43-61

Legal sideffects of oligandria

• Αρναούτογλου, Ηλίας

A fragmentary inscription from the late first or early second-century AD Chersonesos Taurica, (SEG 55.838, AEp 2007 no. 1243, BE 2008 no. 411), brings forward an ill-attested, so far, consequence of oligandria, i.e. shortage of male citizens to man the courts of the polis. The inscription preserves a decree of Chersonesos in Crimaea. according to which the size of court panels was to be curtailed down to more than fifteen judges for disputes worth an unknown sum of money, fifteen judges for disputes worth more than 60 denari, to nine judges for disputes worth between 30 and 60 denari and to seven for disputes worth less than 30 denari. In addition the decree grants to the litigants the right to exempt from the judicial panel five undesirable persons. The decree, despite its state, reveals important features of the institutional make up of Chersonesos. From a legal-history perspective it is noteworthy a) the reaffirmation of the practice, attested in a few cases so far (IG ix (l)2 (3) 717, B 10-18 (Nomima I 53); FD iii (1) 486. 3-4 (Staatsverträge III 558); IG ix (l)2 3, 706, A 21-22 (Staatsverträge III 472)), of deciding the competence of a court to judge a case depending on the value of the dispute and b) the adoption of the Roman rule of reiectio iudici and its adaptation to the institutional setting of Chersonesos. While in the Roman formulary system the litigants had the right to exclude a certain number of appointed by the praetor judges, seemingly in Chersonesos the same right was exercised before the allotment of judges. What is particularly interesting is that similar arrangements were not completely unknown in Hellenistic times, the only difference being that they were confined to regulations regarding inter-poleis disputes and they usually concerned specific impediments for someone to act as a judge. (SEG 29.1130bis, 37-44; IG ix (1)2 1 3 A, 9-11; SEG 30.1119, 13-19 (Dubois, IGDS 206)) An early parallel to the Roman rule of reiectio is attested in third century-Egypt (P. Gurob 2, 1-11); direct evidence for Roman influence is provided by similar stipulations in the Greek version of de provinciis praetoris (Crawford (1996: ocp. 12 V, 14-22)) and in the Augustan legal intervention in Cyrene (SEG 9.8 I, 22-31). What lies behind these regulations is safeguarding the impartiality of juries, a worry that led Athenians to amend their jury appointment-system twice in the late fifth and fourth centuries. The decree from Chersonesos reveals that Greek cities in the East could adopt and adapt Roman institutions into their institutional framework, in a dynamic relationship between tradition and innovation.

• Law

• Δίκαιο
• Διοικητικό δίκαιο
• Courts

χερσόνησος Ταυρική, ολιγανδρία, σύνθεση δικαστηρίων, reiectio iudicium, επιγραφές, πρόσληψη δικαιϊκών κανόνων, chersonesos Taurica. reiectio indicium, oligandria, court panels, legal reception, inscriptions

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