What sources did Justinian use to create his legal code?

Answer 1

Justinian the Great did not use any sources for the Corpus Juris Civilis (Justinian Code is a term which was coined in the 16th century). He did not compile it himself. He appointed a commission charged with compiling and harmonizing the writings of classical Roman jurists. This commission was headed by Tribonian, a jurist at the court of Justinian. The aim of creating an harmonized compilation of juristic writing was to clarify the law and shorten litigation, create a syllabus for law schools, and create a text book for first year law students.

The Corpus Juris Civilis (Body of Civil Law) was a set of books which provided a very comprehensive digest of centuries of Roman civil law which revised Roman law. It also included collections of essays by famous Roman jurists in two student textbooks. It came in four parts:

1) The Codex (book) Justinianus, was a review of imperial laws going back 400 years (to the time of Hadrian). Therefore its sources were centuries of imperial edicts. It 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. It consists of 12 books, 1 book covers ecclesiastical law, the duties of high officers and sources of law, 7 cover private law, 1 criminal law and 3 administrative laws.

2) The Digesta was 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%). It was a large amount of writing which was condensed in 50 books. It was used as an advanced law student textbook.

3) The Institutiones was a textbook for first year law students written by two professors. 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 an updating of the Institutiones of Gaius, a jurist of the 2nd century AD.

4) The Novellae Constitutiones, which contained laws recently issued by Justinian.

Answer 2

He used a combination of Greek, Roman, and Mesopotamian laws. Other law codes were also used, but these are the main three.