The imperial council
The emperor was assisted by a permanent body of advisers, the sacrum consistorium22 which had developed out of the earlier consilium principis as this was organised by Emperor Hadrian in the second century AD.
The sacrum consistorium consisted of the highest officials of the imperial administration and functioned as a privy council of the emperor in legislative, judicial and administrative matters. Its members included the heads of the four main government departments, i.e. the chief of the imperial offices {magister officiorum), the minister of finance {comes sacrarum largitionum), the minister in charge of the administration of the imperial lands {comes rerum privatarum) and the minister of justice {quaestor sacri palatii), as well as the chamberlain of the imperial household {praepositus sacri cubiculi)2* and a number of full-time councillors termed comites consistoriani. The jurists who served as members of the imperial council exercised a strong influence on imperial legislation, the chief source of law during the later imperial period. Besides its advisory functions, the sacrum consistorium sometimes operated as an imperial court of justice, usually dealing with appeals from decisions of lower courts.
More on the topic The imperial council:
- The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council
- The imperial court
- Imperial constitutions
- Imperial Legislation
- Early compilations of imperial legislation
- 7.2 BENTHAM: AN IMPERIAL GLOBAL STRUCTURE
- Imperial constitutions
- The imperial civil service
- The Reorganisation of the Imperial System
- The Development of Imperial Law-Making
- Civil Procedure in the Late Imperial Age