Early history of jurisprudence

Originally, Roman jurisprudence was in the hands of the high priests (pontifices) who took care of state religion, public worship, and sacral law. They were the creators of the first intellectual and technical elaboration of the law.

The pontiffs constituted a body, the Pontifical College, that grew from three members to fifteen or even more. They organized the Roman calendar and watched over the forms preserved in the archives of the Pontifical College. They were the experts and guardians of rules and sacred rites. Until the third century bce, the Pontifical College had a monopoly on the law and legal proceedings. As the keepers of the legal forms and rites that had to be applied in legal procedures, the pontiffs were therefore the interpreters of the law.

Tradition attributes the breakdown of the monopoly to the fact that Gnaeus Flavius, a secretary of Appius Claudius Caecus (censor in 312 bce), compiled and published with Appius’s consent the first collection of legal forms of civil actions (ius Flavianum) around 300 bce. Tiberius Coruncanius, consul in 280 bce and the first plebeian pontifex maximus, or chief priest, was

also the first who offered public consultation on legal issues (Pomponius, D. 1.2.2.35), thereby transforming jurisprudence into a legal profession. According to Pomponius (D. 1.2.2.38), the earliest major work of legal literature was the Tripertita of Sextus Aelius Paetus, consul in 198 bce. The Tripertita consisted of an edition of the Twelve Tables, an interpretation of this law, and formularies for litigation and legal transaction. The Tripertita still existed in Pomponius's time, and it was called “the cradle of the law.”