Twelve Tables

Why Do Societies Need Laws?

• Laws maintain order and protect people’s rights.
• They provide rules to resolve conflicts peacefully.
• Without laws, chaos, fear, and injustice can spread.
• Laws help societies work together and grow fairly.

The Purpose of Laws

Patricians vs. Plebeians

• Patricians:
• Wealthy, land-owning class.
• Controlled politics, religion, and law.
• Could be senators, judges, and priests.
• Plebeians:
• Common citizens: farmers, soldiers, merchants, laborers.
• Had little political power.
• Faced unfair treatment under unwritten laws.

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Unfair Laws

• Plebeians were eventually granted right to elect tribunes to the representative body to protect their interests
• Until 451 B.C.E there were no written laws
• Patrician judges interpreted laws in biased ways.
• Plebeians could be unjustly punished or enslaved for debt.
• Created anger and protests from plebeians.
• What are the disadvantages of an unwritten law code?

The Demand for Written Laws

• Plebeians wanted equal treatment and legal protection.
• They demanded that laws be public and consistent.
• In 451 BCE, Rome appointed 10 officials to write the laws.
• These laws became the Twelve Tables, completed in 450 BCE.
• Engraved on 12 bronze tablets.
• Posted in the Roman Forum so all citizens could read them.
• Gave plebeians basic legal rights and protections.

Table I: Civil Procedures.

• If someone is accused and called to go to court, he must go.
• If he does not go, he may send a witness to stand for him. If he does not come or send a witness, he may be captured and forced to come to court.

Table II: Civil Procedures.

• If a person needs evidence or a witness, he may go every third day to the doorway of the person and call for him.

Table III: Debt

• If a person owes a debt and is brought to court, he shall have 30 days to pay the debt.
• After 30 days if the debt is not paid, the person owing the debt may be put in chains.
• After 60 days in custody the person owing the debt can be sold into slavery or be put to death if the debt is not settled.

Table IV: Parents and Children

• If a child is be born with a severe deformity, it shall be killed.
• Parents have the right to sell their children into slavery.

Table V: Inheritance

• If a person goes insane, he shall not have power over his goods and they shall be given to his nearest male relative.
• If a person dies without a male heir, his nearest male relative shall inherit his goods.
• Women shall always be given a male guardian to accompany them

Table VI: Property

• If a person makes a promise or contract verbally, it shall be considered binding and must be fulfilled.
• If a man and woman shall live together for a year, they shall be considered married.

Table VII: Real Property

• If a person builds a road and it becomes unusable because of decay or damage, travelers may travel across the property wherever they wish and are not bound to use the road.
• If a person’s road or building shall cause damage to another’s property, the owner of the road or building shall pay for the damage.

Table VIII: Crimes

• If a person insults or gossips about another person publicly, the person who did the insulting or gossiping shall be clubbed to death.
• If a person injures another person physically, he will be injured in the same way unless he agrees to pay for damages.
• No one may hold meetings at night.
• If a person who is called to be a witness in court and lies, he shall be thrown from a cliff.
• If a person throws something without aiming and injures another person, he shall owe that a person one ram.

Table IX: Constitutional Principles

• A man can not be put to death without first having been found guilty in court.
• A judge who is found guilty of taking a bribe shall be put to death.
• It is forbidden to pass laws in private.
• It is also forbidden to pass laws against a single person.

Table X: Funeral Rites

• No man shall be buried or cremated within the city.
• Women are not allowed to mourn loudly or slap their own cheeks or tear their clothes during a funeral.

Table XI: Marriage Laws

• Marriages are forbidden between plebians and patricians.
• Men in the army may not marry until their training is complete.

Table XII: Punishments

• If a person accuses another but is lying, the liar must pay double the penalty of the crime or be put to death.
• The eight forms of punishment are: fines, placing in chains, whipping, inflicting the same injury as was committed, public humiliation, banishment from the city, slavery and death.