Reference Edition:

A. D’Ors, El Codigo de Eurico. Edicion, palingenesia, indices, in Estud. Visig.,II, Roma-Madrid 1960.

The Codex Euricianus is part of the so-called Romano-barbaric laws, issued around the fall of the Roman Empire of the West (476 CE), or shortly thereafter, by some of the kingdoms that rose in what formerly had been imperial territory. It survives in an incomplete form of various miscellaneous fragments, thanks to a single palimpsest, Paris. Lat. 12161, which was discovered during the mid-18th century. The fragments of the Codex Euricianus appear in nine double folia, that is, in eighteen pages, written in uncial script, perhaps from the south of France in the sixth century. The Codex was overwritten by Hieronymus’ De viris illustribus, in the minuscule cursive of the 7th/8th century. Chapters 276-336 of the compilation remain, although there are several lacunae, and they are subdivided by headings reconstructed conjecturally by A. D’Ors, the editor of the reference edition, in the following order: de iudiciis; de falsariis; de accusationibus; de his qui ad ecclesiam confugiunt; de fugitivis; de plagiatoribus; de furtis; de caedibus; de vulneribus; de veneficis; de medicis; de violatoribus sepulcrorum; de transmarinis negotiatoribus; de nuptiis inlicitis; de raptu virginarum et viduarum; de adulteriis; de expositis; de incendiis; de damnis arborum; de vitiatis animalibus; de vitiosis animalibus; de iter agentibus; de terminis; de commendatis vel commodatis; de venditionibus; de donationibus; de successionibus; de libertatibus. The preceding 275 chapters, which are unfortunately missing, probably set out the king’s powers. Some of its sources can be recognised, including the Gregorian and Hermogenian Codes, the Theodosian Code, the Institutes of Gaius and the Pauli Sententiae. The Codex Euricianus is a corpus of laws drawn up by the king and the most important men in the kingdom; it is an expression of the juridical culture of southern Gaul during the fifth century, albeit with influences from Germanic customs. It seems that the Codex presupposed, for topics that were not addressed, the general application of the Roman law that had been in effect before the fall of the western empire. The work was edited by K. Zeumer, as Leges Visigothorum (MGH, Leges Nationum Germanicarum, I), Hannover-Leipzig 1902, pp. 3-27, and then by A. D’Ors, El Código de Eurico. Edición, palingenesia, indices, in Estudios Visigothos, II, Rome-Madrid 1960, with a second edition edited by X. D'Ors, 2014, which adheres to the text of the first, except for the correction of typos, but which provides an updated bibliography and cites further sources that confirm or supplement the proposed reconstruction. Many aspects of the theory are debated: the dating (although 476 CE is the most followed), its relationship with subsequent Visigothic kings’ codifications, and related questions of a palingenetic nature, but above all, the personal or territorial value of the compilation. For some scholars (in particular Levy and Kunkel), the Visigothic legal sources, including the Codex Euricianus, dealt with certain groups of people; for others (among them, García Gallo and A. D’Ors), these sources would have had territorial application; for still others, considering the state of the sources, the problem must remain unsolved. According to A. D’Ors, the Codex Euricianus was not the first compilation of Visigothic law, but a compilation of vulgar Roman law in effect for all kingdom’s subjects, both Roman and Visigoths. He believes, moreover, that it is not technically a Codex, but an Edictum (the Edictum Eurici regis), since when the western Roman empire fell, Euric took over from the prefect of Gaul, not from the emperor. The king submitted the compilation to the popular assembly in 475 CE, in which year the emperor Julius Nepos formally recognized the full autonomy of the Visigothic kingdom (whereas the previous Visigothic kings had reigned as imperial legates), and published it the following year, after the deposition of Romulus Augustulus. The epochal significance of the compilation is noted by Isidore of Seville, Hist. Goth. 35: Sub hoc rege Gothi legum instituta scriptis habere coeperunt, nam antea tantum moribus et consuetudine tenebantur. Although this sentence has led some scholars to assert that the Codex Euricianus only applied to Visigoths, Isidore’s words can rather be taken to signal the passage from an exclusively customary right to a more comprehensive legal system that includes written rules, a perspective that does not exclude Roman subjects from the application of the Codex. The Codex Euricianus was used for subsequent codifications of the Visigothic kings, but it also influenced the law of other barbarian populations, and contributed to the diffusion of vulgar Roman law in the medieval Germanic world. [M. A. Ligios; tr. C. Belanger]