Quid aequitatis? The Formation and Changes of the Concept of Aequitas in Classic Roman Law

Abstract

This paper aims to study as object the concept of aequitas in the Roman juridical conceptualization between centuries I BC and III AD, understanding it as a mutable concept in the intellectual and technical context of Classic Roman Law. In the first section, it traces the etymological Latin origin pertinent to the aequitas theme (like aequus and iustum) in the religious and moral spheres. Second, it is researched how the term aequitas was received by the Rhetoric, approaching the concept to that one of iustitia and, by Cicero’s writings, with the innovation of the distinction between naturalis aequitas and civilis aequitas. Third, through the Digest, it is described how the classical iurisprudentia, well aware of this tradition, included the concept of aequitas within the technical and juridical framework of the iuris scientia. Particular attention will be devoted to Labeo, who continued the Ciceronian binomial; and to Ulpian, who projected an integration of that “two” forms within the ideological framework of the Severan dynasty.