"Institutions" Guy. General characteristics and history of occurrence

Roman law has always been and still is the foundation of all world jurisprudence. The learned people of Ancient Rome made an invaluable contribution to the development of this humanitarian science. Apparently, they had no idea, being still savages in a small settlement between the three hills (Palatine, Quirinale and Capitol), that their scientific discoveries will be studied thousands of years later in the most venerable universities with a world-wide name. The invention of the ancient Romans is called Roman law. In the process of studying this historical branch of law, many problems arise that require detailed consideration. To date, lawyers have been able to identify the system of Roman law, and also found information about the sources of the law branch. One such source is the instruction for lawyers, who were called institutions.

The heyday of Roman private law

In the 1st-3rd centuries AD, Roman private law reached its peak of evolution. This period is distinguished by historians of the state and law as "classical." At this time, Roman lawyers not only tried to legitimize some civil relations between different strata of the population, they deduced patterns, created theories, invented new trends in the development of Roman legal science. The classical period of Roman law led to the emergence of several sub-sectors of this science, namely:

• Public law.
• Private law.
• The right of the quirits.
• The right of peoples.
• Pretor's right.

In these sub-branches various legal norms regulating legal relations in different spheres of Roman life have united. But if it was right, then there were lawyers. Then the question arises: how did they appear, who (or what) did they prepare? The answer to this are the institutions of Guy, a general characteristic of which will be given below.

Why institutions were created

Before talking about the institutions of the Roman lawyer Guy, you need to understand what exactly these institutions are in general. The term means a set of rules and legal norms that are included in a single collection used in the process of educating young lawyers-practitioners (in ancient Rome there was no differentiation of lawyers, each of them led practical activity, in other words, theorists practically did not exist). In the Roman Empire of the 1st century AD there was a strong contradiction between slaves and the free population. Rebellion took place very often. Therefore, before the lawyers, the task arose: to satisfy the interests of the ruling classes in the field of their property rights over slaves, without violating the shaky balance in the middle of the free society. They could not allow the outbreak of internecine war in the ranks of the free population. His practical works, many prominent lawyers wrote down and published small manuals, quite elementary.

"Institutions" Guy. general characteristics

It should immediately be noted that the "Institutions" of Guy is an innovation in the world of legal science of that time. The collection absorbed all the necessary qualities, namely: brevity, clarity, brevity, the availability of examples from the judicial practice, the accuracy of the presentation, understandable and pure Latin language, an abundance of historical information. In other words, Gayev "Institutions" became the main educational literature for lawyers studying Roman law. "Institutions" Guy served as the basis for the compilation of the next well-known textbook, which became part of the famous codification of Justinian - Corpus juris civilis.

The meaning of "Institutions"

In the process of studying this source, one must understand what benefit the "Institutions" of Guy have in themselves. General characteristics of the legal science of ancient Roman society - this is exactly the knowledge that must be present in the head of every practicing lawyer. This knowledge is the useful basis for which this "textbook on Roman law" was created. It is in the "Institutions" that the norms that show Roman law in its early stages of development are preserved. Guy gathered together the norms that existed in the pre-imperial period. Of course, such a heritage is an extremely interesting find.

Sources of Institutes

No legal phenomenon emerges from nowhere, not even the "Institution" of Guy. Sources of this phenomenon existed many years before Guy decided to create this textbook. "Institutions" have a lot of sources, but you can choose the most important ones, namely:

• Laws XII tables - this is the fundamental source of all Roman law in general.

• Constitution of the consuls.
• Edicts and decrees of magistrates.
• Vedomosti about the conduct of civil processes, the practical activities of lawyers.

The "Institutions" of Guy, whose general characteristics are given above, have their own internal structure. The manual for practicing lawyers consists of four books, each of which deals with individual rules of law with notes.

Conclusion

In the article we tried to clarify the question, what is the "Institutions" of Guy. General characteristics and structure are given in the article in order to convey information about this preserved monument of Roman private law as accurately as possible.