Experts identify scraps of lost Roman law text

Copy of the Gregorian Code, which was first drafted in AD300, had been chopped up and used to cover medieval book

Scraps of a lost Roman law code, which survived because they were chopped up and used as packing in the cover of a medieval book, have been identified for the first time and translated by academics in London.

The 17 fragments of parchment come from the Gregorian Code, first published around AD300. There were no known surviving originals from the code, but scholars knew of it because parts were cited in later Roman laws and legal writings. St Augustine of Hippo, the fourth-century theologian, was one of many later authors who cited it in his work.

The code compiled earlier precedents in legal rulings by Roman emperors, and most of the fragments concern appeal procedures and the statute of limitations.

Most of their 1,600-year history is unknown. The script, found on both sides of expensively prepared parchment, is from a book dating from around AD400, possibly made in Constantinople, and used as a working text by a lawyer.

Benet Salway and Simon Corcoran, historians at University College London, say the fragments show signs of being cut up and used in binding another book, probably in the 15th or 16th century as print replaced handwritten books.

The fragments were bought by a private collector at a sale in London. After failing either to translate the script or identify the subject, he circulated photocopies which eventually reached Salway and Corcoran, who have been working on Projet Volterra, a 10-year study of surviving Roman law funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

"Even in a not very clear photocopy, the words jumped off the page at me," Salway said.

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