52 ON THE PROBABLE ORIGIN 
prerogative still existed, but much impaired by 
feudal usurpation, and therefore between the 
fall of the Carlovingians and the reign of Otho, 
or from 850—950. Another eminent jurist, 
the late Dr. Haubold, of Leipsic, fixes its date 
at the beginning of the 10th century. Regarding ~ 
it asa summary of the law of the Lombardic Ro- 
mans in this age, we find from it that the cities 
had an independent jurisdiction, and that the 
fines for evading it were paid to them; that the 
Boni homines* elected the judge, by whom this 
jurisdiction was exercised, and who, in addition 
to his judicial functions, had the charge of the 
property and revenue of the city. He adminis- 
tered justice not alone, but in conjunction with 
the Boni homines, in trivial matters; those of a 
graver nature being reserved for the Princeps, i.e. 
the duke or count or the seniores principes, the 
judges appointed by the sovereign, who however 
in the true spirit of the German constitution, de- 
cided ‘cum bonarum personarum judicio.’ The 
existence of a municipal jurisdiction, humble in 
its objects and limited in its sphere, has thus 
been traced to within a century and a half of the 
time, when all admit that the cities of Lombardy 
possessed free institutions, and within half a cen- 
* Savigny every where substitutes Decurions for the Boni ho- 
mines of the original, agreeably to his own theory. 
