13. JUNIUS
BRUTUS, an eminent Roman jurist, who, judging from his praenomen and
the time in which he is said to have lived. was probably a son of No. 12. He is mentioned by
Pomponius (--Post hos fuerunt P.
Mucius et Manilius et Brutus [vulg. et Brutus et Manilius], qui
fundaverunt jus civile. Ex his P. Mucius etiam decem libellos reliquit, septem Manilius,
Brutus tres [vulg. Brutus septem, Manilius tres]. Illi duo consulares
fuerunt, Brutus praetorius, P. autem Mucius etiam pontifex maximnus. The transposition
of the names Brutus and Manilius makes the clause Illi duo consulares fuerunt,
Brutus praetorius, consistent with the former part of the sentence. It also makes the
testimony of Pomponius consistent with that of Cicero, who reports, on the authority of
Scaevola, that Brutus left no more than three genuine books de jure
civil. (De Orat. 2.55.) That more, however, was attributed to
Brutus than he really wrote may be inferred from the particularity of Cicero's statement.
Brutus is frequently referred to as a high authority on points of law in ancient classical and
legal authors (e. g. compare Cic. de Fin. 1.4, and
responsa which he gave to clients, and he and Cato
are censured by Cicero for publishing the actual names of the persons, male and female, who
consulted them, as if, in law, there were anything in a name. (De Orat.
2.32.) From the fragments we possess (de Orat. 2.55), Brutus certainly
appears to enter into unlawyer-like details, giving us the very names of the villas where he
happened to be. Whether Servius Sulpicius commented upon Brutus is a much disputed question.
Ulpian (libro
primo ad Brutums, and Pomponius (Servius duos libros ad Brutum perquam brevissimos ad Edictum
subscriptos reliquit. It is commonly supposed that Servius, instead of commenting on the
work of the jurisconsult, dedicated his short notes on the Edict to M. Junius Brutus, the
assassin of Julius Caesar, or else to the father of the so-called tyrannicide. (Zimmern, R. R. G. ยง 75; Majansius, vol. i. pp. 127-140.)