (non-Roman citizens with various degrees of legal rights, such as Latin or Italian rights) access to the Roman legal system.
If a difficult dispute with others emerges, modern legal systems have various methods of conflict resolution, such as arbitration and mediation, for us to utilize before resorting to a formal court hearing.Ĭompared to modern day, it is likely that an even smaller percentage of those living within Roman territory found themselves in a court within their lifetime. Most people move through their lives obeying the laws and avoiding conflict with others by means of careful scrutiny of legally binding documents such as contracts, perhaps even bringing in experts for advice before they undertake important transactions such as purchasing a house. Compare to modern day-what percentage of the population takes a dispute to court or is charged with a crime? How many people have seen the inside of their local courthouse as participants? A small percentage, of course. However, differences exist-great enough in number and importance that all students of the ancient world must take care when drawing conclusions without solid evidence to support them.įirst, it is important to recognize that the Roman courts dealt with exceptional, rather than normal, events within Roman society. Because the modern legal system used in most western countries derives from ancient Rome, it is not entirely wrong to assume that the ancient Roman courts were much the same as their modern descendants. Today, when we think of a court, we typically imagine a structure built in a style to impress passers-by, containing one or more rooms in which various officials move through a prescribed set of procedures, to either resolve a dispute between individuals or determine a penalty against an offender.
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