HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE SOCIAL POSITION OF CITIZENS IN ANCIENT ROME

Nenad Stefanović

doi:10.5937/ptp2203038S

Authors

Nenad Stefanović The Faculty of Law in Novi Sad, The University of Business Academy in Novi Sad, Serbia https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7899-9585

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5937/ptp2203038S

Keywords:

human rights, the right to life, slavery, Roman law, freedom

Abstract

The paper analyzes the status aspects of human rights during the period of existence of the Roman state. Considering the fact that it was the empire lasted for several centuries, the position of a human in it and his/ her rights changed. The modern understanding of human rights originates from the period of the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century, when The School of Natural Law laid the foundations of the understanding of human, natural rights, which did not exist in that form during the ancient period. The primary social diﬀerentiation of the population in ancient Rome was based on a simple division of people into free ones and slaves. From this premise, they built the foundations of their rights as well as their social, legal and political positions. In theory, Roman history is chronologically divided into four periods: The period of Kings, The period of the Republic, the Principate and the Dominate. In those periods, the social structure diﬀered significantly. The aim of this paper is to show the position of the population in each of these periods, their rights and mutual relationships. The Roman law represents the cradle of contemporary continental law, and the germ of human rights was “sown” exactly in that period, which, for this reason, deserves to be the subject of a deeper professional analysis.

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