OF MODERN CORPORATIONS. 51 
the French. Maffei, Muratori, Lupi and Fuma- 
galli are unanimously of opinion, that the Roman 
constitutions had entirely perished in the cities, 
and that we are not to look further back than 
to the 11th or 12th century for the origin of 
their liberties. Sigonius and Sismondi assign 
an earlier date to the revival of municipal free- 
dom,—the reign of Otho I. p. 950, but equally 
suppose its previous extinction. 
The principal arguments, by which Savigny 
opposes this prevalent belief, are derived from the 
Codex Utinensis, a MS. transferred from the 
Cathedral of Aquileia to that of Udine, and pub- 
lished by Canciani in 1789 in his great collection 
of the Leges Barbarorum. ‘The basis of it is the 
Breviarium of the Visigoths, itself a compilation 
from the Theodosian Code. That it was com- 
posed in Italy appears from the frequent occur- 
rence in it of words of Italian formation ; its date 
is more uncertain. Canciani thought that it was 
composed under the native Lombardic princes, 
but Savigny, from the frequent use of fretwm and 
admallare, two words of Frankish jurisprudence, 
concludes that it must have originated in the 
times subsequent to the conquest of Lombardy 
by Charlemagne ; and from the mention of both 
rex and principes, that it was written when royal 
D1 
