a Roman jurist, who, as appears from i.
e. Septimius Severus and Caracalla).
In a passage of Lampridius (Alex. Sev. 68) which, either from
interpolation or from the inaccuracy of the author, abounds with anachronisms, Callistratus is
stated to have been a disciple of Papinian, and to have been one of the council of Alexander
Severus. This statement may be correct, notwithstanding the suspicious character of the source
whence it is derived.
The numerous extracts from Callistratus in the Digest occupy eighteen pages in Hommel's Palingenesia Pandectarum ; and the fact that he is cited by no other jurist
in the Digest, may be accounted for by observing, that the Digest contains extracts from few
jurists of importance subsequent to Callistratus. The extracts from Callistratus are taken
from works bearing the following titles :
The treatise
What is meant by
The phrase
The principal commentator on Callistratus is Edm. Merillius, whose Commentarius ad Libros duo Quaestionum Callistrati is inserted in Otto's "Thesaurus,"
3.613-634. A dissertation by And. W. Cramer, de Juvenibus apud Callistratum
JCtum, appeared at Kiel, 8vo. 1814.
Cujas (in his preface to his Latin translation of the 60th book of the Basilica, reprinted
at the beginning of the 7th volume of Fabrot's edition) mentions among the commentators on
the Basilica a jurist named Callistratus. Fabricius also supposes the Callistratus of the
Basilica to have been different from the Callistratus of the Digest. Suarez naturally
expresses strong doubts as to the existence of a later Callistratus; for there are many other
asserted duplicate names, as Modestinus, Theophilus, Thalelaeus, Stephanus, Dorotheus,
Cyrillus, Theodorus, Isidorus; but Reiz has shewn, in several instances, that the asserted
later commentator, bearing the name of a prior jurist, is a fictitious entity. The name of
the prior jurist has perhaps been sometimes attributed to the scholiast who cites him; but we
believe it would appear, upon examination, that the existence of two sets of jurists of the
same names but different dates has gained credit partly from the mendacious inventions and
supposititious citations of Nic. Comnenus Papadopoli, and partly from a very general
misunderstanding of the mode in which the scholia on the Basilica were formed. These scholia
were really formed thus : extracts from ancient jurists and antecedent commentators on the
collections of Justinian were appended to certain passages of the text of the Basilica which
they served to elucidate. These extracts were sometimes interpolated or otherwise altered,
and were mingled with glosses posterior to the Basilica. Thus, they were confounded with the
latter, and were not unnaturally supposed to be posterior in date to the work which they
explained. The determination of the question as to the existence of a duplicate Callistratus
may be helped by the following list of the passages in the Basilica (ed. Fabrot), where the
name is mentioned. It is taken from Fabr. Bibl. Graec. xii. p. 440, and
the parentheses ( ) denote a reference not to the text, but to a Greek scholiast.
"Callistratus JCtus, 1.257, 2.36, 315, 512, 3.206, iv. (263), 292, 358, 507, (568,) 810, 833, 5.10, 734, 778, 788, vi. (158), 436, 468, 490, 677, 680, 702, 703, 7.439, 515, 537, 564, 585, 628, 687, 710, 715, 783, 803, 827, 833, 836, 837, 869, 871, 888." On reference to these passages, we find nothing to indicate a Graeco-Roman jurist Callistratus.
Bertrandus, de Jurisperitis, 1.100.27; Aug. Jenichen, Ep. Singular. de Callistrato JCto, 4to. Lips. 1742; Zimmern. R. R.
G. 1.101; Suarez, Notitia Basilicorum, ed. Pohl.
Lips.1804,ยงยง 34, 41.