civil law, † right
[L. jūs cīvīle.]
The law of Roman citizens; thence, the Roman law as a whole, esp. as received in Western christendom in and after the Middle Ages.
In early times, specially distinguished from the canon law, in later times from the common law of England. See law.
| c 1380 Wyclif Sel. Wks. III. 326 Alle þis is lawe cyvyl. c 1425 Wyntoun Cron. viii. iii. 95 The lawys cyvyle, na canown. 1483 Caxton Gold. Leg. 427/1 Grete scyence bothe in ryght cyuyl and in Cannon. 1577 tr. Bullinger's Decades (1592) 107 There are an innumerable companie of examples in the ciuill law. 1751 Johnson Rambler No. 125 ¶1 It is one of the maxims of the civil law that definitions are hazardous. 1817 W. Selwyn Law Nisi Prius II. 827 This head of revocation was originally borrowed from the civil law. 1846 M{supc}Culloch Acc. Brit. Empire (1854) II. 355 Trinity Hall has twelve fellowships, usually held by graduates in the civil law. |
b. In more general sense: The law of any city or state regulating the private rights and duties of the inhabitants; also used in other senses of civil.
| 1483 Caxton Cato A viij, Right lawe deuyne cyuyl and moralle. 1588 Fraunce Lawiers Log. Ded., The name, Cyvill, beeing common to the several lawes of any peculiar kingdome. 1651 Hobbes Leviath. (1839) 251 Civil law, is to every subject, those rules, which the commonwealth hath commanded him..for the distinction of right, and wrong. 1825 Cobbett Rur. Rides 378 In defiance of the law, ecclesiastical as well as civil. 1844 H. H. Wilson Brit. India II. 395 In the administration of civil law, Panchayats were had recourse to, while criminal cases were investigated by the British functionaries in person. 1880 Muirhead Inst. Gaius i. §1 What each people has established on its own account is peculiar to itself, and is called its civil law. |