The Code of Leovigild or Codex Revisus was a
Visigothic
The Visigoths (; la, Visigothi, Wisigothi, Vesi, Visi, Wesi, Wisi) were an early Germanic people who, along with the Ostrogoths, constituted the two major political entities of the Goths within the Roman Empire in late antiquity, or what is kno ...
legal code
A code of law, also called a law code or legal code, is a systematic collection of statutes. It is a type of legislation that purports to exhaustively cover a complete system of laws or a particular area of law as it existed at the time the cod ...
, a revision of the
Codex Euricianus made in the late sixth century under
Leovigild
Liuvigild, Leuvigild, Leovigild, or ''Leovigildo'' (Spanish and Portuguese), ( 519 – 586) was a Visigothic King of Hispania and Septimania from 568 to 586. Known for his Codex Revisus or Code of Leovigild, a law allowing equal rights between the ...
(568–586). The code does not survive and all we know of it is derived from the writings of
Isidore of Seville
Isidore of Seville ( la, Isidorus Hispalensis; c. 560 – 4 April 636) was a Spanish scholar, theologian, and archbishop of Seville. He is widely regarded, in the words of 19th-century historian Montalembert, as "the last scholar of ...
, a near contemporary ecclesiastic and encyclopaedist. Nevertheless, it was the Gothic basis of the later
Liber Iudiciorum
The ''Visigothic Code'' ( la, Forum Iudicum, Liber Iudiciorum; es, Fuero Juzgo, ''Book of the Judgements''), also called ''Lex Visigothorum'' (English: ''Law of the Visigoths''), is a set of laws first promulgated by king Chindasuinth (642–653 ...
, an Hispanian law code which united it with the law code of the
Hispano-Roman
Hispania ( la, Hispānia , ; nearly identically pronounced in Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, and Italian) was the Roman name for the Iberian Peninsula and its provinces. Under the Roman Republic, Hispania was divided into two provinces: Hispania ...
population, the
Breviary of Alaric
The ''Breviary of Alaric'' (''Breviarium Alaricianum'' or ''Lex Romana Visigothorum'') is a collection of Roman law, compiled by unknown writers and approved by referendary Anianus on the order of Alaric II, King of the Visigoths, with the a ...
.
In 1974, García Gallo made a critical examination of the evidence for the code and came to reject the claim of Isidore that Leovigild had formulated a new code, since the laws of
Chindasuinth
Chindasuinth (also spelled Chindaswinth, Chindaswind, Chindasuinto, Chindasvindo, or Khindaswinth (Latin: Chintasvintus, Cindasvintus; 563 – 30 September 653) was Visigothic King of Hispania, from 642 until his death in 653. He succeeded Tulga, ...
dictated modifications to laws more ancient the reign of Leovigild.
Germanic legal codes
6th century in the Visigothic Kingdom
Legal history of Spain
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