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28.2. 2. That the Laws of the Barbarians were all personal.

It is a distinguishing character of these laws of the barbarians that they were not confined to a certain district; the Frank was tried by the law of the Franks, the Aleman by that of the Alemans, the Burgundian by that of the Burgundians, and the Roman by the Roman law; nay, so far were the conquerors in those days from reducing their laws to a uniform system or body, that they did not even think of becoming legislators to the people they had conquered.

The original of this I find in the manners of the Germans. These people were parted asunder by marshes, lakes, and forests; and Cæsar observes [13] they were fond of such separations. Their dread of the Romans brought about their reunion; and yet each individual among these mixed people was still to be tried by the established customs of his own nation. Each tribe apart was free and independent; and when they came to be intermixed, the independence still continued; the country was common, the government peculiar; the territory the same, and the nations different. The spirit of personal laws prevailed therefore among those people before ever they set out from their own homes, and they carried it with them into the conquered provinces.

We find this custom established in the formulas of Marculfus, [14] in the codes of the laws of the barbarians, but chiefly in the law of the Ripuarians [15] and the decrees of the kings of the first race, [16] whence the capitularies on that subject in the second race were derived. [17] The children followed the laws of their father, [18] the wife that of her husband, [19] the widow came back to her own original law, [20] and the freedman was under that of his patron. [21] Besides, every man could make choice of what laws he pleased; but the constitution of Lotharius I [22] required that this choice should be made public.

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