Garrett

Garrett Gruen

April 8, 2011

If the Romans had only left behind the Laws of the Twelve Tables, we would be able to figure out how a lot of different things worked around that time period. One thing that we could figure out would be how the courts worked. We have to remember according to the third table there were no such things as jails or prisons. Therefore a convicted person became a slave to the plaintiff for a period of time until the plaintiff decided to sell him. This is a lot different from today’s judicial system. Today it would be insane to have a convicted criminal working for you instead of serving time in a prison. In addition, some of the punishments given out to criminals back then are rather similar to the punishments given out to today’s criminals. For example, if you were a younger person and convicted a crime back in ancient Roman times, all you had to do was repair the damage you caused. In today’s society this would be a juvenile going out and doing some kind of community service to make up for the damage he caused. Another thing that we can conclude about the ancient Romans by going off the Twelve Tables is how they went about dividing up their belongings after they passed away. They would pass down their belongings to either the wife or the child, and they weren’t alive the things would be passed down to whoever was in the will. This is similar to how people make wills today. The last thing we can conclude about the ancient Romans from the Twelve Tables is religion. If a man destroys he’s neighbor’s crops then the goddess of agriculture is to be honored by hanging that man. From this we can conclude that the Romans had multiple Gods. I believe that these laws were very unfair. However, this is probably just because I’m so used to the laws that we have in society today. In the end, I believe that the Twelve Tables have helped us learn from the mistakes the ancient Romans have made to help us become a more functioning society!