A fundamental assessment of the place of Cicero in the narratives concerning Roman law of the late Republic
This volume brings together an international team of scholars to debate the issue of Cicero as 'an outsider' and investigates whether, in light of more recent research, this view of Cicero requires revision.

In his 1995 book The Spirit of Roman Law, Alan Watson included a chapter provocatively titled 'Cicero the Outsider'. Watson's argument, following the then dominant Romanist view, was that Cicero's outlook was significantly different from that of the Roman jurists. While Watson's cautious observation has merit in this argument, its subtext is more problematic. It is the purpose of this volume to critique the pervasive view in Roman-law literature that minimises the significance of Cicero in the narrative of Roman law of the late Republic.

This reappraisal of the significance of Cicero reflects current thinking in Roman Law that leans towards a larger and more complex debate concerning the nature of law and of the legal profession in the last century of the Roman Republic.

Paul J. du Plessis is a legal historian and senior lecturer in Civil Law and Legal History at the University of Edinburgh. He is the editor (with John W. Cairns) of Beyond Dogmatics: Law and Society in the Roman World (2007); The Making of the ius commune: from Casus to Regula (2010) and Reassessing Legal Humanism and Its Claims: Petere Fontes? (2015). He is the sole editor of the critically acclaimed New Frontiers: Law and Society in the Roman World (2013) (all Edinburgh University Press).


Cover image: Cesare Maccari, Cicero Denounces Catiline, 1880 © akg-images / Album / Oronoz

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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.