| Revision as of 11:22, 18 August 2017 editCaeciliusinhorto (talk | contribs)Extended confirmed users12,205 edits Undid revision 794938552 by 103.226.160.250 (talk) "actual" is at best redundant and at worst confusing here: how does an "actual professional lawyer" differ from any other?← Previous edit | Revision as of 16:03, 10 September 2017 edit undo47.187.122.242 (talk) ←Replaced content with ' its everyday brp with that disneu channel flow'Tag: blankingNext edit → | ||
| Line 1: | Line 1: | ||
| {{Missing information|other Grecian city states besides Athens|talksection=talksection|date=March 2017}} | |||
| its everyday brp with that disneu channel flow | |||
| ]'', now in the ] (] 131)]] | |||
| '''Ancient Greek law''' consists of the laws and legal institutions of ]. | |||
| The existence of certain general principles of law is implied by the custom of settling a difference between two Greek states, or between members of a single state, by resorting to external arbitration. The general unity of Greek law shows mainly in the laws of inheritance and adoption, in laws of ] and ], and in the publicity uniformly given to legal agreements.{{sfn|Sandys|1911|p=501}} | |||
| While its older forms can be studied by the laws of ], its influence can be traced in legal documents preserved in Egyptian ] and it may be recognized as a consistent whole in its ultimate relations to Roman law in the eastern provinces of the ], with scholars in the discipline of ] comparing Greek law with both ] and the primitive institutions of the ].{{sfn|Sandys|1911|p=501}} | |||
| == Historical Sources == | |||
| There is no systematic collection of Greek laws, thus the knowledge the earliest notions of the subject is derived from the ]ic poems. The works of ]' 'On the Laws', included a recapitulation of the laws of various barbaric as well as of the Grecian states, yet only a few fragments of it remain.{{sfn|Sandys|1911|p=501}} | |||
| === Athens === | |||
| Incidental illustrations of the ] law are found in the '']'' of ], who describes it without exercising influence on its actual practice.{{Citation needed|date=March 2017}} Aristotle criticized Plato's ''Laws'' in his ], in which he reviews the work of certain early Greek lawgivers. The treatise on the ] includes an account of the jurisdiction of the various public officials and of the mechanics of the law courts, and thus enables historians to dispense with the second-hand testimony of ] and ] who derived their information from that treatise.{{sfn|Sandys|1911|p=501}} | |||
| Other evidence for ancient Athenian law comes from statements made in the extant speeches of the Attic orators, and from surviving inscriptions.{{sfn|Sandys|1911|p=501}} | |||
| ==Procedural laws== | |||
| === Athens === | |||
| Historians consider the Ancient Athenian law broadly ] and concerned with the administration of justice rather than ].{{sfn|Carey|1998|p=93}} Athenian laws are typically written in the form where if an offense is made, then the offender will be punished according to said law,{{sfn|Carey|1998|p=95}} thus they are more concerned with the legal actions which should be undertaken by the prosecutor, rather than strictly defining which acts are prosecutable.{{sfn|Carey|1998|p=96}} Often, this would have resulted in juries having to decide whether the offense said to have been committed was in fact a violation of the law in question.{{sfn|Carey|1998|p=99}} | |||
| ==Development of Ancient Greek law== | |||
| === Athens === | |||
| One of the earliest dateable events in Athenian history is the creation of the ], {{circa}}620 BC.<ref name="CAH3.3-370">{{harvnb|Andrewes|p=370}}.</ref> We know little about ] and the code, with the homicide law being the only one known due to it surviving the ].<ref name="CAH3.3-370" /> The law seems to have distinguished between premeditated and involuntary homicide, and provided for the reconciliation of the killer with the family of the dead man.<ref name="CAH3.3-371">{{harvnb|Andrewes|p=371}}.</ref> The homicide law of Draco was still in force in the fourth century.<ref name="CAH3.3-371" /> Though the rest of the code is unknown, it was by Athenian tradition known to have been very harsh.<ref name="CAH3.3-371" /> | |||
| The Athenian law codes set forth by Draco were completely reformed by ], who was the archon of Athens {{Circa}}593 BC. Solon's reforms included the cancellation of debts and reforms to land ownership, as well as the abolition of slavery for those who were born Athenian.{{sfn|Andrewes|pp=381–382}} However, attributing specific legal innovations and reforms to Solon and his successors is notoriously difficult because there was a tendency in ancient Athens to ascribe laws to Solon irrespective of the date of enactment.{{sfn|Carey|1998|p=106}} | |||
| ==Courts and judicial system== | |||
| Along with the official enforcement of the law in the courts in the Grecian states, justice and social cohesion were collectively enforced by society at large.{{sfn|Forsdyke|2008|p=6}} with informal collective justice often being targeted at elite offenders.<ref name="Forsdyke 2008 7" /> | |||
| === Athens === | |||
