Editing Breviary of Alaric

{{short description|6th-century collection of Roman law}}
{{Italic title}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2012}}
{{Expand German|Lex Romana Visigothorum|date=April 2021}}
{{Expand Spanish|Breviario de Alarico|date=April 2021}}
[[File:Bréviaire d'Alaric (Clermont).jpg|thumb|Copy of '''Breviarium Alaricianum''' from [[Bibliothèque du Patrimoine de Clermont Auvergne Métropole]], France, 10th century]]
[[File:Reino de los visigodos-en.svg|thumb|The Visigothic Kingdom at roughly its greatest extent]]
The '''''Breviary of Alaric''''' (''Breviarium Alaricianum'' or ''Lex Romana Visigothorum'') is a collection of [[Roman law]], compiled by Roman jurists and issued by [[referendary]] [[Anianus (referendary)|Anianus]] on the order of [[Alaric II]], [[Visigothic Kingdom|King of the Visigoths]], with the approval of his bishops and nobles.<ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=breviarium-alaricianum-cn Breviarium Alaricianum] in ''[[Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities|A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities]]'' by [[William Smith (lexicographer)|William Smith]], 1890. Retrieved 14 November 2013.</ref> It was promulgated on 2 February 506,<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=ZeI0AQAAMAAJ&dq=%22Lex+Romana+Visigothorum%22&pg=PA90 Encyclopaedia of Chronology: Historical and Biographical], by Bernard Bolingbroke Woodward, William Leist Readwin Cates</ref><ref>{{cite book | last=Frassetto | first=M. | title=Encyclopedia of Barbarian Europe: Society in Transformation | publisher=ABC-CLIO | year=2003 | isbn=978-1-57607-263-9 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yW-GfElbafQC&pg=PR24 | access-date=1 February 2023 | page=24}}</ref> the 22nd year of his reign.<ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=breviarium-alaricianum-cn Breviarium Alaricianum] in ''[[Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities|A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities]]'' by [[William Smith (lexicographer)|William Smith]], 1890. Retrieved 14 November 2013.</ref> It applied, not to the Visigothic nobles who lived under their [[Code of Euric|own law]], which had been formulated by [[Euric]], but to the [[Hispania|Hispano-Roman]] and [[Gallo-Roman]] population, living under Visigoth rule south of the [[Loire]] and, in Book 16, to the members of the [[trinitarian]] [[Catholic Church]]; the Visigoths were [[Arianism|Arian]] and maintained their own clergy.

==Significance==
It is termed a code (''codex''), in the certificate of [[Anianus (referendary)|Anianus]], the king's referendary, but unlike the code of [[Justinian I|Justinian]], from which the writings of jurists were excluded, it comprises both imperial constitutions (''leges'') and juridical treatises (''jura''). From the circumstance that the ''Breviarium'' has prefixed to it a royal rescript (''commonitorium'') directing that copies of it, certified under the hand of Anianus, should be received exclusively as law throughout the kingdom of the Visigoths, the compilation of the code has been attributed to Anianus by many writers, and it is frequently designated the ''Breviary of Anianus'' (''Breviarium Aniani'').<ref name=EB1911>{{EB1911|inline=1|wstitle=Breviary of Alaric|volume=4|page=505}}</ref>

The code, however, appears to have been known amongst the Visigoths by the title of ''Lex Romana'' or ''Lex Theodosii'', and it was not until the 16th century that the title of ''Breviarium'' was introduced to distinguish it from a recast of the code, the ''[[Lex Romana Curiensis]]'' which was introduced into northern Italy in the 9th century for the use of the Romans in [[Lombardy]]. This recast of the Visigothic code was published in the 18th century for the first time by Paolo Canciani in his collection of ancient laws entitled ''Barbarorum Leges Antiquae''. Another manuscript of this Lombard recast of the Visigothic code was discovered by [[Gustav Friedrich Hänel]] in the library of [[Abbey of St Gall|St Gall]].<ref name=EB1911/>

The chief value of the Visigothic code is as a source for Roman Law, including the first five books of the ''[[Codex Theodosianus|Theodosian Code]]'' (''Codex Theodosianus''),<ref name=Oxf>"Codex Theodosianus" in ''[[Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium|The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium]]'', [[Oxford University Press]], New York & Oxford, 1991, p. 475. {{ISBN|0195046528}}</ref> five books of the ''Sententiae Receptae'' of Julius Paulus. Until the discovery of a manuscript in the [[Verona Cathedral#Library|chapter library]] in [[Verona, Italy|Verona]], which contained the greater part of the ''[[Institutes (Gaius)|Institutes]]'' of Gaius, it was the only known work containing the institutional writings of [[Gaius (jurist)|Gaius]], an important ancient Roman jurist.<ref name=EB1911/>

The ''Breviary'' had the effect of preserving the traditions of Roman law in [[Aquitania]] and [[Gallia Narbonensis]], which became both [[Provence]] and [[Septimania]], thus reinforcing their sense of enduring continuity, broken in the [[Franks|Frankish]] north.{{cn|date=January 2019}}

==Contents==
The ''Breviary of Alaric'' comprises:<ref name=EB1911/>
* sixteen books of the ''[[Codex Theodosianus]]''; 
* the novels (decrees) of –
** [[Theodosius II]], 
** [[Valentinian III]], 
** [[Marcian]], 
** [[Majorian]] and 
** [[Libius Severus]]; 
* the institutes of [[Gaius (jurist)|Gaius]]; 
* five books of the ''Sententiae Receptae'' of [[Julius Paulus]];
* thirteen titles of the ''[[Codex Gregorianus]]''; 
* two titles of the ''[[Codex Hermogenianus]]''; and 
* a fragment of the first book of the ''[[Responsa Papiniani]]''.

==See also==
*[[Paris, BN, lat. 4404]]

==References==
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[[Category:6th century in the Visigothic Kingdom]]
[[Category:506 establishments]]
[[Category:Roman law codes]]