History
Tacitus mentions several leges Iuliae (Julian Laws) pertaining to morals and marriage, and the Lex Papia Poppaea as a separate later law, refining the Julian Laws (Annals, 3.25)
Some writers conclude from the passage in Suetonius (Suet. Aug. 14) that the Lex Julia de Maritandis Ordinibus of 18/17 BC was rejected, and add that it was not enacted until 4 AD. In the year 9 AD, and in the consulship of M. Papius Mutilus and Q. Poppaeus Secundus (consules suffecti), another law was passed as a kind of amendment and supplement to the former law, and hence arose the title of Lex Julia et Papia Poppaea by which these two laws are often quoted. It has been inferred from the two laws being separately cited that they were not made into one.
The 6th century Digest only mentions the Lex Julia de Maritandis Ordinibus (Dig. 38 tit.11; Dig. 23 tit.2).
Various titles are used according as reference is made to the various provisions; sometimes the reference is to the Lex Julia, sometimes Papia Poppaea, sometimes Lex Julia et Papia, sometimes Lex de Maritandis Ordinibus, from the chapter which treated of the marriages of the senators (Gaius, i.178; Ulp. Frag. xi.20; Lex Marita, Hor. Carm. Sec.), sometimes Lex Caducaria, Decimaria, etc. from the various chapters (Ulp. Frag. xxviii tit.7; Dion Cass. liv.16, lvi.1, &c.; Tacit. Ann. iii.25). (see References)
There were many commentaries on these laws or on this law by the Roman jurists, of which considerable fragments are preserved in the Digest: Gaius wrote 15 books, Ulpian 20, and Paulus 10 books at least on this law. The law contained at least 35 chapters (Dig. 22 tit.2 s19); but it is impossible to say to which of the two laws included under the general title of Lex Julia et Papia Poppaea, the several provisions as now known to us, belong. Attempts have been made both by J. Gothofredus and Heineccius to restore the law, on the assumption that its provisions are reducible to the two general heads of a Lex Maritalis and Lex Caducaria.
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