Law and Order in Greece & Rome

The legal systems and judicial processes of the ancient Greeks and Romans with emphasis on actual trials. Ancient trials were dramatic and often scandalous affairs in which not only laws but fundamental social values were at stake. The course examines legal cases both famous and obscure through the speeches of defendants and prosecutors and other surviving documents. Besides serious criminal matters (e.g., homicide, assault, robbery), the course introduces legal issues absent from the U.S. judicial system (e.g., impiety, exile) as well as legal matters familiar today (e.g., immigration, citizenship, fraud, child custody). Authors include Andocides, Antiphon, Lysias, Demosthenes, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero and Quintilian.