CONSTITUTIONS, ROMAN. The word Constitutio (from constituere, to set up, to establish) signifies any disposition or appointment ; for example, an edict of the prtetor is called constitutio (1N i. 4, tit. 2, s. 1. 9). The decrees.and decisions of Roman emperors are also called con stitutiones ; and, according to Gaius (i. 5), an imperial constitution is what the emperor declares by a decree, or an edict, or a lettet (epistola). That modern sig nification of the term, which denotes the fundamental law of a state, was not in use among the Romans ; yet Cicero (.De Republica, i. 45) employs the word to express a similar notion. An imperial constitution, then, was a rule of law established by the Roman emperor, either as a judge or as a legislator. A Decree (decretum) was a judgment in some mat ter brought before the emperor either upon appeal or originally. Some of these decreta were final, and, at least after the legislation of Justinian, had the force of law ; but interlocutory judgments had not. An Edict (edictum, edictales leges) was an ordinance promulgated by the emperor, and as a general rule applicable to all his subjects. The word Epistola is a general name for any constitution which was promulgated in the form of a letter ; and this term also comprises Subscrip tions and Annotationes, which were short answers to questions propounded to the emperor, and written, as these terms im port, at the foot or on the margin of the paper which was laid before him. Re scripts (rescripta) were properly answers to an individual who presented a petition to the emperor, or to magistrates who prayed for his advice in any matter. I?.escripta, according to their nature, were only applicable to a particular case, though they might contain general principles which would be applicable to other cases, and so in time they would obtain the force of law. Mandate were instructions to the provincial governors for their direc tion in matters of administration. All these forms of expressing the imperial pleasure, though originally not equally binding as general laws, became in various ways rules of law, and formed a part of what appear in the codes of Theodosius and Justinian as imperial constitutions.
The origin of this system of legislation is properly referred to the time of Octa vianus Augustus, who united in his person the various kinds of authority which, under the Republic, were distributed among several magistrates. From the time of Augustus, legislation by the popu lar assemblies fell gradually into disuse, and the ordinances of the senate (senatus consulta) were the shape in which laws were formally promulgated. The legisla tion of the senate was superseded by the Orations Principum, or messages of the emperor to the senate, which contained his proposed laws, to which the senate gave a formal assent. Still later, about the time of Hadrian and the Antonines the edicts and rescripta of the emperor became the usual form of legislation ; and finally imperial constitutions, as above explained, became the only source of written law.
In course of time the number of these constitutions became so great, that to pre vent confusion collections were made, and called Codes. The first collections made by private persons were the codices Gre gortani and Hermogeniani, of which we know very little ; it is even uncertain if they were two separate codes or only one, but the general opinion is that there were two codes. Opinions vary as to the time when these compilers lived. The Gre gorianus Codex was divided into books and titles. Of the Hermogenianus only twenty-five constitutions are preserved. These collections, which contained the constitutions from the time of Septimius Severus to Diocletian, are lost, and we have only some fragments, which were first edit ed by Jac. Sichardus (Basil. 1528, foL), together with the Codex Theodosianus. The fragments are in Schulting's Juris prud. Vet. Antejust,' Lugd.-Bat. 1712, and in the Jus Civile Antejust.,' Berol. 1815.