Roman Registers of Births and Birth Certificates

Abstract

Students of Ancient History and in particular of Roman Law will, I hope, welcome the following summary of a long discussion. The arduous but successful work which has been devoted to these documents since the beginning of this century is scattered and dispersed in various collections and periodicals, not easily accessible to everybody. A comprehensive and critical statement of what has been achieved so far will therefore be useful. Under war-time conditions it is impossible to reprint these texts here, though a handy and reliable collection of the texts would have been convenient for the reader. I must be content with giving a full list of the documents. I have arranged them in two groups, birth certificates of legitimate and of illegitimate children. Within each group the documents follow in chronological order, as far as possible according to the date of the entry in the register. I have given each a progressive number to facilitate citation.