DUĪLĬA (B.C. 449), a plebiscitum proposed by the tribune Duilius,
which enacted that whoever left the people without tribunes, or
created a magistrate from whom there was no appeal (_provocatio_),
should be scourged and beheaded.
DUĪLĬA MAENĬA, proposed by the tribunes Duilius and Maenius
(B.C. 357), restored the old uncial rate of interest (_unciarium
fenus_), which had been fixed by the Twelve Tables. [FENUS.] The
same tribunes carried a measure which was intended, in future, to
prevent such unconstitutional proceedings as the enactment of a lex
by the soldiers out of Rome, on the proposal of the consul.
DŬŎDĔCIM TĂBŬLĀRUM. In the year B.C. 454 the Senate assented to a
Plebiscitum, pursuant to which commissioners were to be sent to
Athens and the Greek cities generally, in order to make themselves
acquainted with their laws. Three commissioners were appointed
for the purpose. On the return of the commissioners, B.C. 452,
it was agreed that persons should be appointed to draw up the
code of laws (decemviri Legibus scribundis), but they were to be
chosen only from the Patricians, with a provision that the rights
of the Plebeians should be respected by the decemviri in drawing
up the laws. In the following year (B.C. 451) the Decemviri were
appointed in the Comitia Centuriata, and during the time of their
office no other magistratus were chosen. The body consisted of
ten Patricians, including the three commissioners who had been
sent abroad: Appius Claudius, Consul designatus, was at the head
of the body. Ten Tables of Laws were prepared during the year,
and after being approved by the Senate were confirmed by the
Comitia Centuriata. As it was considered that some further Laws
were wanted, Decemviri were again elected B.C. 450, consisting of
Appius Claudius and his friends. Two more Tables were added by
these Decemviri, which Cicero calls “Duae tabulae iniquarum legum.”
The provision which allowed no connubium between the Patres and
the Plebs is referred to the Eleventh Table. The whole Twelve
Tables were first published in the consulship of L. Valerius and
M. Horatius after the downfall of the Decemviri, B.C. 449. This
the first attempt to make a code remained also the only attempt
for near one thousand years, until the legislation of Justinian.
The Twelve Tables are mentioned by the Roman writers under a great
variety of names: _Leges Decemvirales_, _Lex Decemviralis_, _Leges
XII._, _Lex XII. tabularum_ or _Duodecim_, and sometimes they are
referred to under the names of _Leges_ and _Lex_ simply, as being
pre-eminently The Law. The Laws were cut on bronze tablets and
put up in a public place. They contained matters relating both to
the Jus Publicum and the Jus Privatum (_fons publici privatique
juris_). The Jus Publicum underwent great changes in the course of
years, but the Jus Privatum of the Twelve Tables continued to be
the fundamental law of the Roman State. The Roman writers speak
in high terms of the precision of the enactments contained in the
Twelve Tables, and of the propriety of the language in which they
were expressed.