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The Purpose of the Lex Calpurnia de repetundis*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

J. S. Richardson
J. S. Richardson
Affiliation:
University of St Andrews/University of Edinburgh
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Extract

In 149 B.C. the tribune L. Calpurnius Piso proposed a law which was to have momentous consequences for the legal, political and administrative history of the Roman republic. It was his lex de rebus repetundis which first established the practice of trial before a quaestio perpetua, a jury, drawn from a panel of jurors who had always to be available, which became the standard procedure for criminal cases in the late republic. For over fifty years, from the first tribunate of C. Gracchus in 123 to the passing of the Lex Aurelia in 70, such courts were to provide a political storm-centre as various political figures attempted for their own ends to alter the criteria for the selection of the iudices who manned the juries. Moreover, from the late second century B.C. down to at least the second century A.D., the process de repetundis formed the most important means that was available to Rome's provincial subjects of bringing an action against a provincial governor for maladministration.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 77 , November 1987 , pp. 1 - 12
Copyright
Copyright © J. S. Richardson 1987. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 For the history of the quaestio de repetundis, see Lintott, A. W., ‘The leges de repetundis and Associate Measures under the Republic’, ZSS 98 (1981), 162–212Google Scholar, and bibliography cited there; to which add Venturini, C., ‘La repressione degli abusi dei magistrati romani ai danni delle populazioni soggette, fino alla lex Calpurnia del 149 a.C.’, BIDR 72 (1969), 19–87Google Scholar, and id., Studi sul crimen repetundarum nell'età repubblicana (1979).

2 Cic, Brut. 27. 106, 2 Verr. 3. 84. 195, 4. 25. 56, de off. 2. 21. 75; the repetundae law of the Tabula Bembina (FIRA i2, no. 7; hereinafter lex rep.), lines 23 and 74 ( = 81); cf. Schol. Bob. 96 (St.), Tac, Ann. 15. 20.

3 So Lintott, art. cit. (n. 1), 172–6.

4 This is deduced from lex rep., line 12. See further below, p. [20].

5 So Ferguson, W. S., ‘The Lex Calpurnia of 149 B.c.’, JRS 11 (1921), 86–100Google Scholar; Badian, E., Roman Imperialism in the Late Republic (1968), 41Google Scholar; Eder, W., Das vorsullanische Repetundenverfahren (1969), 58 ff.Google Scholar; C. Venturini, BIDR 72 (1969), 81–7.

6 Appian, Ib. 59. 247–60. 254; Livy, per. 49; Cic, de or. 1. 53. 227; Val. Max. 9. 6. 2.

7 Livy 43. 2.

8 lex rep., lines 1–2.

9. Cic, div. in Caec. 5. 17, 20. 65

10 lex rep., lines 2–3; cf. line 59.

11 Cf. Buckland, W. W., The Roman Law of Slavery, (1908), 47 and 667Google Scholar; Watson, A., Roman Private Law around 200 BC (1971) 134–7.Google Scholar

12 On Galba's ‘trial’, which was almost certainly the contio held by the tribune L. Scribonius Libo in his attempt to pass a plebiscite to establish a quaestio in order to try Galba, see Cic., Brut. 20. 80 and 23. 89, de or. 1. 53. 227–8, Mur. 28. 59, ad Att. 12. 5(b); Livy 39. 40. 12, per. 49; Val. Max. 8. 1. 2; Quintilian 2. 15. 8; Gellius, NA 1. 12. 17 (quoting Cato); Appian, Ib. 60. 255; Fronto, ad M. Caesarem 3. 20. See Richardson, J. S., Hispaniae (1986), 137–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

13 So esp. Val. Max. 8. 1. 2; on the effects of such considerations on historiography, see Wiseman, T. P., Clio's Cosmetics (1979), esp. ch.3.Google Scholar

14 de Off. 2. 21. 75.

15 The Italic War of 91, as is indeed stated in the majority of the manuscripts.

16 div. in Caec. 5. 17–19, 20. 65; 2 Verr. 2. 6. 15.

17 lex rep., lines 3 (nominis delatio) and 23 (Lex Calpurnia and Lex Junia). For the conjunction of the two laws, see lex rep., lines 73–5.

