How do Cicero's ideas compare with the ideas contained in Justinian's Code?

Answer 1

The Corpus Juris Civilis (dubbed Justinian Code in the 16th century) did not contain any ideas of its own. It presented, among other things, parts of the works on law by important Roman jurists (law experts). Although Cicero occasionally explained some legal concepts, he was not a jurist. He was a rhetorician and a and moral philosopher. The Corpus Juris Civilis, which was compiled nearly 580 years after Cicero, did not draw anything from his work.

The Corpus Juris Civilis was a set of books which came in four parts. One, the codex, was a collection of extracts from 400 years of Roman laws which scrapped obsolete or unnecessary laws, made changes when necessary and clarified obscure passages. Its aim was to put the laws in a single book (previously they were written on many different scrolls), harmonise conflicting views among jurists which arose from centuries of poorly organised development of Roman law and have a uniform and coherent body of law.

Two other parts were the Digesta and the Institutiones. The first was an advanced law student textbook which comprised a collection of fragments taken from essays on laws written by jurists (mostly from the 2nd and 3rd centuries) which express the private opinions of legal experts. Most were from Ulpian (40%) and Paulus (17%). The latter was a first year student textbook which had a it was a series of extracts from statements on the basic institutions of Roman law from the teaching books by 'writers of authority.' In was largely based on the texts of Gaius, a jurist of the 2nd century AD.

Answer 2

Like Roman roads, Roman laws spread throughout the empire. The Roman senator Cicero (sis uh roh) said that laws "cannot be bent by influence, or broken by power, or spoiled by money."

A later ruler named Justinian (jus tin ee un) used Roman laws to create a famous code of justice. Here are a few laws from that code.