jus gentium
Meaning. The law of nations: in Rome, law common to all peoples; today, international law.
In Roman law, jus gentium meant the rules common to all peoples, applied by the praetor peregrinus in disputes involving foreigners, in contrast with the jus civile reserved for citizens. Because it was thought to rest on reason shared by all mankind, it came to be linked with natural law.
Grotius and later writers used the phrase for the law governing relations between States, and it is the origin of the expression “law of nations”, the older name for public international law.
Example
Grotius built his account of the law of war and peace on the Roman idea of jus gentium.
See also
jus civile · natural law · customary international law
Read more in the study notes
- Origin and development of human rights (Human Rights Law and Practice)
- The natural law school (Jurisprudence)
- The UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Law of Intellectual Property Rights, Human Rights and Environment)
- Natural law from the Greeks to Kant (Legal Theory)
- Rome, the Church and St. Thomas Aquinas (Political Science - Theory and Thoughts)
- International law: nature, definition, origin and basis (Public International Law)