Law in the Roman Provinces

The study of the Roman Empire has changed dramatically in the last century, with significant emphasis now placed on understanding the experiences of subject populations, rather than a sole focus on the Roman imperial elites. Local experiences, and interactions between periphery and centre, are an intrinsic component in our understanding of the empire's function over and against the earlier, top-down model. But where does law fit into this new, decentralized picture of empire? This volume brings together internationally renowned scholars from both legal and historical backgrounds to study the operation of law in each region of the Roman Empire, from Britain to Egypt, from the first century BCE to the end of the third century CE. Regional specificities are explored in detail alongside the emergence of common themes and activities in a series of case studies that together reveal a new and wide-ranging picture of law in the Roman Empire, balancing the practicalities of regional variation with the ideological constructs of law and empire.

1 - Introduction
2 - Aequum et iustum: On Dealing with the Law in the Province of Egypt
3 - Order and Chaos in Roman Administrative Terminology
4 - The Constitutio Antoniniana and Private Legal Practice in the Eastern Empire
5 - The Decision of Septimius Severus and Caracalla on longi temporis praescriptio (BGU 267 and P.Strass. 22)
6 - Law and Romanization in Judaea
7 - Legal Interactions in the Archive of Babatha: P. Yadin 21 and 22
8 - Law and Administration at the Edges of Empire: The Case of Dura-Europos
9 - Latin Law in Greek Cities: Knowledge of Law and Latin in Imperial Asia Minor
10 - Local Understandings of Roman Criminal Law and Procedure in Asia Minor
11 - Navigating Roman Law and Local Privileges in Pontus-Bithynia
12 - Law and Citizenship in Roman Achaia: Continuity and Change
13 - The Integration and Perception of the Rule of Law in Roman Crete: From the Roman Conquest to the End of the Principate (67 BCE-235 CE)
14 - Lesbos in the Roman Empire: Treaties, Legal Institutions, and Local Sentiment towards Roman Rule
15 - An Outline of Legal Norms and Practices in Roman Macedonia (167 BCE-212 CE)
16 - The leges municipales as a Means of Legal and Social Romanization of the Provinces of the Roman Empire
17 - Roman City-Laws of Spain and their Modelling of the Religious Landscape
18 - Public Law in Roman North Africa
19 - Nutricula causidicorum: Legal Practitioners in Roman North Africa
20 - Law, Empire, and Identity between West and East: The Danubian Provinces
21 - Provincial Law' in Britannia
22 - Legal Education and Legal Culture in Gaul during the Principate
23 - Perspectives

Kimberley Czajkowski is a Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Edinburgh. Her main research interests are the Roman Near East, Roman legal history, and the history of the Jewish people under the Roman Empire. Benedikt Eckhardt is a Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Edinburgh. Before joining the department in 2018, he studied and worked at several German universities. His two main research areas are the Hellenistic Near East and the organizational history of the Roman Empire. Meret Strothmann is a Lecturer in Ancient History at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum. She has wide-ranging interests in the history of the Roman Empire, though has recently focused on religious history and late antiquity.