Cicero's Law

Paul J. du Plessis is Senior Lecturer in Civil Law and Legal History at the University of Edinburgh. His research focuses predominantly on the multifaceted and complex set of relationships between law and society in a historical context. He is the co-editor, with John W Cairns, of The Making of the Ius Commune: From Casus to Regula (Edinburgh University Press, 2010), Beyond Dogmatics: Law and Society in the Roman World (Edinburgh University Press, 2007) and Reassessing Legal Humanism and Its Claims: Petere Fontes? (Edinburgh University Press 2015). He is the editor of the critically acclaimed New Frontiers: Law and Society in the Roman World (Edinburgh University Press 2013).

'A thoroughly enjoyable and thought-provoking book. It is always a pleasure to remake Cicero's acquaintance, and this book does not disappoint.' - Craig Anderson, Robert Gordon University, Edinburgh Law Review. 'The essays are very much on the mark set by the editor, and the quality is high. The book is for scholars, but advanced learning methodology or studying the history of Roman law scholarship will find the book useful too.' Ernest Metzger, University of Glasgow, Roman Legal Tradition.

• List of contributors; List of abbreviations; A note on translations; 1. Introduction, Paul J. du Plessis; Part 1. On Law; 2. A Barzunesque view of Cicero: from giant to dwarf and back, Philip Thomas; 3. Reading a dead man’s mind: Hellenistic philosophy, rhetoric, and Roman law, Olga Tellegen-Couperus and Jan Willem Tellegen; 4. Law’s nature: philosophy as a legal argument in Cicero’s writings, Benedikt Forschner; Part 2. On Lawyers; 5. Cicero and the small world of Roman jurists, Yasmina Benferhat; 6. “Jurists in the shadows”: the everyday business of the jurists of Cicero’s time, Christine Lehne-Gstreinthaler; 7. Cicero’s reception in the juristic tradition of the early Empire, Matthijs Wibier; 8. Servius, Cicero and the res publica of Justinian, Jill Harries; Part 3. On Legal Practice; 9. Cicero and the Italians: expansion of Empire, creation of law, Saskia T. Roselaar; 10. Jurors, jurists and advocates: law in the Rhetorica ad Herennium and De Inventione, Jennifer Hilder; 11. Multiple charges, unitary punishment, and rhetorical strategy in the quaestiones of the late Roman Republic, Michael C. Alexander; 12. Early career prosecutors: forensic activity and senatorial careers in the late Republic, Catherine Steel; Postscript, Paul J. du Plessis; Index.