In Search of the Boundaries of Roman Public Law: Some Remarks on Polish Compendia of the Subject

Abstract

Roman public law is a source of knowledge about the relations between the state and the individual, the family, or, more generally, the society in ancient Rome. However, this concept is often viewed as somewhat vague, especially when trying to grasp its actual scope based on the research literature on the subject. Things are getting even more complicated due to the mutual permeation of Roman public law and private law, the latter prevailing in source texts. Speaking of the research literature, authors seem to offer no more than a skin-deep analysis of both the concept and the content of Roman public law. Consequently, the topics and content of works on Roman public law vary substantially in terms of scope. Jurists and Roman law experts most often attempt to reconstruct the history of the Roman political system, and the historians of antiquity are more inclined to explore the social history of Rome, so the balance happens to be far from even. However, are these two domains fundamentally different from each other, or do they intersect anyway? What do we expect from research publications on Roman public law? Presentation of the political history of Rome? Attempts to reconstruct the public law system? Or maybe a clearer picture of the relations between the Roman state and its people as a community of citizens? The author’s point of departure for consideration of the actual scope of Roman public law is recent studies on the subject published in Poland.