Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

248 9. roman law
book was now a good deal longer than before. On 7 April 529 Justinian
promulgated the new codex, for use from Easter (16 April). 39 In fact the
Codex Justinianus which survives is not this but a second edition, the Codex
Justinianus repetitae praelectionis, dated 16 November 534, when it was promulgated
to take exclusive effect from 29 December 534. The use or even
citation of constitutions from other sources thereafter incurred the penalties
of forgery. An exception was made for privileges expressly granted as
a matter of grace and favour. All other privileges were in future to be exercised
only so far as compatible with the laws generally applicable. No
special allowance was any longer made for military matters. 40 However, the
law contained in the old imperial constitutions relating to the state
economy and financial administration retained independent validity.
The twelve books of the Codex Justinianus are each divided between
forty-four and seventy-eight titles. Book 1 begins with ecclesiastical law and
proceeds to sources of law and constitutional matters, again omitting the
monarch himself. Books 2 to 8 deal fully with civil procedure and private
law. Book 9 covers crime and criminal procedure; 10 the ius fisci, taxation
and local government with particular reference to local taxes; 11 corporations
with tied membership, state industries and estates. Finally, book 12
covers the law relating to rank and the holding of offices. Private law thus
receives substantially more space than in the Theodosianus, albeit linked in
with the law relating to control of the economy and status.
The manuscript tradition of the Codex Justinianus causes particularly
awkward problems. 41 In the early Middle Ages the last three books were jettisoned
and the first nine were reduced to about a quarter of their original
size. When, from the late Middle Ages, interest in more complete texts
revived, multiple copies were not made of any of the surviving full manuscripts.
Instead, there was a process of gradual supplementation by the use
of extracts from the fuller manuscripts. But this did not serve to achieve a
complete restoration of the comprehensive range of the original work. We
have lost in particular most of the constitutions which were issued in
Greek, for which we have to make do with Byzantine paraphrases. The tradition
has, however, preserved by way of introductory texts the constitutions
by which Justinian first commissioned the work (Const. Haec),
promulgated it (Const. Summa) and then again promulgated the new edition
(Const. Cordi).
The second edition of the Codex Justinianus had been necessitated by the
issue of numerous Novels. These had in turn been occasioned by the fact
39 CJ Const. Summa.
40 CJ Const. Cordi. Of the first edition of CJ there survives an index to the rubrics of Book i, titles
11–16: P.Oxy. 1814.
41 Krüger, Praefatio (pp. v,xxxxi) to Cod. Iust. (ed. maior); Krüger (1912) 425–8; Dolezalek (1985);
Tort-Martorell (1989).
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