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Athletics in Ancient Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 June 2012

David Ibbetson
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Abstract

In this article David Ibbetson takes a perspective from the ancient world. A number of texts of Roman law are concerned with injuries arising in the course of athletics. They are particularly concerned with blameworthy killings, and constitute some of the most fundamental texts at the historical base of modern negligence liability. Behind them there may lie questions discussed by Greek orators, where they were fitted into a rather different framework from that of the Romans.

Keywords

sports lawRoman lawancient law
Type
Sports Law
Information
Legal Information Management , Volume 12 , Issue 2 , June 2012 , pp. 98 - 101
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2012. Published by British and Irish Association of Law Librarians

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References

Footnotes

1 See in particular A. Wacke, “Accidents in Sports and Games in Roman and Modern German Law” (1979) 42 Tydskrif vir Hedendaagse Romeins-Hollandse Reg 273.

2 Digest of Justinian; available at http://www.fordham.edu/hassall/Source/Corpus1.a9.2.52.4.

3 Wacke, op cit, 278.

4 Digest, op.cit 9.2.11.pr.

5 Wacke, op cit, 277.

6 Digest, op.cit 9.2.7.4.

7 Demosthenes Against Aristokrates, 53; available at http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Dem.+23+53&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0074.

8 Digest, op.cit 9.2.9.4.

9 Institutes 4.3.2, 3; available at http://www.fordham.edu/hassell/basis/535institutes.asp

10 Plutarch, Pericles 36; available at http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text.jsp?doc=Plut.+Per.+36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.018.

11 Antiphon, Second Tetralogy, 3; available at http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0020:speech=3&default.scheme=speech:tetralogy:section&default.type=speech.

12 We should note that this case fell outside the exclusion of liability for killing in the course of an athletic contest referred to above.

13 MacDowell, D M, Athenian Homicide Law in the Age of the Orators (Manchester University Press, 1963)Google Scholar.

14 Daube, D, Roman Law: Linguistic, Social, and Philosophical Aspects (Edinburgh University Press, 1969)Google Scholar, 148; 1 Kings 3.16 ff.

15 Pausanias, Description of Greece, 5.21; available at http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0160%3Abook%3D5%3Achapter%3D21.