ROMANO-BARBARIAN LAWS. - This is the name given to three legislative compilations produced in the West in the 6th century: the lex Romana Wisigothorum (or Breviarium Alaricianum), the lex Romana Burgundionum, and the Edictum Theodorici.
Composed on the initiative of three barbarian sovereigns (Alaric II, Gundobad, Theodoric), and a demonstration of the attraction exercised by Roman legal wisdom on these foreigners settled in the territories of the Empire, they differ from one another essentially in this: that, while the first two were intended to regulate the condition of Roman citizens living in the territories occupied respectively by the Visigoths and by the Burgundians, the Edictum was imposed for the observance of both the Romans and the Ostrogoths subject to Theodoric; and, even in its name, it sought to reaffirm the ideal dependence of the latter on the Emperor of the East, to whom alone the right to issue leges would have belonged.
The lex Romana Burgundionum was promulgated, in all likelihood, a few years after the Breviarium Alaricianum (v. ALARICO II) and before the death of King Gundobad (516). Unlike the Visigothic law, the Burgundian one is not made up of a series of extracts from Roman sources, but represents an organic body of norms, divided into 46 titles. The material is drawn from the Gregorianus, Hermogenianus and Theodosianus codes; there appear in it certain Novellae, among which the most recent is that of Anthemius, the Sententiae attributed to Paul (v.), and a writing of Gaius (v.), probably a summary of the Institutiones. In some old editions the lex Romana Burgundionum is designated by the name Papianus; this is due to the fact that in some manuscripts the Burgundian law follows the lex Romana Wisigothorum, whose last chapter contains a passage of Papinian (v.) and which some copyist considered as the first chapter of the lex Romana Burgundionum, so that Papianus (from Papinianus) came to be regarded as the title of the compilation.
The lex Romana Burgundionum was first edited by Cujas in 1566; the most recent Italian edition is in Fontes iuris Romani anteiustiniani (II, Florence 1940, pp. 713-50).
The Edictum Theodorici, promulgated after 503, is divided into 115 chapters, whose material is drawn from the Gregorianus, Hermogenianus and Theodosianus codes, and from the post-Theodosian Novellae. Among the works of jurisprudence, the Sententiae attributed to Paul were used here too; it is uncertain, on the other hand, whether other works were directly consulted, all the more so since the chapters of the Edictum do not carry an indication of their sources and do not even preserve the original text, which is always paraphrased.
The compilation was first edited by P. Pithou, on the basis of two manuscripts now lost; the definitive edition is that of F. Bluhme (in MGH, Leges, V, p. 149 ff.), on which the most recent Italian one is also based (in Fontes, cit., pp. 684-710).
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Rodolfo Danieli