CIVIL LAW. In the early period of the Roman law the power of the husband over his wife and her property was absolute, as the patria potestas. Whatever property the wife acquired, both be after marriage, became the property of the husband; but in case the wife survived the husband she was entitled to share her husband's property equally with the children. At a later period, but before the time of Justinian, owing possibly to the lack of any formal marriage, we find a fully developed system of law relating to married women which, unlike the common law, was based upon the theory that husband and wife were in law distinct persons having independent rights and liabilities. The wife remained respon sible for her own debts. She could sue and be sued independently of her husband, and her hus band could not subject her property to any dis ability. While there were some restrictions upon the power of women to contract, there was no distinction in this respect between married wom en and unmarried women. The husband, as at common law, was bound to support the wife; but as compensation for this liability his wife or her family was required at the time of the marriage to provide the husband with the dos or dowry.
The increase from the dos was the husband's property. He could also dispose of the dos so far as it was personal property, but not if it were real estate: and in the ease of termination of the marriage by death or divorce, the dos was required to he returned to the wife. Corre sponding to the dos was the donatio ante nuptial" or the donatio propter nuptiam, a gift made by the husband to the wife before the marriage. Not much is known of these, but it seems prob able that the donatio was not required to he equal to the dos, but was given as a provision for the wife after her husband's death, she hav ing lost the right to share equally in her hus band's property with the children of the mar riage. These rules of law might, however. be freely modified by antenuptial contracts, which were enforced much as courts of equity enforced antenuptial eontracts entered into at common law.