A similar principle dictated the Voconian law, which abolished the right of female inheritance. As long as virgins were given or sold in marriage, the adoption of the wife extinguished the hopes of the daughter. But the equal succession of independent matrons supported their pride and luxury, and might transport into a foreign house the riches of their fathers. While the maxims of Cato were revered, they tended to perpetuate in each family a just and virtuous mediocrity: till female blandishments insensibly triumphed, and every salutary restraint was lost in the dissolute greatness of the republic. The rigor of the decemvirs was tempered by the equity of the prætors. Their edicts restored and emancipated posthumous children to the rights of nature; and upon the failure of the _agnats_ they preferred the blood of the _cognats_ to the name of the _gentiles,_ whose title and character were insensibly covered with oblivion. The reciprocal inheritance of mothers and sons was established in the Tertullian and Orphitian decrees by the humanity of the senate. A new and more impartial order was introduced by the _Novels_ of Justinian, who affected to revive the jurisprudence of the _Twelve Tables_. The lines of masculine and female kindred were confounded: the descending, ascending, and collateral series was accurately defined; and each degree, according to the proximity of blood and affection, succeeded the vacant possessions of a Roman citizen.
The order of succession is regulated by nature, or at least by the general and permanent reason of the law-giver: but this order is frequently violated by the arbitrary and partial wills, which prolong the dominion of the testator beyond the grave. In the simple state of society this last use or abuse of the right of property is seldom indulged; it was introduced at Athens by the laws of Solon; and the private testaments of a father of a family are authorized by the _Twelve Tables_. Before the time of the decemvirs a Roman citizen exposed his wishes and motives to the assembly of the thirty curiæ or parishes, and the general law of inheritance was suspended by an occasional act of the legislature. After the permission of the decemvirs, each private law-giver promulgated his verbal or written testament in the presence of five citizens, who represented the five classes of the Roman people; a sixth witness attested their concurrence; a seventh weighed the copper money, which was paid by an imaginary purchaser, and the estate was emancipated by a fictitious sale and immediate release.