In the year following the publication of the first edition of his Code, Justinian undertook a much greater and more important work ; to extract the spirit of jurisprudence from the decisions and conjectures, the questions and disputations, of the Roman civilians. in the course of centuries, under the republic and the empire, many thousand volumes had accumulated, filled with the learned lucubrations of the jurbsconsulta, but which no fortune could purchase, and no capacity could digest. The jurisconsults ever since the time of Augustus had been divided into opposite schools, and thus conflicting opinions were often produced, which only served to puzzle those who had to decide what was law. To put order into this chase, was the object of Justinian. In December, 530, lie commissioned seventeen lawyers, with Tribonian at their head, with full authority to exercise their discretion as to the works of their predecessors, by making a choice of those whom they considered as the best authorities. They choose about forty out of Tribonian's library, most of them juris consults who had lived during that period of the empire which has been sometimes called the age of the Antonines, from Hadrian to the death of Alexander Severus. the works of these writers, said to have amounted to two thousand treatises, the commission appointed by Justinian was to extract and compress all that was suited to form a methodical, complete, and never failing book of reference for the student of law and the magistrate. Justinian gave Tribonian and his associates ten years' time to perform their task ; but they completed it in three years. The work was styled Digests,' and also Pandectm' (" embracing all ") and was published in December, 533. It was declared by the emperor that it should have the force of law all over the empire, and should supersede all the text books of the old jurists, which in future were to be of no authority.
The following is a list of the Roman jurists from whose works the Pandect ' or `Digest' was composed, with their several epochs, so far as they can be ascertained, and the relative proportions which they have contributed to the ' Pandect.' Where (a) is added, the con tribution is less than 1. The sum total of all the figures denotes the whole amount, of which the several figures opposite each jurist's name denote the proportion which his part bears the whole. In addition to the extracts contained in the Pandect ' from each author, many of them are very often merely cited.
If the whole ' Digest' is divided into three equal parts, the con tributions of Ulpian are somewhat more than oue-third.
The ' Digest% ' Is divided into 50 books, each book being also divided into titles, and subdivided into laws and paragraphs. The following are some of the principal heads. Book i. lays down the general principles and the different kinds of law; then establishes the division of persons and of things; spaks of senators, and of magistrates and their delegates and assessors : ii. treats of the jurisdic tion of magistrates; of the manner of bringing actions, of compromises after an action is commenced : iii. explains what kind of persons are allowed to sue in Law, and it defines who are styled infamous, and as such not permitted to sue ; it then treats of advocates, proctors, syndics, and other counsellors : iv. treats of restitution, compromises, and arbitrations, after which it speaks of innkeepers and others in Whose custody we leave anything : v. treats of trials ; and complaints against inofficious (inofficiem) testaments : vi. treats of real actions and their various kinds to recover one's property : vii. treats of personal services (servitutes, as usus fructus) : viii. speaks of real services both in town and country : ix. treats of personal actions which are in imitation of real actions, as actions for a fault or crime committed by a slave, the action of the lex Aquilia, and the action against those who throw any thing into the highway by which any one is wounded or iujured : x. treats of mixed actions, the action of partition of an inheritance, &c. : xi. speaks of interrogatories, and of such matters as are to be heard before the same judge (judex). It also treats of run-away slaves, of dice-playing, bribery, corruption, and false reports ; and lastly, of burials and funeral expenses : xii. explains the action for a loan, con dictions, &e.: xiii. continues the subject of the preceding, and treats of the action of pawning : xiv. and xv. treat of actions arising from
contracts made by other persons and yet binding upon us ; of the Senatus Consultum Macedonianum ; and of the peculium : xvi. treats of the Senatus Consultum Velleianum, and of compensation, and the action of deposits : xvii. treats of the mandate, and of partnership (societal) : xviii. explains the meaning and forms of the contract of sale, the annulling of this kind of contract ;- and treats of gain or less upon the thing sold : xix. treats of bargains, of actions of hiring, of the action called testimatoria, of permutation, of the action called prnscriptis verbis, &c. : xx. treats of pledges and hypotheem, of the preference of creditors, of the distraction or sale of things engaged or pawned : xxi. contains an explanation of the Edile's edict concerning-the sale of slaves and beasts, and also treats of evictions, warranties, &c. : xxii. treats of interest (usurse), fruits, accessions to things, and of proofs and presumptions, and of ignorance of law and fact : xxiii. is upon betrothment (sponsalia), marriage, dowry, and agreements upon this subject, and lands given in dowry xxiv. treats of gifts between hus band and wife, divorces, and recovery of the marriage portion : xxv. treats of expenses laid out upon the dowry, of actions for the recovery of things carried away by the wife or other persons against whom there is no action for theft, of the obligation to acknowledge children and provide for them, on the Rescript Do Iuspiciendo Ventre, and lastly of concubines : xxvf. and xxvii treat of tutorship and curator ship, and the actions resulting from them : xxviii. treats of testaments, of the institution and disinheriting of children, of the institution of an heir, of substitutions, &c. : xxix. treats of military testaments, of the opening of wills, and of codicils : xxx., xxxi., xxxii. treat of legacies and fiduciary bequests in general : xxxiii. and xxxiv, treat of particular legacies, of the ademption of legacies, and of the Rcgula Catoniana : xxxv. treats of legacies on condition, and of the Lex Falcidia : xxxvi. treats of the Senatus Consultum Trebellianum, and of fiduciary bequests, of the time when they become due, of the security to be given by the heir, &c. : xxxvii. treats of universal succession by bonorum possessio : xxxviii. treats of the services due by freedmen to their patrons, of the succession of freedmen, of the succession of intestates appointed by the prtetor, of heredes Sui and Legitimi, and of the Senates Cou natant TennWonsan and Orphitiantun xxxix. expleine the means which the law or the pewter provides for preranung any one from moving damage where • personal, real, or mixed action will not lie, after which It soda sr Rh the explanation of donations generally, and of ruck as are made in contemplation or view of death (mortis cause) : 11. relates to unnumindon or freeing of slaves: x1l treats of the various ways by Lich the property of things is acquired, and of the acqui aims, and lees of pomeesiou, and lastly of lawful causes which authorise power ion sad lead to usucaption treats of definitive and interlocutory sentences, of confessions in judgment, of the earldom of goods, of the mums of seizure and their effects, of the privileges of are&tors : of curators appointed for the administration of goods, and of the revocation of acts done to defraud creditors: xliil. treat, of Interdicts and posseasog actions : xliv, speaks of pleas (raceptiones) and &Imam and of obligations and actions : xlv. of stipulations, : xlvi. of sureties, aerations, delNationa, paymente, discharges, peretorian stipulations, AYH. treat. of private offences : xlviii. treats of public offienem; then follow accusations, inscriptions, prisons; and lastly it treat. of torture, punishments, confiscation, relegation, deportation, and of the bodies of malefactors executed : ill'. treats of appeals; and then give. an account of the rights of the exchequer, and of matter. relating to captive., military discipline, soldiers and veterans : I. treat. of the rights of cities and eitirens, of decuriones and their children, of public offices, of immunities, of deputies and unbsondore; of the administration of things belonging to cities, of public works, fairs, ire.; of taxes laid upon the provinces, concluding with the interpretation and signification of legal terms, end with the rules of law.