| Ancient Greek courts were cheap and run by laypeople. Court officials were paid little, if anything, and most trials were completed within a day, with private cases done even quicker. There were no court officials, no lawyers, and no official judges. A normal case consisted of two litigants, arguing if an unlawful act had been committed. The jury would decide whether the accused was guilty, and should he be guilty, what the punishment will be. In Athenian courts, the jury tended to be made of the common people, whereas litigants were mostly from the elites of society.<ref name="Forsdyke 2008 7">{{harvnb|Forsdyke|2008|p=7}}.</ref> | |||
| In the Athenian legal system, the courts have been seen as a system for settling disputes and resolving arguments, rather than enforcing a coherent system of rules, rights and obligations.<ref name="Davidson94">{{cite journal|last=Davidson|first=James|title=Review of ''The Shape of Athenian Law'' by S.C. Todd|journal=The Cambridge Law Journal|year=1994|volume=53|issue=2|pages=384–385|doi=10.1017/s0008197300099104}}</ref> The ] court was responsible for trialing random residents, animals, and inanimate objects for homicide, and it is assumed that it was in order to ensure that Athens was free of blood-guilt for the crime.<ref name="Davidson94" /> | |||
| The Athenian court system was dominated by men. The jury was all-male,{{sfn|Gagarin|2003|p=204}} and it has been argued that the Athenian court seemed to have been remarkably unwilling to allow any female presence in the civic space of the lawcourt itself.<ref>{{cite book|editor-last1=Osborne|editor-first1=Robin|editor-last2=Hornblower|editor-first2=Simon|last=Goldhill|first=Simon|title=Ritual, Finance, Politics: Athenian Democratic Accounts Presented to David Lewis|date=1994|page=360|chapter=Representing Democracy: Women at the Great Dionysia|location=Wotton-under-Edge|publisher=Clarendon Press}}</ref> | |||
| ====Public and private cases==== | |||
| In Ancient Athens, there were two types of lawsuit. Public prosecutions, or ''graphai'', were heard by juries of 501 or more, increasing in increments of 500 jurors, while private suits, or ''dikai'', were heard by 201 or 401 jurors, depending on the amount of money at stake.{{sfn|Hamel|2003|pp=141–142}} Juries were made up of men selected from a panel of 6,000 volunteers, who were selected annually and were required to be full citizens, aged over 30.{{sfn|Hamel|2003|p=142}} Juries were paid a small fee from the time of Pericles, which may have led to disproportionate numbers of poor and elderly citizens working on juries.{{sfn|Hamel|2003|p=143}} | |||
| ==Oratory== | |||
| === Athens === | |||
| In the Athenian legal system, there were no professional lawyers, though well-known speechwriters such as ] composed speeches which were delivered by, or on behalf of others. These speechwriters have been described as being as close as a function of a modern lawyer as the Athenian legal system would permit.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Cronin|first=James F.|title=Review of J.H. Vince "Demosthenes ''Against Meidias, Androtion, Aristocrates, Timocrates, Aristogeiton''"|journal=The Classical Journal|volume=34|issue=8|year=1939|pages=491–492}}</ref> | |||
| It has been argued that the rhetorical and performative features evident in surviving Classical Athenian law court speeches are evidence that Athenian trials were essentially rhetorical struggles which were generally unconcerned with the strict applicability of the law.{{sfn|Gagarin|2003|pp=198–199}} It is also said that orators constructing stories played a much more significant role in Athenian court cases than those of the modern day, due to the lack of modern forensic and investigatory techniques which might provide other sources of evidence in the Athenian courtroom.{{sfn|Gagarin|2003|p=206}} | |||
| ==See also == | |||
| *] | |||
| *] | |||
| *] | |||
| ==References== | |||
| {{reflist}} | |||
| *{{EB1911|wstitle=Greek Law|volume=12|pages=501-507|first=John Edwin|last=Sandys|authorlink=John Sandys (classicist)}} This describes the topic in more procedural detail, and has a large set of citations. | |||
| *{{cite journal|last=Carey|first=Christopher|title=The Shape of Athenian Laws|journal=The Classical Quarterly|year=1998|volume=48|issue=1|doi=10.1093/cq/48.1.93}} | |||
| *{{cite book|editor1-last=Boardman|editor1-first=John|editor2-last=Hammond|editor2-first=N.G.L|title=The Cambridge Ancient History Volume III, Part 3: The Expansion of the Greek World, Eighth to Sixth Centuries B.C.|author-last=Andrewes|author-first=A.|chapter=The Growth of the Athenian State|isbn=0-521-23447-6}} | |||
| *{{cite journal|last=Forsdyke|first=Sara|year=2008|title=Street Theatre and Popular Justice in Ancient Greece: Shaming, Stoning, and Starving Offenders Inside and Outside the Courts|journal=Past and Present|volume=201}} | |||
| *{{cite journal|last=Gagarin|first=Michael|title=Telling Stories in Athenian Law|journal=Transactions of the American Philological Association (1974–)|volume=133|issue=2|year=2003|doi=10.1353/apa.2003.0015}} | |||
| *{{cite book|title=Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient Greece|last=Hamel|first=Debra|year=2003|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven & London}} | |||
| {{Ancient Greece topics}} | |||
| {{DEFAULTSORT:Ancient Greek Law}} | |||
| ] | |||
Revision as of 16:03, 10 September 2017
its everyday brp with that disneu channel flow