The Classical Review

Abstract

On p. 251 the author lays it down that in the transitional period, in which the case was still tried by formula, but before a index datus, the statement of the issue still has the character, lost in the later system, of a procedural contract between the parties. On p. 272 it is maintained that the procedure in contumaciam was available against the plaintiff as well as against the defendant. On p. 274 the effect of confessio in the cognitio is considered and the view reached that at least confessio certi, or in vindicatio, dispensed with need of judgment—a matter which the state of the texts makes very puzzling. That in classical law the actio iudicati, even where it proceeded to a iudicium, might in some cases lead to a condemnatio only in simplum (p. 220), and that the actio iudicati was still needed as a preliminary to execution in Justinian's law (p. 301), are theses for the demonstration of which the author refers to his earlier Actio Iudicati. On pp. 307 sqq. is a discussion of the obscure procedure by rescript, and on P' 333 an account, which might well have been longer, of the rather neglected ecclesiastical jurisdictions. Not all Professor Wenger's conclusions will be universally accepted: indeed, many of them have been and are the subj ect of acute controversy. But the book is to be warmly recommended, both to teachers and to their pupils, as a model exposition of a difficult and important subject.