Two Studies in Textual History

Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis [Legal History Review], Vol. 30, No. 2 (1962), pp. 209-242

Abstract

1. The texts of Ulpian 18 ad edictum in the Collatio: This study is an attempt to show that Ulpian's liber 18 ad edictum was not subjected in postclassical times to a re-editing in the sense of a thorough going over with the purpose of making a modernised version of the book and that pre-Justinianic corruptions are not so extensive as has sometimes been suggested.

2. Tricks of advocacy in the Libri disputationun: The problematical literature of the Roman jurists has a variety of names and three of these -- libri responsorum, quaestionun and disputationum -- are suggestive of different types of problem. Responsa were written replies in specific cases addressed to iudices or magistrates or the parties involved in the litigation. Quaestiones may be said to be written replies to queries raised mainly by other jurists and usually in hypothetical cases. Disputationes were the oral arguments of the jurists whether in teaching or in a consilium. Although the matter does not seem to have been much considered in modern times where would seem to be agreement that even the leading jurists took part in such disputation. The use of the word 'dixi' is said to be proof enough of this. What I wish to show here is that the form of a number of texts from the libri disputationun, of Ulpian especially, but also of Tryphoninus, is directly due to their origin in verbal legal argument. The form of a legal text, no less than that of a building, depends upon its function.

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