Joannes Bassianus was an Italian
jurist
A jurist is a person with expert knowledge of law; someone who analyses and comments on law. This person is usually a specialist legal scholar, mostly (but not always) with a formal qualification in law and often a legal practitioner. In the Uni ...
of the 12th century.
Life
Little is known of his origin, but he is said by his jurist contemporary
Carolus de Tocco
Carolus may refer to:
People
* Carolus (name)
* the medieval Latin form of the name Charles
**Charlemagne (742–814)
* King Charles XII of Sweden, who is sometimes referred to as "Carolus Rex"
Scientific
* ''Carolus'' (plant), a genus of flow ...
(Carlo di Tocco) to have been a native of
Cremona
Cremona (, also ; ; lmo, label= Cremunés, Cremùna; egl, Carmona) is a city and ''comune'' in northern Italy, situated in Lombardy, on the left bank of the Po river in the middle of the ''Pianura Padana'' ( Po Valley). It is the capital of th ...
. He was a professor in the law school of
Bologna
Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nat ...
, the pupil of
Bulgarus
Bulgarus was a twelfth-century Italian jurist, born in Bologna. He has been confused with Bulgarinus, a 15th-century jurist.
He was the most celebrated of the famous Four Doctors of the law school of the University of Bologna and was regarded as ...
, and the master of
Azo. The most important of his writings which have been preserved in his ''Summary on the Authentica'', which
Savigny regarded as one of the most precious works of the
Glossators.
Joannes, as he is generally termed, was remarkable for his talent in inventing ingenious forms for explaining his ideas with greater precision, and perhaps his most celebrated work is his "Law-Tree," which he entitled ''Arbor Actionum'', and which has been the subject of numerous commentaries. The work presents a tree, upon the branches of which the various kinds of actions are arranged after the manner of fruit. The civil actions, or ''actiones stricti juris'', being forty-eight in number, are arranged on one side, whilst the equitable or praetorian ' actions, in number one hundred and twenty-one, are arranged on the other side.
A further scientific division of actions was made by him under twelve heads, and by an ingenious system of notation the student was enabled to class at once each of the civil or
praetor
Praetor ( , ), also pretor, was the title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to a man acting in one of two official capacities: (i) the commander of an army, and (ii) as an elected '' magistratus'' (magistrate), assigned to discharge vario ...
ian actions, as the case might be, under its proper head in the scientific division. By the side of the tree a few glosses were added by Joannes to explain and justify his classification. His Lectures on the
Pandects
The ''Digest'', also known as the Pandects ( la, Digesta seu Pandectae, adapted from grc, πανδέκτης , "all-containing"), is a name given to a compendium or digest of juristic writings on Roman law compiled by order of the Byzantine e ...
and the Code, which were collected by his pupil
Nicolaus Furiosus Nicolaus is a masculine given name. It is a Latin, Greek and German form of Nicholas. Nicolaus may refer to:
In science:
* Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer who provided the first modern formulation of a heliocentric theory of the solar syste ...
, have unfortunately perished.
File:Bassiano, Giovanni – Lectura Institutionum, 13th-century – BEIC 7566030.jpg, ''Lectura Institutionum'', 13th-century manuscript. London, British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
, Royal MS, Royal 4.B.II.
File:Bassiano, Giovanni – Summa cum glossis Bassiani, 13th-century – BEIC 10527150.jpg, ''Summa cum glossis Bassiani'', 13th-century manuscript. Reims, Bibliothèque municipale, Fonds manuscrits, Ms. 684.
References
;Attribution
*
Further reading
* Francis Zulueta and Peter Stein, eds., "Introduction," ''The Teaching of Roman Law in England Around 1200'' The Selden Society, 1990
*
External links
Works of Joannes Bassianus at ParalipomenaIuris
{{Authority control
Bassianus
12th-century Latin writers