The Proculeian or Pegasian school was one of the two most important schools of law in
ancient Rome
In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...
during the 1st and 2nd centuries.
Origin
The Proculeians originally took their name from the prominent jurist
Proculus, but later came to often be called "Pegasians" after the prominent Proculeian
Plotius Pegasus
(Lucius?) Plotius Pegasus was a Roman Senate, Roman senator and jurisconsult active under the Flavian dynasty. He was Roman consul, suffect consul in an uncertain year, most likely 72 or 73, as the colleague of Lucius Cornelius Pusio Annius Messa ...
. However, the tradition on which the school was based comes from the jurist
Marcus Antistius Labeo
Marcus Antistius Labeo (died 10 or 11 AD) was a Roman jurist.
Marcus Antistius Labeo was the son of Pacuvius Labeo, a jurist who caused himself to be slain after the defeat of his party at Philippi. Since his name was different from his father's ...
. Labeo spent half the year convening sessions at actual schools with regular students, who then carried forth his views and perspectives on the law.
They were often contrasted with the
Sabinian school, a rival school operating in roughly the same time and place, and were (very generally) considered the more progressive of the two, while the Sabinians were seen as more advocates of legal conservatism. Proculeians were thought to "push a legal principle to all its logical consequences,"
and the legal tradition they inherited from Labeo was one of liberalism influenced by a keen understanding of the science of the day.
The Proculeians tried to enlarge the scope of Roman law, and tried to push legal innovations into practice such as were suggested by their liberal philosophy and the principles of reason.
The progressive and conservative natures of the schools increased over time, and there came to be wider chasms between the two, which is perhaps why the schools came to be named after later prominent disciples and students, and not after their originators (the Proculeian school being named after Proculus but originated by Labeo, and the Sabinian school being named after
Masurius Sabinus but originated by
Gaius Ateius Capito).
Positions
The Roman legal compendium known as ''
Digest'' records many decisions in which the Proculeians advocated. Among these were:
* Fixing the legal age of puberty (decided in favor of the Proculeians)
* Deciding the validity of an appointment of an heir in a will in which the son had been omitted (decided in favor of the Sabinians)
* Deciding the validity of a will in which the will writer made inheritance conditional upon an impossible condition (decided in favor of the Sabinians)
* Deciding the legal effect on slaves that are jointly owned when one of the owners grants the slave their freedom (decided in favor of the Sabinians)
['' Digest'' iii, ยง 167a]
End of the school
The rivalry with the Sabinians ended in the 2nd century CE when the two schools either merged or disappeared, or were united under the 3rd century's leading legal mind,
Papinian.
Notable Proculeians
*
Marcus Antistius Labeo
Marcus Antistius Labeo (died 10 or 11 AD) was a Roman jurist.
Marcus Antistius Labeo was the son of Pacuvius Labeo, a jurist who caused himself to be slain after the defeat of his party at Philippi. Since his name was different from his father's ...
*
Marcus Cocceius Nerva (jurist)
*
Marcus Cocceius Nerva (emperor's father)
*
Publius Juventius Celsus
*
Lucius Neratius Priscus
*
Proculus (jurist)
*
Plotius Pegasus
(Lucius?) Plotius Pegasus was a Roman Senate, Roman senator and jurisconsult active under the Flavian dynasty. He was Roman consul, suffect consul in an uncertain year, most likely 72 or 73, as the colleague of Lucius Cornelius Pusio Annius Messa ...
*
Titus Aristo
References
{{reflist, 30em
Roman law