18 Gaius 4. 13. The actio sacramento is most fully described in Gaius 4. 13–17, although the section on the in personam form is unfortunately illegible in the Veronese palimpsest. For an account of the legis actio sacramento, see Buckland, W. W., A Textbook of Roman Law3 (1963), 610–16Google Scholar; Kaser, M., Das römische Zivilprozessrecht (1966), 60–77Google Scholar; Watson, op. cit. (n. 11), 162–3.

19 So Eder, op. cit. (n. 5), 97.

20 See lex rep. lines 1–4, 9–11, 19–27, 49–56, 58–72; Mommsen, Th., Römisches Strafrecht (1899), 382–4Google Scholar; Jones, A. H. M., Criminal Courts of the Roman Republic and Principate (1972), 50–1Google Scholar.

21 Kunkel, W., Untersuchungen zur Entwicklung der römischen Kriminal-verfahrens in vorsullanischer Zeit (Abh. Bayerische Akad. 56, 1962) 13–14, 102 and 132–3Google Scholar. Cf. Huschke, E., Die Multa und das Sacramentum in ihren verschiedenden Anwendungen (1874), 473Google Scholar.

22 Gaius 1. 1; id., D. 41. 1. 1; Justinian, Inst. 1. 2. 1–2; cf. Kaser, op. cit. (n. 18), 45.

23 lex rep., lines 1–3.

24 So Serrao, F., ‘Appunti sui patroni e sulla legittimazione attiva all' accusa nei processi repetundarum’, Studi Francisci 2 (1956), 473–511Google Scholar, esp. 478–80;Kunkel, op. cit. (n. 21), 15; A. W. Lintott, ‘The. procedure under the leges Calpurnia and Iunia’, ZPE 22 (1976), 207–14, esp. 208–9.

25 Gaius 4. 16.

26 Gaius 4. 30; cf. id. 4. 11 and Cic, Mur. 12. 26–8.

27 Ulpian, D. 50. 17. 123; Justinian, Inst. 4. 10 pr.; Gaius 4. 82.

28 So Thomas, J. A. C., The Institutes of Justinian (1975), 309Google Scholar.

29 A. W. Lintott, loc. cit. (n. 1), 174.

30 lex rep., lines 1–3 and 9–11; Sherwin-White, A. N., JRS 62 (1972), 97–9Google Scholar. Note that the person who can place an accusation ‘alieno nomine’ under Gracchus’ law (lex rep., lines 6 and 60) is not a patronus, but a cognitor, who would either have, or assume for the purpose of the litigation, the status of his principal (Sherwin-White, A.N., JRS 72 (1982), 20–1Google Scholar; Buckland, op. cit. (n. 18), 708–9). In the Verres’ trial, Cicero still refers to himself, in a non-technical sense, as the cognitor of the Sicilians.

31 This suggestion was made to me by Peter Brunt and Michael Crawford. The same possibility had occurred to Mommsen, who suggested it in ZSS 12 (1891), 278 n. 1; but he omitted these pages when preparing the article for his collected writings (cf. Gesam. Schr. 3 (1907), 362–3). (I am grateful to Jean- Louis Ferrary for this reference.) For the fictio civitatis, see Gaius 4. 37. For an instance of a fictio used in the early years of the following century, see JRS 73 (1983), 39 and 74 (1984), 52–4.

32 Thus Kunkel, op. cit. (n. 21), passim.

33 Above p. 5.

34 Gaius 4. 16.

35 So Kunkel, op. cit. (n. 21), 68–70, citing Plautus, Aulul. 408–11.

36 Cic, div. in Caec. 5. 17. See above p. 3.

37 It is this, testified to by Varro (apud Gellius, NA 13. 2. 6), which makes legal actions against a serving magistrate impossible, rather than, as Buckland, W. W. believed (JRS 27 (1937), 37–47)Google Scholar, the unchallengeable nature of any acts of a holder of imperium. Lintott, art. cit. (n. 1), 174 n. 54, discussing Gellius, NA 13. 13. 4, misses Varrro's point by assuming that the problem about summoning a magistrate attended by lictors was a practical one. It is clear from the earlier passage that the presence of a lictor represented the right of arrest (prensio). See also Weinrib, E. J., ‘The prosecution of Roman magistrates’, Phoenix 22 (1968), 32–56CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and his subsequent discussion with D. R. Shackleton-Bailey (ibid. 24 (1970), 162–5 and 25 (1971), 145–50.

