The code of the Visigoths presents no trace whatever of the first of these systems, and scarcely any of the second; the third immensely predominates. There was no _mallum_, no _placitum_, no assemblies of free men in the provinces; no enactment ordains, or even refers to them. Scarcely does there exist any indication of the power of the patron over his client, of the landowner over the inhabitants of his domains. The law which I quoted in my last lecture, with reference to slaves, proves that, even in their case, the jurisdiction belonged to the royal judge of the district.
The _Forum judicum_ mentions a large number of local magistrates who were invested with the power of administering affairs and distributing justice. "As there is a great variety in the means of remedying evils and terminating affairs, let the duke, count, vicar, conservator of the peace (_pacis assertor_), _tinfadus, millenarius, quingentenarius, centenarius, decanus, defensor, numerarius_, and those who are sent to any place by order of the king, and those who are accepted as judges by the agreement of the litigant parties,-- let all persons, in fine, of whatever order they may be, who are regularly invested with power to judge, and each person in such proportion as he has received power to judge, equally obtain from the law the name of judges, in order that, having received the right to judge, the duties as well as the advantages connected with that right may devolve upon them."
It is difficult to determine with precision the different functions of all these magistrates, the hierarchy which existed among them, and the manner in which each of them received and exercised his power. Those who belonged to towns, as the _defensor_ and the _numerarius_, were certainly elected by the clergy and inhabitants. Several others, as the _millenarius_ and _centenarius_, seem to have been appointed by the dukes and counts of the provinces; but however this may be, nothing indicates that they received their authority in a popular and independent way; the opposite principle is formally laid down in these terms: "No one shall be permitted to judge suits, except those who have received power from the prince to do so, or those who have been chosen as judges, by agreement of the litigants; the choice of these last shall be made in presence of three witnesses, and shall be attested by their mark or signature. If those who have received from the king power to judge, or those who exercise judicial power by commission from the counts or other royal judges, have charged, by writing, and according to the prescribed rules, other persons to fill their places, these last shall exercise, in the regulation and decision of affairs, a power similar to that of those by whom they were appointed." Thus, all the judges, all the local officers, received their power from the king or his delegates. Of the three systems of institutions, whose co-existence and conflict are manifested amongst most of the German peoples, the monarchical system is the only one with which we meet in the code of the Visigoths.