Code of Euric

The Codex Euricianus or Code of Euric was a collection of laws governing the Visigoths compiled at the order of Euric, King of the Visigoths, sometime before 480, probably at Toulouse (possibly at Arles); it is one of the earliest examples of early Germanic law.

The Codex Euricianus contains, among other things, provisions governing border disputes and, in particular, issues arising from the division of land between the settled Gothic conquerors and the Romanesque landowners, as well as provisions for lending, purchase and donation, marriage and succession.

The work is written in good Latin; in his writing Roman lawyers must have had a significant share.

Parts of the Codex Euricianus can be found later, probably as a base, in the Lex Baiuvariorum, the first Bavarian legislative codification.

These two laws together remained largely in force until the Visigoths settled definitively in Spain under King Liuvigild (568-586).

Imaginary portrait of Euric by Manuel Rodríguez de Guzmán (1855)
Copy of Breviarium Alaricianum from University of Auvergne , France, 10th century