38 For the argument, see, for instance, Buckland and Lintott, cited in the last note. The one republican case produced by Lintott in favour of his contention that exmagistrates could be sued in private law for acts committed while holding imperium, that of C. Antonius and the Greeks (Asconius 84C), is of little help, since it is not clear that Antonius was holding imperium at the time.

39 Cf. Kelly, J. M., Studies in the Civil Judicature of the Roman Republic (1976), chs. 4 and 5Google Scholar.

40 Sir Matthew Hale, Historia Placitorum Coronae (published with notes by Sollom Emlyn, London 1736) cap. xx, sect. iv.

41 lex rep., line 87; cf. lines 76–8 (83–5). Above pp. 5–6. On citizens as accusers in the lex rep., see Venturini, op. cit. (1979) (n. 1), 82–91, and the observations of Ferrary, J.-L., Labeo 29 (1983), 70–1.Google Scholar

42 Paulus, D. 41. 1. 48pr and 48. 11. 8; cf. Gaius 2.45.

43 So van Binsbergen, J., De legibus ablatae pecuniae (1906), 22–3. On the forms of ownership, cf. Gaius 2.40–1.Google Scholar

44 lex. rep., line 74 (81).

45 For a similar position in the change from legis actioto formulary procedure, see Birks, P., ‘From Legis Actio to Formula’, Irish Jurist 4 (1969), 356–67.Google Scholar

46 Cic, div. in Caec. 5. 18, quoted above, p. 3.

47 Thus Venturini, op. cit. (1979) (n. 1), 85–7; Lintott, art. cit. (n. 1), 174.

48 Buckland, art. cit. (n. 37), 46.

49 So Buckland and Venturini, locc. citt.

50 Above p. 6.

51 This was available in Gracchus' law (see above n. 30); for the legis actio, such permission might be modelled on the action pro populo, which was one of the exceptions to the rule that no one might act alieno nomine (Ulpian, D. 50. 17. 123; Justinian, Inst. 4. 10 pr.; Gaius 4. 82). For an instance of the legis actio sacramento pro populo in 144 B.C., see Frontinus, de aqu.1. 7; E. Weiss, ZSS 45 (1925) 97 ff.

52 Cic, de fin. 1. 7. 24; cf. Livy, per. 54, Val. Max. 5. 8. 3.

53 Livy, per. 54.

54 This was the view, however, of Zumpt, A.W., Das Criminalrecht der römischen Republik 2. 1 (1868), 42 ff.Google Scholar; on which see Lintott, art. cit. (n. 1), 173.

55 Livy 43. 2; cf. Richardson, op. cit. (n. 12), 114–15, with further bibliography.

56 They were L. Aurelius Cotta, an otherwise unknown Salinator, and M'. Aquillius (cos. 129). See Appendix below.

57 Appian, bell. civ. 1. 22. 92.

58 Cic, pro Font. 17. 38.

59 In classical law, iniuria committed by a magistrate was treated as a private law matter, whether he had acted in an official or a private capacity (Ulpian, D. 47. 10. 32).

60 lex rep., line 12; Mommsen, , Gesam. Schriften 1 (1905), 51–2, A.H.M. Jones, op. cit. (n. 20), 48.Google Scholar

61 This was still technically the case for foederati, liberi and amici in the first century A.D. (Proculus, D. 49. 15. 7, cf. Pomponius, D. 45. 15. 5; A. Heuss, Die völkerrechtlichen Grundlagen der römischen Aussenpolitik in republikanischer Zeit (Klio Beiheft 31, 1933), 6–12).

62 So Livy 21. 18. 4–5, 36. 3. 10, 38. 45. 5–6, 45. 25.1–13. See the comments on this practice by Rich, J. W.Declaring War in the Roman Republic in the Period of Transmarine Expansion (1976), ch. 3.Google Scholar

63 See recently, Sherwin-White, A. N., ‘The Lex Repetundarum and the Political Ideas of Gaius Gracchus’, JRS 72 (1982), 18–31, esp. 21–3Google Scholar.